The Olevolos Project - New Video!

As the Holidays draw near, and we get farther and farther away from our summer trip to Africa, it's been a gift to be able to look through the footage we shot and photos we snapped to remember what an incredible journey we had.

Some of you may remember from our post in June that we had the opportunity to visit The Olevolos Project just outside of Arusha, Tanzania.  The Olevolos Project is an organization that strives to "develop young leaders in the Olevolos Village through formal schooling, tutoring programs, and extra-curricular activities."  One thing I can attest to from our travels, however, is that it is one thing to say that's what you're about; but it's a very different thing to actually be those things and work towards them every single day.  Everyone at The Olevolos Project walks that walk, and does it with a HUGE smile. 

Don't take my word for it... just watch our brand new video about The Olevolos Project.  It is guaranteed to make you smile!

Energy in Common- Flip that switch!

The smell of cooking fires.

Certainly one of the sensory souvenirs we left Africa with. Indeed throughout the developing world, energy poverty (lack of access to clean, safe, reliable energy) is something you can physically feel.

Energy in Common is a wonderful organization that uses the fundamentals of micro-finance to help entrepreneurs in the developing world improve their livelihoods through clean, modern energy technologies. In turn, lenders from the developed world get carbon offsets for their investments.

Our 30 sec spot for EIC attempts to tell this story in an energetic and passionate way. Take a watch! Its sure got us looking at every light switch we flip as a small miracle.

NCLEJ - Moving Mountains

As we are catching up on sharing some of the videos we did earlier this year, we simply can't forget NCLEJ - the National Center for Law and Economic Justice.

NCLEJ is a nonprofit organization that advances the cause of economic justice for low-income families, individuals, and communities. Their work is hugely important and very often overlooked. While NCLEJ doesn't work with individual clients, they do tackle the systematic stuff that ends up moving mountains. It was a challenge to create a video without personal stories, but with the help of solid music and motion graphics, I think we created something that will help add life and vitality each time NCLEJ goes to tell its story.

The Bronx River Alliance- I am the Bronx

One afternoon late this spring I came upon the boy in this picture skipping rocks with his friends. I should say they were trying to skip rocks. In the Bronx you get the feeling that no matter how streetwise our urban youth may seem, they still have lots to learn out on the water.

Still this kid came right up to me and began to tell me all about his river. We were in Concrete Plant Park, a gorgeous community park developed by the Bronx River Alliance and apparently there were all kinds of cool things to see. He showed me where crabs live under the rocks. He told me about a few of the ducks and who was "with" who. He pointed to the massive scrap metals yards in the distance. I showed him how to skip a rock.

This was the highlight of the few days we spent in the Bronx putting together a video for the Bronx River Alliance. It was symbolic of how many treasures there are in a place that is notorious only for it's severe problems. What I loved was this teenager's unabashed interest in nature. In a place that I'm sure demands some toughness to get along, his gentleness reflected that of the river... an oasis in a busy borough. He reminded me that there are beautiful things everywhere. Especially in the Bronx.

Enjoy this video and get out to the Bronx River some time!

Building Futures- When I Walk

It is the deep beauty and privilege of childhood to be able to smile in a difficult place.


That's what I learned on one hot day walking along a winding dirt path towards the hillside school yard of Mbaka Oromo Primary. Ahead of us, two girls walked. Bare feet. Torn sweaters. No books. Giant smiles. As they continued their dawdling dance towards school I realized that this is the side of Africa we never get to see. This is the image that should move us all to contribute to a better life for Kenyan kids.

In many ways Western Kenya is a difficult place.... one of limited opportunity, poor health care, fragile ethnic tensions and even food insecurity. But as these kids made their way to school, I believe they were thinking about what all kids think about on their way to school.... pushing each other in the mud.

It's our great pleasure to present the first fruit of our trip to Kenya.

We hope this video will share with you the tremendous enthusiasm these children have for learning and the boundless love they show for their world, however torn. Hats off to Building Futures for the work they do to make sure that these kids are walk towards something... a solidly built school and a solidly built future.

Back Home- Slow lessons from the students of AFS

I was riding my bike the other night and it hit me. I’m back in Brooklyn.

This wasn’t a revelation. We’ve been back from our African adventure for over a month. It wasn’t that I suddenly “woke up” riding my bike in Brooklyn. To the contrary…. it was this sinking feeling at how quickly our adventure had been covered up by the waves our daily life back here in America. I was back on my bike… going back to my apartment after a long day, back to my kitchen, back to my dinner.

I think we are all hitchhikers who just like to play house. We are made of whatever we have eaten for breakfast…. Whatever color and nationality the dirt is under our fingernails from the day’s travel. We like to think that we inhabit every moment but the truth is that every moment and experience inhabits us (and then moves on).

In some ways it has been disheartening to Erin and I that we can’t keep the sights and sounds of our remarkable travels in our brains and on the tips of our tounges… but we cannot. I can tell the rest of this year will be spent carefully crafting videos for our various project with not only the goal of telling these important stories, but also with an eye towards meditating on the people we met, the problems we saw and the occasional small moment that made us feel like there truly is a world worth doing anything we can to improve.

But as I’ve said… life moves on (whether you want it to or not!) and so does our work. This month, while I’m already lamenting the quick fade of my Kiswahili skills, we had the pleasure of working with one of our favorite clients AFS, one of the oldest international exchange organizations in the world.

We shot two videos for AFS, interviewing exchange students at the end of their 10 month high school exchanges and to my surprise the answer to my malaise came from the mouths of these impressive young people.

Half way through one interview, a student who spent a year in Ghana was struggling to define her difficult experience. As she stumbled I saw familiar look in her eyes, the look of all people who see things so different and wonderful that the right words can’t be found. But then struggled on to beautifully about the magic of bonding with her host brothers, of eating with her hands, of learning to play the drum, of traveling the country.

Still more impressive were the exchange students from abroad who descended on Washington DC to meet officials at the State Department. During a Q&A session, we heard some of the bravest, most intelligent questions from these kids (all from countries with large Muslim populations). It moved me to hear the collective voice of those kids in that room. It made me proud to live in a country that makes itself open to such questions and proud to work for such an organization that teaches kids they have the right to ask them.

What we learned from the students of AFS is that it takes a lifetime to absorb the lessons of traveling abroad. It takes patience and creativity to tell these stories. From Good Eye Video we can promise the full force of our talents and the commitment of our hearts to try to share a piece of the gifts we were given by people in little villages and in sprawling slums. Of simple words and food and sights that really have changed us… even though we don’t know it (yet).

Is it good or is it bad?

Joseph turned to me and smiled. “So life in the US…. is it good or is it bad?” We were moving along the ridge of a mountain from Narok to Nairobi, the view of the Rift valley in all its vastness spilled out before us. This question from our driver friend took me a moment to process. In some ways most of our experiences have been in the pursuit of understanding what life here in Kenya really consists of. It wasn’t until Joseph’s question that I realized that our time in Kenya may turn out to be more of a mirror to our own way of life than it is an investigation of someone else’s.

When we create a video for a non-profit there is always a clear temptation to use binarys… these people suffer, these people triumph…. this is a problem and here is the solution. In Kenya I’ve found myself searching in the same way. Is this a country of farmers, plagued by HIV, poor governance, tribal conflict and broken infrastructure? Or is it a country of people who work from dawn to dusk. Who have learned how to expertly use their fertile soil. Who have put their children’s education above almost all else. Who create instant businesses on blankets by the side of the road. Who love to dance and sing and smile. A people who, even if they are literally destitute, will insist you take tea with them.

I’ve had trouble figuring out whether life here is good or bad and of course that’s because there is no such answer. Kenya is all of these things. As visitors (not to mention storytellers) it has to be our job to consider it all … the good and the bad.

In our American minds there are immediate aspects of life in Kenya that conflict with our sense of “a good life”. The roads here make the potholes of Brooklyn feel like the Autobahn. Female Genital Mutilation is still practiced. Bride Inheritance. Ethnic Violence. Medical care is a luxury item, which puts our entire recent medical debate into perspective. Mostly the opportunity to succeed and improve ones standard of living does not compare. In Kenya with a good mind, a strong immune system and a good education you can still find yourself unable to succeed. I guarantee there are a few Nobel, Pulitzer, Oscar winners hoeing beans right now in the fields of Kenya. This is life without a safety net (you’re lucky if you have a big strong family). This is life without the helping hand of the government. The crippling corruption here is unimaginable to us.

On the other side there are so many aspects of life here which I think any visitor is enchanted by. We have been welcomed here in a way that seems impossible in America. One day a woman (who spoke little English) walked us almost a mile before we realized she was going the other way. She simply wanted to make sure these visitors in her community found their way.

Kenyans use what they have, they conserve, they recycle. They are connected to the land (almost everyone here has picked corn and milked a cow in their life). In my own American life, I’ve only dreamed of being this connected to the natural world. It makes all of the local, organic farming we do seem ridiculously backwards.

Keynan kids are hungry for education in a way that mothers across America would die for. School here can easily last 8 hours a day, 6 days a week.

See… as I think about life in Kenya my thoughts inevitably return to my own country, my own way of life. Have I taken for granted the stability of life that our rich economy and (by comparison) honest government has afforded? (Yes.) In fact, I’d like to invite small government-right wing Americans to take a trip here. This country is begging for more government… more schools, decent roads, clean water, medical care. A safety net. We consider all of these things as constants and we should not.

But don’t I want to actually LIVE on land? To know where my food comes from. To greet every visitor as though they were my long lost best friend. Don’t I want to be hungry for knowledge and treat the opportunity to grow as golden?

Kenya has taught us that engaging in “International Aid” can often turn into an exercise in superiority. “Look at these poor people and all the things we could do for them to fix their mixed up backwards country” But the truth is life here is filled with everything. A Mama dies from AIDS leaving five children orphans. A primary school choir sings a triumphant piece of Beethoven (without reading a note of music). Half of the students eat only once a day… a meal of corn flour. The same kids take turns jumping over a river, laughing the whole time.

Kenya has taught us that the American allergy to walking isn’t just making us fatter, but probably diminishing our inner life by 35%. It has taught us that we are obsessively clean. Obsessively afraid of being late. It has taught us that we have so conquered the quest for food, shelter and fire that we have often become bored (think of dog pedicures, everything in Brookstone, hot dog eating contests)

My answer to Joseph was pretty lame. How can you compare life in our country to life in this one? I had more money in my wallet than he would earn in a month. But the breathtaking view out my window… into the land of the Maasai… well, I’ll never have that. We’ll leave Kenya understanding the reason why half the world is clamoring to know our way of life. And why we, Americans, should be clamoring to know theirs.

HandCrafting Justice

I write to you from the comfort of Jomo Kenyatta International airport. We have about an hour left on Kenyan soil and we are contemplating not only our journey, but return to daily life back in Brooklyn.

The contrast to the glittering duty free and pricey food court is even sharper after the day, perhaps one of the most eye opening we've had here in Kenya.

Here in Nairobi we are doing work for a fantastic organization called HandCrafting Justice, which empowers women all over the world to earn a living with hand crafts. As host of the most excellent Sisters of the Good Sheperd here in Nairobi, we met the women from the slums of who create everything from baskets, to dresses, to greeting cards. After a long day of shooting hands nimbly moving across fabric, paper and thread, one of the group of mamas (who make beautiful woven baskets) marched up and announced that all would like us to visit there homes in Makuru Slum.

What do you say to that? Yes, mama... How is nine am?

So we spent our day in the slum... A maze of one room shanties that stretches for miles.. Rivers of sewage winding between and garbage covers many of the main paths.

The awful parts of slum life are well known and I won't elaborate on them here. Instead I want to tell you about our Journey. Each home we visited welcomed us. Each mama told us what they did to keep food on the table.. One sold nuts. One sold charcoal... One sold fruits. As we went to the next house the other mamas would follow until we had an entourage of rowdy, colorful older women helping us cut our way across the slum. Each stop involved cramming another person into the small one room homes.

Sitting here in the airport the thing that amazes me the most about the slum is the tremendous volume of hard work and vitality we found there today. Tens of thousands of small business occupy every crevice of the neighborhood. People sell fruit, cut hair, roast meat, grind corn. There was a movie theater (a small tv you pay a few shillings to crowd around and watch the world cup on).

This a place where people, despite popular imagination, are struggling to live... not waiting to die. The women we met feed a family of five for less than three dollars a day and they do it with their hands and backs and minds.

In the same way we found HandCrafting Justice a hugely intelligent idea in this context. They are helping these women do what they want to do. Kazi Kazi (Work work!) We are proud to be bringing home images of these women using their hands to not only make beautiful things, but to improve their businesses.

And guess what they asked us for. Not money. Not food. Not our shoes or camera.

Market. Customers.

I couldn't believe it. But over and over we heard these women praying we help them make their hand crafts a success. Sitting there in the slums (as I sit now in the airport) I'm heartened that suffering's companion seems to be the enduring will, talents and potential of the poor to work. For them to make and do things. For them to still invent (and monetize) everything from water to toilets. I believe we owe it to poor people everywhere to respect and learn from their already vast experiences in survival. Only then can we help them thrive.

Wheels almost up. Thanks Kenya...

Kwaheri Kenya, Habari Tanzania

For our next adventure, we headed out on the open road... to Tanzania!  The Olevolos Project, which is located just outside of Arusha, is a non-profit that supports orphans and families in the Olevolos community of Tanzania.  This may sound like a simple goal, but sleeping, eating and working on their site for 4 days gave us a profound respect for not only the passion and commitment of everyone involved, but the lengths they go to in order to accomplish it.

Throughout our work with non-profits and video, we do a lot of “sizing up”.  What is an organization really about?  What social problems do they solve?  Who is their target audience?  How can we best convey their mission and values through video?    The Olevolos Project is new territory for us, because they are no typical 501(c)3 and consequently, the answers to these questions are multi-faceted.  They have taken a very specific problem (increasing numbers of orphans in the Olevolos village, due to HIV/AIDS) and have investigated the best ways to tackle this problem from many different fronts.  That has led to the creation of a number of different programs to address this issue:

-       A nursery school

-       Adolescent Girl’s initiative

-       Secondary School Tutoring Program

-       Sustainable Livestock and Agriculture Program

-       Widow Micro-Saving Group

-       Sports & Recreation Program

The beauty I’ve found in a program like this is that it approaches a massive problem from such a holistic point of view.  When one or both parents pass away, due to HIV or any number of problems, it affects children, wives, husbands, families, and communities at large.  Dory (the Director) and James (the on-site Director) go to unbelievable lengths to involve the entire community: the village chief, the village elders, children from surrounding areas and parents.  The Widow’s group prepared and served a community meal on the site grounds one day, and one neighbor was kind enough to donate some open space to allow three simultaneous (and unbelievably competitive!) soccer games to take place for the sports & recreation program.  In work like this, the only hope of creating a sustainable environment for kids and their families is to get the community involved, excited and invested in its success.  

I just want to quickly share the story and photograph of one family we met.  Kadada (with the tie-dyed shirt), her younger sister Abigaeli and her older brothers Bakari and Kababu are kids who, on paper, would have every excuse to frown... and yet quite literally light up the room with their smiles.  We don't need to look any farther to find an amazing reason to support and chamption The Olevolos Project in all of its efforts.  Thanks to Dory and James for letting us share a few days with these wonderful families!

How do you take your tea?

As a tea lover in a country ruled by coffee lovers, it was a fun and refreshing visit to Kericho, the jewel city of Kenya's tea growing region. Our project was creating a video about sustainable tea growing as promoted and certified by the Rainforest Alliance.

In Africa if you don't have oil, diamonds or giraffes, the word "exports" doesn't inspire bragging. No wonder the Kenyan tea factory managers we met with were unusually proud of their thriving tea industry, the country's leading export and third largest source of revenue.

The Rainforest Alliance works with Kenyan Tea factories and farmers (as it does elsewhere around the world) to make sure the production of tea is done in an environmentally and socially responsible manner. And I think it's working.

In Kenya, small scale tea farms provide a livelihood for thousands of people. Many of the farmers have formed successful co-operatives to process and sell their green-leaf (freshly picked tea). We got to visit a tea factory where the leaf is transformed into some of the best tea in the world.

Factories are cool to shoot. Ask anyone. It was extra cool to see a factory entirely owned by a collective of small farmers. But it was the trip into the hills to meet these farmers that was really special. We approached one woman of seventy as she nimbly moved through leaves of gorgeous green tea bush. During our interview she told us about her life as a tea farmer, her pride in being a shareholder in the factory and her innate desire to sustain the environment.

As we thanked her, she held onto my hand and blessed me. After all the cups of tea consumed from this woman's blood and sweat, no one had hiked up to ask her a few basic questions about how the tea is actually made. It affirmed our belief that there is no one better to tell the story than those being served. Despite the language barrier, we hope this video can be focused on the image of this woman, the spirit of her words and the knowledge that someone like her picks many leaves for every sip we take.

Today these small farmers comprise most of the tea activity in Kenya. The multi-nationals are quickly challenging that (and a way of life). We hope that the Rainforest Alliance certification these small farmers get will help them stay competitive and most importantly sustain their land and ecosystem for the next generation. As we watched Rainforest Alliance work in the field, it was amazing to realize that they are actually making environmental change possible, not through lobbying or advocacy, but through grass-roots, farmer by farmer training. They plug into the community and seem to create a real common sense, bottom up program for creating a better place for cows, trees and tea bushes. Certifications can often be lip service, but as far as we're concerned the next box of tea we drink will be RA certified.

Kenyan kids get behind the camera

We've found Kenya to be a hard working place and in that spirit have been shooting like crazy! As we move on to new cities and projects we'll be working to write a bit more about our experiences. Till then "haraka haraka hiena baraka", "hurry hurry has no blessing."

When we made a plan to teach Kenyan kids to create videos it was a pretty simple idea: bring the cameras, show the kids how to use them... And see what happens. Of course, in teaching (and in Africa!) you never know what the days have in store for you.

What we didn't expect was the way the school seemed to overnight be filled with students with cameras.... pointing them at friends, cows, us... documenting life around them. The idea of capturing the images that travel through your eyes seems to be a natural impulse, especially for kids.

Our teaching began with the fundamentals of the camera, the principles of taking a good shot and the basics of film/video as a vocation. We even had time to delve into the basics of plot and creating story. As we met in the library each day I noticed a few students who seemed to be captivated by the process... One day after class three boys came up to me and presented ideas for short films they'd spent the previous night working on. I can remember that moment of discovery myself... When I realized I could create something out of nothing. I'm confident that if we can provide that opportunity to just a few of these students that the important images and stories will not be far behind.

As we left the school on the last day I saw Job, the amazing school librarian and computer teacher (and soon to be video teacher!), talking with the kids about creating their first short film. It made me realize that with a little equipment, some basic knowledge and a great teacher like Job, we can help kids tell their own stories. That is a beautiful thing and also a viable pathway for non profit video to become a sustainable part of communications strategy.

The more we can help people tell their own stories the better. So we are excited to continue developing this idea of video training. Until then look out for what I can assure you will be some awesome Sundance film festival entries from Mbaka Oromo primary school.

Masai Mara

On Monday morning we packed up and shipped out with the nurses on the 6 am bus to Masai Mara, an amazing national park and wildlife refuge in southern Kenya. After 10 days of hard work, we were ready for a few days of rest and sightseeing. But, alas, safaris are demanding! We were up each day between 5 and 6 am to jump into our Land Cruisers and head out on morning game drives.

Luckily, we had the pleasure of staying at Sekenani Camp - perhaps one of my new favorite places in the world. After a long drive from Maseno, walking up the stone steps to the dining room (pictured above) was like stepping into another world. We all stayed in beautiful A-frame tents, complete with running water, electricity, and a private porch with amazing views (our view attached above).

In two days, we went on a total of 4 game drives. I'll try to list all the animals we saw:

- Lions (pictured above, mamas and cubs, though I'd also like to add that Katie captured a video of lions mating).
- Giraffes (pictured above)
- Thompson gazelles
- Rhino (mom and baby)
- Hippos
- Hyenas (*we actually heard these from our tent, but can only imagine what they look like based on The Lion King).
- Buffalo
- Zebras
- African elephants (a whole herd!)
- Impalas (there were tons!)
- Wildebeests (which don't migrate until July, thankfully, and therefore we were able to visit in the less crowded "low season.")
- Vervet monkeys
- Vultures
- Ostriches

I'm sure I'm missing a few, but beware friends and family - you have a solid 1500 photos of our safari to view when we get back home! I'm also attaching the requisite artsy photo of Dan, standing up in the Land Rover with the camera, capturing some absolutely stunning photos and video of the landscape.

We also took the opportunity to wrap up the St John Fisher Nursing project with a few interviews. It was wonderful to hear about the powerful experiences the nurses had... We're excited to put the video together and hopefully raise the support to keep this program going.

We made it back to Maseno late last night and checked into the Maseno Club. We are back at Mbaka Oromo today, teaching and filming, so stay tuned for further updates!

Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

The morning walk to Mbaka Oromo

Most mornings since our arrival a week ago we've walked the hour+ to Mbaka Oromo School. This may sound far, but the walk is breathtaking (and mostly downhill!), so the time flies.

We thought that since this was such an important part of our day, it would probably be good to take some photographs along the way to get a sense of our journey.

I'm not sure what order these will post in (these posts/photos have all come from my Blackberry), but we start at the Maseno Guest House, where we are staying. (Thank you, Monkey, for jumping into my photo this morning!) Then we continue up through Maseno University and out into the hills where, if it's rained heavily, our hiking shoes come in pretty handy in the mud!

We're hoping to get to an internet cafe soon to try to upload some of the amazing photos we've taken with actual cameras. They'll put these Blackberry photos to shame!

Mbaka Oromo choir time!

(In addition to our video shoots, we are also doing some teaching here in kenya. The following is an update by Katie on her progress with the Mbaka oromo choir.)

I am sitting in the library one afternoon when I hear the sound of sweetly singing voices traveling across the courtyard. Realizing that the choir master Charles must have started choir practice, I rush over to the classroom to join. But Charles isn't in sight. Instead, one boy plays the drum and leads the other 60 or so children, all sitting in chairs, through each of the songs they are preparing for competition.

I don't know about you, but when I was in school and a teacher was late or absent, all the students would just goof off or even leave! Not these kids. They practice 3-4 times a day during their breaks, lunch, and games time. They are learning 11 pieces ranging from English hymns and folk tunes to songs in Kiswahili. I am working with a select group to bring a new style to their repertoire -- collegiate a capella.

We are singing a song that my a capella group sang this past year called New Soul by Yael Naim. Although Charles helped us get started the first day, it has pretty much just been me and the kids all week. Sometimes it has been hard to tell if they are enjoying the experience, but then there will be a shared moment of laughter (at me? with me?) or a shared joyous realization mid-song that "hey, this actually sounds like music!"

There have certainly been barriers. Communication has been the biggest, both in terms of language (whereas we us lala as nonsense singing syllables, it means sleep in Kiswahili, a cause of much student laughter and some confusion) and musical ability (teaching music by rote means I have to try to sing in the basses own octave, again causing much laughter) Also, I am just getting my "teaching legs" and still discovering what works and what doesn't.

But regardless of any challenges, I am quickly learning about the universal language of music. It is amazing to be joining forces with Charles, one of the most passionate and dedicated musicians and teachers I have met, and his band of beautiful voices. I start each session feeling tentative and a bit overwhelmed, but I always leave with the children's voices ringing in my ears, which is just a wonderful gift.

Habari from Maseno!

(Forgive spelling errors and photo quality - this blog update is brought to you by Blackberry!)

Greetings from Kenya!

Well, we made it. After close to 24 hours on planes and in airports, we emerged from the Kisumu airport weary but electrified by the bustling Friday night scene before us. The road is full of life... People walk, bikes weave, cars endlessly pass each other (hoping to get back into their lane before meeting oncoming trucks). There are smells of open cooking fires and the sounds of music from the dimly lit doors of village pubs. There are people everywhere... And now we are among them.

We write to you now from Maseno, a small town in Western Kenya with a spectacular view of Lake Victoria. Our first few days have found us following a visiting nurse contingent from St. John Fisher College. Documenting health care in a developing country is quite a new experience for us, one filled with challenges. During a community health screening at Mbaka Oromo primary school (pictured here) we saw hundreds of children cycle through a series of basic health tests. What struck me most was that these kids waited in the school yard, smiling, wrestling, laughing and in general just being kids. But during the health screening, we found out many feel sick at least once a week. Some have worms and jiggers (a foot parasite). Many eat only once a day. As video makers, it's a tough job to shoot video that reconciles these two truths about children. Balancing an identifiable need with the reality that joy exists, even in the most disadvantaged of situations, is a tricky business. For all of us it was an interesting experience and one that reinforced our desire to make an awesome video that will sustain this program and help raise money for the new health dispensary (more on that in the coming days).

On Monday we accompanied the nurses on their trip to Maseno Mission Hospital. We saw patients in all sorts of very difficult medical predicaments. Many cases of malaria, AIDS and the most heartbreaking... a child in a coma, his temperature near a fatal level. Even though we believe that telling this story is necessary to combat these awful health conditions and encourage more people to get involved, it simply doesn't feel right to video tape someone in their most vulnerable and fragile state. There are too many images out there of fly-covered African children, and we don't need to contribute to that stereotype. But we do need to tell the truth, and the truth is... there is great suffering here. While one nurse assisted with a child's high fever, the child died in her arms.

Yesterday, we switched gears a bit and headed up to Mbaka Oromo Primary School to do some teaching. Katie has been hard at work, teaching the award-winning choir one of her a capella songs from her Skidmore group (much more on this from Katie in a post to follow soon!) Dan and Erin headed to the library to begin a series of classes on video for the 6th and 7th grades. As many of you know, part of our fundraising included purchasing 5 Flip Cameras to bring and leave here, in order to create a sustainable video training program here at Mbaka Oromo. We began tentatively, explaining to a group of incredibly attentive and respectful kids about Good Eye Video - that we make our living in America with cameras! By the end of the class, Dan had each kid taking 5-second videos of themselves, showing them how to properly frame their faces in a medium shot and speak loudly into the camera. The whole class giggled and cheered as the camera was plugged into a projector and they saw their work up on the wall. We will have more on this (and higher quality photos!) as our classes get more in depth in the coming days.

Thanks for bearing with this long inaugural post from Kenya. We will work on more frequent updates, and hopefully some video soon. We hope we can do some small justice to the beauty of this place and the unbelievable sense of welcoming we've received!

Tutoanana!

Kickstarter Success - Kenya, here we come!

Oh, how long we've waited to see that green check mark next to our project. As many of you know, we launched our campaign with Kickstarter last month, and it was a blast to see our friends, family, and some kind strangers get involved in our project. On Saturday, May 1st, our project closed and far surpassed not only our expectations, but our fund raising goal of $10,000 in only 24 days. Now, it's time to get to work! We depart on May 13th for a month and invite everyone to check back regularly for updates as we endeavor to deliver on all of the projects we've been lucky enough to be involved with for this trip:

• Building Futures
• St. John Fisher College Nursing Program
• Energy in Common
• Rainforest Alliance
• HandCrafting Justice
• AFS
• The Olevolos Project

We have our shots, sunscreen, and cameras ready to go - wish us luck!

-Erin, Dan... and Katie!

Self-promotion & Meaningful Media!

This week, thanks to my wonderful friend Laura, Good Eye Video was featured in Meaningful Media's newsletter as a "Featured Member"!
If you're not already a fan/follower/supporter of their work, I highly suggest you become one.  Meaningful Media is a nonprofit network committed to changing our world through media.  Taking film, video, art, music, performance, celebrity, design and other media that spotlights social issues into account, they approach 'media' as a powerful tool to inspiring and activating social change.  Thanks to Meaningful Media for highlighting our company, our mission and our Kickstarter campaign!

The Life You Can Save: Logical food... but still hungry for heart

The cost of saving a human life is "between $623 to $2,367"

Cool logical proclamations like this can be found throughout The Life You Can Save, by Peter Singer, a well known Bioethicist at Princeton University. Singer is a master at weaving logical webs of ethical arguments to address some of the most pressing questions about giving.... why we should give, how much and to whom. The book marches from the initial premise; that donating to charities that save lives is our ethical duty, through the various arguments against giving all the way, to the manner and amount which giving should take shape. All compelling and deeply researched stuff..... but why didn't I end up with that "time to change the world" feeling in my gut as I turned the final page?

While reading Singer's writing I was transported back to college philosophy... a place where mathematical-feeling postulates seemed to cleanly resolve some of life's greatest mysteries, leaving me with the feeling of a problem solved minus any real conviction about the solution. Similarly books like The Life You Can Save, ask me to travel to a place where not saving a drowning child is equivalent to not giving a small donation to water purification for a Ugandan child I've never met. I get it... but is this a convincing strategy for engaging people in the cause of combating poverty?

From our perspective as storytellers, balancing the emotional with the logical is a constant struggle. There is lots of interesting research that indicates that information addressing our logical brain system is much less effective in producing empathy than information appealing to our emotional brain system. At the same time we've come to firmly believe that the segment of the population who is receptive to messages about social causes have a strong attachment to facts, efficacy and a general grounding in reality.

I'm a huge fan of Singer's work, especially something as comprehensive and forceful as this. I just wish he held our hand a bit on this factual journey through moral judgments of our society (readers included). For a book with so many mentions of "To be a good person..." we need more something more poetic to soothe the side of us that feels assaulted by the implication that living a good life is such an inelastic pursuit. I think this point is proven by Singer himself who at the tail end of the book after several hundred pages of logical arguments ultimately appeals to our emotional side.... It may be logical to give as much as you POSSIBLY can without effecting your own basic health and security, Singer concludes that 5% of income is a fair (emotionally viable) starting point for most of us.

These are tricky issues... that don't live neatly in either the logical or emotional realms. As we tell the stories of social causes we need to remember to serve each plate of logic with a healthy side of heart.

Back to Barnard - Diana Center Ribbon Cutting!

We had the pleasure to head back to Barnard for the brand new Diana Center's Ribbon Cutting Ceremony to document the historic event.  You may remember from our earlier post on the student reaction to the building that within days of its opening, the Diana Center had already become an integral (and gorgeous) part of the Barnard Community and Student Life.  Here's the video we came up with, hope you enjoy!

Common Ground

We were fortunate enough to travel to New Orleans to work on a series of videos for Common Ground Relief, one of the toughest and most dependable advocates for residents of the lower ninth ward. My experience was amazing… both inspiring and devastating. I spent a few mornings walking along the famous levee that burst down through the still unpaved roads out into the neighborhood, with house after house that still lie in complete ruin.. In the beginning I think the story of Katrina (told amazingly in many films and videos) was moving to almost everyone in our country.

The sad truth is that in our culture, stories have a shelf life. And it’s getting shorter every day. Today everyone knows what happened during Katrina and no matter how outraged you were at the government’s response, you’ve moved on. Unfortunately the battle continues for those who are trying to rebuild their community. It’s a challenge to retell such an already saturated story.. but it needs to be retold.

In this video we tried to mix outrage with hope… but most importantly we just tried to let the images tell the truth. New Orleans is still very much a broken place. Common Ground is one of the few organizations that I’ve encountered which is truly grassroots. It arose a day after Katrina from the wreckage and has endured and grown through out the rebuilding process. Today it’s a well led, practical and productive organization. If you want to reconnect with this important piece of our national history, I strongly recommend a volunteer trip to common ground. It certainly reawakened our desire to see New Orleans get the attention, compassion and resources it needs to become whole again.

Video & Website: A Family Reunion

I’m always struck by a website that has great video content…. 5 pages deep. Is a video really that good if I have to click 5 times to find it? It seems like far too often video is held at arms length when it comes to integration into a website. But it’s not just because we spend so much time in the edit room that we want videos to be front in center on an organizations website, we really think it makes a difference.

Video is wonderful at providing that visceral and emotional impact necessary to engage anyone in a social cause. That visual punch works best if it’s up front where it can capture people and pull them into the text, links and other images that make up a truly useful tapestry of content. My favorite example of this is The Girl Effect, a website that so seamlessly incorporates video that you don’t even notice when you’re watching the video and when you’re visiting the website. With this level of integration you start to enhance the power of a video and consequently the rest of the site.

Another thing I’ve noticed is that spreading video throughout a website is an amazing way to bring things to life. Not every page has to contain a slickly edited piece, but simply having that visual reference in every area is powerful. Now you’re not only providing content for the visual learners out there (those who learn through reading) but also for the auditory learners too (those who learn through listening and watching). One of our clients provides a clear and powerful example of this. The Urban Justice Center not only put their video in the center of their homepage but took little snippets about each of their projects and put them on the project pages. All of a sudden the site has faces and voices and that elusive quality of “people” that can evade us when we let video and websites remain distant cousins.

The Many Faces of Online Video

A friend of mine in a graduate program at Tufts sent me an amazing YouTube video the other day with the warning "Tufts is now accepting video submissions as part of their application process."

As a "video professional," I watched it immediately and thought: what an interesting new frontier for video to tackle! In this video, an eager student combines her two favorite things ("being a nerd and dancing") and creates dances to demonstrate different types of graphs.  Let me remind you that this is an optional part of the application, so I was pretty impressed to see such a huge following (already 67,000 hits on YouTube!) It's by no means flashy, HD and picture perfect, but it is concise and creative.  We all saw Elle Woods' video submission for admission to Harvard in Legally Blonde, and I think since then this tactic has been generally considered comical, ridiculous and perhaps even a tad futuristic. But how exciting to think that online video will now have a place in the dreaded college admissions discussion! "For Tufts," says a New York Times article that followed the video submissions, "the videos have been a delightful way to get to know the applicants." In a sea of test scores, essays, short answers, GPA's, and transcripts, video has become a legitimate tool for students to better showcase their personality. Lee Coffin, the director of undergraduate admissions at Tufts University, said "We have a lot of information about applicants, but the videos let them share their voice.”

It's my theory that the prevalence of online video clearly and directly benefits the work we do at Good Eye Video, and I can't think of a better way to demonstrate that point than this Tufts example. Video is no longer something unattainable or futuristic. It is quickly becoming a fundamental part of the both the online and "real world" dialogue. Whether you make videos on your cell phone or re-tweet about a new YouTube video, you encourage the widespread acceptance of video as a medium for communication. So, props to Tufts for trying something new and including video in that experiment!

Good Eye Video visits Barnard!

My new role at Good Eye Video has encouraged me to get back in touch with some of the organizations that have mattered most to me in my personal and professional journey. At the very top of that list is Barnard College, and we had the pleasure of creating a couple of videos documenting the opening of The Diana Center, a brand new, state-of-the-art student building on Barnard's campus, complete with classrooms, event space, study space and a even a green roof.  I've posted the first video below, which details the student reaction to the opening of the brand new Diana Center.  It has been wonderful to be back on campus and back in touch with the Barnard community.  Stay tuned for the Ribbon Cutting!