I shot this piece myself, functioning as the camera operator and DP over 2 days.
One of the short videos that was edited together from footage I shot in Mae Sot, Thailand for the Dreamlopments NGO in late 2021, which does great work to help migrants from Myanmar access health care services in Thailand.
All video © 2019-2023 ADRYEL TALAMANTES (except for Bloomberg High Stakes for Thailand’s Cannabis Farmers and Dreamlopments NGO videos)
Another short video that was edited together from footage I shot in Mae Sot, Thailand for the Dreamlopments NGO, which does great work to help migrants from Myanmar access health care services in Thailand.
I shot, edited, and graded this short documentary solo in 2018.
During the 2019 protest movement the streets around the Mong Kok Police station would be host to nightly clashes between protesters and local police, creating an endless cycle of resentment and retribution.
In the days and weeks after the February 1, 2021 Myanmar coup citizen’s of the besieged country in neighboring Thailand held regular vigils for their compatriots in front of the United Nations complex in Bangkok.
Phuket Town on Phuket Island in Thailand annually hosts one of the most amazing cultural practices on Earth: the Nine Emperor Gods Festival, or Vegetarian festival. Participants in the religious practice abstain from eating meat and hold numerous other vows for a certain period of time before the festival, and some become spirit mediums known as mah song. Becoming so enraptured with belief they enter an altered state of conscious where, for them, they do in fact play host to one of the deities from the Taoist/Confucian pantheon. In these states they are able to confer blessings and sometimes take part in ritualistic self mutilation which is meant to gain merit and drive away evil spirits and bad luck from their communities.
One of the defining moment during the Hong Kong protests in August of 2019 was the alleged blinding of a young female protester due to being shot with a “less lethal” bean bag munition by a Hong Kong police officer. At several hospitals throughout the city the next day protests took place held by medical professionals, many wearing a patch on one eye in solidarity with the injured woman.
During video production there are often many small funny outtakes that the viewer usually does not get the opportunity to see. During a NGO job in 2021 there were many great moments when I had interview subjects clap in order to match up the sound, so I decided to put this together.
An early morning look at Yangon’s citizens on their daily commute by longboat across the Yangon River in December 2015.