Documentary

Introduction

The Documentary Project is an opportunity to research and produce a documentary about a topic that we find compelling and important. In English, we produced a research paper about our subjects, which required us to conduct two personal interviews with people close to the topic and include them among our sources. In Digital Media, we created a magazine article in Adobe InDesign with custom-drawn GDEs (graphic design elements), photos, and a cut-down version of our research paper text. Finally, in Animation, we were challenged to find impactful clips from our interview audio and animate a short documentary around them.

When we were first introduced to the Documentary Project, I almost immediately knew exactly what I wanted my project to be about. Back in January of 2024, I spent 5 weeks in Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital Stanford to treat severe complications that had developed from my Crohn’s Disease. The treatments I needed were difficult and had an extreme impact on my mental and physical health. I was in constant pain, and found that none of the pain medications they had besides opioids helped at all. I could barely even move, as I had underwent a procedure that had effectively removed my ability to engage my core muscles. But then a physical therapist, Mary Hunter (one of my interviewees!), approached me with a virtual reality headset. She said she was part of the Stanford Chariot Program and that they had been able to help patients like me feel better using VR. After a few minutes of trying it out, my misery melted away. I forgot I was in pain–I even forgot that I was in the hospital. The immersive nature of the VR game gave me a completely new sensory experience that served as a desperately-needed break from reality. In the following weeks of my hospitalization, using the VR headset was my primary source of movement, exercise, pain relief, and stress relief. Without it, I can’t imagine how much more miserable my time in the hospital would have been. When I have talked about this experience with others, no one I’ve talked to has heard of using VR like this. This is why I decided to do my Documentary Project about the Stanford Chariot Program. I want as many patients as possible to learn about this source of relief that they may have never been able to find otherwise.

English Production

For my Research Paper, I focused on providing credible and study-based evidence for the effectiveness of VR as a source of pain control and mobility. I stressed the significance of this relief for patients and their daily lives, and aimed to describe life in the hospital in a way that would encourage empathy for those going though inpatient treatment. One of the things my hospitalization made me realize was how much the general public likely doesn’t understand about what it’s like being in the hospital for an extended period of time. I noticed many small but significant details about inpatient treatment that I don’t see discussed as common knowledge, such as what an infusion is, how an IV pole actually works (spoiler alert: it beeps really loudly and throws a fit if you lay on the line wrong and doesn’t stop until a nurse resets it, even if you’ve fixed the problem), the fact that IVs go bad after a few days (they start burning like heck) and have to be re-inserted in a different spot, what a PICC line is, the fact that nurses check your vitals every few hours even in the middle of the night when you’re sleeping (imagine waking up to a blood pressure cuff being put around your arm), the fact that IV nutrition actually smells really bad (I personally compare the smell to rotten potato chips), etc. When I came back to school, I even had some classmates ask me what that thing on my face was (it was an NG tube). With this realization, I wanted my paper to help people who have never experienced inpatient life connect with those who have, in order for them to better understand the necessity for exploring VR as an effective source of relief and escape.

Digital Media Production

When producing my magazine article, I spent a lot of time trying to figure out what I wanted my GDEs to be. I knew I would be drawing items/symbols closely related to medicine, but I really wanted to avoid making the items stereotypical. I wanted my personal knowledge and experience with hospital life to come through in a more nuanced and accurate portrayal of what medical tools actually look like. This goal ultimately reduced the number of “medical items” I felt comfortable including, so I focused my energy on a single, decently accurate IV pole. I also drew the Rod of Asclepius (the staff with a snake around it, frequently confused with the staff of Hermes) and reused a VR headset that I drew for my animated documentary. In order to make my drawings as high-quality as possible, I drew everything in Procreate and used the Image Trace tool in Adobe Illustrator to convert my raster drawings into vectors. From there, I used the Live Paint tool to color in my drawings and finished them off with a few touch-ups. In addition to my illustration-style GDEs, I also drew a stylized pull-quote block, heading accents, body text accents, and a large rainbow spilling down the side of the article for my title page.

Due to patient privacy laws, taking my own original photos for the article was virtually impossible. Because of this, I received permission to use photos from the Stanford Chariot Program’s website (and other sources online) with credit.

Animation Production

For my animated documentary, I decided to use a clip of Mary Hunter describing her memory of approaching me with the VR headset. My plan for the animation was to draw the first portion of the documentary in black and white, and then after I receive the headset, fill it with color. Due to time constraints, I had to leave the animation quite choppy, but I hope that the visuals I created were still effective in communicating the emotion I intended.

Below is my full animated documentary!

Interviewee Bios

Reflection

This project was an amazing opportunity to explore a topic that I’m so incredibly passionate about. Ever since leaving the hospital, I’ve wanted to spread awareness for the Chariot Program and how it helps patients, but I never knew how. The Documentary Project served this opportunity on a silver platter. Through my research paper in English, I could back up my experience with credible sources and help potential supporters of the program understand the inpatient experience. In Digital Media, I could combine the informative qualities of my research paper with the eye-catching visuals of a magazine article to draw in a wider audience and spread my message. And in animation, I could explore the emotional impact of my own experience with the program and visually convey the transformation I experienced after they helped me.

I’m so glad to have been able to harness the potential that these expressive mediums have to share topics and experiences that are near and dear to my heart. I’m proud of the effort and quality of the work I put into this project, and I hope that my Documentary Project will send more support the Chariot Program’s way.

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank both of my interviewees, Mary Hunter and Ellen Wang, for graciously lending me their time and energy and for so thoughtfully responding to my questions. I would also like to give special thanks to Mary Hunter for approving my proposal to document the Stanford Chariot Program at the very beginning of this project, and for introducing me to the Stanford Chariot Program in the first place. Finally, I’d like to thank my dad, who agreed to peer review my research paper and spent hours giving me thoughtful feedback.