CASE STUDY — 2014
EXTREME TREKS — SACRED MOUNTAINS
Where it started — four sacred mountains of Tibet and western China, trekked and filmed on foot.
- CLIENT
- DISCOVERY CHANNEL
- YEAR
- 2014
- ROLE
- DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY
- CATEGORY
- TELEVISION
THE ROUTE
Four one-hour pilgrimages in the high country of Tibet, Sichuan, Qinghai and Yunnan: the kora around Mt. Kailash, Minya Konka in the summer monsoon, the circumnavigation of Amne Machin across Qinghai grasslands, and — saved for last — Kawa Karpo's five high passes and river gorges. Aired on Discovery Channel in 2014.
THE WORK
The season that set the series' visual law: the landscape carries the architecture of the frame, the climb carries the story, and nothing is staged that the mountain didn't offer. Chad's Tibet stills archive and this season share a bloodline.
LOGISTICS
Filming permissions in Tibet and restricted western regions — some of the hardest paperwork in television — plus monastery and community consents, and the diplomacy of pointing a camera at the sacred, earned at walking pace.
PILGRIMS PROSTRATING AROUND MT. KAILASH.
Outcome
- 4 SACRED-MOUNTAIN EXPEDITIONS
- DISCOVERY CHANNEL · AMAZON PRIME
- 3 FURTHER SEASONS COMMISSIONED
Credits
- DP — CHAD INGRAHAM
- HOST — RYAN PYLE
- PRODUCTION — RYAN PYLE PRODUCTIONS
Watch the Extreme Treks Season 1 Trailer (3:24)
All projects · Chad Ingraham, cinematographer and photographer, Fredericton NB