1950s
| Year | Title | Duration | Subject | Credit(s) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1952 | Coelacanth | 1x10min | This short film, featuring biologist Julian Huxley discussing the rediscovery of the coelacanth, is Attenborough's first television credit | Producer |
| 1952 | Animal, Vegetable, Mineral? | Unknown | A quiz show based on the game Twenty Questions, which ran until 1959, in which eminent scientists would try to guess the origin of specimens from museum and university collections | Producer |
| 1953 | Song Hunter | 6x20min | Series on folk music, presented by and featuring performances by Alan Lomax | Producer |
| 1953 | The Pattern of Animals | 3 episodes | Attenborough's first natural history series, on animal camouflage, warning signals and courtship displays, was studio-based and presented by Julian Huxley | Producer |
| 1954 | Zoo Quest | 6x30min | An animal-collecting expedition to Sierra Leone with London Zoo curator Jack Lester and cameraman Charles Lagus, in search of the elusive Picathartes gymnocephalus | Writer, presenter, sound-recordist and producer |
| 1955 | Zoo Quest to Guiana | 6x30min | For the second Zoo Quest expedition, Attenborough and Lagus introduced British television viewers to the natural history of South America | Writer, presenter, sound-recordist and producer |
| 1955 | The Trans-Antarctic Expedition 1955-58 | 6x30min | An occasional series following the progress of Vivian Fuchs and his Commonwealth expedition's successful overland crossing of Antarctica | Presenter and producer |
| 1956 | Zoo Quest for a Dragon | 6x30min | This Zoo Quest series features the first known footage of the Komodo dragon | Writer, presenter, sound-recordist and producer |
| 1957 | Quest for the Paradise Birds | 6x30min | Attenborough's first trip to the island of New Guinea in an attempt to film the courtship displays of the native birds of paradise | Writer, presenter, sound-recordist and producer |
| 1959 | Zoo Quest in Paraguay | 6x30min | For the fifth Zoo Quest, Attenborough and Lagus returned to South America and visited the grasslands and wetlands of Paraguay | Writer, presenter, sound-recordist and producer |
Read more about this topic: David Attenborough Filmography