We are a collective of documentary storytellers and participatory social researchers, working alongside communities to make lived experience visible in ways that deepen understanding, strengthen accountability, and catalyse social change.
Using participatory, film-based methods grounded in ethical practice and deep listening, we co-create rich qualitative insights and transform them into compelling, evidence-based stories.
Our work supports program design, monitoring, evaluation, and learning—drawing on approaches such as participatory video, PhotoVoice, enhanced Most Significant Change, and human-centred design.
Making your stories count!
We are story beings.
We make sense of the world through story—
through what is spoken, remembered, felt, and shared.
Story shapes what we see, what we value, and what we believe is possible.
But not all stories are heard. And not all ways of knowing are recognised.
At Story Catchers, we work to bring forward the stories that live closest to experience— held in people, in place, in relationship.
Stories that carry nuance, contradiction, emotion, and truth.
We listen deeply.
We work purposefully.
We create with, not for.
Through participatory social research and storytelling,
We gather lived experience with care— honouring it as both knowledge and evidence.
Because when stories are held ethically, they do more than move us.
They reveal patterns.
They challenge assumptions.
They make the invisible visible.
They create the conditions for understanding, for accountability,
and for change.
We believe story is not just communication
It is a way of knowing, a way of learning, and a way of reshaping the systems we live within.
And when storytelling becomes shared — when communities hold the tools to tell their own stories — it becomes something more.
Not a product.
But a practice.
Not extraction.
But connection.
Not a single moment.
But an ongoing way of seeing, listening, and being together in the world.
WHAT WE DO
Stories for Purpose
We use evidence-informed approaches that integrate social research, monitoring and evaluation, and participatory storytelling—with story at the centre.
All of our processes can be participatory and co-designed, ensuring the voices, knowledge, and lived experiences of communities shape every stage of the work.
Our Story Catching methodology builds on an enhanced Most Significant Change process, PhotoVoice and documentary practice. This enables us to surface relational change, lived experience, and unexpected outcomes that traditional metrics often miss.
By embedding filmmaking and participatory social research methods across every phase—from research design and fieldwork to workshops, analysis, and reporting—we make evaluation more accessible, inclusive, and engaging for the communities we work alongside.
We partner with clients and communities to strengthen program design and communicate impact clearly—through visual case studies, documentary-style evaluations, PhotoVoice and interactive ArcGIS StoryMaps that bring together narrative, place, and data.