Grant Wakefield – Writer / Director

Grant Wakefield began his career as a camera assistant and operator before gaining a place at the Northern School of Film and TV in 1994, where he earned a Post Graduate Diploma in Cinematography. Immediately after graduation he studied under Vilmos Zsigmond ASC and Billy Williams BSC at the 3rd European Masterclass for Director of Photography Students. He then forged a long association with London based Muso Productions, working on feature films and music videos. He gained a credit as music researcher for Ron Fricke’s 5 perf. 70mm 1992 film BARAKA, and helmed 2nd Unit cinematography for the UK’s first ever 8 perf. 70mm production LOST KINGDOM. His enduring interest in large format film making has seen him attend nine IMAX conferences worldwide, and screen 2k digital works at the Bradford International Film Festival ‘Widescreen Weekend’ events in 2009 and 2010. With a lifelong fascination with the Megalithic civilisation of Britain, he has spent almost two decades visiting, researching and photographing sites. His 1998 documentary CROPPIES was broadcast both in the UK and USA, and his audio documentary THE FIRE THIS TIME, released in 2002, was one of the best reviewed albums of the year.

Glenn Smith – Pre-Production Executive Producer

Jan Toensmann – Post-Production Supervisor (tbc)

Rocco Helmchen – CGI and animation supervisor (tbc)

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 Sampler [10MB]

Lisa Gerrard – Music

Prior to exploding into public consciousness with her Oscar winning contribution to Ridley Scott’s GLADIATOR, Lisa Gerrard had for a long time enjoyed a successful and highly acclaimed career, both as a founder member of the band DEAD CAN DANCE and as a solo artist. Combining a love of Middle Eastern rhythms and instrumentation, with a haunting, enormously powerful vocal style of astounding range, Gerrard’s music continues to defy categorisation. As a soundtrack composer she has worked on productions as diverse as Michael Mann’s THE INSIDER and Niki Caro’s WHALE RIDER.

www.lisagerrard.com

 Sampler [14MB]

Steve Roach – Music

Inspired by the pioneers of the ‘Berlin School’ of electronic music, Roach’s early works featured frenzied sequencer patterns and soaring lead-lines. Coinciding with his settling in the deserts of the South Western USA, Roach’s music began to embrace both the vast landscape and an ever developing interest in ancient cultures and sounds. His 1988 release DREAMTIME RETURN, based upon his experiences of the Australian Aboriginal mythology, is considered a classic in the genre. Widely regarded as the premier synthesist of his generation, Roach has released dozens of albums featuring his trademark soundscapes and trance-state explorations.

www.steveroach.com

Edwin C. Krupp – Interviewee / Project Consultant

Krupp is probably the best known astronomer in America and has been the director of the Griffith Observatory in Los Angeles for over thirty years. He received his PhD in astronomy from UCLA in 1972, and has published extensively on astronomical and science education topics. Several of his books have won awards from institutions such as the American Institute of Physics and the Astronomical Society of the Pacific. He consistently promotes astronomy to the general public via his columns, appearances in visual media and through science communication programs at the observatory. In particular, Krupp is noted for his specialist contributions and investigations in the field of Archaeo-Astronomy, on which he has written widely, including such books as IN SEARCH OF ANCIENT ASTRONOMIES (1977), ECHOES OF THE ANCIENT SKIES (1983) and ARCHAEO-ASTRONOMY AND THE ROOTS OF SCIENCE (1984).

Professor George Eogan – Interviewee / Project Consultant

Professor George Eogan is the Director of the Knowth Research Project. A leading expert in the archaeology of Ireland, with a particular interest in the Neolithic and Late Bronze Ages, he has been excavating at Knowth for more than 40 years as part of his investigation into the Passage Tombs of Ireland and Western Europe. Eogan has taught and lectured extensively, and is now Professor Emeritus of Archaeology, University College, Dublin. His research has led to approximately 90 papers and nine books, including IRELAND IN PRE-HISTORY (1977) and KNOWTH AND THE PASSAGE TOMBS OF IRELAND (1986).

Professor Clive Ruggles – Interviewee / Project Consultant

Ruggles has had an academic career specialising in astrophysics, computer science and  archaeology. His current research centres upon people’s interests in, perceptions of, and uses of the sky and celestial objects in various social contexts. In 1999 Ruggles was appointed Professor of Archaeo-Astronomy within Leicester University, the first such post in the world. He has ongoing field projects in Peru and Polynesia and is also completing a critical synthesis of European Archaeo-Astronomy funded by a Major Research Fellowship from the Leverhulme Trust. He is the author, amongst other works, of ANCIENT ASTRONOMY – AN ENCYCLOPEDIA OF COSMOLOGIES AND MYTH (2005) and ASTRONOMY IN PREHISTORIC BRITAIN AND IRELAND (1999).

Julian Cope – Interviewee / Project Consultant

Julian Cope is best known as a British rock musician who first came to prominence in 1978 as the singer / songwriter of Liverpool post-punk band ‘The Teardrop Explodes.’After the group disbanded, Cope enjoyed a very successful solo career, whilst simultaneously spending over seven years writing and researching one of the most remarkable and popular books about Megalithic culture of the 20th century, THE MODERN ANTIQUARIAN, published in 1998. A further six years of study and travel resulted in a follow-up publication, THE MEGALITHIC EUROPEAN (2004), which expanded his research on to the continent. Cope’s work, along with Channel 4 UK’s subsequent long-running TV series TIME TEAM, is almost certainly responsible for the recent huge resurgence of public interest in the Megalithic era.

Professor Archie Roy – Interviewee

Archie Roy is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, the Royal Astronomical Society, and the British Int erplanetary Society. The asteroid (5806) Archieroy is named after him, with a registration in the IAU’s Minor Planet center. He has also been elected a member of the European Academy of Arts, Sciences and the Humanities. He conducts research in astro-dynamics, celestial mechanics, Archaeo-Astronomy, and neural networks. Roy has published 20 books, 70 scientific papers and scores of articles, and has been published in the United Kingdom, United States, France, Russia, Italy and India.

David Dearborn – Interviewee

Dr. Dearborn has worked extensively in nucleo-synthesis, stellar evolution, and astro-particle physics. Earlier astrophysics work resulted in his receiving the 1998 Shelby Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science. His work on the astronomy of the Inca has resulted in a dozen journal publications and co-authored the book ASTRONOMY AND EMPIRE IN ANCIENT ANDES. He is a fellow of the Institute of Andean Studies, and has received two Dudley awards for work in the history of astronomy for this work. Dearborn is a graduate of UCLA and the University of Texas at Austin, and has held positions at the Copernicus Institute in Warsaw, the Institute of Astronomy in Cambridge, The California Institute of Technology, and Steward Observatory in Tucson. He is currently a research physicist at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, and co-edits THE JOURNAL OF ASTRONOMY IN CULTURE.

Martin Brennan – Interviewee

Brennan conducted the most extensive research into Ireland’s carved Megalithic stones ever undertaken. He is the author of two books, THE BOYNE VALLEY VISION (1980) and THE STONES OF TIME (1984). He currently lives and works in Mexico where he is studying Mayan Archaeo-Astronomy.

Margaret Curtis – Interviewee (from pre-production period video)

Curtis and her late Husband Ron researched the Megalithic complex of Callanish for over three decades. Without any formal archaeological training Margaret Curtis has nonetheless developed an intuitive and successful approach to the subject, and is responsible for over a dozen finds of previously unknown sites and for the use of geometry to locate missing stones at known sites. Her theories on the overall purpose of Callanish have generated both rejection of, and a wealth of converts to, the Archaeo-Astronomical viewpoint.

Euan MacKie – Interviewee

Mackie is an archaeologist, honorary research fellow, and semi-retired senior curator of Archaeology at the Hunterian Museum & Art Gallery at the University of Glasgow. He has written extensively for publications such as New Scientist, and is the co-founder of the Society for Interdisciplinary Studies.