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We are here for you. The CoronaVirus, or COVID-19, is making a lot of people feel a little frightened during this time of social distancing. While you're inside, we’ve compiled some resources for you to indulge in, and hopefully bring a little positivity and happiness into your household.
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We reached out to our World Wildlife Day Film Showcase filmmakers to ask them five questions about the experience of making their films.
Answered by the team: Director Sarah Joseph, Producer and Editor Dustin Sylvia, Producer Tyler Dinley, Director of Photography Ivan Agerton, Additional Cinematography Brett Kuxhausen, Sound Recordist Anna Pankova, Original Music by Julian Cisneros, Production Assistant Augusto Bila, Associate Producers Sydney Guthrie, Steph Toft and Devin Swanson, and Executive Producer and Creative Director Vanessa Serrao What inspired this story? This film was inspired by National Geographic Society’s Last Wild Places initiative, which aims to help protect 30 percent of the planet by 2030. We are partnering with conservation organizations such as Gorongosa National Park as part of this goal. Gorongosa uses a progressive approach to conservation that balances the needs of people and wildlife. In particular, their efforts focused on educating and engaging women and youth inspired us. We wanted to share the story of this landscape through the lens of what’s possible when you empower local people, especially girls. 
Photo courtesy of Last Wild Places: Gorongosa
What impact do you hope this film will have? We hope this film will raise awareness about the need to protect our last remaining large natural areas, for the sake of preserving biodiversity and also for the value that they bring to humanity. We also hope it will help spread the message that it’s integral for local communities to be empowered as stewards of these wild places, and that when they are directly involved in conservation, people and nature benefit. Finally, we hope the film will inspire and empower people of all ages and backgrounds - especially women and girls - to become the next generation of conservationists. Please visit Gorongosa.org to donate to their Cyclone Idai relief efforts, purchase their coffee (which supports local livelihoods through sustainable agroforestry), and to plan your own trip to Gorongosa National Park. You can also learn more about National Geographic Society’s Last Wild Places initiative here.
We reached out to our World Wildlife Day Film Showcase filmmakers to ask them five questions about the experience of making their films.
What inspired this story? Executive Producer Steven Bedard: As a digital magazine with its primary focus on biodiversity and its loss, bioGraphic aimed to depict the researchers and conservationists on the leading edge of the effort to protect the world’s coral reefs. Most of the news we hear about coral reefs is about their demise, but there are promising solutions to this loss, and inspiring people leading the charge. Off the Caribbean island of Curacao, one such group is focused on coral colonies that have survived warming, painstakingly providing in vitro fertilization services to those colonies in hopes of breeding corals that will be more resilient in the face of climate change. This video, which was produced as part of the multimedia story "Spawning an Intervention," illustrates the challenges involved in trying to get corals to do in a lab what they typically only do in the open ocean. 
What impact do you hope this film will have? SB: We hope that this film will show that all is not lost for the world’s coral reefs. These are some of Earth’s most important ecosystems, and climate change has begun to threaten their very existence. We can’t afford to ignore the problem, but unfortunately, stories about coral reef devastation has caused many people to lose hope. With this film, we sought to re-instill some of that hope by demonstrating a proven technique for restoring coral reefs, as well as the inspiring people behind this effort 
What drove you as a filmmaker to focus on biodiversity? SB: Biodiversity is one of Earth’s most precious resources, providing food, nutrient cycling, water cycling, pollination, seed dispersal, and myriad other functions that not only make human civilizations and our way of life possible, but keep ecosystems healthy and functional for all of Earth’s organisms. The steady loss of the world’s biodiversity—resulting from climate change, coral bleaching, deforestation, habitat loss and degradation, among others—is increasingly seen by scientists as one of the world’s most pressing environmental challenges. While the losses have been breathtaking, and the trends show no sign of letting up, there are signs of hope. There are ecosystems and populations that have shown resilience; there are innovative and effective solutions that have the potential to be scaled up; and there are brilliant and inspiring people working against all odds to better understand the natural world and to protect and restore what’s left. bioGraphic seeks to highlight these hopeful stories and solutions in an effort to inspire the next generation of conservationists working to make the world a better place.
We reached out to our World Wildlife Day Film Showcase filmmakers to ask them five questions about the experience of making their films.
What inspired this story? Director and Producer Jake Willers: Highways are one of the greatest barriers to wildlife movement on the planet. In the U.S. alone, motorists travel over 3 trillion miles per year – roughly 330 roundtrips between the Earth and Pluto – and a vehicle hits an animal at least every 26 seconds. In addition to killing 1-2 million large animals, these collisions cause 200 human fatalities and over 26,000 injuries, at a cost of more than $8 billion to Americans, every single year. The prevalence of roadkill is both an obvious and unfortunate result of the conflict between the needs of humans and animals. The human need to get to where we are going safely and quickly is a basic expectation of modern society. Yet wild animals need to cross our roads in search of food, mates and shelter. We were inspired to show that roadkill is not simply “bad luck” or an unfortunate consequence of driving, but an avoidable cost and a preventable loss. There are proven solutions to this problem: wildlife crossing structures in areas of known wildlife movement have been shown to reduce motorist collisions with wildlife by up to 97%. In other words, a road that had 100 collisions this year could have as few as 3 next year after installation of wildlife crossings and fencing to guide animals to the structures. The featured wildlife crossing project has improved human safety and welfare with more than 40,000 successful crossings by wildlife documented, reduction in human injuries and fatalities, reduced infrastructure damage, and reduced loss of wildlife. By making these structures visible, people can experience first-hand engineered landscape designs that create safer roads. 
Photo courtesy of (Re)Connecting Wild - Restoring Safe Passage
What impact do you hope this film will have? JW: By showing wildlife crossing structures along I-80 from construction to the restoration of safe passage for migratory mule deer to more than 1.5 million acres of summer and winter habitat, the film demonstrates a local solution to the ubiquitous problem of wildlife-vehicle collisions. Wildlife crossing structures present a timely opportunity to communicate both the problems and the solutions to the general public. By sharing the remarkable story of the decade-long effort by the Nevada Department of Transportation (NDOT) and its partners to improve human safety by re-connecting a historic mule deer migration we hope to raise awareness and build public support for crossings and help departments of transportation across the United States and beyond accelerate their road mitigation projects for wildlife.
Describe some of the challenges faced while making this film. JW: The greatest challenge we faced filming (Re)Connecting Wild - Restoring Safe Passage was capturing mule deer actually using the overpass itself. During the first migration once the overpass structures were in place and open for use, it took a while for the deer to figure out that the fences that prevented them from crossing the road would lead them to the crossing structures. This meant that they spent a lot of time hanging around the fence line before crossing. Many 12-15 hour days were spent with our cameras focused on the overpass waiting for deer. The odd one would cross now and again, but we were really waiting for a group. Finally a few groups were filmed, the largest being 17 individuals. We were hoping for more, but as with all wildlife filmmaking, you get what you get in the time you have! More information: www.arc-solutions.org, www.9caribou.com, #(re)connectingwild, #wildlifeoverpass, www.nevadadot.com
We reached out to our Jackson Wild Media Awards filmmakers to ask them five questions about the experience of making their films.
What inspired this story? Director Nicolas Brown: This story was inspired by the book “The Serengeti Rules” by Sean Carroll, who had started his research after making a trip to the Serengeti and his kids asked him “how come this place has so much more wildlife than anywhere else?” He didn’t learn the answer until he started talking to the people this film is about. Describe some of the challenges while making this film. NB: The science behind the film is intensive, controversial and in many respects brand new, so we had to learn a lot about ecology in a short period of time. (In development we had three PhD’s on our research team). This is also a story with a lot of characters and storylines that cover the entire globe. The hardest part was deciding what not to film! We also were unconvinced there was a way to knit together all of these diverging threads in different ecosystems. In the end we narrowed it down to just 5 scientists and locations, and that is the story that emerges. 
Photo courtesy of The Serengeti Rules
How do you approach science storytelling? NB: We feel it is essential that audiences be given an emotional connection to the story, especially when the subject matter is as intellectual as this is. In this case we used dramatic reconstruction to draw people closer to the key characters. We hope that you, the viewer will fall in love with nature just as our characters did. We also feel the science is easier to comprehend if you have a fully rounded human being that you can identify with and follow through the story. We let our characters tell their personal journeys without resorting to narration. This unfiltered approach is a way of showing the audience respect, and trusting that they will figure out the difficult bits on their own. What impact do you hope this film will have? NB: In some ways the film is already having the impact we hoped for most, and that is inspiring younger people—especially those aged 10- 21—to fall in love with ecology. Biodiversity loss and extinction are depressing issues, so it is important that we project a story that also has some hope. We notice that young audiences are really latching onto this positive message. Ultimately, we hope that the science and the people will inspire everyone who watches the film. The best quotes-- and we’ve heard this more than once--come from 11 year olds saying, “When I grow up I want to be an ecologist!” 
Photo courtesy of The Serengeti Rules
Were there any surprising or meaningful moments/experiences you want to share? NB: Early in the process we knew we had to film the man who got this story going: Bob Paine. We’d set a date to make him the first person we would interview. But not long after agreeing a date, Bob called us to say that he was ill, but was still eager to take part in the film. Then, just a week before the interview, Bob’s daughter called to say he might not live to see the morning. We were shocked, and more than a little depressed. We cancelled our plans to film Bob, and were considering cancelling the whole film when Bob emailed. He said that he wanted to film with us no matter what. He wanted to get this story out there. On the day we arrived, Bob had just a matter of minutes per day where he was even awake and able to speak. He gave us 20 minutes per day on two consecutive days to interview him. Can you imagine, being on your deathbed, in agonising pain, willing to talk to a film crew? You see, for Bob his work was so much more than a job. It was his passion and his mission, and he wanted to share what he had learned right up to his dying breath. He passed away less than a week after we finished the interview. The film is dedicated to his memory. Anything else you would like people to know? NB: If you care about nature, about animals, and about biodiversity, then you need to know how nature works. The 5 scientists in this film helped to crack the code, and it appears that these rules apply everywhere we’ve looked. So predators matter, keystone species matter, and if we are to have any hope of holding onto planet Earth’s remarkable biodiversity, we are going to have to apply this knowledge. That means protecting species—especially predators—and also re-wilding them when they go missing. 
Photo courtesy of The Serengeti Rules
What next? NB: The next step for us is to get this film distributed as widely as possible. We have plans to get it into schools and classrooms. And we hope to find distribution to the widest possible audience. When it comes to impact... NB: This film is about science, therefore the first call to action is to get involved in "citizen science"-- which is available on the HHMI website. The idea of "tolerance" is another great starting point-- we hope people become advocates for predators such as wolves, blue crabs, sea otters, bass, or other keystone species. Finally, the main aim of this film is to encourage young people to fall in love with nature, and follow up that passion with a career in ecology. Bob, Jim, Mary, John and Tony are great role models in this regard. When it comes to visualization... NB: We wanted to tell the story of falling in love with nature. Therefore, we used a mix of drama reconstructions and historical footage to bring this experience to life for our audience. Period costumes, actors, vintage cars, props-- we combined all the tools of drama with the beauty of natural locations. Look for the director who appears several times as a double for John Terborgh and Jim Estes, shot with vintage super 8mm film.
We reached out to our World Wildlife Day Film Showcase filmmakers to ask them five questions about the experience of making their films.
Answers provided by Tom Mustill, Director What inspired this story? TM: I met George Monbiot and he told me about Natural Climate Solutions, and how no one was talking about them or funding them despite their great potential. He released a short animated film and a letter signed by prominent figures including Greta Thunberg. It didn't really make much impact and I felt this was something people had to know about, so I decided to make a film about it that had George and Greta talking directly to you, to engage audiences with them in a way that they normally wouldn't, with a visual style very different from other campaign or environmental films. My hope was that this would get people talking about NCS, and we rushed to make it in time for the New York climate week that Greta was attending. We didn't have funding at first and just decided to make it in our spare time because we felt it was important. Describe some of the challenges faced while making this film. TM: We wanted to have the smallest possible environmental footprint ourselves while making this film. To accomplish this we took trains to Sweden and electric cars in the UK, powered our edit on green energy, had no single use anything, ate veggies and only used recycled stock footage (apart from the two interviews). This reduced our total footprint to 180kg of carbon. We paid to offset this 4x over (so the carbon would be captured sooner) in Natural Climate Solutions making the production carbon neutral. We wanted to show this was possible on a high production value film. 
Photo courtesy of #NatureNow
Were there any surprising or meaningful experiences you want to share? TM: We did not expect the film to be viewed very much, perhaps a few hundred thousand views, but when we released it it went viral, clocking up over 55 million views and even being tweeted by heads of state, with Natural Climate Solutions being a big part of the UN climate and sustainable goals summits discussions in September in climate week. The meaningful part of this is that most of those views came as an accident of our distribution strategy-instead of releasing it on one site as is the received wisdom, we gave it away under a Creative Commons (CC) license to anyone who wanted to host it/show it. An unexpected consequence of this was that the places it received the most views were sites we would not have expected - 20 million on the FB page of the musician who leant us his music for instance - far more than on Greta's and our sponsors official pages where we expected most of the views to be. Hopefully more films will take this approach and give their films away under CC licenses.
We reached out to our Jackson Wild Media Awards filmmakers to ask them five questions about the experience of making their films.
What inspired this story? Director, DP and Editor Katie Schuler: I found out about the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and the threats facing it from wildlife photographer and friend, Peter Mather. His images inspired and impressed upon me the need for more storytelling about refuge. The Arctic Refuge is one of the last truly wild landscapes on Earth. It holds vital habitat for the Porcupine Caribou Herd and is home to polar bears, musk oxen and many other species that could be harmed by drilling. To the indigenous Gwich’in people—whose survival depends on a healthy Porcupine Caribou Herd—protecting the refuge is a matter of human rights. With the support of International League of Conservation Photographers, Peter launched a multi-expedition effort to save the Refuge, and I was able to join two of these expeditions. We then partnered with the Wilderness society which gave us the funding to create a short documentary. We knew it had to cover the most pressing issue, the impending oil and gas development on the calving grounds of the Porcupine Caribou herd, but we needed an Alaska Native Gwich’in character to be our voice. Many stories already covered Gwich’in hunters and activists, but I wanted to tap into something primal and universal. I thought about the pregnant female caribou and the extreme lengths they’ve gone to, for thousands of years, to reach the calving grounds. How the calving grounds are irreplaceable, the perfect habitat for bringing new life into the world. That’s when Peter mentioned to me, during one of our many conversations, that there was a Gwich’in mother, Erika Tizya-Tramm who just gave birth. I decided she would be my voice and I would intertwine her experience as a mother giving birth to Ni’inlii with the fate of the mother caribou. 
Photo courtesy of Where Life Begins
Describe some of the challenges faced while making this film. KS: We had come to the Arctic refuge to see and understand what the country and the world stand to lose if America’s largest and most pristine wildlife refuge is open to oil and gas drilling. Our team of four set our sites on intercepting the world’s largest land mammal migration, that of the Porcupine Caribou Heard. We first flew to Fairbanks, then took a small plane to Arctic village and finally took two trips to fly-in our gear by an even smaller, three-person cessna. We landed on a river bed near the Alaska / Canada border and from there we hiked for two days all the way to the Coastal Plain. We came across several wolves and grizzly bears while charting a path through unexpected blizzards, and over snow drifts. We also saw a cheeky arctic fox stealing ptarmigan eggs. My favorite moment was waiting for Caribou while hiding out in a hole that was once dug by a grizzly bear to hide a caribou kill. Our return hike was a bit dicey because we had a narrow window to meet our pilot between blizzards and had to cross some fast flowing rivers while also running low on food. I hope everyone has a chance to visit the Arctic Refuge before it is forever altered. It’s one of the last truly wild places on earth (not to mention on American soil), you can go days without seeing any sign of humans. Anyone who has the privilege of experiencing this epic landscape and its incredible biodiversity will understand why it needs our protection. 
Photo courtesy of Where Life Begins
How can audience members take action to help the cause or issue featured in this film? KS: Congress passed a backdoor provision that allowed the Trump administration to begin the process for leasing vulnerable refuge lands to oil companies. The Arctic Refuge is now facing a pivotal moment. Oil companies are making plans to conduct damaging seismic testing in the refuge. Meanwhile the government is fast-tracking required environmental reviews, due to come out this month! Oil development would bring roads, airstrips, heavy machinery and noise and pollution. This would damage the refuge’s fragile tundra ecosystem and disrupt age-old migration and denning patterns for caribou, polar bear and other animals. While the threat to the refuge is higher than ever, the fight is not over. We have made great strides building conservation champions in Congress who aim to counteract the latest threats. Many of them wish to permanently protect the refuge through legislation. A bill to protect the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge from oil development has been introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives. We need your help to encourage House members to push this bill past the finish line. Please take action by going to Wilderness.org/arcticrefuge. 
Photo courtesy of Where Life Begins
We reached out to our Jackson Wild Media Awards filmmakers to ask them five questions about the experience of making their films.
What inspired this story? Producer, Director, and Host Bertie Gregory: The island of South Georgia has one of the highest concentrations of wildlife on the planet. Paired with 9000ft glaciated mountains that erupt straight up out of the ocean, and a week-long sail in a 50ft boat through some of the roughest ocean on the planet, it was a bit of a no brainer as a location for a wildlife adventure series. We wanted to get to know 4 of the toughest species that call this place home. Whether is be sass, teamwork, endurance, or city living, I wanted to capture their different survival strategies. That said, the key reason I chose this place was its presentation of the very best and worst in our own human nature. From Captain Cook’s discovery of the island to the whaling era and now its comeback, we wanted to show what’s possible when you protect a place. 
Photo courtesy of Wild_Life: Resurrection Island
Were there any surprising or meaningful moments/experiences you want to share? BG: During the filming of the macaroni penguin episode, I was sat about 20m from where the adults were leaving and returning from their daily hunting trips at sea. Out of nowhere, a male Antarctica fur seal came bolting out of the water, running on its front flippers, towards a group of penguins waiting for their turn to enter the water. Having read zero accounts of Antarctic fur seals hunting macaronis on land I couldn’t quite believe it when the seal grabbed one and began thrashing it around. It was pretty brutal to watch but the real surprise came when the penguin managed to slip out the grip of the seal and get away. The seal turned its attention towards another group. As the seal ran across the rocks, almost all the penguins scattered. All except one who having just watched his comrade get thrown around, turned and faced the seal. The little penguin put its fins out at the seal as if to say, ‘come at me’! The seal looked pretty unsure of what to do and after a brief standoff, turned and headed back to the water. That was certainly one bold little penguin. 
Photo courtesy of Wild_Life: Resurrection Island
Any fun facts about the program, the subject matter or the production crew that might surprise the audience? BG: During the 7-day ocean crossing to the filming location, I got to know the bottom of a black bucket quite well. I named him Barry Bucket. Over the course of the journey we got to know each other quite well. I used to feed him regularly and then take him for a swim, before feeding him again. Why did you pick your presenter to be the on-camera host telling this story? BG: Because if I’d chosen someone else, I would have been out of a job! 
Photo courtesy of Wild_Life: Resurrection Island
We reached out to our Jackson Wild Media Awards filmmakers to ask them five questions about the experience of making their films.
Describe some of the challenges faced while making this film. Supervising Producer Jonnie Hughes: Our whole project (Our Planet) revolved around revealing that “biodiversity loss” is at least as big a threat to our future as climate change, yet it doesn’t get anything like the coverage. This is partly because the word “biodiversity” is so poorly understood as a term. It’s also partly because climate change has a black and white numerical target – “2 degrees Celsius warmer” – what’s our biodiversity target? Rather than avoid using the term, we decided to take it on, and make this short film to explain and express the true value of biodiversity – “our planet’s vital statistic”. How do you approach storytelling? JH: In this discussion there is a very real need to relate what is out there – the wilds beyond – to the everyday lives of ordinary people. Most people would just say that biodiversity is “nice to have”, but the truth is that it is fundamental to every aspect of the lives we lead, because biodiversity creates the very stability that our species relies upon to thrive. We tried to make that connection for people by exploring some of the multitudinous ways in which the living world helps us to live the lives we take for granted. 
Photo courtesy of What is Biodiversity?
Anything else you would like people to know? JH: The rate of biodiversity decline on Earth is absolutely terrifying. I’m not that old (50) and in my life time wild populations of vertebrates have decreased by, on average, 60%. At this rate, we will trigger a mass extinction within my next 50 years! We have to bend this curve, and rewild the world, for all our sakes! I can’t think of a more important message to spread. 
Photo courtesy of What is Biodiversity?
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