The Final Look at the Thylacine

We have released 21-second newsreel clip featuring the last known images of the extinct Thylacine, filmed in 1935, has been digitised in 4K and released.

Be sure to check out the footage of this beautiful marsupial. #NFSAOpenOnline #TasmanianTigerhttps://t.co/s3JSAnmFck pic.twitter.com/FSRYXCTTMy

— NFSA -National Film and Sound Archive of Australia (@NFSAonline) May 19, 2020

The Tasmanian tiger, or thylacine, was an Australian predatory marsupial that went extinct when the last known specimen, named Benjamin, died in 1935. Now we have a newly-released clip of Benjamin taken just months before his death.

Fewer than a dozen source films, amounting to little more than three minutes of silent, black-and-white footage, of the elusive thylacine (Tasmanian Tiger) are known to survive.

All derive from thylacines held in captivity and photographed in only two locations – Beaumaris Zoo in Hobart and London Zoo. Now, unseen publicly for 85 years, a further precious 21 seconds is being released by the NFSA.

Located within a forgotten travelogue, Tasmania the Wonderland (1935), these recently digitised 4K images represent the preservation of the last-known surviving moving images of Australia’s most famous extinct predator:   

Read more about the film and see the footage in a larger format at the National Film and Sound Archive of Australia. (via reddit)