Condensing 65,000 miles of travel across the country, almost three years of research, and nearly 200 interviews into 1 hour and 25 minutes wasn’t an easy feat. But the process of selection says a lot about the things that mattered to us as film-makers. Matt Clarke (editor), Jon (director), and I (producer) decided to build […]
Off-gridders have seen the environmental light
The Halifax Herald published this week a fantastic review of our book. It is available here and reposted below: A book by Phillip Vannini and Jonathan Taggart, Off the Grid, is the single best source of anecdotal analysis on this energy subject I’ve seen in 40 years. Published under Routledge’s Innovative Ethnographies series, backed by […]
New articles in The Tyee and the Huffington Post
Santa delivered two very nice presents this week. First the Huffington Post published this article inspired by an interview with off-grid BC resident Kurt Cehak and with myself. Kurt had some fantastic insights into off-grid living and Rhianna Schmunk from the Huffington Post was kind enough to embed our film trailer and post lots of Jonathan’s […]
Our trailer + Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram
As of today have a great trailer available for Life off grid. You can see it on our website or enjoy it on Vimeo, where you can also grab the embed code to replay it from your website. Our film and book have also found a few new homes on the internet. You can follow […]
Nanaimo press coverage
This morning the Nanaimo Daily News posted this wonderful story on its front cover, WOW!
The first book review
This morning I found the very first review of our book, which I am delighted about. The fact such a positive review comes not from an academic but a member of the general public (strange expression, but you know what I mean) makes it all the more special. It can be found here, but I’ll […]
Latest media coverage
This weekend CBC.ca and the Victoria Times Colonist wrote a couple of stories about our research, which were then picked up by another few websites around Canada. On friday night CBC.ca posted a podcast of last week’s interview on BC Almanac and half a dozen photos to accompany a short written story. And on Sunday morning […]
Life off grid in the media
It’s been a busy week for media coverage of our work. First, the “mother of all back-to-the-land” magazines, Mother Earth News, gave me and Jon a corner to blog about our book and film. We’re both delighted about that. Next, a couple of local radio stations–CFAX (Victoria) and CKNW (Vancouver)–interviewed me live to talk about the […]
Book release date announced
November 18, 2014 has been announced by Routledge as the release date of our book. And the following day the book can be ordered through Amazon as well. Here is the link for Amazon.ca I’m happy to see the price is good ($35 for the paperback). I don’t have information for the cost of the […]
The making of Life Off Grid
Off-grid isn’t a state of mind. It isn’t about someone being out of touch, about a place that is hard to get to, or about a weekend spent offline. Off-grid is the property of a building (generally a home but sometimes even a whole town) that is disconnected from the electricity and the natural gas […]