24/7 Work

The making of 24/7 Work

24/7 Work is a critical and emotionally charged exploration of internalized productivity pressure, the constant mental hum telling you to do more, be more, achieve more. It reflects the emotional reality of burnout: when rest feels like failure, guilt shadows every pause, and the self begins to dissolve under unrelenting internal expectations. This piece is a quiet protest against the normalization of mental exhaustion and the glorification of constant output.

The idea emerged from my own experience of feeling incapable of rest without guilt. I often found myself unable to switch off, haunted by a pressure that didn’t come from outside deadlines, but from within. This project became a way to externalize that psychological weight and create something that others might recognize in their own lives. It’s not just about “work” in the literal sense, but the deeper, internal compulsion to always be productive and “better”.

The visual language of 24/7 Work is intentionally disorienting. Each image is carefully over-posed, but rarely clean or polished. Some are slightly out of focus, tilted, or imperfectly lit — intensifying the feeling of chaos, discomfort, and dissociation. These flaws are not aesthetic accidents, but reflections of a mind under pressure, grasping at control but unable to maintain clarity.

I performed in all the scenes myself. There are no other people visible throughout the entire film, which reinforces the sense of isolation and internal struggle. The lack of interaction or presence of others emphasizes that the pressure isn’t social, it’s psychological, internal, and constant.

The sound design is at the core of the emotional experience. My goal was to overwhelm the viewer gradually, starting with layered whispers, subtle, barely comprehensible, like intrusive thoughts looping in your mind. These layers build over time, stacking until they blur into a sonic fog.

Midway through the film, the whispers shift into a haunting, rhythmic chant of the word “work”. This repetition becomes mechanical and oppressive. A ticking sound enters, slow at first, then accelerating, creating a sense of urgency and panic. The frequency of image changes increases alongside the audio intensity, building toward a claustrophobic crescendo.

Most of the audio was sourced from freesound.org and licensed under Creative Commons while the “work” tracks were spoken by professional voice actors. Marcus Wildelau assisted with the final sound mastering, and thanks to his support, this phase was completed efficiently in just a few hours.

I began with a loose storyboard that helped me structure the early phases, but I allowed the process to evolve. I followed instincts more than planning in the end. The idea was always emotional rather than narrative, less about telling a story and more about immersing the viewer in a specific psychological atmosphere.

Besides sound mastering and minor on-set support from my mother (for technical help during self-portraits), the entire project was executed independently. I managed the concept, acting, photography, and editing myself, which gave the project a personal and introspective intensity.

Voice work was recorded with two professional voice actors, but I ultimately used only fragments of their performances. Their voices were layered and distorted to become abstract elements in the soundscape, serving more as internal noise than as literal narration.

Despite the heavy subject matter, the production itself went smoother than expected. Once the relationship between visuals and audio clicked, the film came together quickly. The final piece doesn't aim to explain or solve anything, it simply inhabits the mental space of burnout, repetition, and invisible pressure.

The goal was not to criticize external systems directly, but to draw attention to what happens quietly, invisibly, inside our own minds when we accept constant self-optimization as normal.

Storyboard