Barbaric Fishing Practices Destroying our Oceans

I chose, for my Capstone Project, to express my views on the damages that the commercial fishing industry has done to the ocean. After having spent a few seasons on various fishing vessels, I was shocked by the numerous sea creatures that fell prey to these careless practices, regardless of “innovations” in the equipment used, the numbers were still exponential. This wasn’t limited to only aquatic sea life either. Even avian sea life is drawn into the fold, as they follow the ships to feed off the catch. Often only to be injured and fall into the sea too drown.

gnarly narwhal

Check out these links to learn a little more of the damages done.

http://www.slowfood.com/slowfish/pagine/eng/pagina.lasso?-id_pg=43

http://water.epa.gov/type/oceb/marinedebris/md_impacts.cfm

 

I’m here to change the world.

For my Capstone project I have chosen to highlight my animation and digital image composition abilities. These two concepts go hand in hand as the digital imagery required for animating purposes has to be built individually, often even frame by frame. Conveying the motions within each individual character model requires several different frames of the same illustrations, each with a slight alteration from the last. Even the background, which is an entirely separate element, changes often within or between the scenes or has some type of subtle movement there within. My animation is going to be based off of characters that I originally hand illustrated for a friend’s children’s book. The story, which is loosely based around the original, will tie in a message addressing the effects of commercial fishing and sea floor drilling on oceanic sea life, and the rest of the environment as well. Using these characters and their touching story, supported with factual evidence of the real damages done, will hopefully educate the viewer on what we as people are doing to the ocean and its inhabitants. This awareness will inevitably bring about change, at least in ideals, if not in actions as well.  This will be the focus of my website and probably a good deal of my future work. I spent a few seasons fishing out of various ports in Alaska. Having seen the amount of by-catch being killed, and other sea creatures being injured by modern practices first hand, I’ve sworn them off permanently.