La Mode Verte
Environmental Awareness Through Media ProductionsArchive for La Mode Verte
LMV Set to Film in the Cayman Islands
La Mode Verte (LMV) director Ed Scott-Clarke is set to travel to the Cayman Islands, a British protectorate in the Caribbean, to investigate and film the effects of marine debris on the island chain. With the kind support of several charities, the research trip should provide interesting and educational footage of one of the biggest problems affecting our oceans today.
The Cayman Islands are well known for its turtles. Unfortunately, these marine creatures are very susceptible to plastic waste, particularly plastic bags which look and move very much like jellyfish when underwater. As such a large part of the Islands’ economy is based on tourism, it will be interesting to see whether marine debris is having any kind of impact. All footage gathered in this trip will be used in LMV’s documentary ‘Plastic Shores’ due to be released in early 2012. The trailer and website will be released in the near future.
LMV Gets New Logo
La Mode Verte has just received our new logo designed by James Knight. We hope to release a range of organic cotton, fair-trade T-shirts with the logo at the same time as our film’s trailer and website (hopefully by the end of August).
LMV Attends the 5th International Marine Debris Conference
The 5th International Marine Debris Conference (5IMDC) has kicked off in Honolulu, Hawaii. The conference is over-subscribed and has attracted conservationists, industrialists, politicians, environmentalists, and local leaders. So far we have interviewed Jean-Michel Cousteau, founder of the Ocean Futures Society and son of legendary ocean explorer Jacques Cousteau, and Congressman Sam Farr, who has pioneered marine conservation issues in US politics. Following the event we are flying to Big Island, the largest and most volcanic island in the archipelago, where we are planning to film Kamilo beach. This is where the Great Pacific Garbage Patch makes landfall in Hawaii and marine debris washes ashore. Plastics cover the beach so thickly that the Hawaiian Wildlife Fund (and other groups) have to clear it on a near weekly basis.
LMV Arrives in Ocean Shores
After a long journey North from San Francisco, LMV director Ed Scott-Clarke and director of photography Leria Polidori have made it to Ocean Shores in the north-westernmost state of Washington. Despite enormous rain-storms throughout Oregon, Ocean Shores has beautiful blue skies although temperatures remain pretty chilly. This morning we attended the 24th Annual Beachcombers Fair where thousands of people from along the US Pacific coast brought marine debris to be evaluated by renowned oceanographer Dr Curtis Ebbesmeyer. Numerous different artisan stalls set up within the town’s conference centre sold a variety of different art pieces made purely from the various flotsam and jetsam washed up on the state’s beaches. Of particular interest were a series of glass fishing-net floats with ‘made in England’ written across their sides (these were promptly bought as LMV mascots). In order to make their way to the Washington coast, these orbs would have had to have travelled the oceanic gyres (orbital currents) of the Atlantic and the Arctic. Other glass floats (like the one above) originated from Japan, Taiwan, Norway, and Portugal. These particular type of float ceased production in the 1970s due to the increasing use of plastics.
‘Bag It’: A Film Everyone Needs to See
Bag It Intro from Suzan Beraza on Vimeo.
On Thursday night the LMV team attended the first (annual) San Francisco Green Film Festival opening. A lot of effort was put into the event with a great after-party (with absolutely no disposable plastic) held in the Embarcadero Center. The opening film was called ‘Bag It’ and tells the story of an average guy called Jeb in his search for the truth about plastic. It was two years in the making and makes for very good viewing so see the trailer above and order it here if you are interested.
LMV Makes it to San Francisco
After a gruelling 7 hour drive, the LMV team has made it to San Francisco from Los Angeles. We stay here for three days and attend the opening night of the San Francisco Green Film Festival on the 3rd March.
Funding for LMV’s Documentary ‘The World of the Plastic People’
http://www.pozible.com/index.php/embed_iframe/project/223/3249
LMV is undertaking the very long process of putting together a documentary describing the effects of plastics on the marine environment and human health. Filming alone will take about three months with the production team travelling to the USA, Monaco, France, and Belgium (so far confirmed). Despite the length of time involved, LMV is determined to keep costs down. All the editors, animators, and sound recordists have agreed to work for a discount price yet they still need a little something to live off. Every little helps so if you would like to support our project please click on the link above to be taken to our crowd-funding profile. Thank you!
LMV to Attend the San Francisco Green Film Festival
The LMV team, in our travels across the USA filming, are stopping by the San Francisco Green Film Festival, which runs from the 3rd to the 6th of March. The event is the first ever of its kind on the American west coast and will host over 70 film premiers, as well as numerous “festival-hub” parties, workshops, and lectures. The opening film is called ‘Bag It’ and focusses on our obsession with plastic bags. In the USA, 60,000 plastic bags are used every 5 seconds mostly for single use, quick disposal. ‘Bag It’ follows the story of Jeb Berrier, an ordinary American, as he investigates what happens to these bags once they are thrown away. Watch a short clip of the film here.
Dusty Pockets Production Photograph to be New Face of LMV
After much deliberation on the right image to use on the LMV business cards, the team has decided to use a photograph (below) by director of Dusty Pockets Productions’ director Leria Polidori. Leria is also working closely with LMV on our documentary (working title) ‘The World of the Plastic Man’. Dusty Pockets has kindly taken on the main production responsibilities for film and will fly to the Pacific to start filming early next year. A tentative completion date is set for the September next year. Keep checking back for updates.
LMV Editorial: ‘The Army of the Sun’
1st November 2010
La Mode Verte’s director, Edward Scott-Clarke, has just had his first article published for the Henry Jackson Society, a UK foreign policy government think tank. The article discusses the future energy needs of armed forces and how this will have a knock-on effect in the way the world as a whole views renewable resources. The military, in the US in particular, has been at the fore-front of changing human energy use patterns: from sail to coal in the 19th century, from coal to oil and then from oil to nuclear power. The current interest of the US military in renewable energy could be what the world needs to shift away from its reliance on fossil fuels.
Read the article: ‘The Army of the Sun: the US military’s move away from Fossil Fuels’.
