Oregon Health Authority, Navigating Vaccination

During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Oregon Health Authority launched a statewide vaccination campaign centered on clarity, empathy, and trust. At a time when public health messaging often felt overwhelming or impersonal, the goal was to create space for real people to speak openly about how they were navigating complex and deeply personal decisions.

Working alongside a creative agency partner, Lightbox Filmworks served as the production partner across a multi-phase campaign designed to support informed decision-making. Rather than relying solely on statistics or directives, Navigating Vaccination focused on lived experience, offering Oregonians a way to see themselves reflected in the stories being told.

This case study focuses on the campaign’s documentary-driven approach and the process behind creating a flexible library of public health storytelling assets during a rapidly evolving moment.

The Challenge

Public health communication during COVID-19 presented a unique challenge. Guidance was evolving quickly, information was often conflicting, and trust varied widely across communities and political perspectives.

The campaign needed to:

• Communicate accurate, up-to-date information

• Remain empathetic to uncertainty and fear

• Avoid sounding prescriptive or directive

• Reach a broad and diverse statewide audience

At its core, the challenge was not just informational, it was emotional. The messaging needed to acknowledge hesitation without judgment and support individuals as they made decisions for themselves and their families.

The Approach

Instead of producing a single campaign video, the work was structured as a long-term storytelling system built around individual voices.

Over the course of two years, we filmed nine different Oregonians across all four corners of the state. Each participant represented a unique perspective, background, and relationship to vaccination.

Each shoot generated multiple deliverables, including:

• Primary story-driven films

• Short-form cutdowns (30-second and 15-second spots)

• Alternate edits tailored to different messaging angles

This approach allowed the campaign to evolve alongside the pandemic itself. As new concerns emerged and public sentiment shifted, the content library could adapt, meeting people where they were in that moment.

Supporting Informed Decisions Through Story

One of the central films in the series follows Casey, a mother navigating the decision to vaccinate her children. Her story reflects a common experience shared by many parents during the pandemic: weighing risk, seeking clarity, and trying to make the best possible decision for their family.

Rather than applying pressure or delivering directives, the film creates space for reflection. Casey’s voice provides context, reassurance, and honesty without claiming certainty.

Across the broader campaign, each story functions in a similar way. The goal is not to persuade through argument, but to build trust through relatability. By grounding public health messaging in lived experience, the campaign transforms information into something more accessible and human.

Production & Collaboration

This was a deeply collaborative effort between the Oregon Health Authority, a creative agency partner, and Lightbox Filmworks as the production lead.

The agency developed the overall campaign strategy, identifying participants, shaping story direction, and guiding messaging. Our role was to translate that strategy into a cohesive visual language through documentary-style production and post.

Production took place across Oregon, with shoots spanning urban, suburban, and rural communities. Each participant shoot was typically a full day of production, combining sit-down interviews with observational b-roll to create a grounded sense of place.

Due to the sensitivity of the pandemic, our crew remained intentionally small, typically two to three people. This allowed us to operate safely while maintaining an intimate and comfortable environment for participants.

We followed strict COVID protocols throughout the process, including regular testing and safety measures for both crew and subjects. At the same time, we were working with individuals from a wide range of backgrounds and perspectives, requiring a thoughtful and respectful approach to each conversation.

This balance, safety, sensitivity, and adaptability, was essential to capturing honest and meaningful stories during a volatile and uncertain time.

Post-Production & Campaign Assets

In post-production, the focus shifted to shaping a large and evolving body of content into a flexible campaign system.

Each story was edited with restraint, allowing voices to land naturally without heavy framing or interruption. The pacing reflects the tone of the conversations themselves: calm, measured, and intentional.

At the same time, the campaign required a high degree of adaptability. With eighteen total deliverables created across the series, the edit process focused on:

• Maintaining consistency across all pieces

• Creating variations for different platforms and audiences

• Allowing individual stories to stand alone while contributing to a broader narrative

This modular approach ensured the campaign could continue to serve its purpose over time, even as public health messaging evolved.

Public Health Messaging Built for Trust

Navigating Vaccination demonstrates how public health campaigns can move beyond instruction and into conversation.

By centering real people and real decisions, the work builds trust in a way that traditional messaging often cannot. It acknowledges uncertainty without amplifying it and provides clarity without oversimplifying complex realities.

The result is a body of work that feels grounded, respectful, and accessible, meeting audiences where they are rather than telling them where to go.

The Outcome

The Navigating Vaccination campaign contributed to a broader statewide effort that helped Oregon lead the nation in effective COVID-19 response outcomes.

During the height of the pandemic, Oregon consistently ranked among the states with the lowest infection, hospitalization, and death rates. The state also achieved high vaccination coverage, including exceeding 90% vaccination rates among Black and African American residents, a leading benchmark among states tracking equity data.

Central to this success was a communication strategy rooted in trust, accessibility, and community partnership. Campaigns like Safe + Strong and Take Your Shot, Oregon combined multilingual outreach, culturally specific messaging, and collaboration with community-based organizations to reach diverse audiences across the state.

The work also supported meaningful engagement with Tribal Nations and historically underserved communities, reinforcing the importance of trusted messengers and locally grounded storytelling.

Through a flexible library of documentary-style video assets, Navigating Vaccination helped meet people where they were, offering clarity, relatability, and reassurance during a time of uncertainty.

Rather than directing behavior, the campaign created space for informed decision-making. The result is a body of work that reflects how public health communication can build trust, reduce barriers, and support real outcomes at scale.

This project is part of our broader Public Interest & Civic Impact work and our ongoing collaborations with government and public health organizations.

Client: Oregon Health Authority
Project: Navigating Vaccination
Industry: Public Health / Government
Location: Oregon, USA
Services: Documentary-Style Video, Public Health Messaging, Production, Post-Production