Wildfire Literacy Education: Support for Burn Cycle Project Santa Barbara based artist Ethan Turpin is poised to expand his high impact education efforts
Santa Barbara based artist Ethan Turpin is poised to expand his high impact education efforts.
Image via the Burn Cycle Project
Project Brief:
There is a great need to keep the community interested and engaged about the risk of fire before another major event occurs. Social awareness regarding fire is generally at a high level of engagement immediately after a fire event, when the risk is lowered because there has just been a burn. However, once an event occurs, the community interest in proactively addressing fire events typically wanes-social scientists have studied this phenomenon and have shown this pattern over time. The challenge of retaining a high level of community engagement around addressing fire prevention can be met by using more innovative methods to keep people engaged.
The Burn Cycle Project started as a design and production service in 2013 here in Santa Barbara County to help the community’s understanding of wildfire’s risks, roles, and behaviors. The project offers immersive and interactive media experiences for both professionals and residents living near fire-lands, and has had public education exhibits in Buellton in 2021, and Goleta in summer of 2022. Content is generated through collaborations with fire services, scientists, artists, journalists, and educators, for exhibition in public spaces. Whether from the fireline or a data-stream, the communication holds attention. There is a need to increase and continue this type of community engagement in Santa Barbara County. The Burn Cycle Project is a unique collaboration about wildland fire between researchers, artists, journalists, educators, and fire personnel. Ethan Turpin, the founder and videographer of this effort, envisions support for the project to “grow as an independent hub for all kinds of interdisciplinary projects”. These multimedia projects fall into categories of narrative, immersive, and interactive, often with cross-over.
The following projects have been identified as ideas that could further support this innovative educational outreach for the community:
Obtain additional fire footage and creation of documentary film
Support for art installations in various communities
Support for front country fire behavior modeling and video simulation/Mission Canyon
Support for educational outreach films to support the fire districts
In-depth Project Description
There is a great need to keep the community interested and engaged about the risk of fire before another major event occurs. Social awareness regarding fire is generally at a high level of engagement immediately after a fire event, when the risk is lowered because there has just been a burn. However, once an event occurs, the community interest in proactively addressing fire events typically wanes-social scientists have studied this phenomenon and have shown this pattern over time. The challenge of retaining a high level of community engagement around addressing fire prevention can be met by using more innovative methods to keep people engaged.
The Burn Cycle Project started as a design and production service in 2013 here in Santa Barbara County to help the community’s understanding of wildfire’s risks, roles, and behaviors. The project offers immersive and interactive media experiences for both professionals and residents living near fire-lands. Content is generated through collaborations with fire services, scientists, artists, journalists, and educators, for exhibition in public spaces. Whether from the fireline or a data-stream, the communication holds attention.There is a need to increase and continue this type of community engagement in Santa Barbara County. The Burn Cycle Project is a unique collaboration about wildland fire between researchers, artists, journalists, educators, and fire personnel. Ethan Turpin, the founder and videographer of this effort, envisions support for the project to “grow as an independent hub for all kinds of interdisciplinary projects”. These multimedia projects fall into categories of narrative, immersive, and interactive, often with cross-over.
A major series in the work involves using video cameras contained in fire-proof boxes to capture fire behavior within different vegetation types, relaying the intensity and pace of active fire. Another collaboration, Future Mountain: An Interactive Fire, Water, and Climate Model innovates ways of perceiving landscape forces using a video game platform. This video shows both Walk Into Wildfire and Future Mountain at a Burn Cycle Project exhibit in Santa Barbara in 2019 (click here to view).
The following projects reflect specific needs for innovative community engagement for the future:
Modeling of fire behavior in front country and associated video/computer simulations.
During past demonstrations of fire landscape dynamics shown to Santa Barbara County audiences, The Burn Cycle project shared simulations they've produced in collaboration with Tague Lab at UCSB's Bren School using data modeling of Southern Sierra watersheds. Tague lab has also already modeled the watershed directly over Santa Barbara, centering on Mission Canyon and neighboring creeks to include hydrology, fire spread, wildland urban interface, chaparral habitat, soils, climate change and other interacting forces.
A local pilot project could include an interactive, visual simulation of this landscape in which users run scenarios across time and space at different scales. The program would operate within a web page and in museum-style exhibits. A first stage would be similar to what the Burn Cycle has done with the current "Future Mountain", but would reveal local dynamics, including land use/development patterns. The next stage would be to build in video game incentives for self-guided learning, which may also inform personal decisions about natural resources, land use and housing. Other opportunities for in-game research based on participant choices and discoveries could be included as part of the project. This simulation could be integrated via GIS data into the Conservation Blueprint Atlas, and the animations and experiences of time scales over space could also be incorporated into Blueprint maps. Augmented reality experiences about fire ecology and history could also use this modeling for self-guided tours of local sites. An app could be constructed to allow people to point a phone at an object, such as a tree, and see animations of root systems, plant processes, hydrological cycles, and fire history.
Continue documenting wildfires and prescribed burns with video
Fire proof camera box footage builds a library of views inside local vegetation as it burns. This is powerful for immersive video exhibits and may also be useful for training and research purposes. Documentary footage helps capture fire behaviors and impacts as they happen for later uses, including informational videos and works of video journalism. Funding to support continued documentation of wildfire in Santa Barbara County is needed.
Fire Stories
Ethan Turpin has an archive of fire incident footage which he’d like to resource in order to create some short documentary stories about important dynamics in contemporary fire regimes. Productions like these have the potential as collaborations between stakeholders of many kinds and would find interested audiences locally and beyond.
A Strategic Plan for Public Exhibits
Support for pop-up exhibits in fire-prone communities, in large public venues such as state/county fairs, and established museums can be a meaningful way to reach many community members. Long term strategic development helps to plan for exhibits with local partners and produce content for their audiences. Funding for coordination with Cal Fire and other interested organizations about how the multimedia simulations, such as Walk Into Wildfire, can support their Statewide training goals, is needed.
Status: Partial funding is in place via the Fire Safe Council and the Regional Wildfire Mitigation Program grant.
Cost: Medium
Funding Sources: National Fish and Wildlife Foundation grant to Fire Safe Council is funding some of Ethan's work, as well as CalFire
Permitting: None