Documentary First Podcast Episode 201: Human Footprints - Part 1

Witness an unexpected journey of science and photography colliding with filmmaking to become an amazing PBS series called “Human Footprint”. Who said science couldn’t be engaging and thought provoking?

In this Part 1 episode, Christian and Jason chat with the creators and directors of “Human Footprint”, Neil Losin & Nathan Dappen. They tell us their journey of making “terrible” videos, a partnership with fellow geek scientist Shane Campbell-Staton and the serendipitous connection to PBS that allowed them to share their vision: cultivating a love for science, looking after the Earth and observing mankind’s impact on the environment and culture.

This is an amazing journey into filmmaking from an unconventional starting point. The perseverance, grind and fun along the way, including making connections with the right people at the right time, result in a great story about getting funding from unconventional sources.

Timecodes:

Introduction to our guests. 0:00
How the series came to be. 2:51
The hopeful impact and awareness of story on the viewer. 7:01
How they met and started collaborating. 10:54
Living on two different coasts and have never lived int he same place and possibly see each other more than their partners. 17:39
How long did it take to get the show greenlit? 21:42
How did they get to the pitch point? 28:18
The importance of getting a grant. 32:25
How did you did the grants help to get you started? 36:39
How did you pitch the idea to PBS? 41:30
What was the budget for the series? 46:02
The difference between producing and directing. 52:10
DocuView Déjà Vu 55:13
Documentary First Update 1:05:21

DocuView Déjà Vu:

NEIL: “Particle Fever”, 2013, 99 mins, Watch on “Curiosity Stream” with a subscription, IMDB Link:
Particle Fever (2013) ⭐ 7.4 | Documentary
JASON: Check out “Human Footprint”, 2023, PBS, Series, IMDB Link:
Human Footprint (TV Series 2023– ) ⭐ 6.8 | Documentary