Independent News and Media Makers

Penelope Andrews doesn't think what she does is all that different from what documentary filmmakers have been doing for years. "When someone makes a documentary, it's usually because they have something important to say. That's the same thing we do."

It's not exactly the same, though, mainly because Andrews isn't an ordinary filmmaker. She's a member of Headwaters Action Video Collective (havc.org) in California, which got its start in 1996 filming raucous protests over logging in the Headwaters Redwood Forest, about 250 miles outside San Francisco. The group continues to make videos on a number of different topics, joining a growing number of activists across the globe who use relatively inexpensive video equipment as a way to get the word out about a particular issue or cause.

With the existence and wider availability of digital video, this form of documenting protests is becoming more common. Erik Gernand co-founded the Atlanta-based company The Media Bunch (www.mediabunch.com), which makes videos for non-profit groups wishing to tell their stories. He says technological developments have given organizations and individuals more options for informing people about their cause of choice.

"With digital video, it is so much more accessible for people to tell these stories," Gernand says. "It wasn't long ago that getting these messages out meant preaching or protesting or possibly print. Now there is a whole new door open. I think at the root of activism and protesting is the desire to communicate a message that you believe deeply. Digital video is just another tool to accomplish that effectively.

Digital cameras and computer editing programs also are relatively inexpensive, which makes them more accessible than more traditional filmmaking equipment, Andrews says. Where traditional editing equipment can cost anywhere from $20,000 to $40,000, any activist can easily be up and running for under $3,…