“[T]he evidence is mounting that the impacts will be catastrophic to our livelihoods and the societies that we live within. Our norms of behaviour, that we call our “civilisation,” may also degrade. When we contemplate this possibility, it can seem abstract. The words I ended the previous paragraph with may seem, subconsciously at least, to be describing a situation to feel sorry about as we witness scenes on TV or online. But when I say starvation, destruction, migration, disease and war, I mean in your own life. With the power down, soon you wouldn’t have water coming out of your tap. You will depend on your neighbours for food and some warmth. You will become malnourished. You won’t know whether to stay or go. You will fear being violently killed before starving to death.” (Bendell 2018, 13)

In his quote, Bendell made it a point to implicate us (the reader) in our involvement with climate change and – in his view – the inevitable need for climate adaptation with the coming degradation of societies as we know them. When climate change becomes personal, maybe a little ‘too close to home’, people process the information in many different ways, as Bendell also points out in his paper. This psychological aspect is what I hoped to capture with my climate media ‘remix’. I wanted to include the absurd, the realistic, the denial, the optimism and the fear that often accompanies discussions around climate change.

I found most of my footage and sound on YouTube, using Greta Thunberg’s famous speech and clips from 80s’ and 90s’ popular culture as a foundation. I used the purely entertaining and highly exaggerated action/drama films, Mad Max 2 (1981) and Escape from LA (1996) to denote the ‘absurd’ and ‘unrealistic’ creative envisioning of potential human dystopias. Much like the future that Bendell suggests, many people are unable process such an outcome from climate change as being realistically possible. It is purely a product of science-fiction apocalypse movies. One doesn’t watch these films and automatically think about their own potential future in a post-climate tragedy world. These media products still do present a future climate (though fictional) which it why I juxtaposed that imagery with those of real-life events. I also used the song Accents 2 Suspense from the Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome film throughout the entire clip to further this connection. It is a conflation between fact and fiction; real and uncertain, a constant theme throughout climate change discourse.

I found the audio aspect of this exercise especially challenging. Audio is such a powerful tool in media making but I know that it is also a weakness of my part as a media maker. I found it difficult to get a nice flow with the audio content, especially with clips that already had music underneath someone’s dialogue. I attempted to get a range of sound in, such as the glacial melting and the bushfires to meld with the background music. I think these areas could still use some refinement with more time and focus. I believe I had a good range of visuals to work with, though could use some improvement with organising them before beginning the editing stage. I also found myself frequently having to go back online and find new clips to use as visuals. With a better planning process and a clearer idea of the things I want to present, this time could have been saved for further editing. I also think my timing on cuts could be improved, perhaps leaning more into the music, using the rhythm as cues for where to cut. Overall, I believe I responded quite effectively given the restraints, but would like to delve deeper into the ideas I’m trying to present.

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