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DIGITAL RANCH PRODUCTIONS

Television and Interactive Production

Digital Ranch is one of America's premier producers of documentary programming for network and cable television. Digital Ranch also has award-winning credentials in producing exciting interactive content on CD-ROM and the Internet. 

The most popular concept in the entertainment industry today is "convergence", the merging of traditional media, such as television and film, with new technologies such as the Internet and DVD. Digital Ranch jumped to the forefront of convergence before the term was even invented.

Digital Ranch was founded in 1993 as a television production company and a publisher of interactive multimedia titles. The mission, even then, was to incorporate emerging technologies with a successful string of award-winning television programs and films. 

Today, Digital Ranch produces both linear television shows for network and cable broadcasters, as well as nonlinear interactive programming distributed on CD-ROM and the Internet. Reviewers and critics have recognized the consistent excellence of Digital Ranch products.

At the core of Digital Ranch is over twenty years of experience producing top quality television programming. The company's President, Robert Kirk is an Emmy Award-winning producer and director. He co-created and served as Senior Producer of Weapons at War, a critically acclaimed 65 hour series on the Arts & Entertainment Network. Mr. Kirk's credits also include the A&E two-hour specials; The Berlin Airlift: First Battle of the Cold War, Robots, and a four-hour special on the history of American prisons, The Big House. 

Mr. Kirk's three-hour special, The Last Days of World War II was nominated for the 1996 Emmy Award as the Best Informational Program. He wrote, produced and directed the premiere episode of A&E's The Real West, for which he received the 1992 Western Writers Association's Golden Spur Award. His Remembering World War II: Pearl Harbor won a 1990 Emmy Award and his Diamond Diplomacy, the story of the birth of baseball in the Soviet Union, was nominated for a cable television ACE award. 

Mr. Kirk has also produced numerous network television specials, including: Angels: The Mysterious Messengers (NBC), Robert Redford and Sydney Pollack: The Men and their Movies (NBC), Twin Peaks and Cop Rock: Behind the Scenes (ABC) and The Making of a Model (ABC).

In 1985 Mr. Kirk produced the award winning children's feature film Kid Colter, and in 1989 he directed the feature film Destroyer starring Anthony Perkins and Lyle Alzado. 

In 1973 he graduated With Distinction with a BA in Psychology from the University of Virginia. He is a member of the Director's Guild of America and the Writer's Guild of America.

Digital Ranch's co-founder and Vice-President Robert Lihani co-created and produced Weapons at War, along with a four-hour history of Rockets and Air Force One. His three-hour documentary, D-Day: the Total Story won A&E Network its highest rating for a special. Lihani has written and produced episodes of A&E's The Real West and Civil War Journal, The History Channel's In Search of History, History Undercover, as well as ABC's Eye on LA and America's Best Kept Secrets. 

Mr. Lihani's program on women astronauts, Mercury 13: The Secret Astronauts, won the 1999 Tribute Accolade Award as "the documentary that best portrays women who have had a significant impact on past or current events."

Mr. Lihani began work in commercial television after completing six years of active duty with the United States Air Force Combat Camera Service. As a Captain, he led the Combat Camera team during the invasion of Panama in December 1989. Mr. Lihani received a BA in Cinema from the University of Southern California Film School. He is also a member of the Director's Guild of America.

In September 1994, Digital Ranch crossed over into New Media and released Wild Blue Yonder I: Fifty Years of Gs and Jets, an interactive exploration of the history of flight. The CD-ROM was the first in a series of interactive aviation programs produced by Digital Ranch and published by Spectrum HoloByte and Cambrix Interactive. Digital Ranch produced this disc using the content and contacts the principals gained as producers of their television series, Weapons at War. 

Critics immediately hailed Wild Blue Yonder as "the best in its class." To date, the title has received numerous awards and was honored as one of the best of 1994 with an Award of Excellence from CD-ROM Today magazine. Multimedia Merchandising magazine lists Wild Blue Yonder as one of the Top Ten best-selling "Entertainment" CD-ROMs for the Macintosh platform. 

In May and November of 1994, Rob Kirk produced two NBC television specials titled Angels: The Mysterious Messengers, and Angels II: Beyond the Light. To coincide with the premiere of the second show, Digital Ranch released Angels: The Mysterious Messengers CD-ROM. This vivid exploration of the history, meaning, art and essence of angels is published by Artisan Interactive. CD-ROM Power magazine gave Angels the magazine's highest rating - a "10". 

In May of 1996, Digital Ranch released Nine Worlds, an exciting interactive tour of the universe hosted by Patrick Stewart. The product was also based on television content, and it was one of the first to offer a direct connection to the internet from the CD-ROM. Boot Magazine called the disc "a kick ass product...that harnesses the power of the Web and delivers the best of what CD-ROM technology has to offer at the same time."

In 1998 the Company released Alcohol 101, an educational training program produced in association with the University of Illinois. The CD-ROM was created to help prevent alcohol abuse among college students and is currently being used by more than 800 colleges across the nation. The information is presented as an irreverent and comedic "virtual party" that incorporates interactive videos, games, and simulations. Alcohol 101 is the winner of two Gold Quill Awards from the International Association of Business Communicators.

In the last year, Robert Kirk and Robert Lihani served as Executive Producers on over 20 hours of documentaries for The History Channel, The Learning Channel and PBS, including programs about Easter Island, Amelia Earhart, Devil's Island, and Eldorado, the City of Gold. 

Currently, Digital Ranch and its staff of twenty, is in production on an ongoing series on dangerous jobs for the History Channel, entitled Suicide Missions, and a half dozen episodes of their popular series, History's Mysteries. 

In February 2000, they commenced co-production with French network, La Cinquieme, on "Big Game", a series of thirteen half hour episodes on the capture and relocation of big game, currently filming in South Africa. 

In Summer 2000, Digital Ranch will start production on "Ranger School", gaining first-time access to the elite and grueling Army training school, in association with Rive Gauche International Television. 

Fall 2000 will also see the launch of Digital Ranch's exciting new venture, Documentary Broadcasting Company, a prestige channel of many hours of interactive documentary programming, distributed over the internet.