Party While Planting Trees, Yes Please!
We love a good bit of alliteration here at Mark Leisher Productions. We also love a good party – which is why we’re excited to be attending the Trees for the Future 25th Anniversary Gala tomorrow night! We’ve worked with Trees for the Future on several projects over the years. In 2010, Mark traveled to Ethiopia to document Trees’ progress in reforesting the Silte region. The trees planted are multipurpose, so they not only fight erosion and nourish the soil, but they provide shade for coffee bushes, grow edible fruit, provide medicine and firewood, and act as livestock forage. Over the 25 years of their organization’s lifetime, Trees for the Future has planted 100 million trees. Now they want to plant another 25 million – this year alone! Interested in helping them achieve their goal? You can attend the gala (and say hi to some of the MLP team), you can volunteer with Trees for the Future on local projects, and you can donate money; just $50 will help plant 500 trees, and can make a tangible difference in people’s lives.
Smashing Goals and Changing the Industry
I know we’ve talked about M3D before (and talked, and talked), but we couldn’t be happier for them, and have to bring them up one more time. On April 7th, they launched their Kickstarter campaign for The Micro 3D Printer – the first truly consumer 3D printer that anyone can use. They set their goal for $50,000 and surpassed it within the first eleven minutes. 11 minutes! That time puts them in the top 5 fastest-funded projects in Kickstarter history. They reached $1 million in 30 hours, and now they’re at $2.79 million, with 20 days to go. Incidentally, that puts them in the 15 highest grossing projects on Kickstarter, and they’re not even done fundraising yet! We are so incredibly proud of these great guys – they’ve made a product that the market clearly clamored for, and having seen it in action, the backers will not be disappointed. Be sure to check them out – they’re the next big thing in their industry!
Filming the Campaign Trail
Living in the DC area, it’s easy to become jaded by politics. Between 24 hour news coverage and sensationalist headlines, it can be tempting to bury your head in the sand and pretend that politicians don’t exist. But there are some great people in public service around here, and its nice to be reminded of that. This week we worked with George Leventhal, Couny Council Vice President, who is currently running for Council Member At-Large. George has served three terms on the Council, and is chairman for the Health and Human Services Committee. He’d committed to making the County’s future brighter; whether that’s by helping secure permanent housing solutions for the County’s homeless residents, providing health care for working families, protecting the environment (he co-founded Bethesda Green), or easing traffic congestion through alternative transportation. It was a pleasure to work with George and his staff, and we’re looking forward to sharing this video with you. In the meantime, head over to our Facebook page to catch a few behind-the-scenes shots of filming with George.
It’s been a busy few weeks here at MLP, as you can see! The future is even busier – filming for The R.I.P. Files starts next month, and we’ve got some other big projects in the works as well. Not complaining!