| Today, a year after Hurricane Harvey, the once-tightknit community of Bear Creek Village in Houston is still rebuilding. An estimated 400 houses remain empty — for sale, for rent or abandoned. Harvey fundamentally altered the fabric of the community. Last month, four Washington Post photographers, videographers and editors teamed up to tell their stories. "Reporter Katie Mettler and I arrived days before our photographer Ricky Carioti and videographer Jayne Ornstein to lay the ground work," said photo editor Nick Kirkpatrick. "We first drove around to get a sense of place." Both of them were struck by how many empty and abandoned homes remained. "It looked like it could have been just weeks after the hurricane, not a year," said Kirkpatrick. For Carioti, the challenge was to document the lives of four families in a short period of time. As soon as The Washington Post staff photographer met with Gil and Carla, though, he knew their stories would be the most visual and "the ones that I needed to spend most of my time with," he told In Sight. "As with any subjects in a project, building trust is a vital beginning. Gil and Carla trusted me early in the process. I spent several hours with them in their travel trailer waiting for moments that showed the love between them despite their circumstances." The story of Gil and Carla is just one of four told through photos, video, graphics and text. "Often times, photographers, videographers and reporters work in silos," said Kirkpatrick. "But to tell a multimedia piece of this scale, all of the pieces had to speak to each other. Having everyone involved in the entire process is key. It was, in the truest sense, a collaboration between photography, video, design and reporting." -- Olivier Laurent |
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