De-Stigmatization Campaign

For this project, we were tasked with creating a 30–90 second motion story that challenges the stigma surrounding substance misuse while conveying empathy, complexity, and humanity. The goal was to tell a compelling, nuanced story that raises awareness, disrupts assumptions, and shifts perspectives.

I thought it would be effective to use a first-person perspective in which the viewer becomes someone using substances and hears various stereotypical advice or comments from the people around them echoing in their mind as they go about their daily life. I believed that inviting viewers to theoretically experience this firsthand would be the most impactful way to reach them emotionally and help them better understand the feelings and challenges involved. Once I decided to move forward with this idea, I filmed the first POV shot of someone waking up in the morning and gathered the rest of the footage from the internet. Then I searched online for stereotypical phrases and used a website that collects movie clips containing those same phrases to obtain the audio that echoes inside the viewer's head. I also thought it would be cool to use a blinking effect for the transitions between scenes in someone's life to further immerse the user.

made with: adobe after effects