Brave New Pictures

Last year, James Borton, a respected global journalist, contacted us via LinkedIn and asked if we’d be interested in collaborating on an environmental documentary in Vietnam. James has been working in and reporting on stories about Southeast Asia for many years, and we were intrigued by his proposal. As filmmakers we’ve been able to share many stories about environmental conservation and cultural preservation all over the world, but we’d never been to Vietnam. This particular project would focus on Cù Lao Chàm, an archipelago 20 nautical miles from Hội An. Over the past twenty years, the islanders, with the help of biologist Dr. Chu Mạnh Trinh, have turned their once-polluted home into a pristine environment. Now, Cù Lao Chàm is part of a marine protected area and a world Biosphere Reserve recognized by UNESCO, promoting conservation and protection of coral reefs, ecological diversity and cultural heritage.

Here's a link to the documentary: https://youtu.be/e8fOshMIiRU

And here's some press: https://m.hanoitimes.vn/cu-lao-cham-island-of-life-new-short-documentary-released-324377.html

Tomorrow, Saturday, October 10 at 6 PM CDT, Chicago Sinfonietta will broadcast its 2020 Virtual Celebration. Brave New Pictures has been their official production company for 19 years, and has proudly supported this innovative orchestra by providing promotional, informational, fundraising and outreach videos and photography for their website, concerts, and press. Chicago Sinfonietta is dedicated to modeling and promoting diversity, inclusion and cultural equity in the arts through the universal language of symphonic music. You can register for the event through the post below!

2020 Virtual Celebration Teaser Chicago Sinfonietta 2020 Virtual Celebration: Experience the past, Imagine the future Register Today: http://www.chicagosinfonietta.org/concerts-events/2020b...

From the BNP archives:

Munnar is a region in the hills of Kerala, India, famous for having some of the most elevated tea plantations in the world. The climate is considerably cooler than its surrounding low-lying regions. We were capturing video and photographs for a project that took us all over the southwest portion of the country, from picturesque tea plantations to organic spice farms and to the famous brackish backwater lagoons and lakes along the Arabian Sea coast.

The beautiful color of these flowers sends a lovely message on this Valentine's Day.

From the BNP archives:

We climbed 754 feet up Observation Hill to get the best perspective of McMurdo Station, the main U.S. research base located on the south tip of Ross Island, Antarctica, and our home for the next month. Off to the right in the distance is Mt. Erebus, the southern-most active volcano in the world. The wooden cross was erected in 1913 by a search party after Robert Falcon Scott and his team perished during their ill-fated Terra Nova expedition on the way back from the South Pole. The day we took this photo it was 48°F in Antarctica, but the very next afternoon a white-out blizzard blew in and brought sub-zero temperatures with it. This underscores the reason everyone who works at McMurdo is required to undergo survival training in one of the planets’ harshest environments.

From the BNP archives:

A few years ago we were shooting in locations throughout the United Kingdom and took a side trip to Stonehenge, about 90 miles outside of London. We were awestruck when this prehistoric monument suddenly appeared right off the road we’d been taking through rolling farmland. Stonehenge was built by a culture that left no written records, therefore how it was constructed and what it was used for remain the subjects of great debate. We arrived late in the afternoon with a storm rapidly blowing in, and were lucky enough to capture this image of the mammoth stones huddling together before night fell.

From the BNP archives:

The Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque is located in Abu Dhabi, the capital city of the United Arab Emirates. It is the largest place of worship in the country and was built between 1996 – 2007 for a cost of $545 million. During religious festivals, the complex can accommodate more than 41,000 people. The Grand Mosque has seven chandeliers imported from Germany that incorporate millions of Swarovski crystals. As impressive as this building is, one thing we found fascinating is the world’s largest carpet, featured in the main hall, which weighs 35 tons and took 1,300 knotters two years to complete.

On assignment with Travel Quest

From the BNP photo archives:

Today marks the 15th anniversary of the designation of January 27th as International Holocaust Remembrance Day by the United Nations General Assembly. It is also the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau, the largest German N**i concentration camp during World War II. This is one of the most humbling and heartbreaking sites we’ve ever witnessed.

After 31 years we found ourselves finally back in Rome – The Eternal City. Here, the Pantheon stands as one of the architectural marvels of the world. We entered through the portico of large granite Corinthian columns just before noon and were greeted with this breathtaking sight. A shaft of angled light came through the central opening of the rotunda, or oculus, which was once considered the ‘connection between the temple and the gods above’. After witnessing the genius of the buildings’ design, it is difficult to argue with this theory. Almost 2,000 years after it was built, the Pantheon still boasts the world's largest unreinforced concrete dome with the height to the oculus and the diameter of the interior circle of the rotunda being the same – 142 ft. It is truly something to behold!

In October of 2016 we introduced two of our favorite organizations. We’ve had the privilege of collaborating with Chicago Sinfonietta for over 20 years as their video production company. Here Maestro Mei-Ann Chen conducts what is considered the country’s most diverse orchestra for their Día de Mu***os concert. The film being presented is from the vast collection of the venerable Chicago Film Archives, entitled Danse Macabre, from 1922. The music was composed by Camille Saint-Saëns. Sinfonietta was founded by Maestro Paul Freeman to address the disconnect between the lack of diversity in orchestras and the vibrant, nuanced, communities for which they play. He was the first African American conductor on the podium of more than 50 orchestras worldwide and conducted more than 100 orchestras in 28 countries over the course of his career. He once told us a story of how he encountered Dr. Martin Luther King at the Atlanta airport and stated he was there to guest-conduct the orchestra, to which King replied, “The last bastion of racism. Hallelujah!”