FEU film “Sakaling Makalipad” vies for 3SF awards on Nov. 12

Wazzup Pilipinas!

A children’s short film with a twist is competing for the top prizes in the Three Shots Film (3SF) Festival awarding ceremonies on November 12, 8 p.m.

3SF festival organizers Media Underground or MUD Studios will award the Best Cinematography, Best Director, Jury’s Choice, People’s Choice, and Best Film to some of the films included in the Top 20 finalists.

Among the finalists is “Sakaling Makalipad,” a short film directed by Rainner Cion of Far Eastern University-Manila, which tells the story of a young boy (Gavin Jake Zamora) who musters all his strength and playfulness with the hopes of getting back his kite which is stuck on a tree.

Teaming up with Cion and Zamora in “Sakaling Makalipad” are screenwriter Rachelle Magalona, director of photography Andrea Gonzales, production managers Abby Sangalang and Caroline Fajardo, production designers Stephanie Andres and Ralph Dustine Reyes, voice actors Raymond Lumibao and Queen Ricohermozo, and creative consultant David Corpuz.

Cion shared that the story is very close to his heart, “Growing up in Nueva Ecija where farming is the main source of living, I have seen the lack of support for our farmers and the continuous deprivation of their rights. That is why I was inspired to create ‘Sakaling Makalipad,’ to shed light on this situation and to tell the story of our farmers and their families. The Three Shots Film Festival is a perfect platform to showcase this story to a wide range of audiences.”

Meanwhile, Magalona revealed that life inspired her to write the script for the film. “Something that is taken away from someone and that means a child has to go through such pain of losing a loved one. I like the idea of a child’s innocence, the thought that their dreams could grow into them,” she explained.

“But what really inspired me is not just to tell a story about what happened to these Filipino farmers but to also commemorate – to remind everyone, especially this administration, to stop the killings. I wrote ‘Sakaling Makalipad’ because I believe that as citizens, we cannot afford to lose more heroes in this country,” she added, referring to reports that farmers are now among the victims of extrajudicial killings in the country.

MUD Studios challenged Cion and other students to make a short film using only three shots and three cuts for a story composed of a beginning, middle and end, with a minimum running time of one minute and a maximum of 15 minutes.

MUD Studios founder and director August Lyle Espino said that they are offering “an alternative content platform that offers a catalog of independent films, festival entries, and original content dealing with a wide variety of real-life themes” through their website, https://www.mud-studios.net/.

Aside from cash prizes and certificates of recognition, 3SF organizers will give away three pieces Selens Redhead Lights with light stand kit, and a four-lens kit worth 12,000 pesos, including a travel case bag, 7.5mm fisheye lens, 16mmwide-angle lens, 25mm macro lens, 65mm telephoto lens, two clip mounts, and cleaning cloth courtesy of Kase Lens PH, as special prizes.

Cion, who is currently taking up Bachelor of Arts in Communication at FEU under the Digital Cinema track, previously won Best Director, Best Editor, and Best Picture at the 2018 Sinebuyas Film Festival for “Si Cheche at si Choco” and Best Picture at the 2020 Quarantine Film Festival for “Day Off.” The latter was also a finalist at the 7th CineMandirigma Interschool Film Competition organized by the University of the East’s Silangan Film Circle.

The student filmmaker is now working on his next short project entitled “Kung Nakikinig ang Buwan.” 

https://youtu.be/Uj1B82SNTtU

Instituto Cervantes pays tribute to the Manila-born musician Luis Eduardo Aute

Wazzup Pilipinas!?

 

On November 18, Instituto Cervantes and the Embassy of Spain in the Philippines will pay tribute to the Manila-born artist and musician Luis Eduardo Aute, with an online concert in which several Filipino singers will cover select iconic songs by Aute. The event, Con tu latido: Filipinas canta a Aute. A Tribute, will be streamed at 7pm on the Instituto Cervantes Youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/InstitutoCervantesManila

 

 

A reputed artist and popular musician in Spain in the latter part of the 20th century, Luis Eduardo Aute was born in Manila on 13 September 1943. His father, a Catalan working for Tabacalera since 1919, married a Spanish Filipina. In his childhood, Aute studied at the De La Salle School, where he learned English and Tagalog. At an early age, he showed unusual ability as a painter and sketcher.

At the age of eight, he made his first trip to Spain, and in 1954, his family had eventually settled there. Living in Madrid, Aute initially planned to be an architect but left the university almost immediately to pursue a variety of career paths —art, film, and music. By the 1970s, he was creating soundtracks for films directed by Jaime Chávarri, Luis García Berlanga, Fernando Fernán-Gómez, Angelino Fons, Fernando Méndez, among others. The 1970s also saw the consolidation of Aute as a singer, with hits like Las cuatro y diez, or Al alba. His successful career saw the following decades with other chart-toppers like Pasaba por aquí, Sin tu latido, La belleza, and Slowly.

A multi-talented creator, Aute passed away in September 2020, leaving behind a vast collection of works in several fields, in literature, music, cinema and painting. Now, seven Filipino singers are gathering to pay tribute to his musical legacy by covering some of his most iconic songs in Spanish.

 

Popular singer-actress Bituin Escalante will render one of the first Aute’s hits, Rosas en el mar, released in 1966.

 

Mark Anthony Carpio, choirmaster of the Philippine Madrigal Singers, will perform La belleza.

 

Toma Cayabyab, a member of the Ateneo Chamber Singers and the Villancico Vocal Ensemble, and leader of his own jazz sextet, Debonair District, will sing another famous composition by Aute, Libertad.

 

Julius Sinoy, who was a Tenor for the University of the Philippines Concert Chorus (UPCC) from 2013 to 2016, will offer his rendition of Aute’s piece Dos o tres segundos de ternura.

 

Fascinated by music at an early age, James Barbecho joined a relatively small church choir at 11 years old. Since then, his passion for music only grew and he has been performing everywhere, from cafés to college events. He will be covering Siento que te estoy perdiendo, a song made popular by Aute in 1981.

 

Sheila Ferrer is a Filipino soprano who has performed as a soloist in both local and international productions. She performed the role of Adina (L’elisir d’Amore), and Serpina (La Serva Padrona). Sheila will cover Slowly, a popular theme released by Aute in 1992.

 

Finally, Ella Castro, a graduate of BM-Music Education from University of the Philippines-Diliman, will render her version of Aute’s Sin tu latido. Ella is a composer, singer, conductor, and an actress who is currently taking her Masters of Music at Northwestern State University of Louisiana.

The concert will be completed by Spanish singer Rosa León’s rendition of Mirándonos los dos, a song released by Aute in 1980.

 

The concert Con tu latido. Filipinas canta a Aute is organized by Instituto Cervantes de Manila, in collaboration with the Embassy of Spain in the Philippines and Intramuros Administration. Admission is free. For further information about the event, you may visit the website of Instituto Cervantes at https://manila.cervantes.es or Facebook page at www.facebook.com/InstitutoCervantesManila

ePLDT expands TIA-942 certifications to four data centers—most in PH

Wazzup Pilipinas!?

ePLDT further continues to fortify the reliability of its data center services as it expands its TIA-942 Design Certifications to four data centers—currently the most number of the said global certification achieved by a data center service provider in the country.

 

The design certification means that ePLDT’s data center facilities conform to the stringent standards of TIA-942 guidelines ensuring that any data center component—including major apparatus and equipment—can be removed, replaced, or repaired without disrupting the operations of its customers.

 

ePLDT currently owns the largest telco-neutral data center network in the country under the VITRO brand, which are strategically located across the Philippine archipelago. To date, only five data centers in the country have received the said TIA-942 Design Certification rating, four of which are from ePLDT including VITRO Makati, VITRO Clark, VITRO Cebu 2, and the newly-accredited VITRO Parañaque. 

  

Nico Alcoseba, VP & Head of ICT Business for PLDT Enterprise, said that the new certification is a testament of ePLDT’s commitment to ensuring the availability and reliability of its customers’ critical data needs.

 

“Our customers rely on us for quality data center services for their mission-critical applications. And we at the PLDT Group are continuously fortifying our capabilities to meet the growing demands of our customers, and this latest certification is an attestation to our commitment of providing reliable data center services that will support their business resiliency and continuity,” said Alcoseba.

 

The TIA-942 Certification is a Telecommunications Industry Association (TIA) program globally recognized as an industry benchmark for telecommunications data centers. It provides a detailed design specification for a highly available, secure, and well-connected facility to meet today’s IT assurance requirements.

 

The design guidelines set forth by ANSI/TIA-942 emphasize the redundancy design of data centers infrastructures to secure the highest availability during unplanned maintenance and infrastructure expansion without disrupting the services of colocation customers.

 

VITRO Parañaque is assured of achieving a minimum service availability of 99.99 percent uptime after its recently completed transformation program. This fortified the power efficiency, redundancy, and resiliency of the data center facility through power systems upgrades such as upstreaming of power redundancy and equipment modernization such as the upgrading of generator sets.

 

“As an end-to-end ICT service provider, we are constantly looking for ways to improve our infrastructure to better meet the needs of our clients. This new certification assures our clients of our commitment to always provide quality and reliable data center services,” said Dave Simon, ePLDT Chief Technology Officer and Cloud & Data Center Business Operations Head.

 

ePLDT has been aggressively growing its data center facilities since 2000, establishing itself as the Philippines’ premier data center provider. It is the largest telco-neutral data center in the country—maintaining 10 data centers and disaster recovery facilities with a 9,000-rack capacity and 26 MW of total IT capacity—ready for enterprise and hyperscaler needs such as colocation, cloud hosting, disaster recovery, managed servers, security, and network services.

 

For more information, visit epldt.com.