When police couldn’t find 8-year-old Wendy Jane Pfeiffer, two Pitjantjatjara trackers did.
Missing combines massive time-lapse photography with 3D, immersive, abstract environments and first-person POVs to plunge the viewer into the dual story of Wendy Jane Pfeiffer and Jimmy James.
...from its narrative power and the emotional involvement of this true story turned into a splendid website.
Incredible, captivating...
Just gave my first “It’s a masterpiece” vote on @AWWWARDS
This WebGL documentary is a 10/10.
The Project
Offering a personal look at one of Australia’s most fascinating true crime stories, Missing is told through the dual perspectives of Wendy and Jimmy and highlights the unique nature of their relationship, which endured for years to come.
The interactive documentary recreates the events that took place, with principal photography by award-winning photo artist Tamara Dean captured on location 52 years later. Each scene is a beautiful, stylised landscape mosaic of photographs in the Adelaide Hills that the viewer must piece together to drive the story forward.
What We Did
Mirroring the first person perspective found in the script, our priority was to immerse the user in the worlds of Wendy and Jimmy, building a stage for both the audience and the characters to move through. Timelapse photography is phased in and out of view and the whole world exploded into tiny fragments - the clues that make up this crime mystery, all made a possible with custom WebGL shaders and an immersive WebAudio soundscape.
- Production Creative Direction, Design, Motion Graphics, Web Development
- Technology ThreeJS, WebGL, GLSL, Javascript, Web Audio
