Shark Week is back and fans can bite into a new lineup of shows featuring some of the fiercest ocean predators.
“We’re really excited about this year because this year we brought the bar even higher,” Joe Romeiro, a shark expert and underwater cinematographer, told Cheddar. “There is going to be some really exciting content.”
Advanced technology will give audiences an unprecedented viewing experience, which will feature shots from fin cameras and hidden underwater lenses, said Romeiro, who has filmed for Shark Week for nearly a decade. “The camera technology gets better and better every year.”
“People will see something there that they have never seen before,” said Romeiro.
Programming will include shows on great white sharks' feeding zones in Baja, California, a search for the supposedly extinct Pondicherry shark, and a feature on the predatory skills of Mako sharks, among several others.
During Shark Week this year, Discovery ($DISCA) and several other brands are partnering with Oceana — an ocean conservationist organization founded in 1999 — to combat the global trade of shark fins.
Amazon ($AMZN), for instance, will donate $1 for every hour of Shark Week streamed on the company’s Fire devices to the Discovery Oceana Shark Fund. Great Clips too will donate $1 for every download of its app.
Discovery and Vans also teamed up to introduce a new shoe line in honor of Shark Week, from which a portion of the proceeds will be donated to the nonprofit.
Now in its 31st year, the annual week of shark-centric programming kicked off on Discovery Channel on Sunday and will air through August 4. Last year, nearly 35 million people tuned in to watch Shark Week.
Shark Week "returns with bigger sharks and even bigger bites," Discovery said in a blog post, adding that the network "will leave no shark fan behind, bringing the Shark Week experience to viewers across digital and social media platforms."
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