Stephen Colbert plays a clip of my movie BLAST!  on his show.

“In a rare combination of content and storytelling, BLAST! treats the viewer not only to the fruits of cosmic discovery but to the fits and starts of dedicated scientists who navigate paths of research that enable it.”  – Neil deGrasse Tyson

Stephen almost never played movie clips on The Colbert Report.  But the bigger coup was getting my brother on the show – he’s the astrophysicist who stars in my feature documentary BLAST! (I extended the excerpt in this edited clip to show off the entire opening).

After arriving home from shooting BLAST! in Antarctica, the first thing I edited was the incredible climax out on the barren ice. Once I had that done, I knew I had a movie, no matter how difficult the rest of the edit would be.

Editing BLAST! required balancing the science with the adventure. Luckily the story had such natural suspense and spectacular cliffhangers that we were able to engage even audiences who would not have otherwise been interested in science. “I finally understand what a light year is!” commented a colleague – one of my most gratifying reviews  (after to Neil deGrass Tyson’s, of course).