by There is so much bad news about global warming and the extinction of wildlife, that it is difficult to communicate the subject in a way that overcomes collective fatigue. But sometimes, a creative idea can stand out, and this is one that’s still getting attention online years after it was conceived.
Josh Smith created a series of computer generated images of endangered species using the same number of pixels as the number of extant species. The closer to expiration, the less pixelated and the more abstract the editable image becomes (see our pick of the best photo editing software).
Each pixel is one animal. The more pixelated the image, the closer to extinction.”
In Smith’s project, an image of an Asian elephant looks like a low-resolution photo but is still clearly recognizable since there are still between 40,000 and 50,000 of them. But critically endangered species like the Amur Leopard cannot be identified through abstraction because there are only 60 of them left.
Images 1 of 10
The project was inspired by a 2008 campaign for WWF Japan called Population by pixels (opens in a new tab). Created by Hakuhodo C&D / Tokyo with Nami Hoshino, Yoshiyuki Mikami. the campaign featured only four billboards, each featuring an endangered species (Panda, Ethiopian Wolf, Japanese Golden Eagle and Cross River Gorilla)
Smith (opens in a new tab) automating the process to apply it to many other species by deleting Animal Planet’s list of endangered animals. He took high-resolution photos and pixelated them in post-production to use an approximate number of pixels for each remaining species.
Images 1 of 2
The fact that Smith’s work continues to capture the attention of people on social media today speaks to the ingenuity and impact of the original campaign, and his ability to capture beauty and vulnerability through digital work. The technique also turns photos into a kind of infographic, without the need for much more design intervention (see our selection of the best infographic makers).
Read more:
