stick with it…
When Michael Fishbach set out for his day of boating around the beautiful waters of the Sea of Cortez, he probably didn’t think that it would be the day he and his friends would become wildlife heroes. As luck would have it, that’s exactly what happened.
The group came upon a stranded humpback whale who was so tangled in a mesh of nylon netting that she was beginning to drown, and as Fishbach noted in this video, was possibly an hour from death. The crew worked tirelessly for more than an hour to free the stranded whale and, to their elation, eventually succeeded. Then, magic happened.
What makes this interesting to me is that Dr. Fishbach, the founder of The Great Whale Conservancy, brought along a video camera with him and shot the entire episode.
This is the kind of thing that National Geographic would (or used to at least) die for… and excel in.
But what with budgetary cutbacks and the pressure for ratings on their TV channel, they don’t do this kind of stuff so much any more.
For National Geographic, this would be a very expensive film to make.
They would have to dispatch a crew and producer to The Sea of Cortez to accompany Dr. Fishback and his team, probably for weeks on end. That’s a lot right there, between travel and day rates and meals and airfares. And there is no guarantee that Fishback would even find a whale, let alone free one from a net.
Yet for Fishbach, making this video cost absolutely nothing.
He is there all the time.
He lives the experience daily, and he knows it better than anyone.
Once, to share even a tiny fraction of this with the general public was both complex and expensive.
Today, it is neither.
So long as Dr. Fishbach brings along his video camera.
What Fishbach needs is a bit of instruction on how to package this a bit better – but all the raw material is certainly there.
Fishback is not alone.
The world is filled with people who know what they are talking about, who live the kinds of experiences that it used to be hard to share in film and video.
No longer.
But the thing you don’t need anymore is National Geographic’s film crews (and their expense) or CNN’s or anyone else’s.
And now the videos and films can be made by people who actually know what they are talking about.
This was driven home to me last month in Geneva when we were working with the folks from UNHCR, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.
They’re the ones who are flying into a massive famine crisis in Ethiopia and Kenya and working with hundreds of thousands of people daily.
Give them a camera, teach them to shoot and cut and you are no longer at the mercy of CNN.
Give Dr. Fishbach a few basic lessons in how to produce a compelling story of his incredible work and you are no longer at the mercy of National Geographic channel.
This is the new world of television and video.
It’s a lot more honest.
It’s a lot less expensive.
It’s a lot more interesting.
It’s a lot more real.
