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I Went Low-Fi To Tell The Story Of High Definition Carbon Emissions For Earth Day
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I Went Low-Fi To Tell The Story Of High Definition Carbon Emissions For Earth Day

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In human history, we’ve never streamed, zoomed, and scrolled more than right now. With 10 million metric tons of CO2 per year created by YouTube alone, it represents a rapidly growing energy footprint.

Cue ‘Earth Definition’, a film that shines a light on the scale of carbon emissions caused by online streaming. The initiative asks online video streamers to change their streaming settings from HD down to SD and save 75% of their streaming energy and carbon.

When I heard the Earth Definition idea it grabbed me immediately. It’s so simple; stream at SD and reduce your energy draw and carbon output. Straight off the bat, I knew this film needed a low-fi style. I drew inspiration from early 3D wireframe games like Combat Zone that I remember playing as a kid at our local arcade. I felt that giving the film a naive prototype line-art style would give viewers that sense of optimism you get when an idea is cool and new. It’s the start of something, of asking less of our pixels for the sake of the planet.

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    I Went Low-Fi To Tell The Story Of High Definition Carbon Emissions For Earth Day

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    Simon Robson

    Simon Robson

    Author, Community member

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    This lazy panda forgot to write something about itself.

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    Simon Robson

    Simon Robson

    Author, Community member

    This lazy panda forgot to write something about itself.

    Violeta Draseikaitė

    Violeta Draseikaitė

    Moderator, BoredPanda staff

    Read more »

    My name is Violeta and I am an editor here at Bored Panda. I love reading memes for a living. It’s obviously much more than that, but I appreciate the variety of topics, information, and pics I get to see every day and share with the world! Those funny memes really make my day too. Being born in the ’90s in post-Soviet Lithuania speaks more about me than I’d like to admit. I’m still learning about the world and myself, but I do love my friends, traveling, art, and my cat. My favorite fact to share about myself is that I used to hide meatballs in my friend’s pockets at lunch so I could go play outside. I wish all those meatballs could find their way back to me someday.

    Read less »

    Violeta Draseikaitė

    Violeta Draseikaitė

    Moderator, BoredPanda staff

    My name is Violeta and I am an editor here at Bored Panda. I love reading memes for a living. It’s obviously much more than that, but I appreciate the variety of topics, information, and pics I get to see every day and share with the world! Those funny memes really make my day too. Being born in the ’90s in post-Soviet Lithuania speaks more about me than I’d like to admit. I’m still learning about the world and myself, but I do love my friends, traveling, art, and my cat. My favorite fact to share about myself is that I used to hide meatballs in my friend’s pockets at lunch so I could go play outside. I wish all those meatballs could find their way back to me someday.

    Diana Lopetaitė

    Diana Lopetaitė

    Moderator, BoredPanda staff

    Read more »

    Hey there, Pandas! My name is Diana (though some prefer to refer to me as Diane, Deanna, and even Liana sometimes), and I am a Community Post Moderator Lead for Bored Panda. As my position title states, I am one of the people (employed Pandas for bamboo) over here who work with the community side of things on this website to ensure all is well, and while at that, I also help various creators and artists get recognition for the incredible work they do by connecting them to a large worldwide audience. Other than that, outside of work, you can find me brewing a nice cup of coffee, making a pizza from scratch, or baking brownies. I also love traveling, concerts, and cats (heavy on that, because I am a cat mom).

    Read less »

    Diana Lopetaitė

    Diana Lopetaitė

    Moderator, BoredPanda staff

    Hey there, Pandas! My name is Diana (though some prefer to refer to me as Diane, Deanna, and even Liana sometimes), and I am a Community Post Moderator Lead for Bored Panda. As my position title states, I am one of the people (employed Pandas for bamboo) over here who work with the community side of things on this website to ensure all is well, and while at that, I also help various creators and artists get recognition for the incredible work they do by connecting them to a large worldwide audience. Other than that, outside of work, you can find me brewing a nice cup of coffee, making a pizza from scratch, or baking brownies. I also love traveling, concerts, and cats (heavy on that, because I am a cat mom).

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    anarkzie
    Community Member
    3 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

    That was really cool and I learnt about something I never even knew was a problem before.

    Blakkur Sverrir
    Community Member
    3 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

    Here is one problem, I have with this (I won't say "THE" problem, but one): I prefer text over video. This way I can get the information into my head faster. And I prefer my info pure, without all the private life/opinion BS that the Uploader feels the need to tell, while I am looking for a tiny bit of info. Also I am a bit sound-sensible. Thats why I prefer to videos with a lot of text overlay, that I can watch on mute, maybe with subtitles. Let's take a cooking recipe for example, so we all got the same picture. In SD, you cant read the text. Even in 720 it's often hard. You DO see a difference. Maybe not with cat videos, but as soon as you need to see/read smaller details you see and need, HD. TLDR: Make your text overlays bigger or put them in the description. Thank you

    Community Member
    3 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

    So then if you need HD to read text, you should switch up to HD. But by defaulting to SD, HD becomes an option you need if necessary as opposed to energy expensive default. In short, let’s have a system that lets us use the extra energy and carbon of HD if we need it, but defaults to SD for all those who don’t

    Load More Replies...
    anarkzie
    Community Member
    3 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

    That was really cool and I learnt about something I never even knew was a problem before.

    Blakkur Sverrir
    Community Member
    3 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

    Here is one problem, I have with this (I won't say "THE" problem, but one): I prefer text over video. This way I can get the information into my head faster. And I prefer my info pure, without all the private life/opinion BS that the Uploader feels the need to tell, while I am looking for a tiny bit of info. Also I am a bit sound-sensible. Thats why I prefer to videos with a lot of text overlay, that I can watch on mute, maybe with subtitles. Let's take a cooking recipe for example, so we all got the same picture. In SD, you cant read the text. Even in 720 it's often hard. You DO see a difference. Maybe not with cat videos, but as soon as you need to see/read smaller details you see and need, HD. TLDR: Make your text overlays bigger or put them in the description. Thank you

    Community Member
    3 years ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

    So then if you need HD to read text, you should switch up to HD. But by defaulting to SD, HD becomes an option you need if necessary as opposed to energy expensive default. In short, let’s have a system that lets us use the extra energy and carbon of HD if we need it, but defaults to SD for all those who don’t

    Load More Replies...
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