Editorial: Independent Documentarians: Doing a great service to Bigfooting

We have all seen these specials on TV countless times, the ones which take a more skeptical look (sometimes TOO skeptical), with sneering skeptics and loaded narration which implies that anyone who studies hairy bipeds worldwide is a candidate for the looney bin and cannot be taken seriously. However, some independent documentarians have stepped up to the plate and bucked the system, with fair and balanced productions which give Bigfooters the time they need to explain their side of things. Some examples of terrific independent documentarians are Jay Michael Long from Hattiesburg, Mississippi, who has produced 3 excellent DVD's on cryptids (Swamp Apes, Bigfoot FAQ and The Honey Island Swamp Monster) and is at work on a fourth on Bigfoot in Oklahoma; Scott Herriott, who has principally produced documentaries on the Pacific Crest Trail and also on strange places in the U.S., but also produced two Bigfoot docs (Squatching and Journey Toward Squatchdom, with the latter being more a hilarious "mockumentary"); Autumn Williams, former host of Mysterious Encounters, produced an excellent DVD called Oregon Bigfoot: Search For A Living Legend Part 1 of 3; Peter von Puttkamer, producer of the terrific Sasquatch Odyssey: The Hunt For Bigfoot, as well as a Learning Channel series on monsters; John Johnsen, producer of Keeping The Watch, which featured profiles of six independent researchers; Todd Partain, producer of the terrific Eyes In The Dark: The Sasquatch Experience and Don Keating, chairman of the Eastern Ohio Bigfoot Investigation Center, who produced 5 documentaries (In The Shadow of The Sasquatch, Ohio's Abominable Snowman?, The Evidence Mounts, Sasquatch Lake: The White Bigfoot Video and The Mystery of...The Sasquatch Triangle) which are also great. These individuals are part of a new breed of filmmakers who give us Bigfooters a true chance to tell our stories without being edited or cut off by a sneering skeptic or loaded narration which makes us look like nutjobs. I would say the future of true independent cryptozoological filmmaking is safe and secure.