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National Film and Sound Archive of AustraliaNational Film and Sound Archive
National Film and Sound Archive of Australia
National Film and Sound Archive
National Film and Sound Archive of Australia
National Film and Sound Archive
Articles

Australia in Colour: Season 2

With Over 160 minutes of NFSA footage

A second season of the landmark factual series arrives on SBS from 10 March 2021, featuring over 160 minutes of NFSA collection footage.

Written by Stephen Groenewegen
08 March, 2021
2 minute read

WARNING: this article may contain names, images or voices of deceased Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.

A second season of the landmark factual series Australia in Colour arrives on SBS from 10 March 2021, featuring over 160 minutes of NFSA collection footage. Watch the trailer:

Australia in Colour season 2, trailer. Stranger Than Fiction Films and SBS, 2021

A Colourful History

Australia in Colour season 1 was one of the top-rating shows on SBS in 2019. The four episodes of season 2 are again narrated by Hugo Weaving, with the footage organised around themes of family, play, crime and industry.

Among the aspects of Australian life and history revealed on film are: early surf lifesaving on Bondi Beach; the arrival of migrants after the Second World War; campaigning for women's rights in the workforce; the launch of iconic brands like Myer, Bushells and Vegemite; and our biggest sporting heroes and national superstars.

The NFSA's Senior Digital Colourist Craig Dingwall scanned 400 different titles for the project, and had to complete the grading of some titles from home during the COVID-19 shutdown in the first half of 2020. The new series features scenes of the 1918 Spanish flu and 1930s polio pandemics which, now seen in colour, will seem eerily familiar to audiences in 2021.

You can see images from the new episodes in the photo gallery below:

Miss Australia Quest entrants arrive on the HMS Implacable at a surf carnival on Manly Beach to aid war veterans and ex-service personnel. From Australia in Colour season 2, Stranger Than Fiction Films and SBS, 2021.
'Abortion on demand' protest march, 1 January 1973. From Australia in Colour season 2, Stranger Than Fiction Films and SBS, 2021.
Distributing relief to women and children at the Trades Hall, 1919. From Australia in Colour season 2, Stranger Than Fiction Films and SBS, 2021.
New migrants read The New Australian newspaper, 1950. From Australia in Colour season 2, Stranger Than Fiction Films and SBS, 2021.
An Australian soldier returns home from the Middle East and is reunited with his family, 7 December 1941. From Australia in Colour season 2, Stranger Than Fiction Films and SBS, 2021.

Where to watch

Australia in Colour season 2 was produced for SBS by Stranger Than Fiction Films and made in association with the NFSA. The series screens on SBS over four weeks on Wednesdays at 8.30pm from 10 March 2021. Episodes will be available after broadcast on SBS On Demand.

The series is subtitled in Simplified Chinese, Arabic, Vietnamese, Hindi and Korean. The series is also available with audio description for blind and vision-impaired audiences. You can catch up with season 1 of Australia in Colour now on SBS On Demand.

We are screening the sport and entertainment episode of Australia in Colour season 2 at Arc cinema in Canberra on Friday 16 April at 6pm, followed by a Q&A with producer Jo-anne McGowan and NFSA Senior Digital Colourist Craig Dingwall. Book your tickets to this event.

Main image: Wedding scene from feature film The Painted Daughters (1925), shot in Sydney.

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