In eight-minute film, “Inside Impact: East Africa,” viewers see lives changed as a result of Clinton Global Initiative Commitments to Action
Today, President Bill Clinton announced the premiere of a groundbreaking virtual reality film, “Inside Impact: East Africa,” during the opening session of the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) Annual Meeting. The eight-minute film allows people anywhere to join President Clinton and Chelsea Clinton on their trip to see first-hand how Commitments to Action made by CGI members are changing lives and empowering communities. The film, taped in East Africa in spring 2015, lets viewers experience communities otherwise inaccessible to most – from modern downtown Nairobi to Kibera, the largest slum in Africa.
The “Inside Impact: East Africa” VR film was produced and directed by Felix & Paul Studios in association with m ss ng p eces, for Matter Unlimited’s “Inside Impact” social impact project and VR film series. It will be available exclusively on the Oculus Store for Samsung Gear VR Innovator Edition, powered by Oculus. A panoramic 360 video version was also unveiled on Friday, September 25, as one of the first 360 videos on Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/clintonglobalinitiative/videos/vb.377374190317/10153250212525318/
To date, members of the CGI community have made more than 3,200 Commitments to Action, which have improved the lives of over 430 million people in more than 180 countries. In the film, viewers explore three CGI commitment sites that President Clinton and Chelsea Clinton visited in Tanzania and Kenya.
- President Clinton meets a Solar Sister entrepreneur in rural Karatu, Tanzania, who uses a solar panel on her roof to charge a generator that provides her house with power. She also sells solar-powered lights, cookstoves, and other environmentally-friendly goods, to increase her income and benefit her community. In 2012, Solar Sister committed to expanding its network of women entrepreneurs by scaling their programs from Uganda to Kenya, Tanzania, and Nigeria. As of September 2015, Solar Sister had trained 2,000 entrepreneurs, 750 of which were in Tanzania.
- Viewers join a classroom in the Farasi Lane School in Nairobi, Kenya, as a teacher utilizes Discovery Learning Alliance (DLA) tools and techniques to teach her students about malaria prevention. The school is part of the 2014 Collaborative for Harnessing Ambition and Resources for Girls’ Education (CHARGE) commitment – of which DLA is a partner – co-chaired by the Clinton Foundation’s No Ceilings initiative and the Center for Universal Education at the Brookings Institution. Today, CHARGE has grown as a collaborative to 50 civil society organizations, companies, multilaterals and governments working to advance girls’ education. This collective effort has committed over $800 million dollars to reach 15 million girls over five years.
- In the film, see a child hear for the first time as President Clinton and Chelsea Clinton join a hearing aid fitting in Nairobi as part of the Starkey Hearing Foundation’s 2010 commitment to fit more than one million hearing aids to people in need this decade. They are ahead of their goal, having provided more than 200,000 hearing aids this year alone.
The film premiered at this year’s CGI Annual Meeting, themed “The Future of Impact.” Through that lens, CGI explores technologies of the future that can make an impact and be part of the next wave of Commitments to Action. “For the first time, we’re debuting a film here at CGI. Unlike any film that most have seen, and certainly that I had ever seen, this one is a 360 degree virtual reality experience where you are actually supposed to feel like you’re there,” said President Bill Clinton. “On our trip to East Africa this spring, we filmed with three different commitment-makers and I think that the film will give people the opportunity to understand the difference CGI members can make in a whole different way.”
The creators of the project see Virtual Reality as a powerful tool to create empathy and inspire action: “When an audience member can feel through VR the on-the-ground progress of a thriving philanthropic project and the positive impact this work is having on communities around the world, we think they will be more compelled to support this work and involve others,” said Robert Holzer, CEO, Matter Unlimited and executive producer of the film and series.
“We are honored to have collaborated with President Clinton and the CGI team to tell this important story,” said Félix Lajeunesse, co-founder of Felix & Paul Studios. “Cinematic virtual reality allows audiences to witness events and moments with an unprecedented sense of awareness, presence, and emotional connection. Through this VR journey, viewers will get to experience the contemporary reality of East Africa in a highly sensorial, immersive way, and witness for themselves the challenges and transformative nature of that part of the world.”
About the Clinton Global Initiative
Established in 2005 by President Bill Clinton, the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI), an initiative of the Clinton Foundation, convenes global leaders to create and implement solutions to the world’s most pressing challenges. CGI Annual Meetings have brought together 190 sitting and former heads of state, more than 20 Nobel Prize laureates, and hundreds of leading CEOs, heads of foundations and NGOs, major philanthropists, and members of the media. To date, members of the CGI community have made more than 3,200 Commitments to Action, which have improved the lives of over 430 million people in more than 180 countries.
In addition to the Annual Meeting, CGI convenes CGI America, a meeting focused on collaborative solutions to economic recovery in the United States; and CGI University (CGI U), which brings together undergraduate and graduate students to address pressing challenges in their community or around the world. This year, CGI also convened CGI Middle East & Africa, which brought together leaders across sectors to take action on pressing social, economic, and environmental challenges.
About Matter Unlimited
Matter Unlimited, www.makethingsmatter.com, is a creative agency whose mission is to amplify the power of brands to drive positive change in the world. At Matter, we align every aspect of our business with a belief in shared value, where good is profitable, and business performance is aligned with social progress.
Matter Unlimited is the agency behind the “Inside Impact” Project, with this being the first of a series of films offering audiences a visceral and direct experience in social impact. Matter Unlimited brought together The Clinton Global Initiative, Felix & Paul Studios and Oculus to create “Inside Impact: East Africa.” Leveraging the power of Virtual Reality, this project tells the evolving story of positive social change around the world, one story at a time.
To learn more about the next installment in the Inside Impact VR film series or get involved, visit www.insideimpactVR.com.
About Felix & Paul Studios
Felix & Paul Studios is dedicated to storytelling through the medium of live-action Virtual Reality (VR). In 2013, the Montreal-based company developed a proprietary 3D 360º camera system with accompanying sound capture, post-production software and process – which set the industry standard for the highest-quality live action VR filmmaking. The studio combines this technological innovation with a unique, pioneering and in-depth approach to the new art of virtual reality storytelling – creating emotive cinematic experiences around content that is either original (Herders and Strangers) or in collaboration with existing intellectual properties (Jurassic Park, Cirque du Soleil, and Wild). Offering viewers a fully immersive sense of presence, time and space yet to be achieved on any other media platform, Felix & Paul Studios invites audiences into intimate, visceral, and emotive cinematic virtual reality experiences, organically immersing the viewer in experientially driven storylines. Led by directors and visionaries Félix Lajeunesse and Paul Raphaël, the studio launched in 2014 as a three-person venture and has since grown into a fully operating team of over thirty. Felix & Paul Studios recently announced a major, non-exclusive content partnership with Oculus.
About m ss ng p eces
m ss ng p eces is a production and entertainment company inspired by storytelling, technology and the limitless potential of the web. We provide production and creative services to likeminded collaborators. Since 2005, we’ve hand-crafted stories and experiences that celebrate the human spirit, innovation, art and culture.
