Close-Up Research is an ethnographic research and storytelling agency specialising in lived experience. We spend time with people in their everyday environments to make sense of how they think, feel and behave. Our insights and films help clients design, evaluate and communicate better policies, products and services.
Alongside ethnography, we also offer diary studies, vox pops, podcasts, photography, animation, co-design workshops and training.
We visited three grantee organisations that work with young people across London to produce this summary insights edit, a shorter edit for social media, and individual case-study films. You can see the other films here.
This summary edit is divided into three sections, navigable via the Chapter button to the right of the play bar: About the organisations / What’s been the impact? (with 3 sub-sections) / What works best?
We visited four grantee organisations across the UK to produce this comprehensive video report. We also made individual edits for each organisation, and one short film featuring just the young people’s voices. You can see the other films here.
This film is divided into five sections, navigable via the Chapter button to the right of the play bar: About the Organisations, Impact for the Young People, Change in the Communities, Challenges & Advice, Looking Ahead.
We co-produced an ethnographic study with 18 families in Lambeth and Southwark, exploring the realities of family life when a child experiences behavioural difficulties. Alongside this individual case study film, we produced written family portraits, a case study podcast and an insights report with recommendations for better support. You can read the full report here, or listen to the audio podcast here.
ECC’s ‘Family Innovation Fund’ supported different organisations to help families in volatile situations build resilience, and reduce their reliance on statutory support. We produced a series of ethnographic video case studies to inform and bring to life the evaluation report.
To help evaluate Arts Council England’s Cultural Citizens programme, we joined a group of students on their trip to Blackpool and returned a few months later to explore how the experience had shaped their lives and perspectives.
The students had been selected after scoring lowest in a school arts-and-culture quiz – a deliberate way to reach those least engaged, rather than reward existing interest.
For this film about young people’s experiences of temporary housing, which was shown at The House of Commons, we worked with participants to co-design an approach that protected their anonymity while retaining their authentic voices. Their interviews were brought to life through objects and stop-motion animation, with the young people also participating in the shoot.
A ‘remote ethnography’ project, we asked six young people with mobility issues, from across England, to record video diaries documenting their transport experiences over a month, and to reflect on how their experiences might differ if travelling by driverless car.
IntoUniversity runs after-school centres that provide academic support and mentoring for young people from less privileged backgrounds, to help them attain a university place or pursue a chosen vocation. We spent a month visiting their Brent centre to produce this ethnographic report.
To find out more about the young people who attend IntoUniversity’s after-school support centres, we visited attendees across the country, to take their photo portraits and interview them in their homes. The theme we used for both the portraits and interviews was ‘three things that bring you most joy’. Clicking on an image below will open an interview snippet.
