Water Aid- Background

Water Aid Advertisement Analysis.

Established in 1981 Water Aid was a response to a united nations campaign for clean water hygiene education in underdeveloped areas. The charity has organisations in 37 different African, Asian and central American countries. Since 1991 the charities patron has been prince Charles. The advertisement was created by Atomic in October 2016, and is titled "Rain For Good" and stars 16 year old Zambian student Claudia and aims to show how communities benefit from clean water by depicting everyday chores such as farming and laundry.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uiy3dkTwPcQ

In the advert for Water Air we see Claudia walking to the fresh water pump in her village. The charity has used bright colours in the character's clothes and the buckets they collect water in to show that although they haven't got a lot of money they are still happy and grateful for what they have. Her walk to the water pump has been used to represent a build in happiness then, at the end of the advertisement, reveals that Claudia is happy and healthy because she has access to clean drinking water. The charity have chosen to use images of children being happy and smiling to show all of the amazing work that the charity provide for people who don't have clean water. The charity also use children because it evokes sympathy within the viewer's hearts because they feel protective of the young girl as in the same way they would their own children.

The charity uses binary opposites to show the audience the vast contrast between the UK and African countries. in the first shot of the advert we are shown an image of a kitchen tap an the rain outside.We can assume that this is in the UK because of the stereotype of England that it is always raining and the voice on the radio appears to have a British accent. The shot is then drastically changed to the dry grass and sand land in an African country. The first shot has been used to make the audience feel guilty because we usually complain about the rain and weather when people in Africa would be grateful for the rain. The tap also symbolises that we have easy access to water and we take it for granted. This contrasts to the later shot where we are shown how happy the clean drinking water is making the young children in Africa. Hermeneutic code has been used to create a sense of mystery as she walks. the audience wants to know where she is going and why. Towards the end of the advert the charity uses lots of girls washing their face and drinking the clean water. This symbolism has a deeper meaning for the audience and has been used to guilt trip them into donating. The audience are shown how happy the clean water is making the children and how grateful they are for it. This makes the viewer think about how easy it is for them to have a drink of water, making them feel guilty and want to donate. The use of the song behind the positive imagery tells the audience that Claudia's life has been significantly improved by the installation of a water pump. This makes the audience want to donate because they can see what a difference their money will make. Once the charity has been able to capture the viewers's attention some facts about the charity are displayed on the screen. These statistics, such as "650 million people still don't have access to clean drinking water", have been used to shock people into donating money to the charity. After this the audience are then shown how they can donate money to the charity. This has been done to better convince the viewers that donating, and potentially saving lives, is as easy as sending a text message.