In keeping with the series' guiding principle "to see animals as they really are, we need to strip away their natural surroundings", a great variety of live-action animals, re-enactors, objects and landscape sets were filmed in a studio against clean white, blue or green backgrounds. For instance, the studio rainforest set was made up of bare tree trunks and exotic potted plants, and monkeys from a British sanctuary. Various digital compositing and manipulation techniques were used to incorporate them into a virtual "Eyewitness Museum".
The minimalist design of the series, with objects filmed against a stark white background, is based on the Dorling Kindersley series of educational books with the same title.