WORLD PREMIERE ‘FOLLOW THE RAIN’
Watch the official trailer for FOLLOW THE RAIN on YouTube
FOLLOW THE RAIN - WORLD PREMIERE
Bangalow Film Festival will host the world premiere of our tribute to fungi at the iconic A&I Hall. This film event is perfect for the whole family.
It's appropriate that FOLLOW THE RAIN will debut in our local area, as the story begins in the breath-taking endangered lowland subtropical rainforests of the Big Scrub on the NSW North Coast.
It then follows the rain to some of Australia's wildest and most ancient landscapes.
We also met the composers of FOLLOW THE RAIN, Romano Crivici and Carla Thackrah, during the 2023 Bangalow Film Festival when they screened their documentary THE LAST VIOLIN.
We were captivated by the layered, ethereal, and yet powerful string compositions, which we thought would be perfect for our fungi time-lapses. This led to a beautiful creative collaboration, and the feedback on the score from those who have previewed the documentary has been nothing but glowing.
We're excited to share the experience with our supporters and the local community on the big screen.
Stephen and Catherine will be available for a Q&A session following the screening, with the much-loved Liz Ellis leading the conversation.
Thanks to Christian Pazzaglia, the director of Bangalow Film Festival for the invitation to premiere FOLLOW THE RAIN locally.
MUSHROOM WHISPERERS
LIVE PERFORMANCE - BANGALOW FILM FESTIVAL - SUNDAY 10 MARCH 3.00 PM
Romano Crivici and Carla Thackrah, the composers behind the magnificent score of the Festival’s world premiere documentary FOLLOW THE RAIN, partner again with Planet Fungi to bring you a sensual, immersive cinema and live music event.
Stephen Axford and Catherine Marciniak’s exquisite fungal time-lapses will be combined with evocative music played live to the screen by Romano and Carla, performing on multiple instruments. It is music that expresses fungi's inner rhythm and other-worldly beauty.
OTHER SCREENINGS - FOLLOW THE RAIN
We are waiting to hear back about the possible selection of FOLLOW THE RAIN for some Australian and International Film Festivals. Once we have more information, we will announce additional national and overseas screening events. However, we do have a few other screenings confirmed in NSW in the meantime.
16/03/2024 – Dorrigo in collaboration with the annual fungi foray with friends and the local film society.
21/06/2024 - Narooma Kinema in collaboration with Fungi Feastival
22/06/2024 - Moruya @The Red Door in collaboration with Fungi Feastival
24/06/2024 - The Picture Show Man in Merimbula in collaboration with Fungi Feastival
28/06/2024 - Perry Street Cinemas in Batemans Bay in collaboration with Fungi Feastival
29/06/2024 - Cobargo School of Arts in collaboration with Fungi Feastival
Planet Fungi will be conducting two macro photography workshops at Fungi Feastival. Stay tuned for more details in the coming months.
The misty mountains and swollen wild rivers of autumn in Tasmania’s autumn herald the start of the fungi season. These wild and remote forests are at their most splendid after the rain. Trees dripping with plump lichen, their roots wrapped in slippers of lush moss and mushroom treasures are everywhere. It is a mycological Mecca for fungi lovers and not just the humankind.
A TASTE OF THE ‘FOLLOW THE RAIN’ STORY
In an endangered forest in Australia, fungi hunter and acclaimed fungi photographer Stephen Axford, spies an intriguing frosty blue mushroom. He discovers it has no name. No one knows where it fits in the Kingdom of Fungi. He is the first to document it for science.
Turns out this mushroom is one of the two million – eleven million species of fungus that scientists think could exist but have not yet been identified.
The science of fungi has been a neglected frontier of discovery.
Today there is a mass myco-awakening and the race is on to document as many species of fungi as possible, as fast as possible.
At the forefront of this push internationally are Stephen Axford, and his partner in life and all things fungi, filmmaker Catherine Marciniak.
In Follow the Rain, their latest documentary, they invite us into their fungi obsessed world.
They share their fungal finds in some of the most stunning wild landscapes of Australia –tropical islands, ancient rainforests, the hostile majesty of the desert.
We discover the creepiness of zombie fungi and the wonder of the Australian ghost fungus.
They take us behind the scenes into their fungarium, revealing what they observe as they record the life and death of mushrooms and mycelium growing in spellbinding time-lapses.
They meet mycologists who are revealing mind-expanding science.
And they unearth new and charismatic species.
The evocative score by composers Romano Crivici and Carla Thackrah layers the story with magical fragile harmonies and powerful rhythms, creating a vast primal soundscape.
Visually captivating, a symphonic treat and incredibly entertaining, Follow the Rain is an exploration of the world of fungi the like of which we have never seen. It combines a decade of research and passion, magnificent fungi time-lapses and footage, and the most incredible fungal stories.
Lord Howe Island is spectacular. It was World Heritage listed in 1982 to honour its incredible biodiversity and to protect rare species of plants and animals that only exist on this island. Most of Lord Howe is a nature reserve surrounded by a marine park. It's probably Australia's last unspoiled island paradise. It is also the location for a final twist in the investigation to name and find a fungal family for Frosty Blue.
JANUARY PHOTOGRAPHY TIPS
When you stumble upon a cluster of mushrooms in the forest, like these Hygrocybe firma, taking good specimen shots that are artistic and include details that will help with identification requires careful composition.
Plan to take at least 4 photographs
Photograph 1 is a wide shot showing the mushroom's vegetation and growing behaviour. In this case, they are nestled into the mossy roots of a tree.
Photograph 2 is side-on and a bit closer. It shows how these mushrooms grow singularly and in groups, and we start to get a hint they are red on top and orange under the cap.
Photograph 3 is an exemplary top view of the mushrooms. We can see more detail of colour and texture in the stipe and the shape and textures of the cap, but we can’t see all those incredible diagnostic features under the cap.
Photograph 4 shows us the gills and their colour, and that there are both short and long gills, which is an excellent diagnostic feature. Stephen used a piece of aluminium foil to reflect light under the gills to increase the detail. Ideally, it would be good to see how the gills join the stipe, but Stephen didn’t want to disturb or damage the mushroom. Still, if you carry a small mirror, you can photograph both the mushrooms and the mirrored reflection of the underside of the cap, providing a good specimen shot without damaging the scene.
Download our free How to photograph and describe my fungus field guide.
Remember to upload your photographs and observations to iNaturalist to help expand the knowledge of species identification and distribution.
For more advanced photography tips you can stream Stephen Axford’s
Masterclass in macro fungi photography
or watch this free video on YouTube about Focus bracketing with the Sony α7R V.
MUSHMERCH
Planet Fungi calendars for 2024 are still available.
Feast your eyes on fantastic fungi in this richly designed calendar. The Miraculous Mushroom is a tribute to these fantastic organisms, such as the drought-defying resurrection mushroom and the wood-colouring green stain fungus. Informative text accompanies each vivid photograph, and elegant graphics identify the fungus’s culinary, medicinal, and other known properties. Learn fascinating fungi facts while savouring each artful portrayal of this diverse and ecologically critical marvel of nature.
"I was looking at mushroom calendars on Amazon and saw this one. Definitely, the best quality one available, by far!" - Alan Rockefeller
They are also an ethical calendar as many materials are recycled, and the fantastic Amber Lotus Publishing has, to date, planted over one million trees. In 2023 alone, they planted more than 20 times the number of trees that were used to create the products.
Your purchase, as always, will support Planet Fungi's advocacy work for the Kingdom of Fungi. You'll find them at Amazon and many local suppliers.
T-shirts are also available on our website including Stephen’s popular Fungi Fetish line.
PLANET FUNGI TIMELAPSES ON THE BIG SCREEN
IMAX DOCUMENTARY - FUNGI: WEB OF LIFE
Over the past few years Planet Fungi has been collaborating on the Imax documentary - Fungi: Web of Life which is rolling out into IMAX cinemas across the world.
It is presented by Merlin Sheldrake the author of the bestseller "Entangled Life - how fungi make our worlds", and narrated by Björk, who speaks the story with inimitable magic and sensitivity.
The film is about the ways that fungi have shaped life on Earth, and how we might partner with them to adapt to the radical change of our times.
It features astonishing time-lapse photography from some of the best fungal photographers working today, Planet Fungi's Stephen Axford, Patrick Hickey and Wim van Egmond. Much of this footage depicts aspects of fungal life that have never been captured in such high resolution before.
The film is trickling into IMAX cinemas across the world, and may already be playing at a theatre near you. Click here to find out where it is currently screening.
If you do not see a theatre near you on the list, please check with your local science centre's IMAX®, Giant Screen, or Fulldome theatre about their latest exhibition plans for Fungi: Web of Life.
Narrated by Björk, presented by Merlin Sheldrake, distributor K2 Studios, produced by Stranger than Fiction Films and Definition Studios, directed by Gisela Kaufmann and Joseph Nizeti, written by Catherine Marciniak and Joseph Nizeti and cinematography by Cam Batten.
Stephen found these specimens of Nectria pseudotrichia on dead wood in the old Macadamia orchard on our property. It has been documented as a plant pathogen in Asia, including on strawberries, pear trees and camellia species grown for tea.