Anna Freud NCCF

CASCADE Framework

The scrapbook

About the client

For over 60 years the UK based Anna Freud National Centre for Children and Families have been working towards a vision of a world where children experiencing mental health conditions and their families are supported effectively and able to achieve their life goals. They came to us to help them further their mission by creating a whiteboard animation to explain the CASCADE Framework.

The challenge

The Anna Freud National Centre for Children and Families needed a film that appealed to teachers and mental health professionals. It had to engage them in this sometimes abstract subject and inspire them to download further information. We had to make this film fit into a wider brand identity, while avoiding a corporate feel. Placing the child at the centre of the narrative, it was important that the film was emotive without being soppy. The brief required us to incorporate elements of charm but still reflect the real and serious nature of the subject.

The film

Over three minutes The Anna Freud National Centre for Children and Families explain how their CASCADE Framework allows teachers and mental health professionals to improve their joint working and instills confidence in professionals to support children and young people experiencing mental health issues.

To reflect this important subject and bring this narrative to the screen we took an approach which was serious, strongly rooted in reality and relevant to its audience. To do this we choose a visual lexicon which reflected the working world of teachers and mental health professionals. This is apparent in the representation of key stats through the use of educational settings and materials alongside the appearance of relevant characters. These settings allowed us to engage our audience while making children and young people the focus of the narrative and imagery. We kept this film rooted in reality but elements of the script lent themselves to carefully selected metaphors, seen in sections such the introduction of the CASCADE framework. It is visualised by children caught in rapids being washed towards causes of stress. The overall effect was a film which took its subject seriously while using the capacities of whiteboard animation to create an engaging and memorable animation which encouraged viewers to seek further information.

The context

Find more information by visiting the The Anna Freud National Centre for Children and Families website here and reading about the Link Programme.