I've made a short video teaser as part of the development of Black Rain, an animated documentary about chronic pain. The project has been developed as part of ANIDOX:LAB, a development lab run by The Animation Workshop in Denmark.
This project in development is an animated documentary about the poorly-understood condition of chronic pain, and about those who experience it. These ordinary men and women overcome huge obstacles every day, in order to find ways to manage their pain and continue with their lives. It is a story of the mysteries of the brain and the resilience of the heart, told through a poetic visual synthesis of science and subjective experience.
Pain is humanity’s most effective survival system; it alerts us to mortal threats through a complex communication system between the external world, the body and the brain. This film looks at what happens when this system breaks – the threat disappears, the body heals, but the pain signals in the brain persist - so also does the sensation of pain. Across the world, 14 million individuals are experiencing life through a lens of chronic pain. The medical profession has no effective cure for this condition, which affects every element of many sufferers’ lives – mobility, emotion, confidence, concentration, compassion, social and professional skills. The best treatments are bespoke constellations of management techniques including medication and physical therapy as well as mindfulness and other psychological techniques. Some sufferers of severe chronic pain are destroyed by it, others find ways to accept their condition and continue living.
Sound Design by New Adult
Additional animation by Tim Divall and Morten Andersen
Sound mix by Mike Wyeld