Russell Barnes has been making award-winning documentaries for fifteen years, often in partnership with intellectual heavyweights such as Niall Ferguson, Richard Dawkins and David Reynolds. Credits include Armistice, a feature-length documentary charting the momentous last month of the First World War, which was short-listed for the Grierson Award, and, in 2011 and 2012, two further BBC documentaries on World War Two – World War Two: 1941 and the Man of Steel and 1942 and Hitler’s Soft Underbelly, which challenge the familiar narrative of how the Allies won the war. In 2010 he produced The Virtual Revolution for BBC2 and The Open University, a first draft history of the world wide web presented by Aleks Krotoski, which won the 2010 International Digital Emmy Award and the 2010 BAFTA New Media Award. Russell also directed Channel 4’s The Genius of Charles Darwin (winner of the Broadcast Award – best science series 2009), the natural history and CGI-based global hit Extinct and the revisionist landmark history series Empire, presented by the historian Niall Ferguson.

Dr Duncan Bulling worked as a biomedical research scientist before moving to television.  He developed the Emmy award-winning science series DNA for Channel 4 and PBS, twice directed the Royal Institution Christmas Lectures, earning a nomination for Best Children’s Programme at the Broadcast Awards 2004, and produced the Richard Dawkins polemic Root of All Evil?, winner of the Bafta Scotland best documentary 2005. Duncan also has extensive experience producing and directing Secrets of the Dead for PBS, Equinox for Channel 4 and actuality series such as Monster Moves and Animal Mega Moves for Five and Nat Geo.