FILMING MOUNTAIN GORILLAS IN UGANDA AND RWANDA
Mountain Gorilla filming tours in Uganda and Rwanda are possible and give visitors opportunity to capture live videos of gorillas in their natural habitat. Gorilla trekking and gorilla habituation allow tourists to take pictures and short videos when spending the one hour with gorillas but a gorilla filming tour provides you a better chance to film gorillas for commercial purposes and have documentaries. This is mostly done by professional film makers, media production crew members and those interested in a detailed film about gorillas.
Gorilla filming tour can be done in the 4 national parks that have mountain gorillas these are Bwindi Impenetrable national park and Mgahinga national park in Uganda, Volcanoes national park in Rwanda and Virunga national park in Congo
Gorilla filming tour enables travelers to take good documentary with the gorillas. Gorilla filming tour can be done in the three countries of Uganda, Rwanda and Congo where the only population of mountain gorillas lives. Different countries have their own procedures to be followed in order to carry out the gorilla filming tour. Uganda and Rwanda have well streamlined procedures to follow unlike Congo. We highlight for you some of the requirements in Uganda and Rwanda though more information can be got through our reservations team.
Gorilla filming in Uganda: Uganda has more than half of the remaining population of mountain gorillas in the world and over 20 habituated groups making it an ideal destination for gorilla filming tour.
Visitors interested in gorilla filming in Uganda need to write to Uganda Wildlife Authority a government body in charge of all national parks in Uganda indicating the reasons for filming, details of the crew members, the date for filming, desired location and indicate how useful it will be on conservation of the mountain gorillas.
If interested in filming mountain gorillas, you will also need to write a letter informing Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA) of the trusted tour company that will handle your bookings and payments.
Once every information is obtained, you get in an agreement or contract with Uganda Wildlife Authority that allows you to carry out gorilla filming tour in any of Uganda’s two gorilla parks.
You can then proceed with purchasing the gorilla filming permit that costs $ 4200 and you will also be required to pay for all the 8 gorilla permits for the reserved gorilla family for a day. This is because you will be assigned one entire group for one hour on the day you requested and each gorilla permit is $ 700 meaning you pay total of $ 5600.
An additional fee of $ 1000 is paid to UWA and this is refundable after presenting a copy of your filming to Uganda Wildlife Authority. UWA again charges an environmental fee of 5% of the filming fee that helps in conserving the natural habitat of the gorillas.
Your again required to have a media accreditation card to carry out professional filming in Uganda, this can be got from Uganda media center a separate government entity from Uganda Wildlife Authority. This card can be processed within 2-3 working days and its valid for 30 days of your stay in Uganda. To get this card you just need to fill a form called Form G, attach scanned passport and passport photos and pay a fee of $175.
In addition to the above requirements, you need to clear with Uganda customs office at Entebbe international airport all the filming equipment that you will use so information about the equipment like the make, serial numbers, type of equipment be it drone should be sent to your tour company to determine the custom fees in advance. Remember all the above fees are exclusive of your accommodation and transportation to the national parks, clearance with the airport, media center.
All bookings in Uganda need to be done 4 months in advance because gorilla permits always sell out so fast. Just find yourself a trusted tour operator to do the bookings for you and when you have fulfilled all the requirements come and document the great apes in their natural habitat.
Gorilla filming in Rwanda; Filming in Rwanda is more less the same as that in Uganda just that it differs a little. Gorilla filming permits cost $ 5000 and this is paid to Rwanda Development Board (RDB) together with $ 2000 refundable fee that you get back after presenting a copy of the filming done. Rwanda gorilla trekking permits cost $ 1500 per person and only 8 people are allowed to visit a group in a day, your also required to pay for all the 8 permits since the group will only be visited by your crew for filming on that day.
A person intending to do gorilla filming tour must follow the same gorilla trekking rules like keeping a 7-meter distance from gorillas, no flash cameras and many more. Packing is also the same because you will still hike in the parks to reach where gorillas are.
