Producing Two Documentaries with The Nature Conservancy of Kentucky about Climate Change
Historically, the Appalachian region has been known as “coal country,” so when Kentucky non-profit The Nature Conservancy asked us to work on a Climate Change video series with them, we knew that our approach to storytelling would have to be a delicate one. In the end we created two compelling videos that are entirely comprised of Kentucky voices, from farmers to business owners, who share real world stories of how they perceive climate change and its impact onto them.
We spent a lot of time in pre-production working with the client to identify interview subjects who not only had stories to share, but were leaders in their own communities. After many weeks of phone calls, meetings, and batting story angles back and forth, we started production on our first film, to be focused on the Agricultural sector. We interviewed five farmers from all over Kentucky during the course of a 3-day video shoot.
Two camera interview setup on-location at Elmwood Farms.
Capturing b-roll in the crop fields.
In our crew we had our primary interview unit, including Eleanor our lead producer, Jen helping with makeup and field producing, and myself directing and running the cameras. Justin and Brandon helped us during setup and then moved to capturing b-roll while we did our interviews, maximizing our limited time at each location. We captured aerial footage at most locations as well, which really showed the scale of the farming operations that were going on.
Our second shoot took place a few months later, and this one would be focused on Kentucky business owners. We interviewed seven business owners from industries including agri-tech, food and beverage, construction, and the arts. Again, our shoots took us all over the Commonwealth of Kentucky with our entire crew and all of our equipment in tow.
Tweaking audio and doing final makeup on our shoot with Jonathan Webb, CEO of AppHarvest.
A more dramatic lighting setup in the seating area of the theater at Appalshop in Whitesburg, KY.
It was interesting to see how each person we interviewed handled the topics of and about climate change; some didn’t want to use that specific phrase and were careful to watch what they said, while others went all in and spoke passionately from years of being negatively impacted by changes in the climate. We did our best to be respectful and let people share their stories openly and transparently, and took that approach all the way through the edits as well to make sure we preserved their voices accurately.
Below are the two final videos, we’re really happy with how they turned out and so was our client! We’re continually humbled and excited to work on such worthwhile projects right here in our backyard.