Creative Strategist · Performance-Driven Content · AI Video
Remote · EU Work Authorization
Creative strategist with 10+ years in video, currently operating at the intersection of storytelling, AI-driven production, and performance optimization.
I focus on improving content performance through creative iteration, format design, and scalable production systems. My work connects audience insight, editorial decisions, and data to build formats that perform consistently across platforms.
I started in journalism, covering breaking news and directing documentaries in Brazil. That background shaped a strong instinct for narrative and emotional clarity, which I now apply to high-volume, performance-driven content.
Today, I work across strategy and execution: leading creative direction, designing experiments, and translating performance signals into repeatable formats.
Unfiltered Stories is a Facebook page with 3.4M+ followers built around raw survivor testimonies. The audience is highly sensitive to authenticity, making any artificial element a potential risk to engagement.
The challenge was to introduce AI-generated content into the format without breaking audience trust or reducing emotional impact.
My role was to define the creative direction across the format, identify what was breaking the sense of authenticity, and guide iterative changes across script, visuals, and audio.
Views per video — creative iterations marked
Creative iterations — what changed and why
The original A-roll felt produced. I asked the editor to rewrite the script to sound less rehearsed (shorter sentences, more pauses) and regenerate the character with a lowres, webcam-style look. The goal was to shift the emotional register from "documentary" to "someone filming themselves." The next video hit 148K, the first real spike.
The tool we were using to generate the A-roll got a significant update. The new model produced noticeably more realistic skin texture and eye movement. We didn't change the creative direction: we just had better material to work with. The improvement compounded the previous iteration.
The B-roll illustrations were too clean. They had a softness that felt at odds with the heaviness of the stories. I asked for something darker, moodier, less storybook: visual language that matched the emotional weight of the testimony rather than illustrating it literally.
Illustrated B-roll, even when dark, still reads as "constructed." I wanted B-roll that looked found: like someone had recovered security camera footage or dug up an old clip. We added fake CCTV shots and grainy, handheld footage emulating UGC. The contrast with the A-roll made both feel more real. Views jumped to 596K the following video.
Clean audio on a rough-looking video creates dissonance the viewer feels even if they can't name it. I asked the editor to apply a lo-fi filter to the character's voiceover (subtle compression artifacts, slightly reduced presence) so the audio texture matched the visual texture. Small change, but it closed a gap.
For a story about an acid attack, I asked the editor to generate the hostess with a visibly scarred face. It was the most direct we had been: putting the physical consequence of trauma on the character's body. It forced the viewer to sit with what had happened. The video performed at 351K and set the emotional baseline for what came after.
ElevenLabs was producing clean, synthetic-sounding speech. On January 19, I flagged to the editor that Veo 3.1 was generating more naturalistic vocal delivery: with involuntary hesitations and breath texture that ElevenLabs couldn't replicate. I suggested he start using it as a baseline for the voiceover, applying it in specific moments where emotional authenticity mattered most. He began incorporating it selectively from that point. The format's upward trend continued: "42 Stitches on My Face" hit 3.4M views and became the 2nd highest-revenue video across the entire channel in Q1 2026, as Veo became an increasingly central part of the pipeline. Full A-roll generation with Veo is still in development.
I shared with the editor a set of overperforming videos from real-life hosts, where the A-roll framing was noticeably more straightforward, direct, and closer to the camera.
| Date | Video | Views |
|---|---|---|
| Aug 29 | A Birthday Surprise That Became 17 Days of Terror | 60K |
| Sep 5 | She Was 14 When He Stole Her Childhood | 32K |
| Sep 12 | She Was 7 When Her Mom's Dealer Took Her | 41K |
| Sep 26 | Kidnapped at Four — Starved and Locked Away | 28K |
| Oct 3 | 7 Years Old and Locked in a Jungle Prison | 54K |
| Oct 10 | He Kidnapped Me After I Said No | 40K |
| Oct 17 | They Tried to Trap Us in the Woods | 37K |
| Oct 24 | He Slipped Something in My Drink… I Was 10 | 20K |
| Oct 31 | They Locked Me in a Box… for Years | 106K |
| Nov 8 | I Was Strapped to a Chair for 'Lessons' | 25K |
| Nov 14 ★ | He Locked the Car Door the Second I Got In | 148K |
| Nov 21 | I Woke Up in a Motel… 38 Days Missing | 195K |
| Dec 5 | He Was Hiding in Our Car the Whole Time | 108K |
| Dec 19 ★ | They Didn't Adopt Me — They Owned Me | 596K |
| Dec 26 | Kidnapped at 13… By My Own Aunt | 324K |
| Jan 2 | Our Gardener Kidnapped Me at 15 | 119K |
| Jan 9 | He Choked Me in My Own Apartment | 171K |
| Jan 16 ★ | They Adopted Me to Win Pageants | 351K |
| Jan 23 | He Stalked Me, Then Attacked Me With Acid | 890K |
| Feb 2 | Born Into a Secret Cult in the Woods | 939K |
| Feb 9 ★ | They Left Me for Dead — 42 Stitches on My Face 2nd highest revenue on the channel · Q1 2026 | 3.4M |
| Feb 16 | I Owed $4,000… They Took Me Instead | 415K |
| Feb 18 | My Biggest Fan Tried to Kill Me | 108K |
| Feb 26 | My Ex Broke Out of Prison to Take My Son | 539K |
| Mar 9 | My Makeup Tutorial Exposed My Parents' Darkest Secret | 732K |
| Mar 16 | My Stepdad's 4th of July "Joke" Changed My Face | 1.4M |
| Mar 23 | My Dad Locked Me Underground for 6 Months | 803K |
The key insight was editorial, not technical.
Realism functioned as a tool to support emotional resonance, not as an objective on its own. Each iteration focused on removing friction between the viewer and the story.
The format's growth came from compounding small creative decisions over time, guided by audience response rather than isolated breakthroughs.
At Clever Poppy, a brand rooted in handmade craft culture, authenticity plays a central role in how the audience perceives content.
The company produces ads for a North American audience while operating with a distributed team across Oceania and Asia. Voiceover was a recurring constraint: internal team members had to simulate an American accent, leading to inconsistencies and slower production cycles.
Non-native accents risked reducing perceived authenticity with a North American audience. Recording cycles slowed down delivery, and iteration was limited by the need to re-record voiceovers each time the script or tone changed.
AI voiceover could improve both creative output and production efficiency: increasing authenticity, reducing production friction, and enabling faster iteration without re-recording dependencies.
I introduced AI-generated voiceover using ElevenLabs directly into post-production. Voice profiles were selected to match North American delivery. Generation was integrated into the editing workflow, allowing control over tone, pacing, and emotional delivery through script adjustments instead of re-recording sessions. The solution was applied selectively to validate impact while maintaining brand credibility.
The approach was validated during an active production cycle. It removed the need for voice recording coordination, reduced friction in the editing process, and enabled faster turnaround and iteration of ad creatives. Performance is currently being monitored across retention, engagement, and production efficiency.
The primary gain was operational and creative leverage.
Removing voiceover as a constraint allowed faster iteration cycles and greater control over delivery, improving alignment between creative output and audience expectations.
Rap Lore is a Snapchat channel covering celebrity drama and hip-hop lore: Diddy, Beyoncé, Jay-Z, Rihanna. The format lives and dies by retention: Snapchat's algorithm surfaces stories based on completion rate and average watch time, so every editorial and structural decision had a direct line to monetization.
I joined as video editor in November 2024, but the role quickly became as much about understanding what was working and why as it was about execution. I tracked retention signals across episodes, identified which content pillars were generating outlier performance, and used that data to push the creative direction toward what the audience was actually showing up for.
Over six months, the channel scaled from 11.1M to 17.6M impressions per quarter (a 58% increase), while revenue grew from $178.6K to $259.2K (+45% QoQ).
Editorial decisions: what I noticed and acted on
The channel covered a wide range of hip-hop topics in its early output. Looking at performance by subject, Diddy, Jay-Z, and Beyoncé were generating consistent outlier impressions compared to everything else. I pushed to concentrate episode output around those three pillars rather than spreading across less-proven territory. The top revenue videos of Q1 (Diddy's Assistant at $28.5K, Beyoncé's Pregnancy at $24.3K, Justin Bieber/Diddy/Usher at $22.3K, Jay Z/Beyoncé Downfall at $18K) all sit inside that cluster. No coincidence.
Snapchat monetizes on impressions, and impressions grow when stories get surfaced, which means completion rate and AWT are the real levers. I tracked these per episode and used them to evaluate structure decisions: where in the script attention was dropping, which opening hooks held viewers past the first snap, and which story beats rewarded completion. The top-performing episodes in the data (Jay Z's M1stress at 3:30 AWT/53.7% completion, Proof Beyoncé's Pregnancy Was a Hoax at 3:08/48.1%, Justin's Afraid of Rehab Because of Diddy at 3:16/43.6%) all share a structure that front-loads a credible, tension-first premise and resolves it in stages rather than at once.
Q4 2024: 11.1M impressions, $178.6K revenue, $16.10 eCPM. Q1 2025: 17.6M impressions, $259.2K revenue. The QoQ jump wasn't driven by a single breakthrough: it was the compounding result of narrower topic focus, improved structural decisions around retention, and consistent tile optimization applied across a higher weekly episode volume. The eCPM dipped slightly ($14.72) as impressions scaled, which is normal: the revenue increase came from volume, not rate.
Editorial instinct and execution aren't separate things on a channel like this. The structure of a story (when you introduce tension, how you pace a reveal, whether the opening snap earns the next one) has a measurable impact on retention, and retention is what determines whether the algorithm shows the video to anyone at all. Over six months, the work was less about producing 50 episodes and more about developing a repeatable model for what a high-retention Rap Lore episode looks like, and then executing it at volume.
Alongside production, I played a key role in accelerating AI adoption across the team.
I translated emerging tools into practical workflows, helping editors and producers integrate AI into daily production and improving overall team efficiency.
Nano Banana — Tutorial · Sep 2025
Within a week of Nano Banana Pro launching, I produced a 12-use-case tutorial video and shared it company-wide.
Within a week of Nano Banana Pro launching, I produced a 12-use-case tutorial video and shared it company-wide. The post gathered 34 🔥 reactions and became an internal reference for the team's AI A-roll workflow.
AI Workshop — Live Demo & Q3 Feedback · Oct–Nov 2025
On October 16th, 2025, I was one of the team members who ran a live demonstration for the entire company, with around 90 people joining the call. The session covered tools for AI image and video generation, with real-time examples and use cases directly applicable to the team's production work. The screenshot below is from that session.
Live demo in progress: Sora, Google AI Studio, and other generative tools. ~90 attendees via Google Meet.
"The demo was mind-blowing and directly applicable to my work."
— Participant feedback, Q3 2025
Highest-rated workshop of the quarter. Feedback noted "excellent reception" and demand for follow-up sessions, which led to a dedicated space for workshop replays and materials.
Each piece reflects a specific creative hypothesis tied to brand context, audience behavior, or performance goals.
AI Animation · Embroidery Kit Brand
The brand sells embroidery kits, so every visual decision had to feel tactile. The entire animation was built in AI with a wool-thread texture applied to the environment and character hair: a deliberate choice to make the material of the product present in the ad itself, not just referenced by it.
The colour palette was pulled directly from the brand's existing identity. Nothing invented, just carried through consistently into a new format.
The script came from a personal place: my mother and grandmother both embroidered. I brought that specific kind of affection (the warmth of watching someone you love make something by hand) into the narrative. The emotional entry point isn't "buy a kit." It's a memory.
Creative decisions
Wool texture on all surfaces · Brand palette preserved · Script rooted in personal memory · AI animation built to feel handmade
Hybrid Production · Influencer + AI · Deepfake · AI Voiceover
This ad mixes real footage with an influencer alongside AI-generated takes to build a seamless narrative. The copy required specific emotional moments, like the influencer arriving home exhausted, for which no real footage existed. Rather than reshoot, I used deepfake technology to generate realistic takes that matched the script and filled those narrative gaps convincingly.
The voiceover is also fully AI-generated, making the audio layer faster to produce and easy to iterate: tone, pacing, and language variants can be adjusted without a new recording session.
Creative decisions
Real footage + AI-generated takes · Deepfake for narrative gap-filling · AI voiceover for speed and flexibility · Influencer presence preserved throughout
Hybrid Production · VSL + Organic Content
This piece blends the structure of a Video Sales Letter with the feel of organic social content. Knowing how much timing matters in content strategy, I anchored it to Setembro Amarelo (Brazil's mental health awareness month) as a natural entry point to talk about self-care and its benefits. The campaign connection gave the message cultural relevance and emotional permission to go deeper than a typical ad.
Creative decisions
VSL structure with organic pacing · Setembro Amarelo tie-in · Self-care framing as narrative bridge · Date-driven content strategy
Selected work across formats, combining storytelling, production efficiency, and audience-driven creative decisions.
AI Simulation · Conspiracy Central · Facebook
This video reached 1.7M views on Conspiracy Central. The concept was built around real footage of the thieves escaping (used as a hook), while the video promised to break down the full story through a timeline.
The key creative challenge was the reconstruction. In traditional TV production, that kind of visual simulation would require 3D modelling or live dramatisation, both time-intensive and expensive. I produced the entire reconstruction using AI-generated imagery, which allowed me to build realistic, cinematic simulations quickly and at scale. That production efficiency directly contributed to the content's performance and reach.
Creative decisions
Real escape footage as hook · Timeline structure to sustain curiosity · AI simulation replacing traditional 3D/dramatisation · Speed of production as competitive advantage
Short-form · Rap Lore · Snapchat
Produced for the Rap Lore channel on Snapchat, this was one of the strongest-performing videos during my time on the project. The hook is a clip of Suge Knight, former CEO of Death Row Records, alleging that Justin Bieber had been exploited and victimised by Diddy. The combination of Knight's credibility in hip hop and Bieber's global profile made for an immediate, high-tension open.
The timing amplified everything: the video was produced and released during the active federal investigation into Diddy, when audience interest in the story was at its peak. It became one of the channel's best-performing uploads and continued generating views through reposts and quick re-edits across platforms.
I was responsible for B-roll sourcing, animations, subtitling, cuts, transitions, and soundtrack selection.
Creative decisions
Suge Knight's authority as narrative entry point · Bieber's cultural reach as the emotional hook · Timed to peak audience interest during active Diddy investigation · Structure built for repost and re-edit virality
Long-form · Rap Lore · YouTube
A deep dive into Frank Ocean's career: his origins, meteoric rise, his unconventional exit from Def Jam, and his years-long withdrawal from public life. This was also where I started experimenting with AI-edited imagery, using generated visuals to fill narrative gaps and bring the audience closer to the story being told, adding illustrative coherence where archival footage simply didn't exist.
Two days before the video went live, Frank Ocean broke years of silence and dropped a snippet of an unreleased track. The timing was entirely coincidental, but it drove a surge of audience interest that helped the video outperform expectations. It became the 12th most-viewed post on the channel, with 161K views.
Creative decisions
AI-generated imagery as narrative illustration · Visual coherence prioritised over archival coverage · Career arc structured around emotional turning points · Accidental timing with Frank Ocean's snippet release amplified organic reach
Short-form · Santa Catarina State Communications Office
Originally assigned to cover a state initiative to clear the Department of Traffic impound lot (hundreds of abandoned, seized vehicles being processed for destruction), I saw an opportunity to package the story in a way that could travel beyond the official communications bubble. Instead of a straight report, I put together a visual montage of the machinery at work, cut to Johann Strauss's The Blue Danube.
The tension is the point: heavy industrial equipment crushing cars, scored to a waltz normally associated with ballet. The contrast makes the mechanical movements readable as something almost choreographic, and that incongruity is exactly what gave the piece traction on social media. It performed well across the state's official channels, driven by the irony rather than the institutional message.
Creative decisions
Reframed a routine institutional assignment as a social-first format · The Blue Danube chosen for its ironic distance from industrial destruction · Synchronised cuts to emphasise the unintentional choreography of the machinery · Contrast between brutality and elegance as the primary hook
Mini-documentary · Santa Catarina State Communications Office
This mini-documentary was produced for the Santa Catarina State Communications Office, telling the story of Escola de Ensino Básico Aldo Câmara da Silva, the first zero-waste school in Brazil. I was responsible for the full creative chain: filming, scriptwriting, and editing. The film documents how the school is transforming its community's relationship with the environment and setting a national example, proving that real change starts in the classroom.
Creative decisions
Community-first storytelling · On-location filming to ground the narrative in place · Structured around concrete, observable change rather than abstract environmental messaging · Institutional tone balanced with human warmth
Creative Strategist · AI Video · Performance-Driven Content
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