Nuclear Free World?

In telling a story on the state of nuclear proliferation, I wanted to approach the subject from several different angles. First, I wanted to address the international rhetoric supporting arms control and nuclear weapons abolition. This was well suited to a map projection, which provides snapshot of how many regions, countries, and leaders are involved in the issue and how global the verbal consensus is on the issue.

Taking these quotes, I wanted to juxtapose them against both contemporary briefs of how different nations’ policies are being enacted and how this is indicative either potential hope or status quo in actually approaching a world without WMD. In researching the background of the major nations involved in international diplomacy around the issue (DPRK, India, and Pakistan are not signatories to the Non-Proliferation Treaty) it was clear that the rhetoric could not match actual spending and weapons deployments.

Lastly, the timeline is an amazingly effective storying telling toll because it so easily allows you to present multidimensional to the user through a intuitive interface. The timeline tells the story of the major arms treaties since 1945 and juxtaposes them with weapons levels of the USSR and US. From watching the animation, the user will find that clearly some treaties were effective and delivered quickly and some were ineffective to say the least.

The overall picture I hope to provide is one that examines the state of our nuclear-armed world in an engaging way that inspires the user to dig into the contemporary politics, historical questions, or strategic questions around the issue.

The Uptake: Inception, Breakthroughs, and Uncertainty

The news industry is suffering one of its worst years in modern history, including a splintering audience, plummeting revenue and the inevitable layoffs that follow. But even in this in environment some have found ways to find success in the fault lines of the media landscape.

The Uptake, a left-leaning Minneapolis-based journalism group has been working to not just survive but thrive under the current conditions by harnessing citizen journalists and live internet streaming.

I spoke with Chris Dykstra, Chairman of the board for The UpTake, asking him first about the news industry as it is today.

Full story

Fotoweek Brings Pulitzer Winners Together

Photographers discuss the experiences behind iconic images

Pulitzer Prize-winning photojournalists from The Washington Post convened this Saturday to discuss the sometimes quirky and often wrenching stories behind their award-winning photographs.

Speaking at the Newseum in Washington, D.C. for a recording of Inside Media, 25 year veteran photojournalist Matthew Lewis talked about the difficulty of capturing political figures.

'You have 25 seconds'

"I decided I would put two cameras around my neck, one with color, one with black and white," Lewis said about his brief photo shoot with Ron Ziegler, Press Secretary to President Richard Nixon. "He walked in and said, 'You have 25 seconds.'"

"I don't think any photographer goes out thinking they're going to win," Lewis went on to say about his haphazard experience.

Winner of the 2000 Pulitzer Prize for his coverage of the Kosovo War along with Carol Guzy, Michael Williamson talked about covering the aftermath of battles in a civil war.

"I was literally going to the towns where I heard there were the most atrocities," Williamson said about how he found a man sitting on a bucket containing the charred remnants of a relative's body in a bucket. "He was waiting for the U.N…. he thought I was with them so he stopped me."

In front of their cameras

Carol Guzy and Michel duCille won their first Pulitzer in 1986 for their coverage of mudslides in Colombia following the Nevado del Ruiz eruption.

Talking about his photo of Omayra Sanchez, the young girl who became trapped in a pool of water and who died from exposure after a three day, Internationally-viewed saga, duCille said, "you can't believe she's right there… I left before she died."

The Newseum held the event as part of FotoWeek/DC series of events. FotoWeek's declared purpose is to, "attract those who make a living practicing the art, science, business, education, and craft of photography." Events for FotoWeek concluded Saturday.