From left, Maria Isabel Sauceda, Alain Hernandez, and Alexis Uscanga are jazzed about presenting their projects tonight at the 11th Annual Student Film Awards. (Courtesy Photo)
HARLINGEN — They’re back — in grand style!
After two years in virtual time, Harlingen school district’s 11th Annual Student Film Awards is back and bigger than ever with more entries and more schools demonstrating their talent.
“This year we have 225 entries, and that’s the most we’ve had out of the eleven years we’ve been doing this,” said Pat Guajardo, the practicum audio-visual instructor at the Harlingen school district’s Media Arts and Communications Academy.
In association with the HCISD Public Relations Department, MACA is proudly presenting the event Saturday night at the Harlingen Performing Arts Academy at 3217 W. Wilson Rd. The event begins at 7 p.m. and the public is invited to attend free of charge.
“The great thing about it is, this year we’ve had more schools participating,” Guajardo said.
Those schools include campuses from San Perlita, San Benito, Los Fresnos and Sharyland. Gladys Porter Early College High School is also participating. And of course there are the regulars from Harlingen High School, Harlingen High School South, and the MACA.
It’s a refreshing return to Tinseltown Harlingen style with all its glamour and glitter and celebration. COVID forced everything into lockdown two years ago, forcing many classes to stop completely or go virtual. The MACA kids were able to engage in some activities last year, in cyberspace, but it just wasn’t the same as face-to-face hands-on interaction.
This year, however, media students have been busy creating their projects for such categories as Documentary, Sports, Highlights, Stop Motion and Music Video, for tonight’s in-person event.
Many of the MACA students seemed to have had a vast storage of creativity just waiting to be manifested. Alexis Uscanga, 18, is entering seven categories, but the one he’s really excited about is his documentary highlighting the Harlingen South Football Program.
“It’s about its success this year and it highlights the work ethic the new coach put in this program to make the students succeed,” said Alexis. “It highlights the before and after of South, because before Harlingen South couldn’t compete with the Cardinal campus like it did this year.”
Alain Hernandez is competing in Art of Foley, Digital Animation and Stop Motion. Art of Foley, he explained, is basically a video with no sound. Instead, the individual makes all the sound effects with random objects.
The 18-year-old high school senior is also presenting two projects in Digital Animation, one of which is called “Chain Reaction.”
“That one I did a few years ago,” said Alain. “I did it when I was starting to do computer graphic imaging and 3D animation at home. I was barely learning, so that was kind of an experiment to kind of test myself out. I did animation of basically a ball. It bumps into things, and as it’s bumping into things, other things happen like a chain reaction.”
The enthusiasm was evident in their voices, eager in anticipation for tonight’s gala event.
“Over the past two years, that’s what the kids were waiting for,” Guajardo said. “They are so passionate about this. They are so excited, you can see it and they are so eager to show up. They are really excited about it and looking forward to it.”
The students showed a strong sense of sportsmanship in their endeavors.
“I’m excited and best of luck to anybody, best of luck to the winner,” said Maria Isabel Sauceda, 18.
Of course, she had hopes for her own entry in Highlights about a little girl on the sidelines.
“She is going out there and she is interviewing these people,” Isabel said. “She’s passionate about doing this. I just wanted to do a highlight of that to show people that no matter how old you are you can do it.”
