CREW REVIEWS

I have been back in my home country for 2 months now and not a single day has gone by where I haven’t thought about my time with Actuality Media in Kenya. It is a memory and experience which I will hold close for ever. I learnt the equivalent of a years worth of University in a matter of weeks but also learnt about myself and what matters in life in a way that you can’t appreciate until you are put out of your comfort zone. The people who I met and collaborated with, I will cherish for life. The friends I made I feel I will always have as we share a unique and life changing experience. The outreach program is an amazing thing to do, one of which I will recommend to everyone. The people are great, the content is great and the memories are unforgettable. Internship Placement: I learnt basically a full years worth of study in 4 weeks. Amazing. Cultural Immersion: I felt that I experienced Kenya in a way not many tourists would. I felt I became part of the community and was given the opportunities to fully immerse myself in the culture. This trip has been one of the best of my life. Program Administration: Emails and queries were always promptly responded too. I always knew what was going on and wasn’t scared to ask questions about the program. Health and Safety: Like with all travel you have to have your witts about you and when getting used to a knew culture, it can be a bit scary because it is different, but once I was accustomed to the culture I rarely felt threatened and overall I always felt safe. Social Life: We were given the freedom to party and explore as much as we wanted. It was excellent!

My experience in Guatemala was one of the most rewarding experiences I have had thus far. Living and working behind the Guatemalan people was an eye opening and humbling experience. The chance to have real world experience and free reign with your creative control makes the whole process extremely rewarding and educational. It was an awesome trip and a great project to be apart of, I am so happy I had the opportunity to work in the field I love working. Internship Placement: I thought the briefings we participated in each morning were extremely helpful and educational, I kept my journal from the meetings and still have it with me now for notation. Outside of the briefings the hands on experience and free reign to control our project was extremely beneficial. I feel that I learned techniques I could not learn in the classroom during the Guatemala program. Cultural Immersion: Living in Guatemala is thus far the most cultural immersion I’ve ever experienced and I know that it changed my perspective for the better. In a short month my eyes were opened more than I thought they could be. The learning experience was not only to do with media production, but it was also a personal learning and growing experience. Program Administration: I think the program administration was appropriate, I felt the set up of dailys and discussion with the group wrapped around the free time we had to work on our own as a team was very effective. Health and Safety: I never felt unsafe while I was down in Guatemala, all of the people there were extremely friendly and welcoming people. Also the instructors were sure to make us aware of any safety issues that need be. Social Life: We would socialize as a grow, the 15 of us (interns and translators) became close friends and hung out together constantly. We also became friends with some of the locals, and would speak spanglish with them or have spanish translated conversations.

My time in Nairobi with Actuality Media is one that I will cherish for the rest of my life. I don’t think that there’s a better way to have experienced the city and country’s culture than by creating a documentary short film with other creative, aspiring filmmakers. I felt welcomed into the program despite that I had little prior experience to creating films, and the academic content of Aubrie’s daily briefings taught me all that I needed to know to be successful in shooting our documentary. You’ll meet friends from all over the world, work hard and play hard. Joining this program was one of the greatest travel experiences I’ve EVER had. Internship Placement: Aubrie’s daily briefings were always well-planned and executed. Each morning’s class held so much useful information that was consistently pertinent to the work we were doing and practicing each day. As a current teacher, I admire the academic content that the program provided to me as an aspiring filmmaker. Cultural Immersion: I MISS being in Nairobi, Kenya with Actuality Media. The program immersed us in all imaginable ways possible. We experienced the slums of Nairobi with local changemakers, traveled out of the city to national parks and safaris, lived in a middle-class setting, and experienced the upper-end touristy destinations and restaurants. While we were there, we truly experienced EVERYTHING, from learning the basics of a new language, to eating the local cuisine each day for breakfast and dinner. I wouldn’t trade my participation with AM for the world. Program Administration: Aubrie and Robin both work very diligently to make this program run as smoothly as possible, while also making sure to provide the highest services possible to creating a documentary short film in a developing country. From overseeing shooting days to editing side-by-side with us in the board room, these two made sure that the overall program was a successful and pleasant experience for us all. Health and Safety: Everyone experienced a pickpocket of some sort, which is expected in urban areas (even in the U.S. or other developed nations), so it wasn’t a surprise to experience them in Nairobi, whether they were successful pick-pockets or attempted ones. Exercise caution. Guys, don’t put phones in your back pockets or even shirt pockets (don’t even take them out with you, you likely won’t need them), and girls, pack thin and small purses you can carry across your shoulder. Social Life: From the night life to the day light, everything and every moment in Kenya was an ADVENTURE. Don’t be afraid to explore the city; we always felt safe during the day, and through exercising caution travelling at night, we were always able to have a blast.

The whole project provided a double learning experience for me. I learned about myself and my particular way of learning and also gained really good hands-on techniques in documentary filmmaking. It was something I don’t think can be replicated. Internship Placement: For me, taking myself out of a classroom, a place where I can learn, was very refreshing. The stimulation and on the ground learning was to me one of the most important parts. Cultural Immersion: Excellent. Program Administration: Did a great job. However, I wish there was a little more one on one time with camera equipment. Meaning, a task or assignment to achieve something and also become more familiar with it. Health and Safety: No problem at all. Social Life: All the people accompanying the entire trip I wish I lived near and around them. They were inspired and inspiring people.

This is the best experience I have had abroad. I was with a great group of people in an amazing place and learned so much. Though a month is such a short time to make a film and you think you will be so busy, but the program is designed so you are able to travel and see the city you are in as well as develop relationships with the people around you and the locals. As long as you put in the work you need to do, with the help of the program managers, you will have an awesome time. Internship Placement: Learned so much is such a short amount of time Cultural Immersion: We got to do so much is such a short amount of time, and although we were super busy, we were given so many opportunities to travel on days off. Program Administration: Gave us a lot of room to do what we wanted, while helping us make really awesome films. Overall one of the best experiences I’ve had. Health and Safety: I always felt safe, but you had to watch out for your electronics (phones, camera, etc.). Besides that, I felt safe enough to go places by myself during the day and out with a group at night. Social Life: We were able to go out to the local clubs, bars, etc. or stay in and hang out. You had a lot of choices which was great.

Amazing way to learn about documentary filming, meet incredible friends from around the world and have a holiday all at once!

Life in San Jaun La Laguna is worlds away from my comfortable life in Sydney, Australia. Everything from the people, food, transport, down to your bathroom faucet being the penis of an angel statue, is different and exciting! What made the experience was learning exactly how and why the world of San Jaun La Laguna works in this way, and we had the inside scoop as documentary makers in the town. People are more than happy to share their life with you, but always for a small price. Lesson 1; Nothing is free, not a photo, chat or even pausing too long when looking at one of the talented textiles ladies scarves. You always end up giving them something for their time. Arriving to meet our change makers only to find that they are currently in a power struggle that has divided them, and has the doors to their association chained shut. Lesson 2; These people seem to lead such different lives, yet they suffer from the same basic struggles as all humans. Power and money. These woman who may be fighting over something much smaller than who has power over a country or International Corporation, but their passion and work for their industry and basic struggle to make a living end up having them act like many deceitful politicians that I am sure we are all well acquainted with. Finding a new change maker a week prior to filming week, and therefore lacking the time to get to know them as well, and more importantly lacking the the time for them to know and trust you. Lesson 3; People, even lovely old Guatemalan ladies, don’t just trust a group of Caucasians promising to make a documentary about them. Our struggle to gain her trust so close to filming week proved to be a difficult task, one which we unfortunately didn’t achieve until the end of editing week when we showed her the finished product. All in all this was a month of challenges, and the ways in which I found myself overcoming these daily obstacles was the basis of the many lessons I learned. If you are bored in your everyday life and are looking for a challenge, Actuality Media can definitely help you find this. Or even take it a step further and go out and make your own documentary in a foreign country. The lessons you can learn are endless. Internship Placement: I feel there was different amounts of support for different roles. Editors – great support, great instruction. Very much shown from the progress in Yao and Ru’s editing. Cinematographers – Good support, was generally easy to get help when needed. I feel there could have been some more access to equipment in pre-production that would have helped us to iron out some errors that were instead made during shooting week. Directors – Support was readily available when asked for, I feel little instruction was given to them on their role other than the story telling instruction we received (which was very comprehensive and I found to be very beneficial, you are very talented at this Aubrie). In saying this, in the case of my group any instruction you could have given would probably have made no difference to the actions of the director. In general all directors had a good prior knowledge in which to conduct themselves, so this was not problematic, but more guidance on their directing skills may have had them walking away feeling as though they pushed themselves harder or potentially with a better result. I also believe that directing a documentary has extra elements involved than directing a short film or feature does and most directors found themselves diving in the deep end with this. This could just be done in an hours tutorial with just the directors, but I feel needs to be done before the first meeting with change makers. Producer – I feel we had a lot of support from you guys and more instruction than other roles, mainly because a lot of our job was actually done by you guys. My role felt somewhat void as a lot of the logistics etc had to be organised prior to getting there. Not necessarily a negative but I feel I would have learned more had I been more apart of the earlier production work. There could be more instruction for Producers on how to tackle each stage of the documentary as well. This may have had us more involved. Overall, I think it would be beneficial to sit down with each role on Monday’s (more important for directors and producers, but could still be helpful for the others) and outline exactly what they need to focus on that week to achieve what you want from each group by the end of the week. Cultural Immersion: Was a good cultural immersion for a big group of Westerners. You both had great knowledge of the local area to offer to everyone as well which kept us from falling into tourist traps. Program Administration: Generally well administered, generally well organised especially considering Guatemalans run on a terribly relaxed clock. I found the finding of the change makers to be a little disappointing. I understand that things happen that can’t be helped, but I also feel that some of the issues that 2 of the groups had could have been found out earlier had some further research been done. There were a few times where I believe the teams needed more support than was given. Most notably the final week, when we were re-working stories for editing. In my opinion Aubrie really needed to be there at this point, as this is her forte, in no way criticising Robin, as his forte is more on the technical side of things. It was disheartening and frustrating to work on a story for 2 days, and then be told at 9pm our story had to be re-worked, rather than being told that at 10am on Monday morning, before hours of editing had been tackled. Health and Safety: I never once felt in danger, especially in the situations that were required for making the documentary. Social Life: I found everyone on the trip very interesting, and all people that I really enjoyed their company! Good work on picking such a great bunch of people!

My trip to Guatemala was very satisfying. From the stay at the hostel, to the trips around town I enjoyed every minute. Our overseers Robin and Aubrie Canfield did an amazing job as tour guides and were very professional teachers. Living Situation: I absolutely loved the homey feel of the hostel we stayed in. The staff was amazing and I would definitely visit again. Cultural Immersion: This trip satisfied my idea of what a complete cultural immersion should consist of.

Incredible opportunity with a group who understands the issues they want to help present with all the tactical know how of getting the films accomplished and seen. Internship Placement: I learned quite a bit about the entire process of Documentary Film planning. Anyone can shoot a film, but it takes a lot to create the story and piece it together. Living Situation: Cesar’s Hostil was an incredible place to stay and even though my class mates and I were packed in tight, the situation was made very easy because of the food. Cultural Immersion: Guatemala is a great place. tough not knowing enough spanish but it was easy to get by.

Actuality Media is extremely good at what they do. The program is unique, dynamic, and highly instructional. Overall, an excellent experience. Internship Placement: All the lessons and guiding from instructors was invaluable. Also, the fact that we were given the opportunity to learn from our own mistakes was important.