Jacques Perrin Presents Oceans

"Oceans" is the official companion volume to the challenging, breathtakinglybeautiful documentary of the same name, created by Jacques Perrin and acrack team of scientists, cinematographers, divers, and technicalspecialists. A veteran of more than forty years of film-making andexploring the natural world in works like The Monkey People andMicrocosmos, Perrin is the public face of an elite group that includes bothveterans of Jacques-Yves Cousteau's pioneering exploits and cutting-edgeinnovators whose custom-created equipment captures never-before-witnessedscenes. From the tropics to Antarctica, from Norway to New Zealand, and from tinyorganisms at the bottom of the marine food chain to such magnificentcreatures as blue whales, polar bears, swordfish, and giant squid, thisvividly illustrated, deeply informative volume roams the seven-tenths ofEarth blanketed by oceans that make our blue planet so hospitable to life.To capture the images here, divers swam unprotected among great whitesharks and patiently staked out the breeding grounds where families ofhumpback whales sing their distinctive songs. Resourceful crew memberscreated everything from streamlined camera pods able to keep pace withfrolicking dolphins to a remote-controlled, mini-helicopter which hoveredover a pod of whales to obtain footage impossible otherwise. Photographersinvented a microscopic lens that revealed and recorded new universes ofplankton, algae, coral, and tiny fish eggs - the minute building blocksthat nourish this entire intricate, interdependent ecosystem. Not just an authoritative, wide-ranging guide to the world's oceans, thisis also a fascinating behind-the-scenes glimpse of practical film-makingunder demanding, often difficult, sometimes downright dangerous conditions... and, last but by no means least, it's a clear-eyed, timely, persuasivepreview of future seas: what we might have if we act now - and what we willsurely get if we don't.