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A US DIRECTOR and photographer was so moved by images of Japan’s tsunami-ravaged coastline captured by Google Street View that he has launched a fundraising project to enable him to travel there and participate first-hand in the clean-up operation.
Aaron Hobson, of the Cinemascapes project of some of the world’s most isolated places as seen by Good Street View, says he was deeply moved by the search engine’s project to photograph the north-eastern area of Japan most affected by last year’s tsunami.
“I’ve seen the photos and the videos from the disaster and was obviously moved by them, but it wasn’t until I could see them at ground level and move street to street and town to town over an area covering hundreds of miles that I began to fully grasp the shear size of the devastation,” he told TheJournal.ie.
“It felt almost post-apocalyptic. It was very moving to see entire villages and small cities completely washed away with only the footprints of foundations left behind.”
After searching for various organisations who are providing assistance to those affected by the earthquake and tsunami, Hobson came across the group It’s Not Just Mud, a disaster relief organisation which is based in Japan’s Miyagi prefecture.
The group supports and organises volunteers to assist the recovery of individuals and small businesses who have been affected by the March 2011 disaster.
Hobson has never been to Japan before, though has heard and seen things about it from his parents who visited the country in the years after his father was stationed in Okinawa as a military photographer during the Vietnam War.
He says he is planning to spent between seven and ten days towards the end of this winter or early spring 2013 to help with the post-tsunami clean-up:
It’s not a long time and the work I will complete is hardly a speck of what is needed, but if I can help one family by making life just a little bit easier it will be worth it for me. I hope to take photos during my free time in Tohoku and quite possibly have an annual fundraising sale to return annually.
Hobson aims to raise the funds to cover the $2,500-$3,500 travel costs for the journey from New York to Tohoku, Japan and any remaining monies raised will be donated to It’s Not Just Mud.
To raise funds, he is selling a series of limited edition prints of Japan’s damaged coastline which cost $25 per image and can be delivered worldwide. The photographs are similar to his Cinemascapes project in that the images were captured by Google Street View and then processed by Hobson.
“I hope that anyone that purchases a print would follow my Facebook photography site to look for photos and more after the project begins,” he said. “They can see what I am doing on their behalf and also see the people that they have helped in the process.”
Climate change. Any bad weather is a direct result of global warming / climate change
@Christopher Byrne: Was It global warming that caused the flooding over a century ago or was it just a freak storm?
@Slippy ❤️: sarcasm mate…sarcasam. I live in Perth and we’ve has the coldest winter in the 6+ years I’ve lived here but Ive no doubt it will be reported as the hottest on record
@Christopher Byrne: higher average global temperatures result in more moisture in the atmosphere which makes storm systems powerful. So yes the strength of this storm was added today b the fact that GLOBAL temperatures are rising. Weather is a global system, it doesn’t care if it’s been cold in Australia lately. Some models suggest that Europe might actually get colder over the coming decades as a result of GLOBAL average temperatures rising if it continues.
@M: Yes, climate models. Very reliable they’ve proven to be….We can’t predict weather reliably 2 weeks in advance but we’re supposed to believe in these models forecasting 30 years down the track as gospel. Despite the fact most if not all of them have failed to accurately predict the future
@Christopher Byrne:
I think you’ve been living in the colonies for too long….mate.
@Tweed Cap: wow I don’t know how to even begin talking to you when you say something as clueless as that . climate is not the same thing as weather. Are you saying that releasing huge amounts of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere will not cause global temperatures to rise? …Why not?
@Christopher Byrne: don’t stray too far from home you’ll fall off the edge of the earth
@Christopher Byrne: I love listening to people who have read some articles and now know it all. Just proves studying and practicing science is a waste of time, we just need an opion
@Christopher Byrne: isn’t winter 2 months away yet? Also weren’t there record highs recorded in summer in parts of Oz? Also, true or false, don’t parts of Oz have a monsoon season and isn’t this just an extreme version of that?
@Dave O Keeffe: No, on all counts
@Boganity: I think you’ll find you’re incorrect on all points. Australian winter is our summer months. They had record temperatures over Christmas, and there is indeed a monsoon season in parts of Australia.
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