Sea Studios Foundation is a powerful team of award-winning filmmakers, scientists and strategic communicators. We’re dedicated to raising awareness of all the ways human life is entwined with the natural environment and motivating action on urgent threats to our planet’s health. Whether a primetime television series for the public or a specialized video targeting business or government leaders, we rely on extensive scientific and public opinion research, work with a vast network of collaborators, and rigorously evaluate everything we do.
Mark Shelley, Executive Director
As Executive Producer and Director of Photography for Sea Studios, Mark has been responsible for numerous award-winning exhibit and television projects throughout the world. Under Mark’s direction, Sea Studios has been responsible for developing many new techniques in underwater, macro, and time-lapse photography. He has a specialization in deep-sea imaging and has developed systems for Bob Ballard (who found the wreck of the Titanic), National Geographic Television, and the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute. Mark served as Executive Producer and Director of Photography for The Shape of Life, an 8-hour, Hi Definition series of specials co-produced with National Geographic Television. Most recently, Mark served as Executive Producer of the critically acclaimed and award-winning 4-hour PBS series and outreach project, National Geographic’s Strange Days on Planet Earth. Mark graduated from Stanford University (B.Sc., 1972) with honors in Biology and conducted research at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution for two years. Prior to beginning his film career, Mark was Program Director of Oceanics School, which ran academic programs on traditional square-rigged sailing ships. While freelancing in New York City, Mark had the opportunity to work on shorts for Saturday Night Live and line produce German theatrical films. It was while Mark was in New York that he worked on his first National Geographic Specials, Dive to the Edge of Creation and Polar Bear Alert. Mark is an expert diver, submersible pilot, and a licensed plane pilot with an instrument rating (and owner of a Cessna 182). He lives a very rural life with his wife, Elizabeth, and daughter, Lucy.
