Our Story
For more than a decade, Exposure Labs has developed, shared and supported stories to address big societal challenges and inspire hope and action for collective solutions. Read on to learn more about our journey.
Note: To view the below embedded reports in full screen size, click the outlined box icon in each report’s bottom navigation bar.
“The Chase Begins
Stanford University senior Jeff Orlowski-Yang joins National Geographic photographer James Balog and his team as a videographer and embarks on what will eventually become Exposure Labs’ first production. CHASING ICE chronicles Balog’s quest to photograph undeniable evidence of our changing planet through time-lapse cameras and daring adventures across the Arctic.
Fun fact: The CHASING ICE production crew won two Guinness Book World records, including one for capturing the “Largest and Longest Glacier Calving Ever Filmed,” a clip that now has 61+ million views on YouTube.
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“CHASING ICE Premieres and Exposure Labs Is Born
After 5 years in production, CHASING ICE premieres at the Sundance Film Festival and is picked up by both Netflix and National Geographic. Through independent theatrical distribution, the film garners $1.3 million at the box office, one of the highest grossing documentaries at the time. The film later wins an Emmy Award for Outstanding Nature Programming and is nominated for an Academy Award for Best Original Song. As CHASING ICE meets millions of people across 172 countries and all 7 continents, audiences are profoundly moved, asking one question on repeat: “What can I do?” .
With the realization that film could be leveraged as a powerful tool for change – and go far beyond its initial release impact – CHASING ICE director Jeff Orlowski-Yang founds Exposure Labs with collaborator Larissa Rhodes as an innovative film production and impact studio to use storytelling as a tool to illuminate the issues affecting humanity. Today, Exposure Labs is co-led by Orlowski-Yang, Larissa Rhodes, and Shirley Alfaro.
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“CHASING ICE’s Impact Campaign Is Launched
The CHASING ICE impact campaign team experiments in film-based campaigning with shortened versions of the film, a free online multimedia tool for climate science education, discussion guides for middle, high school and university students, a robust community screenings program that included film events from the United Nations to the White House, and the CHASING ICE Ohio Tour (below).
Our campaign goes on to win Doc Society’s prestigious DocHi5 Impact Award for its successful experimentations using the film for grassroots organizing.
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“CHASING ICE Ohio Campaign Prompts Congressman to Reverse His Denial of Climate Change
Exposure Labs launches the CHASING ICE Ohio Tour to use the film to shift the political conversation around climate change, laying the foundation for our local to global approach. We take CHASING ICE to one Congressional district, where Congressman Pat Tiberi (OH-12) has denied climate change, and host dozens of screening events with 13,000+ central Ohio residents. After watching, constituents write messages to Congressman Tiberi that are posted on social media and on a dedicated website. Congressman Tiberi responds to the call, publicly changing his stance, and later joins the Climate Solutions Caucus as a vocal advocate.
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“CHASING CORAL Premieres
In the midst of CHASING ICE’s campaign, former ad man and hobby photographer Richard Vevers emails our team with shocking photos of dying coral reefs: Yet more powerful visual evidence of climate change was happening under the waves that our team needed to capture before it was too late. Like CHASING ICE, CHASING CORAL uses cutting edge camera technology and emotional storytelling to document the invisible and incite public pressure that cannot be ignored.
CHASING CORAL premieres at the Sundance Film Festival, winning the Documentary Audience Award. The film is acquired as a Netflix Original soon after and wins an Emmy Award for Outstanding Nature Documentary. Our impact team gets to work capturing interest and planning for the release with resource building and outreach.
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“CHASING CORAL’s Impact Campaign Is Launched
We roll out a global community screenings program to maximize CHASING CORAL’s power to change hearts, minds and policy. After a June 2019 screening of the film ahead of a biodiversity loss hearing, the U.S. House unanimously passes a bill to address ocean acidification. We also launch four discrete, hyper-local campaigns (below) in politically red and purple communities to test different levers of systems-level change.
CHASING CORAL so permeates the public consciousness that Pantone selects Living Coral as its 2019 Color of the Year. In acknowledgement of its innovative impact campaign and excellence in filmmaking, CHASING CORAL wins a DocImpactHi5 award.
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“Four Hyperlocal Campaigns Move the Needle on Climate Action
Over the next two years, we launch four discrete campaigns with a focus on using CHASING CORAL and other unexpected climate stories to connect the dots from the films to local issues in the Southeast and Colorado.
Beginning in 2017, we partner with Conservation Voters of South Carolina (CVSC) to launch the Dear South Carolina tour Dear South Carolina Tour, using screenings of CHASING CORAL and other climate-focused films to ultimately help secure unanimous passage of the Energy Freedom Act in South Carolina to make solar more affordable. In the 2017/2018 school year, over 3,000 students across 7 South Carolina high schools see CHASING CORAL in a single semester through the Unstoppable Schools Project , a project-based learning curriculum developed by our team. In Spring 2018, we launch the Big Screen Bloc Party in Atlanta to use film to grow the environmental voter bloc ahead of the 2018 midterms. And in Fall 2018, we work with 8 independent, locally-owned breweries to coordinate screening events of CHASING CORAL across 5 cities in Colorado, broadening support for environmental action by tapping into places and spaces where the environment isn’t typically top of mind.
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“Exposure Labs Expands Scope to Support the Broader Social Impact Storytelling Ecosystem
Expanding beyond our own films and impact campaigns and moving toward deeper partnership building, we launch Climate Story Lab and Film in the Field to support the work of other storytellers and grassroots organizers, laying the foundation for our Climate program. In partnership with Doc Society, the inaugural Climate Story Lab convenes 12 storytelling teams with funders, experts and organizers for five days in New York City to accelerate effective climate communication and impact at the regional level. We also develop our Film in the Field Library, a curated catalog of climate films and organizing resources to support frontline advocacy groups in using storytelling as part of their distributed campaigns.
Over the course of 2019 and 2020, we test multiple additional models to support other filmmakers, including consulting, advising and regranting.
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“THE SOCIAL DILEMMA Premieres
Moving from environmental ecosystems to our information ecosystem, THE SOCIAL DILEMMA unveils the exploitative technology impeding our ability to solve climate change and the many other existential threats we face. The film premieres at Sundance Film Festival and is released by Netflix in September 2020 in the thick of the COVID-19 pandemic, where it becomes the platform’s 6th-most-watched movie of 2020, reaching 38 million households in its first 28 days. The film goes on to win two Primetime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Picture Editing and Outstanding Writing For A Nonfiction Program.
According to a 3,000 participant survey run by USC’s Norman Lear Center, 9-out-of-10 viewers took at least one campaign action after watching, such as attending events hosted by our team or partners, hosting their own screening, signing a petition, or joining a volunteer group.
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“The Second Annual Climate Story Lab Is Held in the UK
Climate Story Lab UK builds capacity for 14 climate storytelling teams in a new region through curated workshops and a range of people interested in the same challenge: how to communicate the climate crisis more effectively and move communities to action.
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“Climate Organizers and Storytellers Adapt to the COVID-19 Pandemic with a Virtual Earth Day Convening
In response to the COVID-19 lockdown, we expand our library of films and tools to support organizers in moving their Earth Day mobilizations online. To complement the watch parties, we host a Q&A conversation to connect film teams and organizing insights for driving climate action and later share a case study and lessons for the social impact filmmaking community.
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“Exposure Labs launches 1-on-1s Program for Storytellers and Impact Producers
We pilot of a public team office hours initiative, which eventually becomes our current 1-on-1s Program, designed to serve the broader film and impact field and democratize access to industry professionals and expertise. Through the program, current and aspiring filmmakers and impact producers can sign up for a no-cost informal conversation with a member of our team based on their interests, questions and needs.
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“Phase 1 of Film in the Field Request for Proposal Process Is Announced
Our newly-formed Climate Program launches our first Request for Proposal process with the Southeast Climate & Energy Network (SCEN) for advocacy organizations using climate films in our Film in the Field Library as an organizing tool. We select seven grantees to screen films in their communities, granting a total of $5,000.
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“THE SOCIAL DILEMMA’s Impact Campaign Is Launched
Our impact campaign for THE SOCIAL DILEMMA focuses on catalyzing both individual and systemic change through public education, political will-building and youth empowerment, helping to instigate a worldwide reckoning with the catastrophic consequences of unchecked technology. Our COVID-adapted, fully-virtual community screenings program supports more than 8,000 grassroots film events, and 300,000+ conversations around the film and our campaign emerge online; the youth we educate and activate lead a groundswell of young people demanding better technology; our policymaker briefing materials are repeatedly used in hearings with tech execs; and the calls-to-action we elevate from our coalition partners ultimately help incite the introduction of the Ban Surveillance Advertising Act in January 2022.
The film and campaign win a 2021 Webby Award, the “Internet’s highest honor” for projects that entertain, help us uplift one another, explain complex issues affecting our world, and inspire global movements.
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“Exposure Labs Establishes Guiding Mission/Vision/Values and Dedicates Itself to Becoming an Anti-Oppression Organization
During the course of 2020 and 2021, our team undergoes a process to develop a series of foundational statements to guide the long-term direction of our work. We begin with developing organizational Mission, Vision, Values and Culture statements, and then further refine our thinking for how to integrate our commitment to Justice, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (JEDI) across all of our work to become an anti-oppression organization. In order to live our values of transparency, accountability and mutual learning, we make an external version of our JEDI Team Workbook available here. ”
“The Third Annual Climate Story Lab Is Held Virtually in the U.S. South
We co-design the Climate Story Lab U.S. South with New Orleans Film Society and the Southeast Climate and Energy Network to inspire and activate a regional cohort of storytellers, climate organizing groups and climate experts interested in using stories from their region to reach and engage diverse audiences around climate action. We select seven dynamic South-based storytelling projects for a week of collaboration with a variety of stakeholders, where we strategize and imagine how best to build power, collaborate, and leverage the power of storytelling to mobilize communities around climate action.
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“Exposure Labs Expands Support for Social Impact Storytellers and Organizers and Launches Short-Form Original Productions
Development of new long-form storytelling projects picks up as our impact work more fully shifts to supporting other storytellers and organizers in the climate and humane tech movements. We also launch a short-form arm of the organization dedicated to the stories and issue areas we’ve been invested in the past decade to support our partners and sustain the impact of our films.
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“CHASING CORAL Community Grants Program Launches
Five years after the film’s initial release, we continue our impact work around coral by launching a grant program to resource communities and artists working on coral and climate projects.
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