Noted director Mayo conducts film workshop in Zamboanga City

ZAMBOANGA CITY, Philippines – Some 30 participants have just finished a three-day seminar and workshop on filmmaking conducted by award-winning director William Mayo in Zamboanga City in Mindanao. Mayo, whose films include the epic "Lapu-Lapu," discussed the various stages involved in producing a 35-mm movie and digital filmmaking at the Ateneo de Zamboanga University. “If you have the passion, just do it. Don’t be afraid, be imaginative and pursue you goal and produce a movie. Zamboanga is a beautiful place and it is rich in culture and history and these are very good materials for you film," said Mayo, who is also the president of the Kapisanan ng mga Direktor ng Pelikulang Pilipino and the Philippine Motion Picture Directors Association Inc. Many of the participants were film students and digital filmmakers. The seminar ended on Saturday. The National Commission on Culture and the Arts and the Film Academy of the Philippines sponsored the workshop in partnership with Zamboanga City Rep. Maria Isabelle Salazar and City Councilor Gerky Valesco and the Ateneo de Zamboanga University. Fr. Antonio Moreno, president of the Ateneo de Zamboanga, also took a brief time and visited the seminar and inspired the participants. Valesco, himself a television director, who was responsible for organizing the workshop, said a second seminar on advance filmmaking and cinematography is now being planned, including the possible holding of the first Chavacano Film Festival in Zamboanga City later this year. "We are opening the door to opportunities for our local talents to be known in the field of filmmaking and hopefully to include ZamboangaCity among the many cities in the Philippines where filmmaking is striving," Valesco said. Salazar, a television documentarist, urged those who finished the workshop to pursue filmmaking here and promote not only Zamboanga, but show that local talents can also be world class. - Al Jacinto, GMANews.TV