Sandwell Safeguarding Adults Board: Domestic Abuse – It happens to us too

The brief

Studies have shown that in the UK, if you have a disability, you are twice as likely to experience domestic abuse, and half as likely to report it.

Sandwell Safeguarding Adults Board commissioned us to create an awareness-raising animation to discuss this issue and help address this inequality.

Creating the animation

The film highlights the prevalence of domestic abuse for disabled people, the added difficulties they may have in reporting it and the help that is available to those who need it. It also works to destigmatise being a survivor of abuse and carries the important message that it is not the fault of the person suffering abuse and that everyone has a right to feel safe in their own home.

To achieve this aim we worked with Sandwell SAB to adapt a real-life case study, anonymising the story to protect the individual’s privacy.

The artwork

It is always important when handling sensitive topics such as domestic abuse to work in a way that is trauma-informed. Animation can be an excellent tool in cases such as this. All of our illustrations are always made specifically for each animation, and this allows us to strike a balance between being true to the events of the story without using imagery that might be overly triggering. Original artwork also gives us flexibility in making sure our characters can display a wide variety of diversity.

The voiceover

It was important to Sandwell SAB that the voiceover for the animation reflect the people they serve in their community, so they requested that the main character be voiced by an Asian woman with a Black Country accent. We did our research and were able to hire an actress from a local drama group who fit the bill.

Subtitled animation

All of our animations come with subtitles as standard, and this animation has also been translated into British Sign Language – a service we are proud to offer at cost because we believe accessibility shouldn’t come at a premium.

Would you like a version of this animation to help the people in your area?

Sandwell Safeguarding Adults Board has been extremely generous in offering to share this film for use by other safeguarding boards and organisations around the country.

To facilitate this, CC Animation Studio creates new end slides to provide contact details for other local organisations, enabling the animations to reach and help far more people all around the UK.

Please get in touch with us to find out more about this service and the other animations we have available for re-badging.