Love Out Loud– tafLabs 2010
My favorite thing about our "tafLabs" room is not the ten computers or the impressive mass of wires and hard drives everywhere. It's not even the six Canon DSLRs with all their amazing lenses scattered on all the desks. (And you know how much I love my DSLRs!)
No, it has nothing to do with the gear.
At each of our stations, we are working on individual projects that contribute to the whole-- parody videos; marketing surveys; a retrospective documentary; the slideshow. Every so often, someone will stop what they're working on and lean over to check in on someone else. Andrew coaches Justin through video editing. I help Tiffany rename her files. Ho Chie and Eric look through photo albums from 1989 and laugh at their reminiscences. Karen stops by and we have the kind of late-night conversation about purpose and life decisions that makes me reminisce about life in college.
I love this space because it feels alive. People are connecting and doing amazing work-- completely unpaid-- out of love.
Every year, 200+ youth gather in the Midwest for this summer camp, the Taiwanese American Foundation (TAF). Unlike the rest of the programs (elementary through high school), tafLabs is a space dedicated to developing all sorts of projects, small to huge, that contribute to the TAF mission or serve the larger community beyond TAF.
Within the week, I created a photography mentorship group, started an online video project, produced a mini documentary, and helped with our epic 3D slideshow.
The tafLabs crew this year:
The amazing thing about TAF is that I've been attending since I was 10, and yet I still walk away every year feeling like I've pushed myself to grow. We intentionally create this space for people to be open and vulnerable with each other, and it's awesome to look around and see lightbulbs going off everywhere and people clicking into gear. I'm constantly inspired, amazed, and thankful to be a part of it all.
Here are just a few more images from the week:
The Juniors (elementary) campers crowd around a laptop for a special message from the future.
The annual Thursday afternoon water fight is preceded by a variety of stations, one of which resulted in dumping water on unsuspecting counselors.
Full blown water fight!
This is a fairly good representation of what it's like to be a Juniors counselor.
We walked into the gym already lit like this, so we had to take advantage. And if you think the shot looks pretty decent now, just go check out what happens when it goes 3D in our slideshow.
Tearin up the dance floor. He's inexhaustible.
The wonders of off camera flash. Thanks to Jon Lee for running around the dance floor with me.
The 2010 theme-- Love Out Loud (LOL)
That's all for now. See you at TAF 2011!
Learn more about TAF/tafLabs and see our work at blog.tafworld.org.
Behind the Scenes of Census 2010: Write in “Taiwanese” | Passion Project
It's been a week since the Census 2010: Write in "Taiwanese" video debuted on YouTube, and it's already garnered over 120,000 views. Produced by Slideshow Pictures in conjunction with at least seven Taiwanese American organizations, the public service announcement is part of a larger campaign to get Taiwanese Americans to self-identify on the US Census by checking "Other Asian" and writing in "Taiwanese."
If you know me well, you may know that I love being behind the scenes of all sorts of projects and productions. So I was very lucky to find myself a last-minute addition to this project. Five days beforehand, we worked it out for me to fly down to Los Angeles for a day and a half, just to help out a tiny bit. Let's be honest-- I basically had an very fun day just hanging out with the various cast and crew members, but my official capacity was to serve as the behind-the-scenes photographer on set of the video production. Later, I pulled my own weight by designing the accompanying website for the video campaign (http://taiwaneseamerican.org/census2010). But now I get to bring you behind the scenes with me!
We got an early start on the day, rolling out of bed around 6am and heading over to the studio in Alhambra.
Three Slideshow Pictures producers and a makeup artist relaxing a bit before shooting begins: Jon Lee (CEO, Slideshow Pictures), makeup artist Yuriko Bondies, Alex Yang (Slideshow Picture), and Howard Chen (Slideshow Pictures). Jon has been working in Hollywood for a couple years now. He was an associate producer on Formosa Betrayed. So between him and director Karen Lin, they were able to make this a first-class production with sound, photography, and editing professionals up and down the production chain.
Byron Werner and his crew sets up the backdrop, lighting, and camera.
They test the setup on Howard. Looking good in both frames.
Jon Lee with Alex Wen, owner of KCW studios.
The famous "Taiwanese" Census 2010 shirts. Order yours today from TACL!
Harrison and Haley are third generation hapa Taiwanese Americans. Adorable! Harrison just kept on munching away at his fruit while he was waiting, and Haley was a natural star, delivering lines flawlessly!
Love the giant pencil. Love.
Politician and lawyer Ted Lieu gets some pointers from director Karen Lin.
Two sets of sisters! We had a few really great families who came to the shoot. On the left are Japanese-Taiwanese American Muramoto sisters. On the right, Agnes Hsiao and Elena Ling.
If you've been following me or Taiwanese American news, you might recognize these two as the killers from Formosa Betrayed: actors Henry M. Chu and Adam Wang (links to previous shoots with me). Keep an eye out. You'll be seeing them more in the near future!
You may recognize actress Michelle Krusiec from Saving Face, amongst other projects. And on the right, a 96-year-old a-ma, Mrs. Ray-Yun Tsai Huang.
There were many, many more interesting people who participated in the video, but I don't have space to show all of them here, so head on over to the Census 2010: Write in "Taiwanese" website to meet all of the other cast and crew members.
Singer-songwriter Alice Tong fills out some information for me-- my other job that day was to collect bio information from everyone.
Director Karen Lin wraps the shoot at the end of the day-- 8am to 5pm. A full day's work.
Alex works on the giant pencil.
Breaking everything down-- the scene outside.
A wider view of KCW studio.
I don't know what they're thinking! You tell me.
Lastly, a word about the campaign-- I could launch into an argument about history and politics validating a Taiwanese identity. But for me, it's also about upholding the right to identify ourselves rather than be defined by others.
So share the YouTube video and the website. Tweet this. Go after one of the many other ways to take action. And tell every Taiwanese American person in the United States about the campaign.
But as Ho Chie says, no matter how you identify, whether Taiwanese or not, be sure to represent your own identity and community. This is important for all of us as Americans, and this is our only chance this decade.
Be Counted. Be Recognized.
Above, my latest web creation. Their bios display on hover! You can also learn more about the campaign and ways to help by visiting the website.
Passion Project: TaiwaneseAmerican.org | Webdesign
Every so often-- more often than not, actually-- I get to spend my time working on projects I love. It's not just a coincidence, but a conscious effort to pursue what I find compelling. And while the idea of pursuing your passions is a common enough sentiment, I think many people perceive it too difficult to actually live this way. For one thing, doing something 'for the love' often means doing it for free. But in reality, doing something out of passion will drive you through all of the tedium and the long hours of work much more effectively and rewardingly (yes, I made up that word) than the allure of money ever could.
So take a look at my latest passion project: the brand new face of TaiwaneseAmerican.org. I created the new look and functionality for the site with the help of many, many generous friends. Read my post from behind the scenes of the revamp: Behind the Scenes: A Word from the Designer. And because I love a good 'before and after', here are some screenshots of the website, pre- and post- makeover. Let me know what you think by leaving a comment here or there.
Before:
After:
3 Shoots in 3 Cities in 3 Days | Bay Area, Los Angeles Photographer
Miles driven by others: 37
Miles flown: 390
Miles driven by myself: 150
____________________________________
=577 miles traveled, and that's just today.
Sometimes exhaustion is the most gratifying feeling in the world. In that moment when you finally sit down and have a chance to rest, you can feel the very essence of gravity as it pulls your every muscle down toward the Earth. The soreness in your bones and the slight dizzyness in your head are almost overwhelming, but somehow, none of it is worrisome. Instead, the feelings are reassuring. Because when you've put yourself that wholeheartedly and whole-bodily into your work, the tiredness is not a feeling of emptiness and depletion, but your body's evidence of what you've done and what you can do, and it's all the more encouragement to recharge yourself to do it again.
I couldn't think of a more gratifying way to close out January 2010.
Before I describe my weekend, I'll give the disclaimer that this might make my life seem much more glamorous and exciting than it really is. My life is not like this all the time. My bed is often my favorite place to be. But because I want to remember these adventures, I will capture what I can in a quick summary. Ready? Start.
Friday morning I had a great session with the members of the San Francisco Guitar Quartet. Right after work, I took off for the Oakland airport. After landing in Long Beach (thanks JetBlue!) I was driven back up to Los Angeles by my friend Vince. Saturday was the big film shoot-- the reason I flew down-- for the "Taiwanese American" 2010 Census Public Service Announcement. We arrived in the Alhambra studio by 7:30 am. Ten hours, several celebrities, an Olympic athlete, and a California State Assemblyman (amongst others) later, we wrapped on shooting, had a celebratory dinner, and eventually called it a day. By the next morning at 9am, I had gone back through Long Beach and arrived back home in Oakland, but only briefly, as I then drove up another 70 miles to Sebastopol for an engagement shoot at an amazingly cute family farm.
You'll have to come back and visit again to see the fruits of all these labors. But for now, I leave you with this picture:
Long Beach Airport, the tiniest airport I've ever flown through. This one building is the entire terminal, with four airlines from beginning to end. This came in handy when I almost missed my flight but discovered it only takes 5 minutes to get from front door to airplane seat and thus made it with time to spare.
And now, it's time to sleep.
Good night, world!
tafLabs & tafMedia
I've been working this week at Taiwanese American Foundation, the summer camp I've attended since I was ten years old. I'm serving as part of tafLabs, a new program in which we develop projects to make awesome things happen in our community.
To see some of the multimedia work we've been doing, follow out the new blog I created for TAF this week. http://blog.tafworld.org.
Behind the Scenes: TAF 2009
Welcome to Taiwanese American Foundation 2009: Sprout! After a two-year absence on my part, I am very happy to return for my 13th year at TAF, this time as a member of the TAFMedia crew.
Our first project of the week: given 24 hours, produce a video to be used as the Intro/Theme skit for the orientation. Follow young Brussell as he meets the Taiwanese American Fountainnn and learns about the 2009 theme: ethics and values, sprout! Watch the video here and scroll down below for the behind-the-scenes access.
Credits:
Brussell: Steven Wemhoener
Fountain: Andrew Loh
Writer: Jon Lee
Video: Anna Wu
Editing: Steven Wang
Set Photos: Albert Wu
Special Thanks: Jason Lee
Glamour Overload
as i mentioned in the previous post, TAFers converged on the bay area last weekend, and we had a rather ridiculous photo shoot, inspired by jon and howard's taiwan glamour shots from five years ago.
for those of you who have never experienced asian glamour shots, it basically goes like this: they dress you up, they do your makeup, they lead you to a series of crazy sets and setups, and you proceed to shoot an entire portfolio of usually completely unnatural, often tacky, but usually glam photos. maybe one day i'll re-post some of my glamour shots from yore. but until then, you can enjoy the fake band we created (four guitars and a pair of chopsticks?) and the deep v necks we donned for a day. i attempted to select a couple pictures with redeeming artistic merit that would offer a slight glimpse into the hilarity.
