About us

Who are we?

Scenery Station is a video production company specializing in HD nature video. We were the first podcast in iTunes to provide pure, unadulterated footage of the natural world – way back in 2005! Our episodes contain no voiceovers or narration, no host and no music – just the sights and the sounds of nature. And we’ve been doing it in HD now for about 4 years. We also film promos and events; some examples of our other work are available on our Portfolio page.

Liza Poppert

Liza grew up in Sydney, Australia and remembers getting her first camera from her parents at about the age of 4. Most of the photos she took were of the sky, clouds and grass, though she was eventually persuaded that it might be worthwhile to photograph people as well! While pursuing her love of scenic photography, Liza obtained an Arts degree in Communications and Philosophy and worked as a camera assistant on television drama series, music videos and TV commercials. She has also delved into short filmmaking and had her work screened at the Hof International Film Festival in Germany, the Telluride IndieFest Film Festival in the USA, the Commonwealth Film Festival in England, as well as various Australian film festivals. Liza started up Scenery Station so that she could return to her first love – filming nature.

Matt O’Connell

Matt is a New Zealander from Christchurch. Scenery Station has travelled extensively in the New Zealand South Island, and through his work with the company Matt has developed a new appreciation for his homeland. He currently lives in Sydney but longs for the biting cold and astonishing landscapes of the South Island. Matt has a Masters degree in Physics and has worked for many years in the financial markets, as well as making two short films that have screened at international film festivals.

FAQs

What type of nature video do you produce?

Our work is a virtual window into the natural world. We want our viewers to escape into peaceful landscapes and the awesome beauty of nature. So we keep it simple. We don’t have a host to get between you and the view, we don’t use narration to distract you from the sounds of the location and we don’t use music to alter your mood. We just bring you nature, raw and undiluted. In High Definition.

So, are all your videos locked-off ‘virtual windows’?

No. Our primary aim is to draw viewers out of their busy lives and into the great outdoors. So in addition to our locked-off virtual window scenes, you’ll also see very slow pans that give you a 180º or even a 360º view of a spectacular location. Sometimes we use a steadicam and shoot a walk through a forest or along a coastal track so it seems as if you the viewer are walking along the track with us. If we can film nature in a way that makes you feel like you’re in it when you watch it, we’ll do it.

How is Scenery Station different from other podcasts or travel TV shows?

When we started our podcast in iTunes back in 2005 we were the first to offer this kind of nature video podcast. In 2007 we discontinued our standard definition podcasts and began producing our videos solely in HD. Now there are other podcasts that offer beautiful scenery, but still none of them are quite like Scenery Station’s Natural World in HD. Not only do we provide HD videos of stunning scenery, but we tell you how to get to each location and even provide the GPS co-ordinates, along with some other information you might find useful – like what the weather was like when we were there.

Travel shows on TV provide some great scenery, but you usually only get a few seconds of a picturesque scene before a presenter steps in front of it and tries to sell you something – be it accommodation nearby, a tour or a local attraction. We have no objections to receiving sponsorship for our show (please contact us here if you’d like us to film the scenery around your resort for inclusion in our podcast!) but unlike travel shows on TV, sponsorship we receive will never intrude into our show.

Do you process your video scenery to enhance the colours and make it look better than it actually does?

No. What you see is what we saw. We try as hard as we can to replicate the feel of each location and sometimes that might mean we have to correct the video or the sound. But we never go beyond adjusting for the limitations of our equipment. Ultimately, if you go to the GPS co-ordinates we provide and stand in that location, you should see what we saw when we filmed it – the weather not withstanding!

What’s the best way to watch Scenery Station?

The best way to watch Scenery Station is while relaxing in your living room with our scenes playing on your massive flatscreen TV! There you can truly enjoy the clarity and vibrancy of the scenery. For the past few years our podcast has been formatted to play on devices like the Apple TV to encourage living room viewing. However, we know that people also like to watch content on the move, so we now provide a second podcast of Scenery Station’s Natural World in HD which is formatted specifically for iPods and iPhones. After all, you might want to take the scenes with you when you travel to see them for yourself!

So how do I subscribe to the podcast?

Please visit our Podcasts page. There you will find links to subscribe in iTunes to either the Apple TV optimized feed or the iPod/iPhone optimized feed. You will also find links to subscribe using your web browser or other favourite RSS reader.

What if I just want to look at a few of your scenes on the web?

All of our podcast episodes are also available for viewing on our Videos page.

What equipment do you use?

We shoot all our footage on the Panasonic AG-HPX172EN. This gives us beautifully rich HD footage with high colour resolution (4:2:2 colour sampling for the techs out there). The camera shoots directly to solid-state P2 cards using the DVCPRO HD codec at 100mbps. This means that each minute of raw footage we shoot takes up approximately 1GB of hard drive space. Our tripod sports a Miller Compass 15 fluid head, which allows us to create our super-smooth pans. We edit in Final Cut Studio.

Why are the scenes only 1 minute long?

For the moment we’re keeping our podcasts short, but rest assured that we are looking at options for delivering longer scenes. We’ll keep you posted!

What other types of video does Scenery Station produce?

In addition to our HD nature video core business, we produce other types of videos. Promos, events - we even film lectures and conventions. You can view some of our other work on our Portfolio page. If you’d like us to work on your project or produce a video for you, please contact us.