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Celebrated wedding videographer Jason Magbanua offers services for free
This is not a drill.
Celebrated wedding videographer Jason Magbanua, who has been the go-to person of the country’s who’s who, is offering his services for free because he said the best things in life are free.
He is not kidding.
“Hell, even my services can be free! For real. It’s not April 1st, it’s already the 5th. I’ll do it. Just for you,” he wrote on his site and Instagram account on Tuesday.
All you have to do is send him a pitch and all the details he needs for the shoot—locations, logistics.
Single? In a relationship but not walking the aisle anytime soon? You still got a chance to bag this offer. You don’t have to be engaged to get his free services.
“Your vision of your wedding or whatever your event is. I’m listening. It doesn’t need to be local, I can travel. I’ll drive, I’ll fly. I’ll ride a canoe. Let’s arrange it,” he said.
Magbanua even makes it simpler for you: He just wants a story that will inspire people to love, or at least make them understand.
“Your wedding (or not) doesn’t need to be one of a kind, nor push boundaries. The only thing it needs to be is compelling. To inspire people to love. Or to make people understand,” he explained.
But really, why is Magbanua doing this?
He just wants to go back to his roots: shooting alone.
“Just me. One camera. One man. One story. Your story... It’s a creative exercise for me, a not too foreign experiment. As for the output, expect something different as well. Prepare to be be surprised,” he hinted.
He is giving his services for free to a couple or a few people who only need to pay him with great coffee. Although, a good meal is also appreciated, Magbanua said.
Here are his other terms and conditions for a chance to get his services for free:
- You must be human. But it can be about your pets.
- I will accept events until the entire 2017. If I'm free I'm free if I'm not, tough.
- This form will be closed on April 15, 2017.
- Take this seriously. I will. I have every intent to fulfil my part of the bargain.
- Whatever the story is. Please allow it to be made public.
- Let's inspire people to love. That's the whole point isn't it?
- Or maybe to make people understand things?
- There are tiny tiny things I will ask for or need. They will be reasonable.
- This doesn't need to be local. I can travel.
- I'm winging a lot of stuff as I go. Wing this with me.
Pitches come in
Netizens lost no time in sending pitches to Magbanua, hoping he will pick them.
Instagram user @doinksdocil said she is a single parent of four kids, and her husband-to-be is single. She said she already drove him away before, telling him she has four kids and could not bear children anymore, but he stayed. "Ang daming hirap na pinagdaanan to the point na kahit sinong lalaki e magiisip na iwan na lang ako," she said.
Their civil wedding will be in Tagaytay this May, and their church wedding in July 2017. "Hindi po kami mayaman pero tulad ng ibang bride pinapangarap ko po na maging memorable," she said.
And to hook Magbanua more, she said: "Sir, masarap din po ang kape namin. May sarili po kaming timpla. Freshly brewed pa and bottomless."
Another netizen, @sarias27, said on Instagram she and her fiance have been in a relationship for nine years, with almost five of those in a long-distance relationship. Her fiance is a seafarer in a cargo ship, making it difficult to communicate since there is no Internet access.
"The communication is not easy since he can only contact me when he buys Internet, but it's not a hindrance in our relationship since we trust and really love each other," she said.
They'll get married in Lingayen, Pangasinan this June.
Instagram user @icemanjoseph, meanwhile, suggested Magbanua choose his uncle and aunt. The two have been together for 47 years but decided to get married in church before Joseph's uncle passes away. "He is diagnosed wih cancer and the doctor already told him that he has only 1 month to live," icemanjoseph said. The wedding is on April 23 in Fairview.
Many more pitches were posted on Magbanua's website.
Jhune Polecios Saulong wrote that he wants a memorable wedding with his girlfriend. "Pero hindi ko po afford magbayad ng mahal. I'm thinking of 'paano ko ba maipapakita sa girlfriend ko kung gaano ko sya kamahal sa pamamagitan ng aming kasal.'" They're getting married in December 2017.
He went on to say that he and his girlfriend Marj are so different. "Sobrang magkaiba ang estado ng buhay namin ni Marj, Doctor ang daddy nya, farmer ang daddy ko. College graduate ang Mom nya, Yaya naman ang trabaho ng mama ko," he wrote.
A netizen named jas on the other hand said even before a movie came out with an actress shouting and pouring her heartache out at Echo Valley in Sagada, she already did it. "Sumigaw na ko sa Echo Valley. Nag-wish ako na magkaron ng someone na makakasama ko habang buhay. :) and a year after that I met my boyfriend," she wrote. They're getting married in October.
But it's not all wedding pitches. A reader named Ian wrote and asked if Magbanua would like to shoot them bonding with their kids.
"Here's my pitch. I'm married, 10th year now with two adorable boys. This is not for a wedding. We spend weekends in UP, running or just lazing around on a mat admiring the landscape. Can you shoot us incognito? Just to capture the fun of just being in a family. I will have fresh coffee for you and a hotmeal hidden in the bushes:-)," he wrote.
First gig
Magbanua's entry into the field of wedding videography started when one of his students asked him, "Sir, can you videotape my kuya's wedding?"
“That wedding was in Gumaca, Quezon. I said, sige. So I hired another student who owned a camera, hired another student who had lights, and we all took a bus, me with my Hi-8 handheld videocam in tow to get to the wedding. It was very Cinema Veritae. We shot it, then caught the last bus back to Lucena to edit it.”
Even in that humble first gig, Magbanua already knew he wanted to do things differently.
He has come a long way since then, and among his recent videography gigs are the weddings of Vic Sotto and Pauleen Luna, and Drew Arellano and Iya Villania.
Magbanua also did the pre-nup wedding video of Kapuso actress Solenn Heussaff and Nico Bolzico. —Trisha Macas/KG, GMA News
