Protecting the bees

InforMEA is the United Nations’ database of international environmental policies. One of its many topics is the role of bees and other insects in global ecosystems. What are the main threats to bee populations, what are we, humanity, doing to protect them against these threats and which further actions can we take to keep protecting them?

To most people international law is a dry and complex topic. The goal of this explainer animation is to present it in a less intimidating form. The playful designs illustrate the importance of bees to our daily lives.

The fuzzy handmade visual style helps viewers to identify with bees as fellow earthlings. In order not to root the narrative in an idealized fairy-tale-world, however, we’ve worked towards a reduced color palette and more abstract spaces and shapes. We didn’t want to have to rely on figurative landscape shots and other things that would just imitate stock photographic imagery.

The abstract iconographic approach has given us the freedom to move through the narrative smoothly and efficiently. The cool hues are being accentuated by bright lighting and occasional bursts of vibrant contrast colors.

Below is an example of an early test-design and the final style frame next to it.

Check out InforMEA here.

And for all your environmental data viz needs, there’s Zoï.