Showcase

Based at UNSW in Sydney, The Big Anxiety aims to reposition mental health as a collective, cultural responsibility, rather than simply a medical issue.

Through festivals, creative design, curated community programs and collaborative participatory research their work highlights the need for a more people-centred approach to mental health, and for a move beyond the narrow focus of our current mental health system on purely clinical services.

Since 2021 we've documented several of their events and created 2 short films and 1 feature documentary working with Professor Jill Bennett and her team.

Changing the way we understand and respond to mental health and suicide prevention is important to us and we hope this work is able to support everyday people and influence decision makers.

Stronger On Country

As incarceration and mental distress rises among young Aboriginal people, First Nations communities are desperately calling for solutions that are rooted in culture, not correction. The Big Anxiety Research Centre has partnered with the Githabul community in Warwick, QLD to do exactly that. Led by Nathan - a young Githabul man and traditional owner - the team fuse culture with cutting edge virtual reality (VR) to support healing through connection to Country, creating a virtual pathway home for those who are lost.

Ash Dargan, a Larrakia man, internationally renowned yidaki player and cultural facilitator with We Al-li, wants to make a diﬀerence to the lives of incarcerated Indigenous young people. Engaged by The Big Anxiety Research Centre (BARC), who work to reposition mental health as a collective, cultural responsibility rather than simply a medical issue, Ash is facilitating the creation of a VR tool that can help young inmates on the verge of release to reconnect with culture and community. Working with local Traditional Owner Nathan and respected Aboriginal healer Uncle Alan, they set out to first design, then test, this innovative approach to healing mental health struggles.

STATUS: Pre production, pitching for funding

EXPECTED RELEASE: 2027

Changing Our Ways

When The Big Anxiety comes to town a group of women are inspired to tackle the devastating effects of suicide and trauma. The transformation they experience raises a bigger question: do we as a society need to change our ways when it comes to mental health?

This is a feature documentary completed late 2023 and currently entered into film festivals internationally. We are currently seeking conversations on distribution for this important documentary.

Status - seeking distribution

Throughout 2022 and 2023 we worked with Queensland Music Festival and their Trails program to document music events and festivals.

Qld Music Trails brings Australia’s favourite music artists and places them in the most beautiful locations in the state. From stunning coastal mountains and sun-drenched beaches, the lush rainforests of the far north, or the endless horizons and open plains of the west - we will give you unique ways to explore Queensland one incredible music event after the other.

Dan and Steph traveled around Queensland with the QMF Marketing team capturing some of the beautiful environments, communities and moments from the Trails events delivered in urban, regional and remote locations. From the spectactular backdrops of Jagera, Giabal and Jarowair country on the Darling Downs at an elegant historic home for Opera At Jimbour, to the captivating mountain ranges and ocean views of the Shine on Gimuy events in Cairns and Yarrabah in Far North Queensland, to the beauty of the Cape Hillsborough coastline on Yuwibara Country at Between The Tides, to the big stage at The Long Sunset set in the Scenic Rim, to the long dusty roads winding through western Queensland along the Outback Trails, and finally to Magandjin (Brisbane) for Sweet Relief, a one day festival on Yuggerah and Turrbal land headlined by Groove Armada and The Avalanches. It's been quite a ride that we've loved and hope to continue with in 2024.

Released

Producer: QMF Marketing

Cinematographer: Dan Baebler

Gimbal and drone: Steph Vajda

Post Production: Dan Baebler and Millicent Norman

Colour: Dan Baebler

We were honoured to work with Jungaji to create this stunning music video as a tribute to his late father.

With such a beautifully crafted and performed song like Ol' Rooster to work with, we were able to collaborative with Troy Jungaji Brady and his family to make this video. We've known Jungaji and his father for some time, and so it was with great privilege that we accepted this project and set out to design and execute a creative piece that respected his legacy, family and the huge impact JB had on all those around him.

Out now through Jungaji's social media networks

Status: Released

Produced, directed and edited by Steph Vajda

DOP: Steph Vajda

Additional camera: Dan Baebler, Dan Schist and Kimberley Schwartz

Concept design: Perrin Finlay-Brown and Steph Vajda

An incredible opportunity to work with 3 talented First Nations poets and Plumwood Mountain Journal to create a set of short films shown at the 2022 Edinburgh International Festival

Poets Dakota Feirer, Samuel Wagan Watson and Luke Patterson weave histories and stories, at once immensely personal and radically political, into poetry visualisations that poignantly subvert and reshape the ‘archive’. These works enter into a dialogue with the pervasive forces that have colonised and dehumanised Australia's First Nations people. Forces that continue to this day.

Commissioned by Prudence Gibson and Amanda Lucas-Frith, Managing Editor of Plumwood Mountain Journal, these poems are part of a suite of poems commissioned to respond to plant specimens in the herbarium collection. These films, funded by AIATSIS, are the result of those commissions.

Co-designed with poets Dakota, Samuel and Luke, each film finds a way to connect with the deepest meanings of their wordcraft to provide a visual glimpse into their artistry. Filmed on Gubbi Gubbi, Yuggerah and Turrbal lands around Magandjin (Brisbane) including Deception Bay, Mt Cootha, St Lucia, the CBD and West End. We are humbled by the opportunity to work with such important philosophers and hope these films are widely seen. Thanks to AIATSIS for project funding.

Creative Commons 2024

Released

Producer: Steph Vajda

Director: Steph Vajda, Dan Baebler and Sam Watson

DOP: Dan Baebler

Camera & Drone: Steph Vajda

Sound recording: Steph Vajda and Sam Watson

Edit: Dan Baebler, Steph Vajda and Sam Watson

Sound master: Steph Vajda

Colour: Dan Baebler

First Nations people with a disability are some of the most disadvanted people in Australia. Working with Carly Wallace and her team at First People's Disability Network (FPDN), we've created a set of stunning advocacy and training films to further their work.

At Article One we especially love working with people who understand the value of embedding culturally driven, participant-lead engagement into the process of filmmaking.

Through careful planning with mob with a disability located around the country, Carly and her team designed a 4 month program for us to gather rich stories that have provided an opportunity to create documentary style advocacy content that FPDN will also use to train and educate staff, collaborators and other agencies working in disability.

We filmed conversations between the FPDN team and mob with lived-experience of disability in Perth, Derby, Broome, Adelaide, Mt Gambier, Port Macquarie, Darwin, Alice Springs, Brisbane, Thursday Island and Cairns, leading to the creation of 7 training films and 7 films that share participants stories.

We hope to continue working with FPDN to create advocacy stories that empower participants and allow them to access audiences not always available to social change and advocacy organisations.

Creative Commons 2024

Expected release date - June 2024

Producer: Carly Wallace

Camera & Sound: Dan Baebler and Steph Vajda

Post Production: Steph Vajda with Sam Watson and Millicent Norman

Sound master: Steph Vajda and James Hardage

Colour: Dan Baebler

So much of the mental health support content we see speaks about getting beyond struggles. But how do people cope from day to day and what strategies can be used to improve someone's situation enough just to glimpse the possibility of change?

The Other Side [of Depression] is a project that aimed to create short films that could help people stuck in depression to try simple measures that might allow them to make small improvements in how they feel. Delivered as a participatory filmmaking project with people from the region of Ipswich, the films we've designed are creative stories that showcase the little things that have helped people to make small improvements to how they feel. Whether it's walking, or connecting with others, or immersing yourself in Nature, sometimes it's the little things we do consistently that help us move through depression to a better place.

Nash's story shares his passion for Nature and how when he's stuck in the middle of a pain-induced depression period, finding ways to get himself into the bush can really help him see things differently and understand how to better care for himself. After losing two children, Andrea's story celebrates the way that connecting with people online through forums really helped her to grieve and accept the hardships she was experiencing. Each film was developed, written and filmed in close collaboration with Nash and Andrea and we're excited to support them to share the films and continue their advocacy work around mental health.

Thanks to Ipswich City Council for providing RADF funding towards the completion of these films.

Creative Commons 2024

Expected release date - September 2025

Produced, written and directed: Steph Vajda

Camera: Dan Baebler and Steph Vajda

Sound recording: Sam Watson

Post Production: Steph Vajda

Sound master: Steph Vajda

Colour: Dan Baebler

We're currently working on a new (and long overdue!) showreel! Here's Dan's from 2018 (left) and Steph's from 2025 (right)

Creating films about creative, cultural, lived-experience and community-lead approaches to mental health and suicide prevention

"Working with Article One was made easy and rewarding by the team's professionalism, skill, and commitment to the project."

Documenting events around the state for the Queensland Music Festival

"The Department of Tourism...said that imagery captured and overall marketing of QMF events is second to none...everything looks and feels very polished and content captured is always beautiful."

A music video for local Magandjin/Brisbane artist Troy Jungaji Brady

A series of short films with First Nations poets

A set of short films to be used for advocacy and training by First People's Disability Network

Short films with simple mental health support messages made with people who have lived-experience

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FOR MORE OF OUR FILMS CHECK OUT OUR VIMEO PAGE

WE'RE BASED AT TRIPLE A IN WEST END, BRISBANE

TRIPLE A has sound and film recording spaces for hire.