NatGeo Explorer Aishwarya Sridhar wins Editing Honour for ‘Leopard Dynasty

Aishwarya Sridhar’s wildlife documentary Leopard Dynasty: The Rise of Rana won Best Editing at the Earth in Focus - Singapore Nature Film Festival. Combining cinematic storytelling with wildlife observation, the film celebrates Rana the leopard and the team behind its creation.

HYDERABAD: For Aishwarya Sridhar, the well-known National Geographic Explorer, it is yet another feather in her cap when her documentary ‘Leopard Dynasty: The Rise of Rana’ won the Best Editing Award at the Earth in Focus – Singapore Nature Film Festival.

It may be mentioned here that some of Aishwarya’s high-points as a wildlife photographer and NatGeo Explorer was winning the prestigious Wildlife Photographer of the Year Award in 2020 in Adult Category.

“This is an incredible honour and a deeply emotional moment for our entire team. This recognition means so much because it celebrates not just the technical brilliance of editing, but also the soul of storytelling—something we strived to bring alive through the journey of one extraordinary leopard,” Aishwarya informed ‘Telangana Today’.

“We filmed Rana for over one and a half years in the Jhalana Leopard Reserve, tracking him day and night through the rugged landscapes of Rajasthan. Every moment was a lesson in patience, perseverance, and respect for the wild,” said the Mumbai-based photographer.

“What inspired this project was my love for cinema—especially Bollywood. I wanted to bring the emotional gravitas that is often missing in traditional documentaries into the world of wildlife storytelling. I used the universal language of cinema—emotion, drama, action, and romance—to stylise a wildlife documentary for the first time. From crafting the “romance” between Rana and Flora in a DDLJ-style mustard field sequence, to capturing his triumphs and heartbreaks with cinematic flair, our goal was to make audiences feel for Rana, not just observe him,” Aishwarya explained.

The passionate wildlife photographer thanked her editor Akash Gulati “whose hard work, sleepless nights, and Bollywood editing sensibilities brought this vision to life. His ability to blend emotional storytelling with natural history was nothing short of genius. I was honoured to collect this award on his behalf in Singapore.”

Aishwarya also owes her latest Award to what she calls her ‘incredible team’ including cameraman KennethLawrence and field producer Hemant Dabi along with the field team of Bunty, Raju and Kuldeep.

“We all worked tirelessly in extreme conditions to keep track of Rana every single day. Their dedication and resilience made this film possible,” she said.

“Working across three time zones—with edit producer Julie Busse in the USA, and my producer Jacqueline Farmer in France—was no small feat. But our shared vision kept us together: to push the boundaries of natural history storytelling and create a film that is as entertaining as it is meaningful,” Aishwarya said.

“I would like to thank my co-production partners Terra Mater Studios, Ouragan Films, ARTE G.E.I.E, Ushuaia TV and Anil Agarwal Foundation by Vedanta for supporting this film and believing in the vision of this project,” she said.

“The wild has stories as grand and emotional as any human saga. When we tell them with empathy and imagination, we build a bridge between people and the planet. Let Rana’s story remind us all that conservation begins with connection—and connection begins with storytelling. This award, to me, is a tribute to Rana himself—a leopard who has truly redefined leopard behaviour and shown us how intelligent, adaptive, sentient and emotionally complex these cats can be,” is Aishwarya’s message to every conservationist and wildlife lover.

For his part, Akash said: “”Editing this film was a really immersive experience. Even though it’s a wildlife documentary, I never approached it that way. Subconsciously, I treated it like a human story – guided by emotions, relationships and those small moments of connection.”

“What also made the process special was working with an incredible all-women team – the director (Aishwarya Sridhar), producer (Jacqueline Farmer), and edit producer (Julie Busse) – all based in different time zones. Despite that, our collaboration always felt natural. There was a lot of mutual trust, clarity and creative honesty in the process, which made the whole experience very fulfilling,” Akash said.