Storytelling and our National Parks [my work with Randy Olson]

This is a new video I made for Dr. Randy Olson. Like all good producers, he’s an opportunist. He had recently learned that I was dating someone in Colorado, so of course he figured out a way to use this fact to create content 🙂

The very next time I paid my special lady friend a visit, Randy asked me to make a trip up to FT Collins to interview a few employees of the National Parks Service. It turns out that Emily Wright (special lady) is more than just a pretty face. She is the Marketing Director for Onno T-shirt company in Boulder [‘Marketing Director’= muggle word for Producer]. So she was integral in getting me some extra lighting equipment, and actually helping me shoot the interviews.

The interviews went pretty well… really well, in fact. It wasn’t very difficult for Randy to make selections for my edit. You don’t often come across government employees who are so well spoken and concise. Maybe there is a unique element at play here…

As I’ve said before, I have been drinking the Randy Olson Kool-Aid for awhile now. If you’re not familiar with his theories on narrative, get familiar! Not only is it an intuitively compelling idea, but the data has been consistently backing it up. Sadly, even our current presidency is a testament to Randy’s Narrative Index:

[another video I made for and with Randy]

I hope you enjoyed my latest work with Dr. Randy Olson, and I hope you consider the importance of Storytelling especially when it comes to communicating something as important as science.

John Rael