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This powerful piece of storytelling transplants the ongoing conflict in Syria to a Western setting. Politics aside, this video – under the direction of Save The Children, a worldwide nonprofit network  – is an example of a masterful production specifically aimed for social media distribution. While many organizations struggle with creating truly engaging video content, the makers of this “Most Shocking Second a Day” video are hitting all the right notes in terms of fully utilizing the strengths of video as communication.

VidIQ Stats (48 Hours)

• 12 million Views
• 78% Average View Time
• 176,000+ Facebook shares
• 103,000+ YouTube Likes
• 12,000+ YouTube Comments
• 26,000+ Tweets
• 31,000+ Google +1s

SaveTheChildrenUK had 16,000 subscriptions to its YouTube channel in the 48 hours after the video’s premiere. At the time of this writing, subscriptions have surpassed 24,000, a 50% increase in the past three days.

Point of View

The storytelling utilizes a “second person address” aesthetic rather than employing a first person perspective where the audience takes the role of the camera. Here, the little girl is positioned specifically in the foreground as the narrative unfolds around her. It’s important to note that the protagonist never holds direct eye contact with the camera until the very end. Here, the creators  pointedly break the fourth wall to acknowledge the audience. The action fades to black then white as we see the tagline’s gradual introduction, “Just because it isn’t happening here doesn’t mean it isn’t happening.”

Revisit Scenes, Motifs, Ideas

Though only about 90 seconds in duration, the plot of the video features a few reversals and callbacks where early scenes enter a “dialogue” with later updates. For example, one of our first interactions with the little girl includes her cheek being pinched by her grandmother. The protagonist is playful, vibrant, and bats her grandmother’s hand away in embarrassment.

This scene is seemingly innocuous and primarily exists to quickly depict the familial bonds, relationships, and home life of the little girl. However, the creative team revisits this gesture again with different intentions. Now, we see the same action after the incredible devastation the little girl and her family experienced.

Some nameless soldier pinches her cheek at a checkpoint. Gone is the energy and youthful joy. The little girl is defeated, dulled, and nearly catatonic. She doesn’t even flinch and keeps her eyes trained on the ground.

The video begins and ends with bookend images of a birthday celebration. At first, we see family and friends circling our main character. Ultimately, we are left with the stark, devastating image of a broken little girl with a thousand yard stare.

The storytelling choice of revisiting and inverting previous scenes allows a greater sense of poignancy to surround our main character’s journey. Examining a scene, motif, or concept again with new information or a new context can add necessary depth to your narrative while making your viewers reconsider what they have previously seen.

One Second Storytelling

The protagonist’s “first act” is marked with the events and milestones of a happy, middle-class childhood. We see flashes of a birthday celebration, cuddling with a stuffed animal, her cheek being pinched by a grandmother, her disgusted reaction to a certain food, and falling asleep during a car ride. This “second a day” montage style gradually reveals important information that seems trivial at first. In addition, our attention is consistently refreshed as the use of jump cuts keeps the story shrouded in unpredictability. We get enough of a glimpse to process the information but nothing enduring so that we get comfortable.

Montage can be a way to quickly characterize someone in a relatively short span of time. We see the little girl as a playful, happy youth that practices an instrument, loves her family, and plays games. This is not a groundbreaking backstory; the creators intended on establishing a normal, average avatar of a middle class child for like-minded audiences to sympathize. That makes her arc that much more alarming and heartbreaking as violence and civil unrest disrupts everyday normality.

This “second a day” aesthetic has largely been proliferated through social platforms and YouTube. What’s interesting to note is the translation of the cinematic montage to current digital storytelling mediums. In other words, this same “Most Shocking” narrative could be edited and re-told as a Vine, Instagram Video, or extended series of both. Yes, certain nuances native to the long-form story will be lost but new perspectives may emerge through juxtaposition. Imagine selecting the six most powerful seconds of this video for a Vine or 15 seconds for an Instagram. What is kept and what is lost?

Sound Strengthens Context

The soundtrack – or lack thereof – is integral to this video’s impact. The creators opted to utilize diegetic sounds (i.e. sounds that naturally originate from objects, people, or the events contained in the scene) to ground the piece in a sense of realism. This tasteful choice avoids the blatant tugging of the heart strings of overtly-sentimental videos that circle human interest subject matters. Using an inappropriate song or score can drastically reduce the efficacy of your message. At best, the visuals and music are mismatched. At worst, you are undoing all the goodwill of your storytelling with a distracting, annoying, or overblown soundtrack.

Due to the jump cut editing choices, we are constantly skipping around in noise levels. This shifting makes it difficult to telegraph or predict where/how events unfold. Early scenes are ho-hum reflections (e.g. the little girl putting on lipstick, practicing a recorder, riding her bicycle, playing soccer/football with her dad). Soon, new audio cues are introduced that foreshadow the eventual disintegration of the family. The most obvious point: an “audio match cut” of the little girl’s father saying “Ready or not…” during a game of hide and seek followed by “…here it comes” as he passes the ball to her. Next, we see a talking head journalist on television referencing clashes/unrest. The ticker reads “Hundred’s Dead. United Nations…”

This inkling soon develops a crescendo. Her father listens to a radio report and then argues with a neighbor. We hear jets fly overhead. Car alarms go off as the family frantically packs necessities into their station wagon. The talking head returns with updates about “airstrikes on rebel positions.” Subsequently, the family is in full-fledged disaster response as bombs go off. The ceiling cracks as dust and debris fall on the little girl. A bloodcurling moment involves a terrifying explosion that occurs just behind our protagonist.

The rest of the video is punctuated with periods of relative calm (e.g. the little girl walking, eating a rotten apple) in between the symphony of violence. We hear gunfire, police sirens, and anguish when the family is split apart at a checkpoint. The final act follows the little girl as a refugee whose dead eyes carry the weight of immense physical and emotional trauma.

Use the Whole Frame

Our main character doesn’t speak at length. Most of her lines are one word names, frantic questions, or shrieks. Instead, the makers have wisely leveraged the medium of video storytelling by taking advantage of depth of action. Expository elements are introduced in subtle fashion through background props and audio inserts. For example, we see the protagonist playing with a Rubik’s Cube as her mother watches a BBC-ish news update. Here, our focus is trained on the little girl placed squarely in the foreground. However, our eyes move towards the talking head as the newscaster utters “…clashes with British….”

Later, we see a wordless scene where the little girl plays with a straw. More importantly, we get another plot development; her father reads a newspaper with the headline, “Government Declares Martial Law.” In this instance, the creative team decided to show rather than tell. This tactic rewards the truly engaged viewers who are actively scrutinizing the frame for any clues, hints, or knowledge.

Remember, video works best by engaging both sight and sound. You can produce wholly original and compelling video content by maximizing control of the foreground, mid-ground, background, and audio cues in your shots. You may find yourself exploring multiple planes and vertices of action and movement. You might find ways to add quality production value without blowing your budget by simply adding an auditory reference. In any case, your viewers are agreeing to go on a journey with you so you better reward their patience.

Choose Annotations Wisely

Rather than bombard viewers with distracting annotations at the forefront of the video, Save the Children judiciously utilized them in the waning segments. Initially, their annotation contained a bland, straight forward call to action, “Find out more….” This CTA was placed in the top right corner in a grey box on a white background.

Later, the final graphic was changed. The new version includes an annotation enclosed in a red text box with stronger, action-oriented language that emphasizes viewer participation. The call to action, “How you can help,” is also placed at the top right hand corner.

SaveTheChildrenUK’s YouTube channel managers understand color contrast and layout and have applied annotations accordingly. Notice that the audience sees only three visual elements. First, we catch the prevailing hashtag centered in bold, capital typeface. Below, we see the logo of the parent organization. The annotation sticks out amongst this minimal graphic and supports rather than clutters.