CCM: WEEK 2 / Recycling Climate Media
Jem Bendell is known for his paper Deep Adaptation, in which the above quote is from. The main point of his paper, and this quote, is to provoke a deep emotional response from readers. Bendell very clearly demonstrates his belief that climate adaptation is inevitable, and the society we currently live in will soon disappear. The deep emotion and sense of urgency Jem Bendell pushes in this quote can be quite heavy for readers, it almost feels like a personal attack, which to some can be quite overwhelming,
My main take from this quote was keeping a sense of urgency and emotion, but in a less intense and overwhelming way. I believe that often the reason a lot of people avoid or ignore climate media, is because it’s overwhelming, scary and because ignorance is bliss, many choose to ignore it.
I broke down the construction into parts. First I’d start with my base layer, audio. I usually tend to start with visual material, but for creating an emotive and informative piece, finding the right audio material was crucial. Audio is extremely powerful in provoking emotion and altering how a message is perceived. I avidly searched for cinematic and emotive musical score until I came across Farewell Life (fitting title) a song composed by Nights Amore and Arn Andersson. I combined the audio with Greta Thunberg’s United Nations speech, arguably one of the most well known pieces of climate media. Greta, being a young activist and voice for many generations, speaks fluently, emotionally and with great power. You can sense her strength and passion in her voice, and this passion sparks motivation for listeners.
I cut Greta’s speech down, ensuring I kept the crucial and most powerful parts and ensured I spaced them evenly enough to give breathing space, and time for viewers to take it in. When it came to the visual material, I spent a fair amount of time on YouTube going through endless videos for cinematic shots of the planet, time lapses appealed to me heavily as they encapsulated a lot of change in a short amount of time. I wanted to showcase the beauty of the earth and what we’re risking losing. I found mini documentary which included many beautiful shots of Alaskan canals and rivers, they fit perfectly alongside the musical score and allowed for much focus to be on the audio.
I wanted to include words, quotes, posters and visual of people protesting for the planet. I found using footage of students, like Greta, was most fitting. The Guardian, BBC News and 60 Minutes were some of the channels I found provided the best clips from protests around the globe. I tried to include the best posters I saw in these videos, the messages that most reflected Greta’s words.
As for the obvious blank spots in my video, I included them strategically after the feedback from my peers and Elaine. Everyone seemed to think the cut to black I had at the beginning was intentional, at first it wasn’t, but it worked. The cuts to black allow for audiences to see their reflection on the screen while watching, reflect on the content, their climate action and the state of the world we’re in. They allow for a short moment to really listen, think and reflect (as much as you can in a few seconds). Although the breaks are only small because the video is short, I think they work well in giving that time to process and begin thinking about your actions against climate change.
Given more time, I potentially could have done more professional or complex editing that added cinematic value to the piece, but overall I’m mostly content with how it turned out. I believe I get my message across in a powerful, but not overwhelming way.
A1 Lauren Bisignano – Remixing CCM from Media Factory on Vimeo.