The video production, “Helmeted Hornbill”, was conceived to target donors and raise funds for the conservation work of BirdLife International and partners for the Critically Endangered species of hornbill in its Southeast Asian range. The central message of the video is that Helmeted Hornbills are facing extinction due to a surge in demand from China where their solid casques are carved and sold as a luxury ornament.

Tim Plowden was assigned as Director of Photography and Producer. He produced deliverables including the script, storyboard and schedule. He sourced and managed creative freelancers for voice over (Ian Russell) and motion graphics (Olena Trushina). He filmed close-ups of the Helmeted Hornbill and interview of BirdLife staff.

The BirdLife tone of voice and brand guidelines were strictly followed. BirdLife coordinated with partner conservation organisations from the Helmeted Hornbill Working Group to provide stills and footage of Helmeted Hornbill in its environment, stills of illegal trade depicting arrested poachers, confiscated weapons and casques and stills of deforestation. 

"I proposed filming close-up footage of the visually arresting bird. As time and resources were limited I suggested filming a bird in captivity. There is only one. The rescued bird is kept in a wire fence enclosure and I didn’t know if I would be able to get the natural shots the client was after."

The first of two versions of the 3 minute video was delivered to a strict deadline of November 28th for a BirdLife fundraising gala screening at National Gallery Singapore. The second version of this video was completed shortly after the event with new stills and footage of Helmeted Hornbill in its environment included. This video is for distribution to BirdLife’s donor community in the UK.

A shorter 1 minute subtitled video was produced for distribution on social media. Different versions of the square format video were encoded for YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.