Thanks to the use of some very realistic and innovative gorilla-shaped animatronics, we have been able to contemplate the daily routine of gorillas, including their particular sonata while they enjoy food and the subsequent flatulence due to the ingestion of large amounts of food.
The video is part of the BBC-PBS miniseries Spy in the Wild 2 that aired in late April. Throughout production, the filmmakers at John Downer Productions developed a complex process that employs realistic robots made to look like wild animals. Dozens of these spy robots were “cloaked in the animal world” to capture unique animal behavior up close and personal. Spy gorilla is one of the “stars of the show”.
“First, we have to determine which spy animals would be the best to film the animal, hence we put in a baby gorilla” (so they wouldn’t feel threatened), explained filmmaker Matt Gordon on his blog.
The result was a collaboration between producers, who are also biologists and zoologists, to make the creatures as realistic as possible, hence being able to open, close their eyes and even look away.
This little robot ” witnessed some of the family’s most intimate moments, discovering recorded mountain gorillas singing for the first time on camera, offering an interesting point of view on the evolution of language and vocal communication, especially ours.
And of course, taking into account that these great apes ingest about 18 kg of plants a day, flatulence occurs “semi-permanently”.
