THE SAN BEDA Red Lens (SBRL), along with Kulturang Laya Bedista (KLB) and The Spires, captured the passion for writing, directing, and patronage of Filipino films in their webinar entitled, “CINESkwela: Istoryang Pilipino” last March 22 via Zoom.
The webinar discussed two topics, each led by two speakers who are currently students from De La Salle-College of Saint Benilde (DLS-CSB).
The first speaker was Marc Guevarra, a second-year multi-media arts college student and film director who shared insights on Techniques in Filmography and the Creative Process of Film Production.
At the beginning of his talk, Guevarra emphasized that information is free and that everyone with access to the internet may find various videos to study such as cinematography, angles, framing, and coloring. Subsequently, Guevarra elaborated that there are four steps to the creative process in film production which are development, pre-production, production, and post-production.
Furthermore, he mentioned that the script is the bottom line of any film project which entails the screenplay, the most important production part of creating a film that brings depth to the film. To develop techniques in filmography, Guevarra affirmed to repeat the process to be able to improve. Guevarra mentioned that in making a film, one should be able to find themselves and the reason to answer who, what, and why.
The second speaker, Jean Evangelista, who is taking up Bachelor of Arts in Digital Film, is a certified writer and filmmaker who shared insights on storytelling or script writing. Evangelista mentioned that as a child, she would always write novels to herself only along with journals filled with everyday events of her crush that made a spark for her to write something.
“I think I owe it to my inner child to write every day, di naman every day but to write in my whole life,” Ms. Evangelista said. As the talk continued, Evangelista described storytelling as the creative way of telling stories because, to her, it allows one to properly express their own statements.
Evangelista stressed that each person has their own uniqueness that distinguishes their story from others, and she believes that each person is connected to the story they create from hidden meanings or actions they portray. One of Evangelista’s works entitled “Malikmata” used popular media as the story and was based on the news where soldiers killed Filipinos in order to build the Kaliwa Dam.
She then explained Freytag’s pyramid using her work, “Citsalp” being its exposition as the start of the story, rising action as the start of the adventure, climax as the inciting incident, falling action as the realization, and resolution as the end or denouement. Evangelista concluded her discussion with some inspirational words, “Tell stories that matter, never stop believing in yourself, never stop writing.”
Lastly, Denise Pangilinan, SBRL President, ended the webinar with her speech along with some inspiring words.
“Bilang alagad ng sining alam naten lalo na ng mga org na ka-collab naten kung gaano ka importante na mailaban ang ating creativity whether in a form of photography, videography teatro or literature it gives life to our soul and it fuels our lives,” she concluded.
(With Jannine Salinas)
Photo courtesy of San Beda Red Lens
