Permaculture Soils DVD Trailer
What a pleasure it was to work with Geoff Lawton on his latest DVD. “Permaculture Soils”, Geoff’s fourth DVD in the Permaculture series being currently produced by Eco Films. Since we last turned up at Zaytuna Farm home of the Permaculture Research Institute, we noticed the changes and improvements made to the farm almost immediately. A large barn greeted us at the entry and further down the lane were a fleet of parked cars and tents as students camped in a line of smaller pavilions.
So what’s on this Soils DVD?
Working with Geoff is a fast, no time wasted experience. We ended up calling him “One take Lawton!” as it was very rare that Geoff to rehearse any words.
Occasionally we would ask him to repeat a phrase so we could re-frame the camera or fix an audio glitch.
Geoff was always a gentleman and courteously obliging.
Of course making good compost is a big ingredient in the film and Geoff had a variety of Nitrogen ingredients ready to mix into his cubic meter compost heaps. From Goat manure, Cow manure, Chook Manure to Human Manure – if it once lived – it was fair game to be put into the mix. Even dead road kill was useful.
My wife Jane who acted as sound recordist got tangled up frequently in the cables of the Sound Devices 302 Audio Mixer but the end result was useful as good audio is a must on something like this.
I have to admit by the end of the day – we were exhausted. Geoff Lawton walks the talk. Following him at his average work pace was grueling and we slept well at night.
Setup shots were quick as we would move quickly to another location. From the cow paddock to the Kitchen Garden which looked immaculate, gleaming with fresh morning dew, Geoff would reveal some obscure detail like the converted duck pond spa that would be connected to the kitchen garden tap – providing an endless source of nutrient rich water at a turn of the tap. It all seemed quite casually a normal Permaculture thing to Geoff and nothing too out of the ordinary.
The Compost shower as featured on this video works exactly as shown. I remember having to check the water temperature to make sure it was hot by sticking my hand into the stream of water as we were filming and Yes it works very well.
The compost tea brewing segment is the most fascinating aspect of this DVD. Geoff took a pipette from the brew and added a tiny drop under his microscope and showed me the millions of tiny bacteria that were active, gyrating about. I always thought bacteria would be too small to see, but their tiny little shapes were visible under high powered magnification.
From Willy wagtails on the cow’s back to mineralization of the farm stock feed, to free range chickens in mobile tractors following the cows search for sweet grass, its all in this unique Permaculture Soils DVD.
The DVD wont be ready until later this year as we still have a number of animated segments to include and a few additional video segments to shoot with Geoff.
Update:
For more information, check out Craig Mackintosh’s post at www.permaculture.org.au
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