Once A Little Mermaid
For our final project in Video and Sound, Jenny Wang and I collaborated on creating a reinterpretation of The Little Mermaid in the form of a social media video campaign.
Process
We expanded on the previous storyboard that Jenny sketched out with more details about our version of The Little Mermaid and the character of Ariel. We decided that Ariel lived in New York City and had her own social media account, and she would tell the story of her former mermaid life and why she traded her voice to be human through an introductory video post.
To develop the video, we came up with five parts we wanted the narrative to include: 1) introduction, 2) Ariel's past mermaid life, 3) what changed and what she found, 4) her reasons for leaving home and becoming a human, and 5) her message and mission. From there, we wrote a voiceover narration and identified what video/audio assets we needed for each section.
With Adobe Premiere Pro as our editing software, we used a combination of footage that Jenny sourced along with video I filmed with my iPhone in Long Island City. We also both watched the Netflix documentary, Chasing Coral, which became a point of inspiration for this project. The Ocean Agency, whose work on documenting coral bleaching was featured in this film, had a coral reef image bank with video footage healthy and bleaching coral reefs available that we were able to use. I initially recorded the narration just to get a sense of timing for the video, but we ended up using it as the voiceover for the final version.
Social Media Campaign
To give Ariel a voice, we chose Instagram as her platform and created an account with the handle @once.a.little.mermaid. The graphic for her profile photo was inspired by one of the poster illustrations for Disney’s animated version of The Little Mermaid. True to our ocean activist character of Ariel, the accounts she follows and engages with are primarily organizations related to ocean and marine life conservation.
A screenshot of the profile page for our character, Ariel Tritonsdatter, on Instagram as @once.a.little.mermaid.
Instagram Posts
The initial draft of our introductory video was just under two minutes in length, but after reviewing it and receiving feedback in class, we shortened a few pauses and split the video into two parts for posting. (We also considered the time limits for video posts, although another option could have been posting the full-length video as an IGTV post — but there was the short attention span of social media to keep in mind.)
Introductory Video: Part I
Introductory Video: Part II
Additional Posts
To follow up the call to action from the last video, we planned on having the subsequent posts raise awareness about specific issues of ocean pollution, such as the impact of ghost gear and plastic on marine life, and highlight actionable steps that humans can take in their everyday lives to help protect the ocean.
Final Result
Soon after making the Instagram account, we picked up some followers and likes on the posts, and we also received positive feedback on this concept and the reimagining of Ariel as a former mermaid on a mission to save the seas.
While Jenny and I had not initially planned on continuing the project beyond this class, there are still many more potential stories and content that could be produced and shared through this account. We both care about ocean conservation and environmental issues, and Jenny compiled excellent research as part of this project. Some ideas we had for future posts included creating short videos and covering issues such as coral bleaching from climate change, the impact of COVID-19 on the plastic pollution problem, and ocean acidification. Stay tuned!
