Client work · 2024
Our Waters
A film made for the Indigenous Watersheds Initiative and MakeWay, visiting five First Nations and Indigenous organizations across BC to show the watershed restoration and stewardship work the initiative funded.
The Indigenous Watersheds Initiative put a one-time investment into watershed work led by First Nations and Indigenous organizations across British Columbia. Over a few years it funded restoration, protection and stewardship projects around the province. As the program came to an end and moved into the longer-term Watershed Security Fund, the people behind it wanted to recognize what had been done.
Our Waters visits five of those projects: Hesquiaht First Nation on the west coast of Vancouver Island, Quatsino First Nation on northern Vancouver Island, Ts'il Kaz Koh First Nation and the Upper Fraser Fisheries Conservation Alliance in northern BC, and Stqeeye' Learning Society on Salt Spring Island. Guardians, elders, knowledge keepers and nation staff explain the work in their own words. Each community also received a shorter cut of its own chapter to keep and use.
Salmonberry Studios came to the project through referrals from nations it was already working with. Benjamin Hazel directed, shot and edited the film, mostly as a one-person crew, with community members and initiative staff helping on each trip. It premiered at an in-person screening in Vancouver, where people from across the province gathered to mark the close of the initiative, and received a standing ovation. It was also shared online and through press releases.
What it did
Premiered at an in-person screening in Vancouver marking the close of the Indigenous Watersheds Initiative, attended by people from communities across BC. Standing ovation. Shared online and through press releases. Shorter chapter cuts delivered to each participating community. Studio was referred by First Nations it already worked with.
- Made for
- Indigenous Watersheds Initiative, with MakeWay
- Year
- 2024
- Where
- Hesquiaht First Nation (west coast of Vancouver Island), Quatsino First Nation (northern Vancouver Island), Ts'il Kaz Koh First Nation (near Burns Lake) and Upper Fraser Fisheries Conservation Alliance (northern BC), Stqeeye' Learning Society (Salt Spring Island), British Columbia
- Our role
- Direction, production, cinematography and editing, working largely as a one-person crew alongside community members and Indigenous Watersheds Initiative staff
- Running time
- 18 min
- watershed security
- Indigenous-led stewardship
- First Nations
- Indigenous Guardians
- water restoration
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