A 3D visualization of the elevational dance of the Andean high mountain biome in the Pleistocene arena

“Sky Islands: a past time travel in the Andes mountains” is a short film based on the scientific publication “The flickering connectivity system of the northern Andean páramos”[1], which was selected for a special virtual issue in the Journal of Biogeography (July 2021) as one of the highest citation rates of papers published since 2009. This film used digital art, photography, 3D animation, and scientific data visualization to understand how the high-altitude ecosystems of the Northern Andes, the páramos, evolved in time and space. It displays how the shifting elevational distributions of the páramos were caused by changing temperature conditions driven by long-term climate fluctuations and how speciation could have increased exponentially under these dynamic conditions. Additionally, it provides key insights in how the present-day biodiversity, which was built up during several million years, is deteriorating in just a few decades of devastating human activity. The film has now been shown at different public events, is available in Youtube ([2] over 10,000 views since 07-2018), and an updated version has been the official selection of international environmental film festivals, winning several awards in addition [3]. The results of this outreach approach have had a significant impact in various ways. First of all, decades of knowledge on the evolution in Andean ecosystems has been integrated, providing a much-needed interface for multi-disciplinary research between paleoecology, phylogeography of plants, and pollen-based reconstructions of paleoclimate. Secondly, strong information graphics trigger new initiatives in mountain research globally, elucidating the origin of biodiversity in an unprecedented manner. Thirdly, science visualization is increasingly being considered as a vital tool in communicating key scientific development. In addition, it helps students to better understand the history of the páramos, and high mountain ecosystems in general. Finally, the visualization is relevant for a large public including scientists and universities, filmmakers, new media artists, schools, policymakers and governments, stimulating outreach to the community also through the use of social media tools [4,5]. In this talk, we will elaborate further on the process of making a scientific film from a scientific publication, and the challenges of “translating” a scientific story into a work of public outreach and art.

References

[1]     Suzette G.A. Flantua, Aaron O’Dea, Renske E. Onstein, Catalina Giraldo, Henry Hooghiemstra 2019. The flickering connectivity system of the northern Andean páramos. Journal of Biogeography 46(8), 1808-1825. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/jbi.13607

[2]      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Wcp18vBDK4

[3]      https://www.catalhinagiraldo.com/sky-islands

[4]      https://www.instagram.com/skyislandsandes/