Filmmakers & Media

Since 2013, Kellettville and the Black Caddis Ranch have been the setting and backdrop to some of the world's most influential nature and documentary filmmakers.  Radim Schrieber started photographing and shooting video of the Synchronous fireflies.  His footage led the BBC and Ammonite Films to us in 2015 with their famous narrator/host Sir David Attenborough.  Producer/Director, Joe Loncraine and Videographer, Martin Dorhn filmed Attenborough for the first time using a high-tech 4G camera in the darkness of the forest for a segment of the award-winning Attenborough's Light On Earth.  Then in the summer of 2017, the Passion Pictures company filmed a segment for their 2018 documentary Serengeti Rules, a film based on the book of the same name by Sean Carroll.  The film made its debut at the renowned 2018 Tribeca Film Festival. and has since won numerous industry awards.  It was adapted for the PBS Nature Series in 2020.  Most recently, the new Netflix original series "Alien Worlds" featured the fireflies in Pennsylvania in the second episode.  Five minutes of the episode focused on the fireflies' ability to flash and the scenes were filmed right here in the backyard of the Kellettville Firefly Farm.

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Several other photographers and documentarians have since spent time in the firefly habitats around Kellettville and produced some beautiful and mesmerizing results. David Forstate of Pittsburgh's WQED, documented a Pittsburgh 360 Youtube episode.

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Ted Anthony, associated press contributor, and photographer Gene Puskar posted a Travel Lab story complete with video and audio podcast.  Then Buffalo, NY outdoorsman and writer David Barus who writes under the byline, Forrest Fisher, stayed with us and submitted this moving narrative, Light Wizards of the Midnight Woods to Share The Outdoors. 

 

Photographers, filmmakers, writers and researchers coming to this part of the country will find the area easily accessible by car (within 3-hours) from one of three major cities of Pittsburgh, PA, Cleveland, Ohio or Buffalo, New York.  Once here, natural and historic settings are abundant and conveniently located.  Almost everything you need can be reached by paved/gravel public roads.  Local residents are friendly and helpful.  Permits and fees are minimal.  To make reservations at the Kellettville Firefly Farm for lodging while filming, contact us at least 6-months prior to your shooting date.