18/ Visual investigations, wildfires and epic case studies
Starting an independent visual investigations unit.
Welcome to the 18th issue of Nuanced Narratives.
I’ve started working with OSINT journalist Leopold Salzenstein to produce independent visual investigations in partnership with European publishers. We currently have two stories in early development for which we’ll be pursuing grant financing - more on these soon!
Patreon members will be getting access to behind the scenes explainers on our entire process.
We also have some very exciting case studies scheduled for the coming months:
In February, My Life with Long Covid with Gabrielle Mérite
In March, Britain’s Shadow Border with David Blood
In April an upcoming project with Lars Vers
If you’d like to join these sessions you can reply to this email requesting an invitation, or sign up for the free membership tier on Patreon.
Inspiration
This month's award goes to Axios for the Haze story on wildfires in North America. I particularly loved the detailed choices in art direction and illustration, the geo-based filtering of heat data and the cartography.
The special mention goes to Jigsaw for the ever beautiful design and creative animation on their story about white supremacy.
Insights
In January I hosted a talk with the Kontinentalist team to discuss the making of their story on traditional architecture in Asia.
Curations
Latest curations from the internet garden:
My last project is a visual essay on polio eradication for the WHO
I collaborated with journalists in Lebanon to plot civilian casualties in Gaza
I recently discovered SMERFs, eager to see these used in journalism
Zach Seward, the creator of Quartz, will be heading up the New York Time’s AI journalism team
Protomaps for an open-source mapping GUI
ProtoPie as a prototyping tool for visual stories
Thanks for reading!