Biography

Michael deGruy was born on December 29, 1951 in Mobile, Alabama, USA. He was a cinematographer and producer, known for The Blue Planet (2001), National Geographic Explorer (1985) and Predators (2000). He was married to Mimi Armstrong DeGruy. He died on February 4, 2012 in Jaspers Brush, New South Wales, Australia.

Is survived by his son Max, and his daughter Frances.

Perished in a helicopter crash that also took the life of filmmaker Andrew Wight.

American cinematographer Mike deGruy and Australian TV writer-producer Andrew Wight were killed when their helicopter crashed and burned on takeoff in eastern Australia while filming James Cameron's DeepSea Challenge.

Fascinated by sharks - he hosted and shot four documentaries about them - deGruy barely survived an attack in 1978 when a grey reef shark ripped off the top of his right arm, which, after 11 operations, left it only partially operable.

I grew up in Mobile, Alabama - somebody's got to be from Mobile, right? - and Mobile sits at the confluence of five rivers, forming this beautiful delta. And the delta has alligators crawling in and out of rivers filled with fish and cypress trees dripping with snakes, birds of every flavor.

If you're a wildlife filmmaker and you're going out into the field to film animals, especially behavior, it helps to have a fundamental background on who these animals are, how they work and, you know, a bit about their behaviors.

If you ever really want to get away from it all and see something that you have never seen, and have an excellent chance of seeing something no one has ever seen, get in a sub. You climb in, seal the hatch, turn on a little oxygen, turn on the scrubber, which removes the CO2 in the air you breathe, and they chuck you overboard. Down you go.

If you're going to make a lot of films about a particular group of animals, you might as well pick one that's fairly common. And octopus are: they live in all the oceans. They also live deep. And I can't say octopus are responsible for my really strong interest in getting in subs and going deep, but whatever the case, I like that.