Mountains & Rivers Media

  • Conservation Photography and Visual Storytelling

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Our Why | Our Flavor of Conservation Photography and Visual Storytelling |  Our Vision | Our Primary Team

Mountains & Rivers Media Provides Conservation Photography and Audio-Visual Storytelling Services and Assets

​​Our Why

​Mountains and Rivers'  journey is to use visual storytelling for Rewilding the human imagination and to re-establish the human's sense of place and connection in and with the natural world.


We provide effective photography, audio and visual storytelling resources to challenge and awaken, move and invigorate, nourish and empower, rejuvenate and connect people to each other, themselves, and nature. 


We use the resources we have or that we create to contribute towards a fundamental and global understanding of the interdependent relationship that humans share with each other and the rest of life on Earth.  We intend to inspire a multi-cultural, multi-generational, and embodied sense of stewardship through the resources we create and that our clients distribute.


Mountains & Rivers Media is a small and agile business.  We are contributing our collective writing,  photography, videography, and technological skills, our knowledge of ecosystems, and decades of place-making with "genius loci", and we combine that with a contagious passion for the natural world to give our clients and partners relevant tools so they may continue creating change in the world and locally in their communities.   We see race, culture, sex, and soical equities as essential strands in the web of life.

The mission of Mountains & Rivers Media is to use profoundly effective photography and audio and visual storytelling to challenge and awaken, move and invigorate, nourish and empower, rejuvenate and connect people to each other, themselves, and nature. 

"We see race, culture, sex, and social equities as essential strands in the web of life"

​​Essential Problem We Address :

​Many if not all of our clients (grass roots, private enterprise, government, nonprofit, and institutional entities) are so busy addressing the change they seek in the world, or providing the level of protection, awareness, and engagement that their mission driven operations needs, they seldom have the room or time to tell effective, meaningful, and relevant stories that connects their work to a broader audience.  Other clients and partners struggle to celebrate with their audience and staff their small and eventual victories.  As an independent organization we can uncover and tell all sides of a story, advocate for our clients and the work projects we do with them, and continue to cover the issues as the story unfolds and becomes a reflection of the organization and the work that they do.  

​​Our Vision

​Mountains and Rivers Media is formed to responsibly use visual storytelling to create models that communicate and internalize revised perceptions that changes the human relationship with the natural environment, others, and an individual’s self and other perceptions.  Over time these messages will stretch the accepted norms and create meaningful cultural shifts towards respecting and caring for and about other-than-human existence, both for the sake of life itself and as (what may seem like) a generous act of compassion and deeper understanding towards others. 


Mountains & Rivers’ existence results from the recognition that several things are true as they pertain to life, human nature, and the natural world (as if it were separate from the world that we as humans inhabit).  One, that life on Earth is an interdependent relationship, and that we need nature and other beings in order to survive and co-exist.  Two, humans as individuals and collective groups tend to ignore or overlook information, ideas, and occurrences that they are indifferent or neutral to.  And third, that humans, as individuals and collective groups, will protect, steward, seek to better understand those things that they “love” or have a feeling of affinity towards. 


Nature is important for the continuation of life.  However, humans have not been encultured in embracing, accepting, and “falling in love” with nondomestic life forms except the amiable creatures to feature from exotic places e.g., Panda Bear, or Sea Lions at Sea World. 


Mountains & Rivers Media expects because of being in business and doing its work that it will create a sense of awe for the eastern United States wild places similar to those that humans hold for the “west” and “African savannas”.  To do this it will excite, invigorate, connect with, and reinforce the human imagination through the visual storytelling work provided to and distributed by its clients.  It will be this outcome that Mountains & Rivers Media will use as both its indicator and its measurement of success in fulfilling its mission and vision. 


Our ambition includes using original creative works and repetition (with updated content) to normalize:


  • Healthy and sustainable life supporting planetary stewardship, 
  • Create a culture of deep nature connection, 
  • And increasing human vitality and individual quality of life both as a species and as earth neighbors.

Our Motto's

  • Rewilding the Human Imagination (TM)
  • and Love Life Better ❤️(TM)

Conservation Photography and Visual Storytelling Team

​​About John Canan, conservation photographer and visual storyteller

John is a photographer, naturalist, and community builder based in Western Maryland on the edge of the Central Appalachian Mountains. His approach focuses on creating imagery that fully engages people and invites them to deepen their connections with their communities, the natural environment, and ultimately, themselves. He earned a degree in Sustainable Community Development and Regenerative Design from Prescott College and was a recipient of the esteemed Servant Leadership award.


John specializes in using photography to serve institutions, businesses, and communities. His work is described as a catalyst for positive change. He is a perpetually curious adventurer and a story sherpa who immerses himself in and openly shares the natural beauty where he lives.

Matinicus (Tinni)​

Tinny is the resident blue merle, Pomeranian. Matinicus is an Abenaki word for a beautiful island 23 miles off of the coast of Rockland, in Knox Co. Maine. Tinni is pensive, sometimes content, and she always ready to explore and share her love of the moment.


Tinny also is the Visit Hagerstown, Washington County, Maryland (CVB) adventure mascot, where she enthusiastically uses her expertise in location scouting, supervising John's stunts, and providing general inspiration. Cute and snuggly, she also has a hunter’s heart. To tell her story with a camera means being able to live life at 1/8000 of a second.


Follow Tinny's Adventures on Instagram and Facebook

Our Why | Our Flavor of Conservation Photography and Visual Storytelling | Our Vision | Our Primary Team

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© Copyright 2015 - 2021 John Canan.  Love Life Better (TM) Rewilding the Human Imagination (TM).  Mountains & Rivers Media, Brunswick, MD  www.mountainsandrivers.co     +1 (301) 969 - 2400