The BBC has admitted that there is one part of Planet Earth that is fake – the sound.
The hugely popular documentary is narrated by Sir David Attenborough and shows baby lizards barely surviving their dash through a literal snake pit to the flamingos slipping and splashing in water.
“Wildlife film soundtracks are a combination of sounds recorded in the wild during the filming, or recorded in the wild previously, as well as sounds that must be re-created in a studio and, of course, music,” the broadcaster stated.
Fake: The BBC admitted that they use fake sounds in the popular nature documentary series Planet Earth | BBC
After many fans of the show spotted that the sound wasn’t real, an statement written back in April by the BBC was recovered.
“Some sounds are removed because they would distract from the tone of the film (e.g. helicopter rotor blades may be replaced by music over sweeping aerial shots). This is normal in documentary filmmaking,” it read.
“In many ways recording wild sounds for natural history films is an even bigger challenge than getting the shots. Sound recordists face many of the same challenges as directors and camera operators – they cannot direct wild animals in the way you can direct people, and they risk disturbing wildlife by their presence.
“But these difficulties are exacerbated by the fact that microphones have far shorter ranges than lenses.”
Many only found out about this recently and took to Twitter to voice their outrage that the nature sounds were actually fake.
I love Planet Earth, but enough with the sound effects please. A lizard gliding through the air does not sound like a jet.
— Roland Hughes (@hughesroland) November 22, 2016
Planet Earth II is gorgeous, but I absolutely hate hate hate the fake sound effects every time something moves.
— Jennifer Bresnick (@JenRoseBresnick) November 21, 2016
Had to turn Planet Earth 2 off yesterday. Great cinematography but can’t be doing with the sound effects, drama & ‘softening’ of reality.
— Keith Kerr (@akkwildlife) November 21, 2016
my roommates are trying to tell me planet earth is kinda fake and it makes me want to punch them
— mags (@hoggywurtz) November 18, 2016
So BBC used fake sound effects for planet earth? Lol im annoyed
— L ? (@LainieThomson) November 24, 2016