Sometimes you want to visualize something larger than what you can produce yourself. It touches a piece of human history from a time you never lived through, yet it fascinates you. To recreate something set during the Second World War in the Netherlands, you would need thousands of euros per day in production budget just to approach it with traditional film.
To still be able to tell a story or capture an atmosphere from that era, I chose to run an experiment using imagery from the Second World War. You inevitably enter ethical territory when working with historical moments of this weight, but regardless I tried to focus primarily on atmosphere; an interpretation shaped by the visual language of that time rather than a literal reconstruction.
When it comes to the use of the medium itself, generative imagery through Midjourney, everything comes together here. The format is short, focused on social platforms, and not intended for cinema. Do not mistake it for film. Think of it instead as a new medium that is still finding its definition.
By combining real archival footage with personal sound design, you can get remarkably close to a certain rawness that feels specific to the medium itself.
