“Going digital is no longer an option, it is rather the default.”
The world has long embraced digitalization but it wasn’t until the pandemic that the world fully succumbed to digitalization. Suddenly, we were thrusted into a world that was not supposed to be new but still caught all of us off guard. As our lives slowly fit in a new pattern, our ways then sparked towards a never-ending circuit of possibilities.
The new normal pulled the generation’s strings of capabilities with the gift of technology that man has gifted to humanity. The strings that were attached to everyone have worked like limbs of a body that craves for action and nothing limits its reach, extending its arms even to campus publications from the tiniest medium and yet to a massive crowd.
Cebu Technological University’s (CTU) Campus Publications launched a series of Campus Journalism Webinars in extending influence, information and inspiration. On November 27, 2020, CTU Tuburan’s The Polytechnic Bulletin with CTU Main’s The Nation Builders hosted the Campus Journalism Webinar Series Session III: Multimedia and Video Making Webinar with the resource speaker, Mr. Crisanto Etorma of Campo Santo Studio.
The webinar gathered around a hundred participants via zoom, both teachers and students in one virtual room for about 3-4 hours of lecture and interaction with Mr. Crisanto starting with the appropriate and alternative equipment that we can use in video making. He added information about the kind of phones and editing software one can use in the absence of a digital camera. After discussing the tangible requirements, he stressed the importance of the concept to determine the five W’s (who, what, where, when, and why) and one H (how) of a story. The creation of a concept also tells how a story must cost you financially and physically. After the lecture proper, an open forum commenced encouraging queries from the participants regarding the topic and the discussion. It opened our minds with a lot of ideas that we have choices and he offered suggestions as well.
“Is this your passion or is this just a job?,” one of the students asked Mr. Etorma as we were nearing the end of the webinar. He then answered, “Now it’s my job, but it started with a passion.”
The dimension we are in now offers us choices and yet we see less to our liking and some even say disadvantageous to our convenience. This is what a third-world country would feel with the low employment rate, literacy conditions, general economic dilemmas, and political turmoil. Even without including natural disasters and threats to national security, it has kept the country on its knees for a long time. Amidst the gravity-like factors from fully connecting with the new trend, fueled passions even with poor skills will thrive. A skill is learned, it can certainly be practiced. It can absolutely be perfected. It can definitely be enhanced. This is not to discourage passion, this is to encourage a thirst for knowledge and evolution. We can start with what we love and then to what we need to learn or we can begin with what we love and how it can evolve./Merie Fer Medequillo