David Wallace-Wells and The RSA
The Brink of Climate Catastrophe
Climate impacts every aspect of every life on this planet. The consequences we’re starting to see on our screens aren’t a hangover of the past, they are the result of our actions, and they’re happening much faster than expected. David Wallace-Wells, journalist and author of The Uninhabitable Earth, unpacks the reality and repercussions of climate change in the latest RSA Minimate.
The Scrapbook
About the speaker
David Wallace-Wells is the author of ‘The Uninhabitable Earth’. He is deputy editor and a columnist at the New York magazine, and has previously been a national fellow at the New America Foundation. Wallace-Wells’ work often focuses on climate change and the near future of science and technology.
About our partner
The Royal Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce (RSA) explore and share enlightened ideas that have been at the forefront of social change for the last 260 years. Their fellows have included Professor Stephen Hawking, A. C. Grayling and Sir Tim Berners-Lee. Our previous work with the RSA includes the RSA Animates series and RSA Minimates featuring speakers like political analyst Anand Giridharadas and political philosopher Michael Sandel.
The challenge
The impacts of climate change will be felt in every facet of life and capturing this breadth of topics in a cohesive manner was one of our biggest challenges when creating this Minimate. We had to draw to together historical context, impacts on the natural world, political, social and economic insights, and the data underpinning Wallace-Well’s talk in a way which highlighted the relationship between them all. Data was an important part of this Minimate and the engaging presentation of it was essential.
The film
We utilised every aspect of whiteboard animation to bring David Wallace-Wells’ message to the screen, from the layering and connecting of information to the construction of a rich visual stage. Much of the narrative hinged on data and the insights it provided. Presented in forms such as timelines and charts, we used engaging visual language to unpack meaning and make that meaning more accessible. Our timeline featured recognisable visual icons of each era to aid relatability and relevance. Visual metaphors played an important part in developing the visual narrative, seen in moments like Shakespeare’s stage.
The inter-related nature and scale of climate change’s impacts was highlighted through a linked array of icons, each graphically reflecting a point made by Wallace-Wells in his voiceover and connected to related impacts. Animation on a small and large scale allowed us to transition between scenes and give a greater impact to key points, seen in the way the camera travels with a falling bag of money and a point about weather is highlighted by a cyclone. We echoed Wallace-Wells’ strong tone, adding moments of charm among the other rich visual language in the form of cultural references such as Greta Thunberg and weatherman Michael Fish. All these elements combined into a layered and information rich animation with a strong call to action.
The context
‘The Uninhabitable Earth’ by David Wallace-Wells explores the points made in his RSA Minimate further. You can watch the original talk David Wallace-Wells gave to the RSA here.
