Catrin Ody
Tisch School of the Arts. Drama major with minors in Producing and Film.
Senior by credits, and Junior by years.
New Yorkers on Climate Change.
Initially, when I started this project, what I wanted to address was the issue of accountability in the climate crisis. I wanted to see where people hold themselves accountable, how they hold others accountable and how they understood the largest issue of our generation. However, while I wanted the piece to be about people and specifically New Yorker’s thoughts on the crisis, I also wanted to educate in my video so that those I interviewed, and those who watched my film would walk away having learnt something. I wanted people to face the facts live and record their reactions to the imminence of the crisis, specifically in New York, and to expose the ignorance, knowledge, care and confusion. A feeling which I think is relatable to a lot of the general public when it comes to the Climate Crisis.
I started with research. I met with Peter Terezakis to discuss imminent issues in New York. I then researched how rising sea levels will effect NYC and also did a deep dive into the city’s recycling and waste disposal programs to find the facts I included in the film.
I then set about setting up interviews with my subjects. Here is where I ran into some issues. Initially, I was going to film them all so that I could include their faces and mannerisms as they attempted to grapple with the climate crisis. However, due to COVID-19 and the inability of a few of my subjects to get tested in time to film, I decided it would be safer to record audio interviews. I also could have filmed them through zoom, but the city felt like such a large character in my film, that I did not want to leave her out, so priorities that.
Which leads me neatly onto my next task. Finding the most beautiful view of the city and time-lapsing it, which I did.
I then, having lost the visual stimulation of having faces on camera began brainstorming ways I could illustrate my point. As well as a filmmaker, I am also an avid artist and decide to combing my talents to illustrate New York sinking under water. I used a combination of blue acrylic paint and water to paint a messy imagination of a skyline made of water. I then used Ultra Key in PremierPro to green-screen the white background and give the effect that I was painting directly onto the skyline, which turned out really cool.
I also made a Qualtrics survey to spread the questions and conversation further to the audience viewing the film as well.
And finally posted the whole thing to youtube:
In terms of learning, the people I interviewed had to think about their own accountability in answering the questions. Additionally, my interviews/ conversations went on for 40 minuets in some cases and I’d like to think both parties learnt a lot.
I got a lot out of this experience, and I definitely learnt a lot, both through my research and through talking to people about the climate crisis
I also love the video because its like a game of wheres Wally as people walk around their rooftops, lights go on and off – I think it really brings together the idea that this island is alive with so many lives and how beautiful but incredibly unsustainable it all is. The success was definitely in the art of it all.
I do wish I had been able to film the people in person although I did enjoy the anonymity of it. I also would have loved to interview more people, but cutting down all the great things people said proved more difficult than I thought, so it wouldn’t have been possible. However, I do feel like the survey remedies that a little bit so I was satisfied with that.
Next time I would simply have spoken to more people. I also think while the opinions of real people and the general Public are very worth wile and often lost in the conversation around climate change, I think my video may have benefited from some expert voices. But perhaps that belongs in a sister project. I could definitely make a sister project that sees the sun come up and the removal of the paint while speaking to experts on how we are fixing and ways we can fix the climate crisis. In fact, I think that sounds like an excellent idea and I may indeed follow through with that.
Sources:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zVBkjMbF4Z4
https://www.politico.com/states/new-york/albany/story/2020/01/05/wasted-potential-the-consequences-of-new-york-citys-recycling-failure-1243578
https://www.grownyc.org/recycling/facts
