Navotas City Hall, through its Public Information Office, conducted a seminar-workshop on digital filmmaking for junior high school students and teachers last May 10 and 11, from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., at the Pangisdaan Hall, 4th Floor NCH.
The workshop, which was facilitated by advocacy filmmaker and film educator Seymour Sanchez, aims to prepare the participants for the shoot of their short narrative film entries to the 3rd Navoteño Film Festival. Navotas City Mayor John Reynald Tiangco and Vice Mayor Clint Nicolas Geronimo also delivered inspirational talks during the event.
Sanchez teaches filmmaking, film appreciation and video production at the De La Salle-College of Saint Benilde School of Design and Arts, and cinema, scriptwriting and journalism at the Far Eastern University Department of Communication. He is a graduate of the 14th Ricky Lee scriptwriting workshop for film and the first Brillante Mendoza directing class.
His short film “Caretaker” won second prize in the short fiction category of the sixth CAM International Festival for Short Films in Cairo, Egypt, as well as the Golden Philippine Eagle Festival Director’s Choice and Best Actor award for Rolando Inocencio at the third Singkuwento International Film Festival, Audience Choice prize at the Active Vista Human Rights Film Festival, among others. He also won the grand prize for “Hiwaga” in the screenplay category of the 59th Don Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Literature.
Sanchez discussed development, pre-production, production, post-production and distribution, and talked about scriptwriting, cinematography and lighting, production design, sound, music, editing and directing. Eloisa Sanchez imparted her knowledge in production management and producing films for Red Room Media Productions while FEU’s resident actor and short film editor Rowi Du shared some tips and advice in his fields of expertise.
The annual project, which is facilitated by PIO head Irish Cubillan, is open to all junior high school students from the city. Among those competing this year are Kaunlaran High School, La Naval Academy, Navotas National HS, Navotas National Science HS, San Jose Academy, San Rafael Technological and Vocational HS, San Roque National HS, Tangos National HS and Tanza National HS. Only one entry per registered school will be accepted.
All members of the production team (maximum of eight students per school) must be officially enrolled in the school they are representing. A certification from the school principal must be submitted to PIO prior to production. They must also submit a written parental consent endorsed by the teacher-adviser/s and principal to PIO prior to the shoot.
The film festival, which has tourism as its theme this year, serves as a platform for the city’s future filmmakers to develop and harness their craft and showcase their works, as well as a means to discover young and talented Navoteños for the city’s art scholarship program.
