It's On Us (video)

In mid March 2015, I met with my PLU colleagues to discuss on new activities for the It's on Us campaign. We explored different options and kept surprising ourselves with many ideas to create a public event that could make a big impact to the campus community. We wanted an event that could involve a large number of people. While talking about new marketing ideas like photo booth, animated slideshow, or even something that were quite off topic, we were stroked by the idea of creating an oversize collage of head shots of PLU community members to show their personal commitment and support to the campaign.



The final result was an impressive photo wall made of polaroid portraits of PLU students, faculty, and staff who attended the public photoshoot to show their support for ending gender and identify-based violence.



Talking about technical aspects, this projects involved some of my first times. It was my first time doing a time lapse. A great learning resource is Lynda.com; the tutorial videos are super helpful. I learn a great deal of technics for shooting time lapse such as how to set up and operate camera, calculate shooting interval, and assemble the image sequence.

It was also my first time to edit a video using Adobe Premier Pro CC. As many other Adobe professional creative software, the Adobe Premier Pro interface might look intimidating at first because of its numerous menus, panels, and dials. It was the reason why I had been hesitate to leave Final Cut Pro X. However, I was able to quickly learn the new software since its many tools, layouts, and keyboard shortcuts are similar to other programs within the Adobe Creative Suite. I am now quite comfortable to cut a video using Adobe Premier, and I can see much potential from it to improve my workflow.

You can watch the video here or on PLU website.

300+ Lutes turned out to make a personal commitment to help keep all people safe from sexual assault and violence on campus and in our community.

Production Team: 

Hai Doan and Lace M. Smith | Creative

Aaron Steelquist | Outreach

Jennifer Warwick and Jonathan Yglesias | Content

Rustin Dwyer | Audio

Students, Faculty, Staff and Administrators of PLU | Amazing

Video: Get Ready for the Holidays

It is that time of the year, when we are super excited to for the holiday season. We both love Christmas and everything about it: gifts, decorations, music, candles, hot cocoa, and cinnamon buns. Here is a video about our weekend project to transform our house for the holidays.

This video was filmed with the iPhone 6 and put together in the Final Cut Pro X.

Travel Video: Vietnam 2013

Back in 2013 I had a chance to go on a recruiting trip for my college. I spent a week to visit partner agencies and meet with prospective students in Vietnam. Despite the fully loaded work schedule, I enjoyed visiting places and capturing moments along my way.

This video highlights my days in Ho Chi Minh City and my hometown in Vung Tau City. Visit my previous post for photos.

Tech Specs: The entire video was shot with an iPhone 5 and the native Camera app. All footages are straight out of the camera and edited with iMovie without any special effects. The iPhone was surprisingly good for travel video. It is compact and was with me all the time. The video quality is acceptable, and the format is very friendly for home editing.

Video: PLU Wild Hope Project

After receiving a message from a PLU Director, I came in for a quick meeting about an exciting project, which utilizes my videography skills. I was ordered to produce a promo video which will be part of the presentation to the Board of Regent on the Wilde Hope Project at PLU. The project moved very quickly in two weeks with one meeting, one filming session, couple days for editing, and one week for review and revision. Once again, I feel so blessed to work with the incredible PLU staff and students and continued to be amazed by how much they have done to the community. Here is the final product...

Mid-Autumn Festival 2010 + Fun Video

Moon Cakes

For this year, I surprisingly had one of the best Mid-Autumn celebrations ever... you can guess it could not be that good without friends. My little house was packed with nearly 20 people... and literally everyone had to stand and stay very close to each other. But it was very cozy and enjoyable! This might be the first time for some of my friends to celebrate Mid-Autumn Festival, and for many of us it was the best one since we came to The States.


Let's start by a quick history lesson about the festival:

The Mid-Autumn Festival, also known as the Moon Festival (Tết Trung Thu in Vietnamese) is a popular harvest festival celebrated by Chinese, Japanese, Korean and Vietnamese people, dating back over 3,000 years to moon worship in China's Shang Dynasty. It was first called Zhongqiu Jie (literally "Mid-Autumn Festival") in the Zhou Dynasty. The Mid-Autumn Festival is held on the 15th day of the eighth month in the Chinese calendar (lunar calendar), which is usually around late September or early October in the Gregorian calendar. It is a date that parallels the autumnal equinox of the solar calendar, when the moon is supposedly at its fullest and roundest. The traditional food of this festival is the mooncake, of which there are many different varieties. (Source: Wikipedia)


Initially I was planning to invite everyone to come over my house for dinner to show my appreciation for their support at my grandfather’s funeral. They are the best!...So, grandma cooked some chicken curry to treat everyone, and Thanh also wanted to share some sweet treats brought from Vietnam. Everything was well planned and prepared for a small and simple gathering at my house... but well, it can never be a tedious gathering with as many as 20 people attending, especially all of my sprightly friends. We absolutely loved the chicken curry... yes, it was yummy and finished quickly. The air started to explode when we were sharing the luscious mooncakes and tea. The celebration could not be completed without the traditional children song “Rước Đèn Tháng Tám”. Things were really heated as we were singing and group dancing. Everyone really put themselves out to the party, and laughing was countless.
Although there was no either lantern or moon watching, it was definitely one of the best celebrations that I’ve ever had in life. Thanks everyone for a wonderful time!


And here is a fun video to end this post.Enjoy!