WC136 MayJune 2024 - Magazine - Page 6
FRONT
Water related news,
events, and trends
from Canada and
around the world
MITCH AZARIA
Mitch has had a multi faceted career
in broadcasting. In 1982 he began
his career as a reporter/anchorman
at Global Television. Then in 1994,
formed Good Earth Productions Inc., an
independent production company, that
has won numerous international awards.
As Executive Producer of Good Earth
Productions Inc. Mitch has overseen
the production of over two hundred
documentary programs for broadcast. In
that time GEP has won numerous awards
including a prestigious, Hot Doc. GEP
has also had eight Gemini nominations.
Our first series, Great Canadian Parks
was Discovery Channel’s top rated prime
time series. More recent programs
include Inside Paradise, and the
TRIPPING series for TV Ontario.
Film producer
Mitch Azaria
and his crew
paddled 110
kilometres from
Lake Nipissing
to Georgian Bay
along the historic
and beautiful
French River.
6
AWARD-WINNING film producer Mitch Azaria
took his filming skills and love for Canada’s
waterways, along with a 16-foot Prospector
canoe, to the French River, one of Canada’s most beautiful and historic waterways.
Starting at the mouth of the French on Lake
Nipissing, the crew paddled all the way to
Georgian Bay, a 110-kilometre journey. It’s
the same distance voyagers would paddle in
a day, so that’s what Azaria and his team did,
too. The result is a beautifully edited movie
called Tripping the French River, which takes
viewers along wide, serene stretches, over
challenging rapids, tight canyons, and difficult
portages.
“The greatest challenge was filming the
rapids without making our viewers seasick,”
said Azaria. “We spent a lot of time reviewing
different camera systems to find a camera and
stabilizer that could be robust enough to take
the lurching out of the rapids, rugged enough
to take the abuse and inexpensive enough to
replace if it went for a swim. The first time we
WATER C AN ADA • M AY/JUNE 2024
used it, it completely failed, and we couldn’t
check the dailies in the field, so we shot the
entire day and only realized back at camp that
the camera was faulty and the entire day was
unusable.”
The canoe also posed a challenge. Though
sturdy, it was heavy work on long portages,
of which there are a few on the French. But
among the beauty of the landscape, the water,
and the adventure, one aspect stood out to
Azaria – the people using the river.
“The other cool part of filming had nothing
to do with rolling the camera. It was seeing
all of the different paddlers on the river. There
were people of all ages, all different levels of
expertise and a great number of new Canadians, who, despite their newness to paddling,
were out in the river for two- and three-day
trips. There is something about being Canadian and paddling that are so closely linked.”
The film premiered on April 21, 2024, on
TVO, TVO Today and YouTube, and is the
latest in the popular Tripping series.
WAT E R C A N A D A . N E T
Mitch Azaria
TRIPPING THE FRENCH RIVER
