Behind Working With Local Yemeni Journalists to Document Yemen’s War in Rare 360 Footage
“One day, air raids hit a boat of Somali refugees [off the coast of Yemen], killing more than 40 people. I went to the hospital as soon as I heard, but until now, dear Joi, I can remember all of the details. The blood, the wet clothes, the crying, their language.”
Manal, a journalist from Hodeidah, a coastal city in Yemen, typed out to me over WhatsApp. Alongside another Yemeni journalist from Sanaa, Ahmad Algohbary, we worked together to film our latest 360 documentary, Yemen’s Skies of Terror, that examines the toll the last three years of 16,600+ air raids have left behind on the the country.
Our team first came into contact with Manal and Ahmad in December 2017. Through a contact in UNESCO, we identified three promising Yemeni journalists and equipped them with small portable 360 cameras while they were attending a conference in Jordan. Ahmad Algohbary is a young journalist who has worked with various international news organizations, and is based in Sana’a, the nation’s capital. Manal Qaed Alwesabi is a journalist based in Hodeidah, who has been documenting countless air raids over the last few years, and works primarily with Arabic language media. The third journalist is based in Hajjah, to the north of Sana’a, but we were not able to connect with him after he went back to Yemen.
In line with our other work training and equipping journalists to report in 360 from their own communities, we also wanted to replicate the same model in Yemen. Once the equipment was handed off to Ahmad and Manal, we began a four month journey together that spanned over endless WhatsApp messages and phone calls.
We had our 360 video manual translated from English to Arabic and handed it off to the two journalists, neither of whom were videographers let alone familiar with 360 storytelling. Through detailed instructions and lists, from text messages to voice notes, and through patient trial and error, the journalists became better and better 360 filmmakers.
From the onset, our team was interested in documenting the impact of the air raids in Yemen. One of the biggest challenges the Yemeni journalists faced was gaining the trust of those who had been impacted by the war. In Hodeidah, Manal had come into contact with a man who had been affected by an air raid, but he quickly disappeared, saying that he had traveled to his village and was no longer available.
“I know he didn’t go anywhere, but he was just frightened. I felt very sad for him, because I know what he’s thinking. People here are not sure who will win in this war, so it’s not safe for them to talk about the crimes that have happened to them. I don’t know how to explain how to feel about this, the people in my country are not cowards, but it is not easy to become the breaking news,” said Manal.
Ahmad also experienced some resistance from potential documentary subjects in Sanaa, before eventually finding the two young Yemenis who became an integral part of the film, Akram and Wedad.
As the footage started to trickle in, Viktorija Mickute, producer of Yemen’s Skies of Terror, began to craft the vision of what the final documentary would look like. Our post-production lead, Maria Fernanda Lauret, stepped in to help shape the visual identity of the piece and edit the documentary together.
Putting detailed lists of additional shots that were needed, we sent countless rounds of feedback to both of the journalists, as well as giving different tips to improve their 360 filming techniques. With connectivity being so sporadic and unreliable in a war-torn country, communication and transfer of footage was often delayed and prolonged, but the journalists worked diligently, shooting, sending, receiving feedback, and then reshooting.
They captured the stories of three young characters, two of whom were 15 and 17 years old, and one who was as young as 7 years old.
As always, our team tackles issues through focusing on human interest stories, but through Yemen’s Skies of Terror, we wanted to strike a balance between the three stories and finding ways to represent data to help the audience understand the larger context of Yemen’s war. In this documentary, data became a crucial element.
We verified the information on the air raids reported by the Yemeni journalists by cross-referencing it with the data of Yemen Data Project, an independent human rights monitoring group, and the data collected by Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International.
In terms of visualization, we created animations, incorporating a ticker that was constantly rising in number throughout the film, representing the number of air raids coming down in Yemen over the past three years. Acknowledging the heaviness of the topic, “we also understood the need to be highly sensitive to the fact that these are stories from young adults and children; hence why we used animations rather than using archival footage of air raids causing destruction.” says Viktorija.
As we neared the completion of the filming, we began looking for further collaborators. Similar to the approach we took for Oil In Our Creeks, our virtual reality documentary on the aftermath of oil spills in Nigeria, we wanted to include as many Yemeni voices as possible in the making of this documentary.
Through our network, we found a talented local Yemeni musician and composer to come on board and score the documentary. Based in Sanaa, Mohsen Althaheri has a vast library of work and knew the right feeling and music needed for the documentary, as he himself has been living through the war for the last few years.
We also worked with Eclectic Yemeni, a young Yemeni artist to create the illustrations for the animated characters found in the opening shot of the documentary.
Four months after the beginning seeds were planted, Yemen’s Skies of Terror was released on March 26, 2018, the three year anniversary from when Saudi Arabia began their large scale air raid campaign. Their first 360 video documentary, Manal and Ahmad were able to see their work published across Contrast VR, Al Jazeera English, Al Jazeera Arabic, AJ+, AJ+ Arabic, and Amnesty International.
Manal told me, “I am happy if I see anything in the news about the war in Yemen. We need to feel that we are not alone.”
CREDITS:
PRODUCER: Viktorija Mickute
CO-PRODUCER: Joi Lee
EXECUTIVE PRODUCER: Zahra Rasool
DIRECTORS OF PHOTOGRAPHY: Ahmad Algohbary, Manal Qaed Alwesabi
VR POST PRODUCTION: Viktorija Mickute, Maria Fernanda Lauret
ILLUSTRATIONS: Eclectic Yemeni, Zaidali Rasool
ANIMATION: Hugo Rodriguez
MUSIC: Mohsen Al-Thaheri
NARRATIONS: Soumar Aridi, Zaccaria Ahmad, Amani Khan
PRODUCTION ASSISTANCE: Mohammed Almoayed
DATA SOURCE: Yemen Data Project
