Behind the Lens: How Storytelling Shapes Conservation with Alex Goetz & Justin Grubb, Ep.102

Wildlife filmmakers Justin Grubb and Alex Goetz have traveled from Costa Rica to Alaska capturing stories that connect people and wildlife in powerful ways. As co-founders of Running Wild Media, their work has appeared on National Geographic, PBS, Discovery+, and Disney+, and has been recognized with multiple awards and Emmy nominations.

In this conversation, Justin and Alex share the behind-the-scenes realities of wildlife filmmaking- the challenges, the ethics, and the unexpected humor that happens along the way. From hellbenders in Appalachia to red wolves in North Carolina, they reveal how the most effective conservation stories aren’t about animals alone, they’re about people.

You’ll also hear how they build campaigns that lead to tangible impact, why hopeful storytelling is their most powerful tool, and how each of us can use our own voice to spark change, no matter what our day job is.

Highlights

• From prairie dog turf wars to crocodile close calls, what it’s really like in the field.
• The ethics of getting the perfect shot while respecting the wildlife.
• Why the most powerful wildlife stories focus on the humans connected to the animals.

What YOU Can Do

Justin and Alex shared several simple yet meaningful ways listeners can help support wildlife and conservation storytelling:

1. Tell your own story.
   Use your phone, words, art, or photos to share the nature you love. A story told with authenticity and hope can inspire others to care. 
2. Be a hopeful voice.
    Social media can get dark. Choose to amplify the good instead. Share solutions, success stories, or even small wins happening in your community. 
3. Engage locally.
   Attend or support environmental or wildlife film festivals. Ask questions, start conversations, and connect with filmmakers and advocates in your area. 
4. Support authentic conservation media.
   Donate to or share films that are fact-based and community-centered. Look for productions that give voice to both people and wildlife. 
5. Stay curious and informed.
   Fact-check what you share, know your sources, and help counter misinformation about wildlife and conservation issues. 
6. Look closer to home.
   You don’t need to go to the rainforest to find wonder. Start by noticing and appreciating the wildlife in your own backyard.

Resources

• Running Wild Media website
• Hellbent (Film) – about hellbenders and the Rights of Nature movement  
• Running Wild Instagram  
• Running Wild YouTube 
• Emerging Wildlife Conservation Leaders (EWCL) program 

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Transcript

 Hey friends, if you're here, I'm going to assume that you're interested in environmental stories, and in that case, I wanna recommend that you go check out the Healthy Seas podcast. I host that show for a fantastic marine conservation organization called Healthy Seas. The guests are all about making waves around the world to protect our oceans.

Go dive in and take a listen.

I am Crystal DiMiceli and welcome to the Forces for Nature Show. Do you find yourself overwhelmed with all the doom and gloom you hear of these days? Do you feel like you as just one person, can't really make a difference? Forces for nature cuts through that negativity. In each episode, I interview someone who is working to make the world more sustainable and humane.

Join me in learning from them and get empowered to take action so that you YouTube can become a force for nature.

Welcome to another episode of the Emerging Wildlife Conservation Leaders program series. Today, we’re heading behind the camera with two award-winning wildlife filmmakers who are redefining how conservation stories are told- Justin Grubb and Alex Goetz, the co-founders of Running Wild Media.

Together, they use storytelling not just to showcase the beauty of nature, but to inspire action and empower communities to protect it.

In this episode, you’ll hear how their journeys- from a biologist and a film student who met in college- to co-creating a company that has helped shift real-world conservation outcomes, like protecting red wolves and Appalachian streams, came to be.

You’ll also notice some construction noise in the background on my end—a building was literally being torn down next door while we recorded! But don’t worry- it doesn’t drown out the incredible stories Justin and Alex share.

Speaking of, these two are natural storytellers. From crocodile mishaps in Costa Rica to prairie dog turf wars in the Badlands, they bring humor, heart, and a hopeful lens to every tale.

So settle in- this one’s a fascinating look at the power of film to change how we see, and ultimately protect, the wild world around us.

[00:00:00] Crystal: Alex and Justin, thank you so much for joining me on Forces for Nature. It's so great to have you. 

[00:00:04] Justin: Yeah, it's great to be here. Thanks for having us. 

[00:00:07] Crystal: So let's dive right in.

, What first drew each of you into wildlife filmmaking? How did you begin? 

[00:00:14] Alex: Yeah, I think we both came from very different backgrounds.

and so it's the combination of kind of both of our backgrounds, I think is what makes running wild media so interesting. growing up, I loved animals. I wanted to do something with wildlife. I didn't know what that would be. I thought it would [00:00:30] be like. Typical kid careers, like I was gonna be a biologist or a marine biologist and work with whales or something, or a zookeeper or a veterinarian.

and then as I got into school, high school and junior high, I realized, wow, I'm really bad at science and I'm really bad at math in like the traditional learning sense, like how we learn it in classrooms. there's gotta be a different path for me. it wasn't until I saw the First Planet Earth Series, actually by the BBC, [00:01:00] that I was like, oh yeah, like people get paid to film animals.

And I had grown up watching Animal play in it and, national Geographic and TV shows on all these different programs, but it hadn't really clicked with me until that moment that I was like, there is a career telling stories about animals from a, a more artistic way, that fit better with. My brain, rather than the traditional 

sciences.

[00:01:26] Justin: So I really got interested in film and photography [00:01:30] and stuff when I was a little kid. But before even that, I was really into wildlife and I kind of grew up in like a suburban area just outside of Columbus, Ohio. So the wildlife I got to see were pretty small. Insects and frogs and little things. And so when I got to see really cool stuff like polar bears and elephants, it was on television.

And I love the show called Kratz Creatures, and this was before Za Booma Fu, which a lot of people have heard of. But Kratz [00:02:00] Creatures was on PBS and I just loved that show and I wanted to do what they did, just go out and see animals and study wildlife and do all the things to just get close to animals.

And that kind of led me on a path to becoming or studying wildlife biology. So I studied it in college. And I became a wildlife biologist for a little while, and that was really cool and stuff, and I absolutely enjoyed that, but decided that I would have more impact on, in the conservation space [00:02:30] by really working with people.

And so, you know, as a biologist, I would take cameras out and everything and take photos of the animals and showcase these animals to people whose, you know, backyards that they lived in and, you know, really get a, give them a sense of what was around them in a, in a way that they haven't seen before. And I started to see people's brains click when I was able to do that.

And so. I kind of, that kind of put me on a path of just sort of switching more towards [00:03:00] communication as a conservation strategy versus focusing on wildlife research and doing communications and creating films and taking photos of wildlife has honestly gotten me a lot closer to animals. And I've been able to work with a lot more communities and people and I've been able to see more regions around the world that way.

So it's been very, very rewarding. And you know, I would never do it any different, but I will say a fun story about Alex [00:03:30] and I and how we met in this space is. you know, we met in college and I was studying wildlife biology and he was studying film production, but we were both drawn to an organization called BG on tv.

It's Bowling Green on tv and it was a, like a club that was associated with our local PBS station. And I wanted to join because I couldn't do film production as a dual major, but I was still interested in it because it was just something that I had [00:04:00] always enjoyed as a kid, making home movies with friends and.

We walk into the same meeting and people are going around the table talking about like what projects they wanna work on and everything. And I had mentioned that I wanted to do a wildlife show for PBS, and I think everyone's reaction was like, why would anyone wanna do a wildlife show? That's like the weirdest thing.

But Alex was like, yes, let's do it. So we kind of teamed up there and we just started like filming local wildlife around Bowling [00:04:30] Green. You know, we went to some of the metro parks. We even went down to the Columbus Zoo to talk about coral reef conservation. And then that eventually led us to riding a grant and submitting that to our university to do a trip to Costa Rica to film wildlife and create a documentary about our travels and the wildlife in Costa Rica and the threats they face and the solutions to them.

And so that's really where Running Wild was born during that little trip to Costa Rica. And we've just been working together ever since 

[00:05:00] Crystal: [00:05:00] It's so funny that you say that everybody looked at you funny because I was sitting here thinking, I am sitting here thinking that, you know, anybody watching those wildlife movies or documentaries on TV and whatnot must feel like, oh, that's the dream job 

[00:05:17] Alex: until you pitch it to a room full of college students.

And 

That's 

[00:05:23] Justin: fantastic. 

[00:05:24] Crystal: So how do you decide what stories to tell , you went to Costa Rica [00:05:30] and,, from that point on, like how, how do you decide what stories to tell and then how do you decide to tell them?

[00:05:36] Alex: I think at the beginning it was whatever we could afford. It was literally like, we started as college students and like eventually we were living in the same apartment and we were just eating nothing like carrots and raisins to save up money because we knew we could get a spare, a Spirit Airlines flight to like, Honduras for like $200.

And so a lot of our beginning stories [00:06:00] just took place in like the Caribbean and Central America because it was the most affordable place we could go and find things. since it's just grown, I think to be, based on who approaches us and maybe the stories that they need help telling. and I think even today, now we're starting to shift to be more local.

we're both in the Midwest and while we've been fortunate to go all over the place filming stories in places like Indonesia and South America, it [00:06:30] feels like we can really make the biggest impact now in our own backyards. And so we've really started to focus more on that. It doesn't mean we won't go to the cool places because ironically, Justin literally just got back from Alaska.

So like we can't, I can't totally say we're only exclusively Midwest stories, but it's definitely where our focus is lately. 

[00:06:52] Justin: Yeah. Yeah. And I'll definitely say that like the process by which we decide what stories and how we tell the stories is [00:07:00] very impact driven and focused on creating some sort of a change within the human community.

And so. that determines who our audience is that determines what characters we choose in our film. That pretty much sets the overall tone that we have with our story. So, Alex mentioned Honduras. So we did a story in Honduras about a community who lives on an island that's literally, that could fit inside a soccer stadium.

You know, there's a hundred or so, [00:07:30] maybe, probably more people who live on this island. they lived on this island for, you know, three to 500 years. So it's like a very old community and the reef around them is in pretty good shape. And so the story that we were telling was about their relationship with the coral reef and how communities like that could live sustainably around coral and not over exploit their, their fisheries or pollute their waters and everything like that.

So it was kind of like this message [00:08:00] of hope showing that it is possible and these people are doing it, but. You know, stories that we have now, people will come to us and say, you know, we want, we wanna make this change in our community. We want more people to know about one of our programs. Or in some cases we identify an issue in the world that we wanna address.

And so we'll use the story to address that issue. And then we're very methodical about how we do it. We make sure that everything kind of lines up. And like I said, we do the solutions [00:08:30] focus where we're looking at what our impact is, and then work backwards and then we create our story with that framework in mind.

[00:08:37] Crystal: Yeah, I was actually just gonna ask, what is the process of bringing them to life? But you just mentioned how you actually work backwards. 

[00:08:44] Justin: Yeah, yeah. So I could give a pretty decent example of a recent film that we just came out with called Hal Bent , it's focused on Hell Benders and I used to work with Hell Benders when I was a biologist, and they're a creature that I really, really like and think.

They're super [00:09:00] fascinating. There's not a lot known about them, but they're also facing a lot of threats in the wild. And you know, where they live in the Appalachian Mountains is also experiencing a lot of exploitation from the natural resource extraction. So there's a lot of fracking in that area. And when you have a lot of fracking, you have a lot of communities that are suffering from that.

You know, there's communities that are exposed to high levels of pollution and toxins, which just pretty much [00:09:30] overlaps with the hellbender. The hellbender is also experiencing siltation and pollution being put into the river. So like our project was to focus on marginalized communities living in rural Appalachian mountains and their fight against these.

You know, natural resource extracting entities. And so the campaign essentially was to use a film to elevate a local group who used a grassroots movement called Rights of Nature to [00:10:00] protect themselves and the hellbender, and promote that as a legal framework for others to use in their backyards to stop fracking from impacting their communities.

And so, that was the goal of the campaign. And in order to make it happen, we created the film. We chose two characters that represented the region very well, and we did a ton of local screenings. We did a ton of screenings with local nonprofits and groups that were interested in this. We had a legal partner who [00:10:30] offered this service, who was part of the film, who also was in a lot of our screenings and could talk about the rights of nature and the framework for using it.

And then we did film festivals all around the country to try and push this rights of nature movement so that people knew about it. Would be connected to resources that they could utilize to use it in their own communities. And then we also pushed for favorable public opinion of Rights of nature to help with the court cases that were going on with the community [00:11:00] featured in the film in Pennsylvania.

So that's like a really nice example of kind of how our projects work. 

[00:11:05] Crystal: Was there an organization that came to you with the desire to do all of those things? Or did you guys know that, to make the follow-up impact and go to the local communities and whatnot, that that was from you?

[00:11:19] Justin: Yeah, that pretty much was all from us. there wasn't anybody that really started this other than a retreat that we had all gone to [00:11:30] in 2020. Basically it was a retreat full of filmmakers and we had a private donor who was willing to put down the funds to create a film, any film. And we all kind of came together and pitched our ideas and discussed which one would be most impactful and which one thought would be successful and everything.

And that's the one that kind of rose to the top. And so we decided to go with this project, and it was all self-driven. You know, we reached out to all the [00:12:00] partners, we found the characters, we coordinated all of the production elements and the biologists in it and everything. And so that was kind of all self-driven.

And what's interesting about it is like. You know, we're very thankful for the situation that we were in because I feel like we would've had a very difficult time trying to pitch this story to somebody because it is anti-fracking. And it does touch on some political topics where like [00:12:30] we, our characters don't speak favorably about their experience with the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Environmental Protection in Pennsylvania.

And so for us to go into some project like that and have those in a grant, I feel like we wouldn't have been successful. So having money that wasn't restricted politically, we were able to kind of tell the story as it was and has the impact as it did. 

[00:12:58] Crystal: Getting funding for [00:13:00] this kind of work, , that's one way to do it.

Is that how people get funded usually to do wildlife documentaries, 

[00:13:07] Alex: I feel. How long have we been doing this now? 20, like 2017. We've been full-time doing this and I think every single year my idea of how to make these things. Has changed. Like every year I'm like, all right, I think I figured it out. This is where the funding comes from and this is how we make this thing.

and honestly, I think that's more [00:13:30] reflective of the industry is that it, there isn't a set way to go about it. I think Hellbent is a good example and actually I think it's probably our favorite example of how our projects are supported. So we had a private donor approach us, and that's where Hellbent came to fruition.

And actually since the completion of that film, they've been willing to put up the budget for the next project. We are, we're starting to see that I think with some other projects that we're working on. And it's really nice because it is kind of [00:14:00] unrestricted creativity in that way, whereas, before it's interesting to talk about the wildlife film industry is like not in a great place right now.

a lot of the distributors just don't have the funding to, commission a lot of projects, whereas in like 2022 to 2024, maybe even earlier, they were just like buying up everything. and I think they just kind of bought too much. That's a whole side conversation, but. [00:14:30] Obviously when you go to some of these distributors, like a PBS or something, there's a lot of restrictions that come with, you know, accepting the funding from them.

And oftentimes it, it means you can't speak about political topics or you can't accept money from a certain donor to produce a project. And it does become a little bit more challenging in that way. And so the projects that we are kind of taking from like an idea through the edit, those are projects we typically have to find either a private donor [00:15:00] or some conservation organizations that we've worked with to come and contribute some funding towards it so that we can make them happen.

But in addition to that, like we'll get hired as camera crews, to go out and film things. And so, you know, that's just like, here's our budget. Can you go film Polar bears? Can you go film Prairie Dogs out in South Dakota? Like, it can be kind of anything. but oftentimes that's us, like 

supporting somebody else's project.

[00:15:26] Crystal: To get even further into the nitty gritty of [00:15:30] making wildlife documentaries. I wanna ask you kind of for a behind the scenes glimpse, for instance, I've heard that many documentary scenes are, are multiple individuals or scenes cut together to tell one cohesive story?

How do you bring 'em together and does a new story sometimes present itself when your intention may have been another? 

[00:15:52] Alex: I feel like this is a good opportunity to talk about prairie dogs again, which I'm not unhappy about. I, I think, [00:16:00] yeah, oftentimes you'll find that sometimes it'll be different animals that will be cut together to create, a storyline.

I think if you're really lucky, you get to see one animal, do a behavior and kind of get a full story with that single individual. oftentimes we go out with the intent to film something like that, and so we go out with kind of the most knowledge we can, to figure out like the habitat we need to be in, where to find the animal, what time to find them, what [00:16:30] season they might be doing, the behavior that we're looking for.

To try and make our chances as high as likely that we'll, we'll get that. but for instance, like I went and worked on a National Geographic TV show a few years ago out in the Badlands, and I spent six weeks in the Badlands filming a whole variety of animals. And some of the sequences definitely were sequences that were just kind of a couple different animals all cut together to look like one.

but there was one particular storyline that they had hoped we would get with [00:17:00] prairie dogs, that ended up shifting with what we actually saw. So two different prairie dog families that actually built their burrows, too close together. And so one of the prairie dogs, as it was excavating, was actually kicking dirt over into the other prairie dogs burrow, and it became kind of this weird neighbor turf war.

That was just not something we expected to see. And so when moments like that come out, these kind of unexpected moments, you definitely wanna like turn the camera on those to just [00:17:30] see how they play out. And it literally became Prairie Dogs pushing dirt, like throwing it back at each other. And this just escalated over the course of a day where finally it was like all these prairie dogs were just fighting each other.

And what is only described as a prairie dog turf war, I feel like it's the best way to describe it. That's amazing. And, and it was just because they set up too close together. And so that was something that I think you can't expect to see. and it [00:18:00] wasn't in a script and it was just purely by being present for as many days as we were.

You kind of see these little moments unfold and you get kind of this whole storyline that emerges from these couple of prairie dogs. And it's one of those like nice moments where, you know, like, okay, as you see it on screen. You know, it's not just a hodgepodge of different prairie dogs all cut together.

It's this one little group of them. 

[00:18:24] Justin: Yeah. And with that being said, sometimes it does go the other way where [00:18:30] we, for example, we spent a month in Yellowstone filming red foxes mousing. It's where they kind of run along top of the snow jump and then they're able to catch the mice and voles and stuff that dig tunnels and everything underneath thick snow.

And we spent a month trying to film these foxes and I, we probably filmed a handful of 'em and I think we spent about 40 hours perming. And that includes like searching for the [00:19:00] foxes, getting set up, filming foxes that don't do the ING behavior. And when the final sequence came out, it was like maybe.

20 seconds and it like, I think they put together a couple different foxes to make you feel like it was one fox on a hunt looking for a mouse. And then it was just kind of, kind of a quick little thing, but like a lot of effort went into getting the footage for something like that. And so, yeah, that's a pretty decent example.

I would also say like we [00:19:30] do have times where we're working on a bigger story, like a whole film, and then we get a new bit of information or something changes like politically or you know, environmentally where the whole story kind of shifts. And in which case we have to kind of tell a new story or it improves the story that we're currently working on.

And that even happened with Beck. You know, we were looking at telling a story about ethylene cracker factories getting put in along the Ohio River, and then COVID happened, [00:20:00] and then Trump got in a fight with China and China pulled their funding out and so they didn't end up finishing one of the factories and they didn't build the other three that they were going to.

And so we pivoted our story a little bit to be mostly about a local issue in a grassroots movement, rather a regional issue and an issue that was being fought on multiple fronts. And so it kind of simplified the story, but I think it made it a little bit more digestible and easier to pull into an impact campaign.

[00:20:28] Alex: Yeah, I think Hellbent, what [00:20:30] was it was gonna be our solution to a larger story was to just like feature these two women in their community and be like, yeah, you could use rights of nature if all this bad stuff's happening. And it was gonna be just like a moment. And then we filmed the first shoot with them and we're like, these are the best people in the world.

They're like the greatest characters and this needs to be the whole film. Yeah. This is the story They were great to 

[00:20:53] Crystal: watch. I enjoyed them. I, I, yeah. Saw Hellbent and I really liked it.

So flexibility is obviously [00:21:00] very needed because animals are unpredictable and so is the environment and politics and, and all of that. but how do you balance getting the perfect shot with also respecting the animals and the environment? You don't wanna stress them out. are there moments where you've had to stop filming for the sake of the animal?

[00:21:19] Justin: Oh yeah. That's like one of our biggest things as a production company is that we do not do anything to stress an animal out. I mean, it, it's hard to [00:21:30] balance that because you being there obviously is gonna change the animals. Behavior, but the point of mitigating that as much as possible is kind of like what we try our best to do.

And that honestly is just good ethical process because you're getting the best natural behavior out of that animal and you're also just not undoing the thing that you're there to do. You know, the whole purpose of the film is to create some sort of impact. And if you're [00:22:00] there, you know, impacting the animal in a negative way, then it's pretty much gonna run counter to the film that you're working on.

and one big thing I will say is like we went to Indonesia to set up a system of trail cameras in the canopy to get footage of a horn bill species and it coming in and nesting.

We wanted to do a full nesting sequence of the species so that we can pull together a nice little scene to where, you know, you see the animal create the nest cavity and then [00:22:30] raise the chick during the whole season. And then they come out at the end and we brought all of our tree climbing gear out there.

We hiked hours and hours up. Mountains to get to this site. We finally got to the site, we start putting up all of the equipment, and we heard squawking coming from inside the nest cavity, which indicated that someone was already inside and our local scientific team didn't know that the bird was inside.

Apparently they had switched like two days before, and the bird snuck in there and built the nest [00:23:00] when the team was moving, so they didn't know. And we basically just called it. We pulled all of our stuff down and we left because if we were to continue working, there was a chance that we would've spooked, the bird could have potentially abandoned the nest site, which would've impacted the breeding and the rearing of this chick.

And so that's a sequence that we do not have in a film that we're working on right now because we decided not to push it and to elevate the wellbeing of the animal over [00:23:30] the story that we were 

[00:23:30] Alex: trying to tell.

[00:23:32] Crystal: do you have a funny or surprising moment from your filming that you can share?, 

[00:23:37] Justin: I think my favorite moments in our working relationship is when we were in Costa Rica filming our first wildlife documentary, and it was a little more like Jeff Corwin style than what we do now. So I was kind of running around, like looking at stuff and in one of the sequences I. Was feeding a crocodile a piece of fish to get it to come out of the water.[00:24:00] 

And so I'm like, you know, doing the whole Steve Irwin thing with the food and getting the crocodile to come up. And this is a captive crocodile, 

[00:24:08] Alex: by the 

[00:24:09] Justin: way. Yeah, this is, this is at a wildlife rehabilitation center. Ina that's an important that I had been turned there right after 

[00:24:16] Crystal: the ethical question. 

[00:24:18] Justin: It was part of its feeding, it was part of its feeding thing.

And so, yeah, I was at a wildlife rehabilitation center in Costa Rica that I had worked at prior, through a study abroad [00:24:30] program. And we were getting the crocodile to, you know, come out to showcase like the animal and everything. But the crocodile jumped and lunged at me, and Alex was filming and vicariously reacted to the crocodile jumping at me too.

So we have a shot of me getting the crocodile of the water and the camera just. Shoots off like the, the, the footage is like everywhere. It was really funny to go back and look at that 

[00:24:56] Alex: , If we would've just released that clip and then no one ever saw [00:25:00] Justin again, it would've been a safe assumption that the crocodile had gotten him.

There were multiple crocodile instances with a wild crocodile. I was filming one in Costa Rica and just, I was down on the bank of the river leaning over and Justin's literally got me by the back of the shirt and he is just holding me just in case it, that wild one did the same thing. He could just try and yank me out quickly before it got me.

[00:25:25] Crystal: These are the non-glamorous parts of wild night filmmaking. 

[00:25:30] Justin: [00:25:30] yeah. Another like scene in Costa Rica. We were filming two spectacle owls. In the forest and we were just sitting there filming 'em and everything and we're like, all right, we got our shots. And then we stopped recording and then moved on.

And then we were watching that footage back after we got back from Costa Rica and realized in the middle of that there were three owls and they were switching places and moving and like, we didn't even see it while we were looking at the footage we had like slowed it down or like replayed it. And we had the ability to like look [00:26:00] back and we'd be like, wait a second, this owl's facial pattern is different.

than it was a second ago. And it literally just like another one came from behind and just replaced it and was like, oh, that was weird. 

[00:26:12] Crystal: That was planned on their behalf. They're like, Hey, let's see these guys notice. 

[00:26:15] Justin: Yeah, they were just playing with us. And then like in Alaska, literally like last week, we were filming a sunset.

And we were like, had our cameras and everything focused on the sunset. And I turned around and there's a red fox just sniffing our bags, like [00:26:30] literally five feet behind us. I'm like, oh man, that's so cool. There's a red fox. So we like shifted around very quietly and I like squatted on the ground and just got footage and photos of this fox as it just kind of like, check this out, sniffed our campsite and then eventually moved on.

But stuff like that happens a lot. 

[00:26:48] Crystal: That's so fun. the job of a wildlife filmmaker or a videographer is often romanticized 

What are some of the challenges that come with field work that you don't see, [00:27:00] like perhaps getting eaten by a crocodile could be one. 

[00:27:03] Alex: Fortunately it hasn't happened yet. I mean, I feel like the challenges definitely change every year. obviously getting things funded is always gonna be a challenge, but now we're both new parents.

Justin's got what, a one and a half year old, and I have a 10 month old. That definitely impacts things. Whereas we used to go out for, you know, six months of the year on projects. We're [00:27:30] definitely trying to spend more time in our backyards filming stories that are close to home, and also spend time with our families.

So there is that challenge. but I mean, we've gotten left in places or not picked up in spots or the hours are long and you don't see a lot sometimes like the red Fox story in Yellowstone, I think we got most of our foxing or mouthing behavior in the last few days in the rest of the four weeks was just driving or [00:28:00] hiking through snow.

And so long hours is a lot of long hours. 

[00:28:05] Crystal: Cold conditions. Yeah, 

[00:28:08] Justin: yeah, yeah, for sure. There's all kinds of variable weather. There's insects, mosquitoes, you know, I would say we're often very hungry when we're in these situations 'cause it's like. It's hard to break for food when you're out in the middle of everything.

And in some cases you can't have food because there's bears [00:28:30] or there's other wildlife around that will smell the food and you don't wanna like impact that behavior there. And you have to be very careful about when you eat, where you eat and how much you carry. And sometimes you're just out working 12 hours in a row and you just don't have the time to stop and have lunch or you're, throwing down oatmeal or a cliff bar early on in the morning and that's gonna sustain you for the next six hours.

And so, that's tough and you just have to have a [00:29:00] high tolerance for baking in the sun and being wet and hungry and Yeah, it's tough. Well that, 

[00:29:08] Crystal: well that right there would do me in, because I have a high, Propensity to getting hangry. So 

[00:29:14] Justin: that, 

[00:29:16] Crystal: that's it. That's, that would be the end of me.

[00:29:18] Justin: It's, yeah, it's like all of those combination of things coming together at one time, but then also like dealing with not finding the animal or you work yourself up over four hours to get the [00:29:30] perfect shot and then someone just drives up and yells what you looking at and scares the thing away. Or like someone walks in front of your big camera lens and set up with their iPad to take a photo up. Close of the thing. You spent three hours trying to acclimate to your presence and oh my god, runs away. And you're just hungry, you're cold, you're covered in mosquitoes, and then now you have to not kill this person who just ruined your shot.

You know? It could be very frustrating sometimes. So having a lot of patience in these situations is really important. 

[00:29:58] Crystal: For [00:30:00] sure. Besides the physical challenges, I'm also curious about the unseen ones. For example, when you told the story about the red wolves, what public misunderstandings did you find most challenging to overcome in the film?

[00:30:15] Justin: Yeah, that's a good one. I mean, a lot of the challenges are clearing up misinformation that's out there in the world. And so when we pull our stories together, we have to be very careful about how we present information and what information we do present. And [00:30:30] it's always important to present solutions and call to actions to that.

And so it gives the people who are misinformed or are against what the story is about. opportunity to kind of see it and learn from it and then see like there's something that they can do about it or there's, you know, something that's happening that's not as bad as what they thought it was. I mean, with our Red Wolf film, the purpose of that one was to like show transparency and what the program was about.

'cause there's a lot of misinformation about what [00:31:00] people thought was going on. You know, they, I don't know, interesting what they truly thought it seemed based on talking to people that they were just dropping red wolves off helicopters and the red wolves were just going and destroying people's houses.

But, turns out that they're very afraid of people and there's never been a red wolf attack. And like all these advantages to having red wolves where they control invasive species populations, they keep rodent populations down, they benefit agricultural practices and things like that.

And so, you know, showcasing those in the [00:31:30] films is important. But really kind of knowing the focal audience and their concerns and. That is a really good way of starting when making a film so you can address those things as you go along. 

[00:31:41] Crystal: were there any reactions or outcomes that surprised you when you were filming about them?

[00:31:47] Justin: Honestly, we hadn't had a lot of resistance to the film, so I guess that's a good thing. there was a lot of support for the film, a lot of praise for the film, like addressing a lot of the [00:32:00] issues that people were worried about. and it was showcased a lot in like local screenings and things so that local landowners would be able to see the film and ask questions and, and you know, do what they need there.

But

[00:32:11] Alex: , I think the most 

surprising thing was just like how easily misinformation could be spread about a species. Like going back to just what Justin mentioned a little bit ago. some of the misinformation that has really harmed the reintroduction efforts of red wolves into the Eastern North Carolina community.

From what we [00:32:30] understood in, in talking to people there was perpetuated by one really vocal individual in the beginning just essentially going like door to door. Like, do you understand what these wolves are gonna do? And like basically just cultivating this whole misinformation in the community.

And in one way it's motivating because I'm like, oh, look what that one person did in the worst way for an animal. does that mean we could do the same thing in a better way for a different [00:33:00] animal? but I think that was the most surprising thing was to just see how much damage one highly motivated individual could have on such a large and 

well-funded effort.

[00:33:12] Crystal: I appreciate hearing that so much because I so often find myself, thinking on how to best communicate across the aisle in ways that I'm not preaching to the choir. And that resonate with people who may have been [00:33:30] misinformed. And so I really appreciate, that story and that you guys are addressing those kinds of issues.

I 

[00:33:36] Alex: think something I've, I've realized with a lot of the work that we're doing recently is that most of our stories now tend to be more people focused. Wildlife might be more of the bee character, but the main kind of underlying theme of the story is the human relationship with either nature or animals.

And I think that's intentional [00:34:00] where we feel like we can move the needle a little bit more with conservation when people can really see themselves in a film. whereas doing the traditional planet earth type blue chip wildlife program, while it's great, oftentimes I don't think it achieves what we need to conservation wise.

so finding individuals that look like the community that you're speaking to or talk like the community that you're speaking to or just live in that community [00:34:30] and then hearing kind of how they are motivated to help the environment or inspired to help an animal, I think means a lot more. Than just like a beautiful five minute sequence of an animal climbing a tree and making a nest.

I think that's what started to be the center of a lot of 

our projects. 

[00:34:50] Crystal: if there's one thing that has risen to the top, especially during this podcast season focusing on EWCL and wildlife conservation, is that [00:35:00] it's all about the people. So you can't have wildlife conservation without including people 

[00:35:07] Alex: For sure.

So, 

[00:35:08] Crystal: yeah. Yeah. How do you balance the doom and gloom with the lighthearted aspects of the wildlife stories? I. 

[00:35:16] Justin: That's a good question. That's something that we try and focus on as much as possible. 'cause we do believe in hopeful storytelling and we think that's the most powerful tool we can use to create change.

I know a lot of negative storytelling is also [00:35:30] impactful and people tend to gravitate around negative things, but we don't really like to, we prefer to be positive. So having solutions focused stories where there is something that people can do to, counteract whatever the threat is, or the challenge or some opportunity that we can present is what we focus on.

We also try and highlight those characters and those people in our stories who are hopeful and funny and engaging and are able to kind of carry that story [00:36:00] forward and aren't kind of pessimistic or would cause any issues with our storytelling, making it not hopeful. So that's just kind of the approach that we use.

We think that hope is much more powerful. Impactful than being negative. So that's what we try and focus on. 

[00:36:17] Alex: The characters make it, we really, we have to have just great characters now. And it makes it difficult because sometimes people will approach us and be like, can you help us in this conservation, communication [00:36:30] campaign, with this species?

And we kind of sift through all the potential character options and it's like maybe they are a little, more doom and gloom than the other and it doesn't make for a great story. and so there's a couple projects that we've been working on recently where it's taken a while to find somebody that we feel like is gonna be the optimistic voice or the hopeful voice that we really need to carry the piece.

hell Bent was just a great example. The women were so [00:37:00] easy to film. They were amazing characters. They're, and they didn't do it for the camera. Like they just were amazing people all around in the community that worked with them. And so they made our jobs easier. 

[00:37:12] Justin: Yeah. And I can tell from just my own personal experience that when I listen or watch hopeful stories, the feeling I have at the end to get out and do something about it is so much stronger than watching [00:37:30] the negative stories. Those negative stories just make me wanna curl up in a ball in the corner and cry.

[00:37:35] Crystal: So that's not very effective in my opinion, but that's my experience. 

[00:37:39] Justin: Yeah. Yeah. With our stories, we want you to cry but not curl up in a ball. We want you to jump off the couch and be like, all right, now it's time to do something. 

[00:37:47] Crystal: Yes. Yes. Conservation can sometimes feel like a niche conversation. How do you make your films resonate with people who might not think of themselves as environmentalists

[00:38:00] Alex: [00:38:00] I think it is, showing those people as characters, as subjects in our films that maybe didn't expect to find themselves in the place that they're in.

So Judy and Stacy and Hellbent for instance, neither of them have any. Background in a wildlife conservation role or job or career. and we're, we see that as well in a newer film that we're working on about beaver conservation, which I wish that we had it ready to like premiere and show now 'cause it's got equally [00:38:30] as amazing women characters in it.

but like one of our main characters, Gert was like a garlic farmer and just happened to have this natural disaster come through her hometown and was doing research on what are the ways that we can mitigate something like this in the future. And then beavers were ultimately the solution.

And so she's partnered with Beaver organizations to try and help support their conservation efforts. And so it's sometimes just that one individual who, you know, [00:39:00] maybe something happened to them that they just weren't expecting, or something's finally impacting them and they have to step up.

And so hopefully these stories have. Single individual stepping up to make a huge difference for their community resonates with people all over. It makes them realize that there's something to protect in everybody's backyard. 

[00:39:20] Crystal: Yeah, absolutely. I love that. 

[00:39:22] Justin: yeah, we just, we try to showcase diverse voices in our films too.

Like different backgrounds. Not everyone's a conservation [00:39:30] biologist that are in our field, in our films. They're just community members, farmers. one of the films we're working on right now is featuring a US Marine Corps veteran. So it's kind of like, you know, using these different characters who represent different audiences allows you to kind of break out of those silos to have conversations with other people about wildlife and conservation.

And, you know, wildlife is kind of in a weird spot where it's not really. A partisan thing. Most [00:40:00] people like animals and are not gonna argue against that. And so finding common ground I think is a bit easier when you're talking about wildlife. How you get there sometimes can change. The understanding of the challenges that the wildlife is facing also is kind of a hard topic.

But at the end of the day, when you're trying to have more of some animal, most people can agree that that animal is cool and they like it and they wanna see it. So, sometimes the argument is not at the expense of [00:40:30] my business or something, but most people don't wanna see animal populations crash.

So it gives you a good talking point. 

[00:40:37] Crystal: Yeah. I think that's important to remember is that most of the time we do have the same final end goals, just maybe different ways of getting there. 

 Which stories does the world need 

more of? Whose voices need to be heard?

[00:40:50] Alex: I don't 

know. This is a tough one. Selfishly, I wanna say Midwest stories, but I know that's not the right answer. 'cause I'm like, we've got great things going. There's no right answer. [00:41:00] I'm like, we've got creepy stories. There's no right answer. this is too general, but I feel like everybody's story has a place.

And everybody's wildlife and environment and their, their hometowns has a place. And I think oftentimes, especially for people getting into wildlife, film and photography, they, they just want to go to Africa and film all the African wildlife and they want to go to Asia and film all the Asian wildlife.

And they don't think about the animals they have in their own backyard. Just doesn't feel as exciting enough for them. but [00:41:30] we've been in places like Indonesia talking about the wildlife we have here in Ohio or Michigan, and they're like, you guys have cardinals? Like those are the most beautiful bird I've ever seen.

And I'm like, yeah, they're just in my backyard all the time. And so we take for granted the things that are just flying around our backyard or running through. 

And so I think those are the moments that.

You go back home and you realize oh yeah, we have really exciting stuff. We just have to shine a light on it. 

[00:41:58] Crystal: Yeah, I was 

[00:41:58] Justin: just gonna echo [00:42:00] kind of what he said is just everybody has a great story to tell no matter where you are in the world. And you know, I would also say, historically underrepresented voices are very important to kind of elevate and show in these films and how they're experiencing the impact of climate change and wildlife and everything.

But everyone says, you frontline communities. Frontline communities. I feel everyone is a frontline community at this point. And so just any experience that you're going outside and, [00:42:30] and seeing and observing is, you know, something worth talking about because there's that baseline shift of like what things were and what things are, and intergenerational understanding of how wildlife was.

And like people are kind of losing what it was 50 years ago and they think the changes that they're seeing now, you know, like, oh, five years ago there was wildlife everywhere, but now I don't see it. But wow, could you imagine a hundred years ago what that wildlife looked like? Yeah. But they have no basis of what that change looks like.

And so, yeah. [00:43:00] Documenting those things and talking about those things and being a part of that conversation, I think is incredibly important. And so that's like a great way for people who are interested in storytelling in general is just document the things that you're experiencing and sharing that with the world because that's a story and that's important and you don't need fancy gear to be able to do that.

You can use a cell phone, you can use the written word, you can paint a picture like however you wanna document that is important and is valuable in this space to talk about the solutions for [00:43:30] the future. 

[00:43:30] Crystal: What's one story that you guys haven't told yet that dream of capturing? 

[00:43:35] Justin: Oh God, we have so many. We have like talking about the funding issue that we have, like we have so many projects going on at the same time that we just kind of curate so that something will take off if another one dies.

And we just have all of these stories that we're just constantly sitting on top of that we want to tell. Yeah, I mean, I would say one big story that we're hoping to tell is, a project we've been trying to push [00:44:00] forward for a while now, and it's about, it's very similar to like a blue chip planet Earth type series, but instead of a European man narrating the story and telling you what the science is behind the animal behaviors and everything, we would love to feature local communities and local cultures who have established relationships with those species for over thousands of years who have a different perspective and to be able to showcase their perspective in a wildlife narrative just like [00:44:30] planet Earth with cinematography, but elevate those stories as valuable and equal to.

Those other scientific stories that people are often engaged with so that it's more of like a spiritual connection to wildlife and an ancestral connection versus a scientific one. We have written grants for this project. We have asked for money. We are having the hardest time, so if you're listening and you wanna support that project, let us know because we have so many people that we [00:45:00] wanna work with in order to make this happen.

We just need the funding to make it happen. 

[00:45:04] Crystal: I was just gonna say, if any of those private donors are listening to this and wanna fund this project, get on it. 

[00:45:11] Alex: We've worked with so many amazing indigenous filmmakers here in the US and they tell us all these awesome wildlife stories about things they've just grown up hearing.

And we're like, that's such a cool story. And it's not the scientific story that we traditionally hear. And we're like, if we can just get you [00:45:30] to direct this piece and we'll film it. And it's like, why a black bear does this versus the scientific way. It's just, I think that there's a whole world of storytelling there that hasn't been, I guess pursued and it might incorporate some supernatural elements into it, but I think that's just what people know as kind of their story, or what's true to them and their community.

And to elevate that [00:46:00] story I think could be really awesome. 

[00:46:03] Crystal: I'd watch that. 

[00:46:04] Justin: God, we would love this project. 

[00:46:06] Crystal: quickly, going back to the nitty gritty, I had another question that came to mind. How do you distribute these films? Like, do you make 'em and then look for distribution TA channels, or do you have that already in the bag before you make the films? Because you also said that you, you have a lot of films in production or stories in production right now, so do you have places for them to go [00:46:30] already?

[00:46:31] Alex: I feel like that's an ever evolving thing, just like the funding. Oftentimes we've been hired to work on stuff, so like we've worked on productions for like the BBC or PBS or National Geographic, and those are larger companies that hire us as camera operators to come on and shoot sequences for the shows, and they already have distribution figured out.

for projects lately, we've started to explore what self distribution could look like. like I mentioned [00:47:00] earlier, the market's in kind of a weird place, and so we've also found that we're, I think we're in like a learning phase right now, to, to just kind of take a bigger look at it. Because hypothetically you get a film on something like PBS Nature or National Geographic, like, you know, the audience that's gonna watch that.

And it's oftentimes somebody who's already ready to watch a nature documentary and already probably knows a lot about what you're gonna be showing them, but they [00:47:30] just love to watch nature documentaries. So exploring self-distribution has been something that's been on our minds and something that we are just having a larger conversation with, with the team that's currently producing the new Beaver film that worked on the Hell Vent film is like, what does this look like and how do we reach people who weren't gonna traditionally see it?

And so that might be as simple as YouTube and promoted posts and targeting people, through like social media ads, or [00:48:00] doing a theatrical release and touring it around. I think we're still figuring it out and I think every project actually does have. A different way it needs to be distributed. We talk about impact producing and some of the projects that we've worked on.

You know, we really only need a couple people to see the project, to be the decision maker that's gonna make a difference for that animal. And so rather than get a million views on YouTube, that's not success for us. Success for us is talking to an organization and getting them [00:48:30] motivated to move the 

needle for conservation in the field.

[00:48:34] Crystal: How can listeners support conservation media efforts? 

[00:48:38] Justin: I would say kinda like we've talked about, the best way to support conservation media efforts is be a part of the media effort, documenting what you're seeing and create content that is pro Wildlife Pro. Environment, pro solutions, hopeful, that kind of thing, just kind of create this movement.

We feel like people are a little bit more willing to be involved if it seems [00:49:00] like a large group of people are already doing it, and so it's a little bit easier for them to kind of step into it. So if you're creating your own stories and doing your own thing and adding to this, you know, cacophony of pro wildlife noise, then I think that's super helpful.

I think another thing that's also really helpful is to support local wildlife and environmental film festivals. You know, everyone's pretty closely linked to a small town or city, and often these areas have [00:49:30] some sort of a film festival and if it's an environmental one or a wildlife one or a conservation one, go ask questions.

Sometimes when you get to talk to filmmakers themselves, you can ask questions that, you know, spark an idea in their head that could create another film that will. Appear there a couple years later, or, you know, be a big hit. So engaging with the filmmakers and the conservationists is a really good way to kind of help support this as well as donate, you know, if you've got money that you wanna support [00:50:00] films, there's lots of films that have, there are crowdsourced for funding that you could support or, you know, you could donate a small amount of money to a local organization that they can use to get photos or videos that will support their mission and everything like that.

So there's a lot of really great ways to support conservation media listening to this podcast. 

[00:50:19] Crystal: Thank you. I appreciate that. Plug.

, For listeners who want to make a difference themselves but don't have cameras or [00:50:30] production teams, how can they use storytelling to support conservation?

. 

[00:50:34] Alex: I just feel like we need people to be more passionate and outspoken about stuff. So it's like when it comes to stuff in your backyard, wildlife and habitats in your backyard, it's one thing to go and stand in it and enjoy it for yourself personally, but it's another thing to bring people into it or to speak about it highly or talk about it, as loudly as you can in a positive way.

There's a lot of people shouting lately. It's a lot of negative [00:51:00] things. Yeah. And not a lot of people shouting good things. And maybe you need somebody to yell at you that you need to go stand in the woods for 30 minutes and reset your brain. I don't know. but I, I think it all just circles back to what you mentioned earlier, crystal, which is like, what do people need more of?

Hopeful messaging. what do we want to tell stories, hopeful stories. Like we, I think that's just it is if you're gonna get in a social media silo, I want it to be a hopeful one or I wanna [00:51:30] watch media that's hopeful. 'cause it can get dark quick 

[00:51:34] Justin: Yeah, it could get dark quick. People tend to like really. Rotate around that. But like if you're gonna create media and add to the noise and stuff, just be sure that you have the right information and you have checked your facts and you know, what the media bias chart is and you are good at using it.

And having sources is important. Like we're science, conservation, communication, so [00:52:00] sources, information, data, stats, facts are all pretty much what we do at the core to make sure that like we're putting out the best information possible. So being an informed citizen is very important while making this kind of content.

But right now, we're in the best space and, and time to create stories and content and stuff. there are so many different diverse ways of creating stories now than there were, you know. A hundred years ago, 10,000 years ago. stories used to be [00:52:30] verbal or sometimes on the walls of caves.

And now they could be, podcasts. They could be books. They could be movies, they could be TV shows, they could be TikTok videos, they could be reels, they could be just about anything you want it to be. So whatever your talent is, if it's painting, if it's dancing, it could add to the storytelling space that we're in right now.

if it's conservation wildlife focused and it's got a hopeful message, then it's definitely something that we want to hear. 

[00:52:58] Crystal: That's a great [00:53:00] note to almost end on, 'cause I have one more question. Which I'm asking everybody this season, this December is the 20th anniversary summit of the Emerging Wildlife Conservation Leaders Program, and I've been asking everybody , what impact did EWCL have on you? 

Yeah, so the Emerging Wildlife Conservation Leaders Program was essential in my transition from being a wildlife biologist to a science communicator, because when I got into the program, I [00:53:30] was very much just spending hours in the field, and doing a lot of data focused research and conservation work, 

[00:53:37] Justin: And through that process of. the program, I learned all about local governance and community led work and how important that is and how to communicate with communities and. Things of that nature.

 shortly after, Alex and I formalized our production company into a business. And so kind of in that space of being able to work with [00:54:00] communities all over the world in education, in conservation, elevating their voices, amplifying their voices, telling their stories, has been extraordinarily rewarding and a lot of fun.

[00:54:13] Alex: Yeah, I definitely agree. I feel like the emerging Wildlife Conservation Leaders program came at a really important time for both of us. 

I definitely felt like going out of college, only working for like three years for somebody [00:54:30] else and then working for myself. I, I missed out on a lot of the professional development opportunities that could have came from continuing to work through other organizations.

I think UL has definitely helped supplement that, and create the opportunities to learn from everybody on my team. 

[00:54:47] Justin: Beautiful. 

[00:54:49] Crystal: guys. This has been so interesting. I love what you do and I'm so happy to have gotten a little behind the scenes peek at, the ins and outs of [00:55:00] it all. Thank you for everything that you do. You're making a difference. 

What stands out most about Justin and Alex’s work is how deeply they understand that conservation is, at its heart, a human story. Whether they’re spotlighting red wolves in North Carolina, hellbenders in Appalachia, or beavers and farmers in the Midwest, their films show that change happens when we see ourselves as part of nature’s narrative.

And even though most of us aren’t lugging cameras through rainforests or tundra, we all have the power to tell stories that matter. A simple photo, a post, or a conversation about the wonders of your own backyard, can spark curiosity- and curiosity can lead to the care we need to feel to save species.

 Don't forget to go to forces for nature.com and sign up to receive emailed show notes, action tips, and a free checklist to help you start taking practical actions today. Do you know someone else who would enjoy this episode? I would be so grateful if you would share it with them. Hit me up on Instagram and Facebook at Becoming Forces for Nature, and let me know what actions you have been taking.

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