Tens of millions of sockeye salmon swim up the rivers of Bristol Bay every year, the world's largest sockeye salmon run on Earth.
The $1.5 billion salmon industry in Bristol Bay supports 14,000 jobs in commercial fishing, sport fishing, and tourism. Pebble Mine would put this industry and a way of life at risk, while destroying over 15 square miles of natural habitat...
... and that's only the beginning.
Stand Together
to Stop Pebble Mine
and Save Bristol Bay.
Tens of millions of sockeye salmon swim up the rivers of Bristol Bay every year, the world's largest sockeye salmon run on Earth.
The $1.5 billion salmon industry in Bristol Bay supports 14,000 jobs in commercial fishing, sport fishing, and tourism. Pebble Mine would put this industry and a way of life at risk, while destroying over 15 square miles of natural habitat...
... and that's only the beginning.
Stand Together
to Stop Pebble Mine and
Save Bristol Bay.
Client: Orvis and Trout Unlimited. Director: Nate Beaman. Script: Erik Jefferis and Nate Beaman. Illustration: Nick Staab.
Animation: Erik Jefferis. Sound Design: Jeff Guerra.
Client: Orvis and Trout Unlimited. Director: Nate Beaman. Script: Erik Jefferis and Nate Beaman.
Illustration: Nick Staab. Animation: Erik Jefferis. Sound Design: Jeff Guerra.
Client: Orvis and Trout Unlimited. Director: Nate Beaman.
Script: Erik Jefferis and Nate Beaman. Illustration: Nick Staab.
Animation: Erik Jefferis. Sound Design: Jeff Guerra.
Client: Orvis and Trout Unlimited.
Director: Nate Beaman.
Script: Erik Jefferis and Nate Beaman.
Illustration: Nick Staab.
Animation: Erik Jefferis.
Sound Design: Jeff Guerra.
Story and Visuals
Orvis has been a great supporter of worthy causes. One of those is Bristol Bay.
When we saw Orvis was supporting the Bristol Bay efforts, we knew we wanted to be a part of it. The next question was how - we had worked for Orvis on other projects, all live-action, and have had amazing experiences working collaboratively with them. Pushing out of comfort zones, however, sometimes yields the greatest results. And for Orvis, this was animation. For many companies, a first animation can be a bit daunting - the process is new and the end result is wide open. Is this going to turn out to look like a PowerPoint star wipe? Or the special effects from Avatar?
Story and Visuals
Orvis has been a great supporter of worthy causes. One of those is Bristol Bay.
When we saw Orvis was supporting the Bristol Bay efforts, we knew we wanted to be a part of it. The next question was how - we had worked for Orvis on other projects, all live-action, and have had amazing experiences working collaboratively with them. Pushing out of comfort zones, however, sometimes yields the greatest results. And for Orvis, this was animation. For many companies, a first animation can be a bit daunting - the process is new and the end result is wide open. Is this going to turn out to look like a PowerPoint star wipe? Or the special effects from Avatar?
To help nail down the style of this piece, we turned to an illustrator we've wanted to work with for a while - Nick Staab. He helped develop visuals that showed off the beautiful landscape of Alaska and created an emotional connection with the audience.
Boards were sketched, character designs were developed and before we knew it we had a visual concept for the piece.
Characters
Bristol Bay is at risk from intentional and unintentional intrusions from the development of the mine. The entire ecosystem could see far-reaching damaging effects, affecting both animals and people.
One challenge we had was developing a spot that acknowledged the risks affected everything, not just animals, and not just people. In that way, we decided to include characters in the piece, but in a way that puts them in equal focus as the surrounding landscape. In this way, we could show that local and global people will be affected while still acknowledging that these damages will also devastate salmon, bears, and the rest of the Bristol Bay ecosystem. Our story follows an on-looking boy, watching as his familiar surroundings fall apart around him.
Fly Fishing
Animators fly fish. Fly fisherman animate. That's the deal, right? Nope. At least not in our case. So when it came to animating the fly fisherman in the river, resident animator Erik Jefferis overly confidently animated the fisherman in a way that he would fly fish - like a misguided hack. Seeking approval from our in-house fly fishing guru Max, he was met with utter disappointment.
Thankfully, all it took was a downtown, middle of the road fly fishing lesson, the line whipping down the sidewalk towards onlookers to get the motion down. Now our little animating fry has become a full-grown fish, ready to swim towards the headwaters. (Nailed it.)
Basically, he's ready for the next fly fishing animation.
After finishing the spot with amazing sound design from Jeff Guerra, we had ourselves a project to be proud of!
Learn how to get involved at
orvis.com/savebristolbay
