In order to open people’s eyes and draw their attention to the significant and essential role that the Red Cross and its volunteers have within our everyday lives, we made a film that would confront them with the enormous impact of this social profit organization through history. The film shows a series of figures about historical crosses and the casualties that were linked to them during conflicts through different centuries. The film ends by showing the Red Cross that has not caused any casualties but on the contrary has been responsible for the fact that the lives of almost 41 million people were saved when they were in need of assistance. By illustrating the wonderful contribution of the Red Cross and its volunteers to our society this way we wanted to trigger people to support the Red Cross and to become a volunteer themselves.

The film shows one historical cross after another and each time shows the figures of the casualties linked to it. The film is supported with an impressive and specific soundscape for each cross, taking people back to the specific age where these crosses had a bad impact on society. Each cross and the number of casualties is presented with a different animation causing the film to progress fluently and consistently. The design of the graphical elements in the film is minimalistic to create a serene atmosphere to communicate this delicate yet powerful message.

The film shows one historical cross after another and each time shows the figures of the casualties linked to it. The film is supported with an impressive and specific soundscape for each cross, taking people back to the specific age where these crosses had a bad impact on society. Each cross and the number of casualties is presented with a different animation causing the film to progress fluently and consistently. The design of the graphical elements in the film is minimalistic to create a serene atmosphere to communicate this delicate yet powerful message.

We focused on creating a film that would have the potential to go viral. We started from a provocative thought that there were a lot of crosses during history that had a bad impact on society and caused large numbers of casualties. We didn’t even hesitate to integrate crosses that today are still present in our lives. We wanted the creative idea to be neutral but at the same time provocative enough so that it would start conversations amongst people. And we launched the film through an approach with different phases. Because of the delicate character of the execution we first launched it within the Red Cross organization itself with an internal campaign. As it was extremely important that the Red Cross collaborators and volunteers would support it. In a second phase we launched it to the broad audience at the occasion of the International Day of the Red Cross.

In Flanders just as in the rest of the world the Red Cross has been saving lives for ages through its extensive network of volunteers. Unfortunately, people take the Red Cross and its volunteers more and more for granted. They don’t even notice them anymore when they’re present at every major event to guarantee first aid. You might even say that people are getting a little indifferent towards the Red Cross. In the long term this can be a problem: if people aren’t conscious about the importance of volunteers they won’t support them anymore and there will be less new candidates to become a volunteer. So our challenge was to make people aware again of the important role that the Red Cross and its volunteers have in our everyday society.