Bidarki: Where Science and Spirit Meet

Bidarki: Where Science and Spirit Meet from Kevin Co on Vimeo.

Subsistence. What does that word mean to you? To many Alaskans, subsistence is a way of life: living off the land and the ocean. There's a saying here that "When the tide is out, the table is set." Take a stroll at low tide and you will encounter a life clinging to every available surface. Rainbows of snails. Carpets of mussels. Forests of kelp.

This is a video about Bidarkis, An invertebrate critter that is important for both native culture and modern science.

I edited for an upcoming exhibit at the Pratt Museum along with Wendy Erd, another local filmmaker.

Eyes Wide Open

Eyes Wide Open from Kevin Co on Vimeo.

Here's a video I made for Memorial Day Weekend, at the request of a few non-profits in town. It's been a while since I've done a war video... a long while. it was a powerful event. Thanks to Anne Nixon who coordinated all the artists, and thanks to all the volunteers who put their time into the project. Here's the video synopsis:

A group of artists gathered on Memorial Day Weekend in Homer Alaska to remember Alaskan soldiers who had fallen during the Iraq War. 108 pairs of combat boots to symbolize our Alaskan troops and 400 pairs of shoes and sandals to represent the Iraqi civilians deaths. Here is a short video interview with Charlie Gibson, one of the volunteers who participated in the event.

Chiswell Ridge in HD!

Welcome to the Chiswell Ridge from Kevin Co on Vimeo.

OK. So we've seen this before... but have you seen it before on HD? I thought not! I have recently begun an affair with Vimeo. Benefits over Youtube and Google Video are being able to show your films in HD and 500MB max filesizes. All the others limit you to 100MB per file. Plus, these videos just look better.

Archive Film: Nothing is Better, Nothing is Best

Nothing is Better, Nothing is Best from Kevin Co on Vimeo.

We love 24 hour film fesivals. Here is a film that we produced for the 2006 DramaSlam. The theme of the film was drawn out of a hat: "Nothing is better, nothing is best". Here was our documentary interpretation of that concept, illustrated by these 3 wonderful young men that we met on the road to Homer.
Enjoy.

Rough Cuts: Picking fish from our nets

Just to be clear, these videos I'm posting about Bristol Bay are rough scenes from a documentary film that I am currently editing (amongst other projects). It's my intention to get my vision of Bristol Bay out into the public sphere so that others can see what I've seen. That said, these initial scenes are just a few out of many many many that need to be cut and distilled into a finished form.

In 2006, the commercial harvest of red salmon was 44.3 million fish. This was the 8th largest return of fish in the last 50 years of Alaskan statehood. The wild salmon runs of Bristol Bay are unique in that this is the last place in the world where this natural phenomena exists.

All kinds of people depend on this valuable, sustainable resource. Native communities have subsisted on this fish for 10,000 years. Commercial fishermen have been here for the last 150 years and that tradition continues today. All fishing is still done by hand in a season that lasts for only 3 weeks.

Every fish that lands in the net needs to be picked out of the net by hand. In 2006, that means 29 million individual fish were killed by human hands.

Think about that as you watch this video.