Mark Stern Podolsky, 1958-2012

As I’m sure many of our followers know by now, my father, who served as the chairman of our board of directors for Wild Lens, passed away a little over a month ago. This has been a difficult transition for all of us at Wild Lens, as my father played a central role on our board. His honest and straightforward advice served as a guiding force from our company’s inception a year and a half ago, right up through the end of his life.

In the weeks since my father’s passing, the amount of support that we have received, in both the form of donations as well as helpful advice and condolences, has been tremendous. I want to take a moment to thank everyone who has made a donation to Wild Lens in my father’s name. This outpouring of support has been extremely important to all of us at Wild Lens. More than just providing funding for our film projects, these donations have provided us with a moral boost that was absolutely necessary. If you have made a donation to Wild Lens in my father’s name, I would like to thank you from the very bottom of my heart. If you haven’t yet made a donation, keep in mind that it is never too late to show your support.

We have come a long way in the past year and a half as an organization. Our feature length documentary “Scavenger Hunt” has screened at film festivals across the country and is beginning to play a central role in the growing movement in support of non-lead ammunition. We learned just recently that “Scavenger Hunt” was awarded a Special Jury Prize at the prestigious Yosemite International Film Festival. Our short documentary projects chronicling songbird and raptor migrations through central Idaho and the precipitous declines of East African vulture populations have been used as teaching aids by educators across the globe.

While my father was proud of what we have accomplished thus far, he was always pushing us to think about the future. He insisted that we always keep the big picture in mind and pushed us to think about innovative solutions to both the creative and logistical issues that we face as an organization. My promise to all of our supporters is that we will continue to strive for excellence with every project and conservation issue that we choose to address. The lessons that we have learned over the past year and a half will not be forgotten, and we will continue to bring you compelling stories about critical wildlife conservation issues worldwide.

Matthew Podolsky