Producing Underwater Film Success

When most Nova Scotians think of great documentary producers, the name of John Davis might not spring to mind. It should. The Shelburne native may not be familiar to many viewers, but anyone who has an even passing interest in the sea has probably seen one of the internationally acclaimed productions created by his team of experts.

Indeed, John Davis and his widening circle of colleagues at Eco- Nova Productions are the brains behind films that have aired on television stations and at museums around the world. The company's Sea Hunters series, for example, has been sold in 180 countries and is the most widely distributed documentary series produced in Canada.

The story of Eco-Nova Productions began in quiet fashion in the late 1990s when Mr. Davis, a former fisherman, was operating an eco-tourism business that specialized in taking European visitors on archeological searches of shipwrecks. Divers from Germany, Great Britain and Switzerland were keen to have film footage of their treks, which were made in conjunction with Parks Canada and Nova Scotia's Maritime Museum.

The film footage sparked Mr. Davis' entrepreneurial spirit. "If there was this much interest from people who were here," he says, "I thought the films might also be of interest to a wider European television audience."

In 1996, with the support of an equity investment by the Nova Scotia Film Development Corporation, Mr. Davis created a pilot TV program with some of the diving footage.

"We are proud to partner with producers like John Davis, people who are continually thinking outside the box, creating things that are new and innovative," says Ann MacKenzie, CEO of Nova Scotia Film Development Corporation.

The executives at Discovery Canada network were also impressed; they commissioned a 22-hour series. Executives at Discovery International quickly followed suit, ordering 26 half-hour episodes of the show, Oceans of Mystery. Today, the series continues to air in more than 152 countries. It also marked the beginning of an evolution.

"While we were making Oceans of Mystery our team decided we were pretty good storytellers, too," says Mr. Davis. "We decided to try preparing something that moved away from the scientific background and leaned more toward telling some of the great stories that can be found in the sea."

History Television was eager to buy the results, The Sea Hunters, which is now in its fourth season of production and already has an order on the books for a fifth.

"Although we work with shipwrecks in almost everything we do for the series, we are not treasure hunters," says Mr. Davis. "Our programs concentrate on the historic value of the sites we visit. Preservation is a recurring theme."

That respect for the sea world, coupled with the quality of work, are just two of the reasons that museums around the world have come to Eco-Nova when they need video surveys of underwater sites. Indeed, the company has created partnerships with museums and governments in Canada, the United States, Great Britain, Poland, Finland, Japan and numerous other countries.

But the partnerships go beyond relationships between clients and producer. In 2001, Mr. Davis and his business partner, Phil Sceviour, brought animator Frank Forrestal and Ghostship Animation Studios, into the Eco-Nova collective. In 2002, Sonic Design and Open Road Productions joined the group, bringing with them the skills of accomplished sound technician John Rosborough and the long-term camera and commercial production skills of Marc Pike.

"I think it's important to find people in complementary fields who can bring their own area of expertise to the group. It works because people are part owners, not just employees. We are all committed to the success and the growth of Eco-Nova."

That ever-increasing expertise also means the Eco-Nova group can perform up to 90 per cent of an average job in-house while each group under the umbrella produces its own shows.

It's a system that is bringing in more than contracts. In 2002 Eco-Nova won an export achievement award for growth in international sales and in 2003 John Davis won the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award for media and entertainment.

"We've come a long way," says Mr. Davis. "In the space of two years our service companies have transformed their core businesses into proprietary television production. It works because everyone owns a piece of the pie and we're all doing something we love."