Second Sight
The film
A blind mother, the husband who became her eyes, and the five minutes that gave her back the world.
An award-winning short following the Laniohan family in the rice fields of the Philippines, where blindness had quietly reshaped a family's life — until a group of doctors arrived and restored sight in under five minutes. Told through Virgilio, who cared for his wife Joanaly through two years of darkness, it's a love letter of hope to everyone who has carried someone they love toward the light.
Recognition
- Telly Awards — Silver · Branded Content, Directing
- Telly Awards — Silver · Branded Content, Documentary
- Mountainfilm 2020 — Norman Vaughan Indomitable Spirit Award
- Musicbed Film Initiative — Winner
The challenge
In the non-profit sector, the hardest part is often making the work's impact truly felt. SEE International needed more than awareness — they needed a story that turned empathy into action: new donors, funded surgeries, and a brand people believed in.
The task was to hold the line between an emotionally honest film and a clear call to give — so the story didn't just move people, it moved them to act.
The craft
As eyesight fades, so do our memories and our picture of the world — the warmth of a familiar smile, the light on a childhood home. We built the cinematography to let the viewer feel that loss, and to look through the lens of someone living with cataract blindness. Shooting through naturally occurring frames, we let our subjects sit inside a wash of texture and blur — the feeling of lost peripheral vision and focus.
Vintage anamorphic glass gave us the rest: textured bokeh, distortion, flare, and soft contrast — the blinding light and haze of the condition itself. Movement stayed organic and subtle, keeping the atmosphere intimate and, when the story called for it, quietly claustrophobic. Color held muted and dry until the final shot, when sight is restored — subjects in strong backlight falling to silhouette, the camera moving through the world much as its subject would.
The story
Casting was the hardest part — and the most important. We had one shot to tell the most compelling story possible for the cause, so we partnered with a local production company in the Philippines to interview more than 60 potential subjects.
Authenticity mattered above all. It would have been difficult for a group of foreign filmmakers to walk into a clinic and these small villages and simply ask to film — so we listened first, compiling an exhaustive list of every subject and the honest pros and cons of each story.
The most powerful stories resonate on a personal level. Sympathy can inspire a donation; empathy forges a deeper connection. Few of us know what it is to lose our sight — but most of us know what it is to care for someone we love.
So we told Joanaly's story through the eyes of her husband, who had become her caregiver. It let the film hold both feelings at once — sympathy for her blindness, and empathy for the family carrying it — and connect with everyone, not just those who could imagine the dark.
The cuts
The digital campaign
With SEE International, we built a full digital campaign around the film. A branded microsite carried the story beyond the screen, and locked content gates invited viewers to trade an email for exclusive interviews and behind-the-scenes — growing SEE's donor list while deepening the sense of exclusivity around the film.
Focused on new-donor acquisition, brand building, and fundraising, and tuned through conversion-rate optimization, the work drew over 700K unique impressions at an 8.9% engagement rate — well beyond the 1–2% norm — and turned a film into measurable action.
After two years of blindness, Joanaly can finally see her family again — living in Mailum, doing the things she loves most.
All Work