Young people at risk of failing through the educational-net post compulsory schooling, or who have done so already, are too often subsumed under negative- based rhetoric such as disengaged, disaffected, and NEET (Not in Education, Employment or Training). This rhetoric suggests that young people are responsible for their, supposedly, demobilised capacity and fails to acknowledge the fundamental adversities highly disadvantaged young people can face, further camouflaging the most vulnerable. In this paper I reflect on my experience of collaborating with a group of young people, identified by their schoolteachers as vulnerable and at risk of nonparticipation. I reflect on my incremental approach to building and sustaining research bonds, and the catalysing role creativity played. By transporting the technique of Direct Animation into a participatory design context, the participants produced metaphorical videography exploring their ambitions, motivations and anticipations for the future; a conduit through which they explored, translated, and narrated their experiences.