Week 1 of shooting Drops of Hope - Water, Wells and Aid

This is a montage of our first week of production for Drops of Hope.

Drops of Hope; Water, Wells and Aid will be 1-hour Public Television documentary that provides a critical look at American volunteerism and service in Tanzania, and the efforts to establish permanent sources and storage of water in this impoverished country.

In a world where 50% of all water projects fail in the first few years, an individual and a service group from a small Northern California town have created two separate and successful water programs in Tanzania. Their efforts go far beyond the typical aid projects that produce warm feelings and photo-ops for the donors then are quickly forgotten; but fully realized programs that deal with accessing the resource and its ongoing management - including the establishment of community water districts and micro leading schemes to create small businesses around water filtration.

What has made these projects successful when so many others have failed? What impact have these programs made on the lives and villages that have received assistance? Can these models be adapted to other poor communities around the world that lack the simple human right of clean, drinkable water?

These are just a few of the questions that Drops of Hope; Water, Wells and Aid will seek to answer against the backdrop of the history of aid in Africa. Over one trillion dollars in foreign aid has been pumped into Africa since World War II. Much of this aid never reached the people or causes it was meant for, but was funneled off by non-profit management, or worse, stolen by individuals and governments in the countries the funds were destined for. This diversion of aid left those in need suffering or dead, and the donors burned-out with hopeless feelings that Africa will never change. Drops of Hope; Water, Wells and Aid will look at the small changes taking place in Africa that may turn this legacy of "dead aid" into a future of possibilities because of the efforts of a few.

Production of Drops of Hope; Water, Wells and Aid has already begun, with principle photography taking place in California. Trips to Washington D.C., Tanzania and London are scheduled for this coming March. We have secured the support of Southern Oregon Public Television (SOPTV), a PBS affiliate, as our presenting station to the public television network and PBS. Upon completion, we will submit the documentary to key film festivals and work with SOPTV to get carriage on the public television network, or if we're lucky, on PBS.

We need funds to cover our filming expenses above and beyond our air travel costs that have already been paid for. These costs include equipment rentals and insurance, meals and accommodations, car rentals, stipends for the crew, and miscellaneous expenses like excess luggage charges and malaria medicine. We need at least $8,500 to capture the footage needed to tell this story.

Funds to complete the film will be secured through programs that provide finishing funds once we have a rough cut of the film or we will try and submit a second project at Kickstarter . See our Kickstarter page here https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/386196705/drops-of-hope-documentary-project

Thank you for supporting independent filmmaking for public television.

Category:

Film & Animation

Tags:

• Canon 5DmII
• Interstellar
• Tanzania
• PBS
• teaser