Pirates show off their prize after seizing a container ship off the coast of Somalia in October 2008. The footage was shot by the pirates on the ship. This is probably the only time I will get to (sort of) work with actual pirates.  The Somali Pirates hijacked the Yasa Neslihan.   The footage was originally shot to show the ship owners and insurance company that no one had been harmed or cargo destroyed (the crew looked bored if anything).  Scott Carney somehow got a hold of the footage and I edited it together.  I took the music from the PA of the ship, and looped the ‘Yasa’ part for some catchy pirate music.

Excerpt From the New York Times:

Wired has made the entire video available on its blog, but also created a shorter edit, which features a soundtrack that includes what seems to be the pirate cameraman repeating the ship’s name “Yasa,” over a soundtrack of music blaring from the captive ship’s public address system. The result is a sort of weird mash-up of a music video, a hostage tape and a home movie Gawker called “kind of charming,” if, that is, you are not being held hostage at gunpoint in the middle of the Indian Ocean.  Presumably videos like this will not do much to bolster the case for more sober news coverage of the pirates….

This video won a Webby Award (honorable mention).