In 2013 I worked closely with Plan Australia to create a series of 7 short films for the launch of a new campaign based on child rights. We kicked it off in Ethiopia with the first brief being centred around the 'Right to Play,' and luckily we found just the youngster to demonstrate how important play and interactive learning are in early childhood development. We had two and a half days with Hennock, and spent the initial time getting to know him, before writing a story and filming during the next two. I actually ran the race with him six times, and he won 5 out of 6 of them (a sandal mishap cost him the first race and threatened to derail the whole shoot).
This project wouldn't have been possible without people like: Charlotte Strong (Senior Communications Advisor Plan Australia) Sinead Blessing (Content & Communications Officer Plan Australia) Demeke Fekadu (Field Officer Plan Ethiopia)
I've been lucky enough to work with Plan for 5 years now as a contractor, offering my services in anything from video production / art direction / campaign strategy. I first ran into the Plan team in East Timor in 2010, since then I've traveled regularly with their communications team to document Plan projects around the world, in truth it's one of the main reasons I remain a freelancer today. I'm proud of the work we've created but also the progression in technique from the early days of getting a Plan employee to stand in front of a water tank and expel brand values, to the latest cinematic short films playing in film festivals around Australia.
In August 2014, the Animatism project lead us into an involvement with East Timor's first ever public art festival named Arte Publiku. The festival was a combination of music, art, dance, performance and all things creative, encouraging nation building and creative exchange through a week of workshops and performance opportunities. I was lucky enough to hold a camera to the event, and collaborated on two projection pieces for the festival.
In 2013 I've been working closely with Plan Australia to create a series of 7 short films for the launch of a new campaign based on child rights. Each film is focused on a different right in a different country, with the focus on quality story telling to give an engaging insight into the lives of those who benefit from Plan's work abroad. For our second video we travelled to Uganda to find a story about Plan's health care programs in a remote community called Tororo. It's a sensitive subject so this one took a very different creative approach - this is Christine's Story (Tororo's number one goal shooter.)