Kiwi internet sensation Jamie Curry stars in a new YouTube series that has already attracted more than two million views. Photo / Supplied
Kiwi internet sensation Jamie Curry stars in a new YouTube series that has already attracted more than two million views. Photo / Supplied
A new YouTube series following the Antarctic adventures of Kiwi internet sensation Jamie Curry has proven a hit, pulling in two million views and rising.
The four-part series, dubbed Jamie's World on Ice and filmed earlier this year, sees the 20-year-old vlogger undertaking survival training out in the cold, checking out a century-old explorer's hut and explaining how climate change is gradually transforming the frozen continent.
With one episode still to run, the series has clocked up more than two million views already: something perhaps unsurprising for a young star who has a massive worldwide audience.
"I'm so happy they seem to be enjoying it - and actually learning from it too which is obviously the main goal," Curry said.
Veteran journalist Damian Christie, who shot the series with Curry in Antarctica, was thrilled at the numbers.
Curry at the Barnes Glacier. Photo / Supplied
"We always knew it was going to be big, but it's amazing to watch it unfold," said Christie, a former TVNZ reporter who recently launched his own science-focused video company, SciFilms.
"Each time an episode comes out I keep pressing the refresh button and watch the numbers going up thousands at a time."
For Christie, comments posted to the clips showed how effective the series had been.
"We're getting young people saying 'you're explaining this much better than my science class'.
"My favourite interaction was one viewer saying 'hope you don't get eaten by polar bears' which prompted another viewer to say 'there are no polar bears in Antarctica, you need to go back and watch episode one again'."
TVNZ has now agreed to put the series up on its On Demand platform, along with a special behind-the-scenes episode.
The project was supported by Crown agency Antarctica New Zealand, and further boosted by the backing of the Deep South National Science Challenge.
"The results are really quite incredible - and I've had great feedback from the science community," Antarctica New Zealand's communications general manager Jeanine Foster said.
While the agency has long supported some of the world's foremost Antarctic scientists to understand what change in Antarctica might mean to the rest of the world, Foster acknowledged it sometimes got "a little lost in the technical language and high level messages".
With one episode still to run, Jamie's World On Ice has clocked up more than two million views already: something perhaps unsurprising for a young star who has a massive worldwide audience. Photo / Supplied
"Sometimes we need a little help to connect with the right audiences, young people, the next generation of whom will be most affected by change itself."
That made Curry - whose YouTube channel alone boasts 1.34 million subscribers - a perfect candidate.
"Simply, Jamie gets it, and now her massive following does too," Foster said.
"Damian and Jamie have made an brilliant series of videos - fun and entertaining but in a way in which makes us want to learn more; we now understand this is really important stuff."
