Covid-19 information series
An information series on Covid-19 for women of underprivileged communities
Introduction
Covid-19 related video series providing information to women of underserved communities and backgrounds.
Background
Amidst the onset of Covid-19 pandemic, everyone witnessed the cases of people suffering, losing their loved ones because of lack of information and fake news spread all over the internet. The condition was much worse in those sections of society where people lacked basic literacy. On of the worst hit group were the women of underserved communities who were not only responsible for well being of their family but also had to face societal evils like domestic violence during this period. Thus the project aimed at providing basic fact-checked information to these women to help protect themselves and their family
Project history
The project was an initiative by Umeed (an NGO for women). They wanted to cover all covid-19 and women related topics in form of videos. I started working on this project in August 2020
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The task was to create a series of 12 short, whiteboard style videos (since they were very well understood by target audience) providing information in simple format in Indian languages (Hindi, Telugu & Marathi). I took it as an additional challenge to follow same visual style to create cohesive identity for the entire series.
My role
I was responsible for creating videos based on research material and audio provided by the team. Apart from them, I also helped in campaign management and SEO.
Process
For a typical video, the research team would thoroughly and extensively research the topic and fact check for info before creating script for video. The script was then translated into Hindi & Telugu (Bengali in 2 videos) and audio was recorded. We would try to limit the length between 3-6 minutes. Upon receiving the audio & script I would create a draft video which was sent for feedback and create the final version incorporating all suggestions.
Throughout the project, we constantly tried to improve ourselves based on feedback we received from the communities of social activists and our audience. In the beginning we laid down certain ground rules including bare minimum text in video, no distracting animation and plain aesthetics.
Challenges
This project was my first experience at making videos and that too for a non-English speaking user group. It took me some time to step in the shoes of my user and realize that the things which were very regular to me might not be for them. Eventually, I became more careful with my selection of words and choice of imagery in the video.
Another challenge was on a lingual front. The videos were to be created for Hindi, Telugu and Bengali speaking audience. Since I did not know the latter 2 languages, I was very tough to properly sync contents of the video with the audio. I learnt few basic words which were frequently used and used them as a reference point for audio sync.
Also, it being a team project, it took some time for all of us to share a mutual understanding and expectation from this project. I remember receiving more than 10 points to work upon in the feedback for first video. However on later stages, it went to almost instant approval with no changes.
Final design
The final outcome was a series of 26 videos (12 on basis of topic and 26 overall since each video was created in Hindi as well as Telugu) which was shared on YouTube and other social media.
Here's one of the video from the series
You can find entire series here - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC_BMd-b-L6mcfkBZGoeiVYA/playlists
Impact
We did receive tremendous feedback for this project and it was even appreciated in daily newspapers. By the time we launched the final video, we crossed 100,000 views across all platforms.
Learnings
The project was full of learning from all aspects. I was my first attempt at making videos, for a non-English speaking audience. The reach of people it impacted was daunting at times and kept me pushing for better.
I do owe a big appreciation to everyone in the team for being very supportive and understanding throughout. Not only were they keen on improving but also were open to every idea, suggestion I had in doing so.