The Australian company White Spark Pictures announced that its newest title, "The Great Kimberley Wilderness" (1x35), will receive its world premiere at the Western Australian Museum in Perth, Australia, on November 23 of this year. The making of "The Great Kimberley Wilderness" was made possible by principal production funding from Screenwest and Lotterywest, with additional support from the Western Australian Museum, National Museum of Australia, Tāmaki Paenga Hira Auckland War Memorial Museum, WAITOC, Kimberley Experiences, Water Corporation, Redsands Campers, and Camera Electronic.
Narrated by Hollywood star and Australian native Luke Hemsworth ("Gunner," "Westworld," "Land of Bad"), "The Great Kimberley Wilderness" is a stunning immersive experience that will transport audiences to one of the most spectacular, pristine, and ancient landscapes in the world. Filmed in 360-degree 3D VR, viewers will soar over the edge of the thundering King George Falls, get up close with saltwater crocodiles, explore the vibrantly striped domes and majestic gorges of the UNESCO World Heritage-listed Purnululu National Park, and travel back over 350 million years to the ancient Devonian Reef.
"The Great Kimberley Wilderness" is the first completed VR documentary film from a content funding partnership announced last year. Three leading museums—the National Museum of Australia in Canberra, the Western Australian Museum in Perth, and the Tāmaki Paenga Hira Auckland War Memorial Museum in New Zealand—each of which had previously seen a significant increase in visitor numbers around showings of White Spark Pictures’ earlier films, "The Antarctica Experience" and "Beyond the Milky Way", came together to create an AUD$1 million fund to invest in three new VR films over three years.
The next two films, currently in development, are "Journey of the Giants," a deep 360° dive into the incredible world of whales, where audiences will feel as if they are swimming alongside humpbacks, and "The Kermadec Islands," which offers a once-in-a-lifetime adventure into a remote and pristine marine wonderland deep in the South Pacific Ocean. Screenwest and Lotterywest also provided significant funding to assist in the making of "The Great Kimberley Wilderness."
Briege Whitehead, founder and creative director at White Spark Pictures, referred to the audience's unique, untransferable experience: “As with our two earlier VR films, 'The Great Kimberley Wilderness' transports audiences to places they might otherwise struggle to visit, providing a uniquely immersive and memorable experience in a breathtaking landscape. We are excited to deliver the first film from this game-changing, world-first content partnership and are delighted that our work together is increasingly generating interest from other venues and attractions eager to find cost-effective and scalable new experiences for their visitors.In addition, with recent budget cuts and the commissioning slowdown for factual, we are seeing more interest from mainstream documentary producers curious about VR’s growing opportunities and how they can adapt their skills. As a result, we are now exploring several interesting new potential partnerships with TV and film producers," commented.
Meanwhile Rikki Lea Bestall, Screenwest CEO, congratulated the producers: “Congratulations to Briege and the White Spark Pictures team for achieving new ground in the world of VR, this time showcasing our beautiful Kimberley. Screenwest is proud to support the creativity, ingenuity, and tenacity of Western Australian filmmakers and crew who produce such captivating content within our home state," noted.
"The Great Kimberley Wilderness" will run from November 23, 2024, to April 28, 2025, at the WA Museum before moving to the National Museum of Australia in December and the Tāmaki Paenga Hira Auckland War Memorial Museum in April 2025. It will also expand to venues overseas in 2025.
At each venue, visitors can share the experience with friends and family via Surround Sync, an innovative patented technology developed by White Spark Pictures that seamlessly synchronizes any audiovisual system with hundreds of headsets remotely, in a simple, scalable, and cost-effective way. The development of Surround Sync was supported by Screen Australia’s Enterprise Business & Ideas fund.
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