Big Picture Ranch founders Rebecca and Josh Tickell — who directed the hit doc ‘Common Ground’ — moved from L.A. to Ventura County in 2012 to be closer to nature and to pursue the latest subject for their climate-centric films: soil.
Two llamas are bounding up a small hill in Ojai, drawn to the sounds of filmmaker Rebecca Tickell yelling in a high-pitched voice, “Rama! Yoda!” Tickell has in her hand a bucket full of feed, and the two shaggy, snow-colored mammals are ready to eat.
“When the chickens got to an excessive number, they started getting picked off by coyotes,” explains Rebecca’s husband and collaborator, Josh. “These guys, they probably get rid of about 60, 70 percent of the coyotes.” What about the other 30 to 40 percent? “What happens is when you run a farm, you begin the cycle of predator and prey,” Josh says. He adds, “Most people have a bucolic fairy tale [image] of what sustainability in farming looks like. And then you get into it and you realize, ‘Wow, this is really hard.’”
At their all-encompassing home, film studio and farm in Ojai, the Tickells are working to practice what they preach. In 2012, the husband-and-wife environmental documentary directing team behind 2020’s Kiss the Ground and 2023’s Common Ground relocated from Los Angeles to this small valley city, nestled within the agricultural hotbed of Ventura County. The couple originally had a vision of creating a living and learning center where they could make films about environmental solutions, raise a family and live closer to nature. Another impetus to move to a farm: They had learned about a potential tool in the fight against climate change that has informed the way they maintain their unique hybrid space and would end up becoming the topic of their latest films — soil.
The Tickells have long focused on making films about the environment. Initially, they specialized in telling nonfiction stories about America’s dependence on oil and advocating to reduce it, starting with 2008’s Fuel, through 2012’s The Big Fix and then 2014’s Pump. But before they began cultivating crops on this 4.5-acre former avocado orchard over a decade ago (for themselves and friends but also for local restaurants and some organic stores), they learned about biological carbon sequestration, or the process of pulling carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and storing it in plants, the soil and the ocean. “We were like, ‘Oh, wait a minute. We can’t just reduce emissions. We actually have to draw down the carbon and put it someplace,’” says Rebecca.