Our experience tells us that, to get the speed and scale of change required, we must tell provocative, exciting and hopeful stories at three different levels:

1. Moving the mass audience –  our big feature documentaries reach audiences in the tens or hundreds of millions, with engaging, entertaining stories that create a new normal by delivering fresh awareness and energizing inspiration to the global public.

2. Helping those with influence move in parallel  – we also develop and create films and campaigns with partners that use storytelling to invite targeted business, political and thought-leader communities to respond effectively to the growing appetite for change in the global public.  These targeted films can be for much smaller audiences – our smallest yet was just 7 people, but it was the G7! 

3. Enabling everyone, everywhere to tell stories, all at once  – the whole world needs to make films for change, which is why we’ve created an open-source footage library, Open Planet.  Anyone can use the shots in the library for free in their own films, for their own audiences in their own languages.  And we can help them to do so.

We have done each of these levels in the past , and we can also do all three at once to get everyone talking about the issues that matter.

Who we’ve worked with

Open Planet is our trusted, open-source library of high-quality footage and data visualisations of our changing planet. 

Launched in 2023, the award-winning library features over 11,000 cinematic, scientifically accurate clips of the major challenges and solutions linked to climate, nature and humanity. Free for educational and impact use, it enables everyone to tell stories that can inspire change and accelerate action on the planetary crisis in this crucial decade. 

Open Planet is an independent community interest company, working with an established network of industry-leading filmmakers, partners, collaborators and changemakers to deliver impact and drive transformational storytelling.   

Our story

Founders Colin Butfield and Jonnie Hughes first worked together on the Silverback Films / WWF / Netflix project Our Planet. They created the Our Planet “Halo”, a campaign of impact films that worked as a companion to the series. After that time, they both worked on Silverback’s David Attenborough A Life on Our Planet, and Colin was Exec Producer on Johan Rockstrom’s Breaking Boundaries, both available on Netflix.

In 2020, they formed an impact wing of Silverback, Studio Silverback, which, in its first year, produced a series of films in partnership with Prince William’s Earthshot Prize, the YouTube Originals series Seat at the Table with Jack Harries, and Sir David Attenborough’s powerful address on the first day of the Glasgow Climate COP26.

Since then, the studio has gained a reputation for top quality impact production from short films to strategic comms campaigns to global feature documentaries, working with a host of partners from broadcasters to foundations to small NGO’s, educators and scientists. It has also launched the open-source footage library, Open Planet, to enable anyone, anywhere to make powerful films for change.  In 2024, Studio Silverback took the new name, Open Planet Studios, to closer align with this unique platform.