Ho Steemians! Today I begin a week of sharing the project I'm most passionate about...
Restoring the summit of Mt. Tamalpais, sentinel mountain of San Francisco Bay, to a natural state. Five years ago I became obsessed with this and began creating my first big film project, an independent doc called "The Invisible Peak". (Invisible because the summit has been fenced off from the public for 60 years.)
This is the first film in what eventually became a trilogy about the area... each film focusing on an aspect of the Cold War Nike missile targeting radar station on Mt. Tamalpais that had been abandoned by the military 30 years ago and never cleaned up. It's not a totally unusual story except for that fact that this is smack dab in the middle of one of the busiest National Parks in the country... The Golden Gate National Recreation Area.
It's almost completely unknown here in the SF Bay Area that while people below Mt. Tam went about their daily business, military planners were on the lookout, 24-7, for Russian bombers armed with nuclear weapons. It was incredibly tense and there were a number of near misses that could have resulted in Armageddon. (all images in this post are from the film)
The soldiers on Mt. Tam literally had their finger on the trigger. Given the fact that we're in a new phase of the Cold War as evidenced by what's going on in Russian and the Ukraine, and that there are hundreds of Cold War sites around the country that still haven't been cleaned up, this is a national issue that speaks to our responsibility as custodians of our resources, how we deal with the destruction of our sacred places and what is our responsibility to the safety of our country in the face of nuclear annihilation.
The desecration of our sacred places...
Is there the possibility of redemption?
The peak of Mt. Tamalpais has been considered sacred by the Coastal Miwok Indians for thousands of years. In modern times it is iconic within the cultural and environment fabric of San Francisco Bay Area life. In 1950, the Army Corps of Engineers bulldozed the highest peak of the mountain to build an Air Force Station tasked with directing jet interceptors and short range Nike nuclear missiles against the potential threat of Russian nuclear bombers.
By 1980 the base was obsolete and summarily closed. The military literally walked away from dozens of structures on 106 acres, leaving behind a huge toxic mess on the mountain -- cables, foundations, asbestos, roads and infrastructure, all cut off from the public by miles of fencing.
And now, after five years of work, the first $500,000 has been raised to begin the clean-up. This is thanks to tireless work from myself and a team of people at the Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy and the Marin Municipal Water District.
"A stunningly beautiful film."
Through the use of motion-controlled time-lapse cinematography, historical footage, interviews, CGI reconstruction of the mountaintop removal and construction of the military base, "The Invisible Peak" tells the virtually unknown story of the “missing” West Peak of Mt. Tamalpais and how local engaged citizens have been fighting to restore their mountain to a natural state for over 30 years.
The script, which I wrote with Peter Coyote and with his moving narration, provides both a historical and spiritual overview of place, along with a sense of deep time and how we caretake our environment.
If you'd like to discover how all this came about, here's a video explaining my process in making this film.
Thanks for watching.
I have a long history of inventing tools for animators and also making films and photographs. My wife, daughter and I live at the foot of beautiful Mt. Tamalpais on the San Francisco Bay and I've been using technology to tell complex stories for a long time. My biggest claim to fame? Leading the team that created Autodesk 3ds Max... the most popular 3D animation tool of all time. When I sold the Yost Group to Autodesk at the end of the last century I jumped headfirst into pursing my original love... photography and filmmaking. Now I spend all of my time exploring the mysteries of my world with my cameras, and revealing what I find in my images and films.
