Another amazing week of TAF has come and gone. We look forward your own personal blog posts, recaps, videos, and pictures, and the TAF Night acts are being uploaded as we speak. And in case you haven’t seen it on facebook or twitter yet, here is this year’s incarnation of the slideshow. Hope you enjoy!
If you like the music we chose, support the artists and buy their songs! 1. Swedish House Mafia – Save the World Tonight (Radio Mix) 2. fun. – We Are Young 3. Monsters Calling Home – Growing Up 4. The Editors – Weight of the World
So it’s been a long time coming. Sorry for the delay! We had some issues with some YouTube copyrights that we were sorting through. But we are extremely excited to finally bring this to you in full color – the way it was meant to be seen!
It was an amazing week, as always. We at tafLabs are always striving every year to find ways to make the slideshow new and fresh for you guys and this year we were fortunate to have a lot of new equipment and toys to play with to find new ways and angles to show off TAF in ways we haven’t looked at before. This year, we put a little bit more emphasis on showing more of the behind the scenes work that the sTAFf, speakers, board, and even the campers, do before and during TAF. We really hope that this year’s inclusion of more video helps to provide more context around some of the amazing photos taken by everyone, and tell the story of the week.
Special thanks to board members Dave, Bob, Alex, and Spencer for taking the time to go through Anna’s photo workshop to help us cover the various events. Additional thanks to the hardworking members of the labs photo and video logging team of Anna Wu, Tom Yu, Eric Wang, Harmony Chiu, Steve Wang, and Andy Chen, without whom this slideshow definitely would not have gotten done on time. Thanks to Chikuan, Joy, and Jason for keeping us well stocked and fed with an amazing array of food and treats. And while it is somewhat self-serving, thanks to Seaglass Cinema for the use of their equipment and skillsets. Go check them out on their facebook page and “like” them! *end shameless plug*
Without further delay, we present to you – TAF Slideshow 2011. Thanks for reading and stop by often!
Can you believe it? Only 5 more weeks till TAF 2011 begins! Join us on spreading the word on TAF this year with our TAF Awareness Facebook campaign!
Copy and paste this message:
Help spread the word about TAF whether you’re a camper or alumni! Download and upload the photo above as your own profile picture, then copy/paste this caption to tell everyone at least 3 TAF memories you’ll never forget. Read about mine below and find more ways to share the tafLove at http://tafworld.org/share!
For us at the tafBlog, our 3 favorite tafBlog related memories are:
After TAF week (some of us during TAF week), I’m not sure what hurts more – my throat from the shouting or my ears from the screaming. Or my abs from laughing so hard.
During Wednesday of this year’s TAF, the tafLabs program was asked to run a workshop for the JH and Youth programs. Obviously, with tafLabs’ collective interest in the arts and media, we wanted to incorporate those topics into our session. However, we’ve already spoken at length about the importance of media along with other subtopics like Asian American representation, etc. We wanted to do something a little more unique and interactive, and thankfully, the yomyomf.com-hosted film contest Interpretations was the perfect workshop content!
The premise of the contest is this — each filmmaker uses the exact same script, in the exact same order. There are only four lines, and they are:
– It’s not something I’d do. – Well? – It’s not what I expected. – You sure?
Each of the Family Groups at TAF came up with their own ideas, some funny, some serious, all incredibly creative. They showed a wide range of interpretation, which is an important part of Communication (ding ding ding!). We sometimes overlook or forget that just expressing ourselves is not enough for good communication. You have to try to do it in a way so that others can receive your message, and vice versa. The point is, good communication is a two-way street and the sending of the message is just as important as the decoding or interpretation of a message.
In the end, tafLabs chose one story idea to film at TAF. Based on the storyline as well as the feasibility of filming it within the time constraints of TAF’s programming (we’re fast because we have to be, but that doesn’t mean we can’t make it easier on ourselves!), we chose the Bacon Family Group’s entry. We filmed the story immediately after our session as a follow-up workshop, which gave the campers a chance to be actors IN media, and to see a side of communication from a different perspective than they might be used to.
And now, we happily present to you the finished piece!
OUT OF ORDER
Now, we also mentioned that we had to choose which story to film partly based on our abilities to film within the constraints of TAF and Manchester College facilities, which means we could not have shot all the stories at TAF even if we had the time. Thankfully, Youth camper Ryan Yang was encouraged to take his story idea and film it in Chicago after TAF ended — and boy, are we sure glad we did. Ryan’s Interpretations submission is a moving piece dedicated to his friend Will Kelley, and others like him, who have battled cancer.
Two other notable pieces to check out: Karen Lin’s “Little Blue Angel” and Jason Lee’s “Strangers in a Park,” which may have content unsuitable for those under the age of 13 — Parental Discretion advised.
Congrats to all the filmmakers and storytellers out there, and we’re proud to see all the creativity connected to TAF and our Taiwanese American community 🙂
With this year being TAF’s 30th birthday celebration, tafLabs and tafMedia created this retrospective piece to commemorate and preserve TAF’s history and development from the early 1980’s till now. While we have all grown and evolved thanks to TAF, TAF itself has grown and changed with us, and its just good to know where it all started from.
Special thanks go out to Anna Wu and Ho Chie Tsai for putting this together, Dan Lu for assisting in research, all of our interviewees, and of course, every single person who has come to, visited, and enjoyed TAF.
TAF has a rich history and there are many more stories like this to share. Maybe someday we can get to more of them, but this will do for now. A great thirty years have gone by, which in reality has only been thirty weeks. Looking forward to the next thirty. TAFLove to all, past, present, and future 🙂
The campers are still all awake, and TAF Night only ended just a few hours ago, but here for your viewing pleasure is the TAF2010 Slideshow!
Credits: Tiffany Su, Justin Ku, Andrew Kuo, Steve Wang, & the rest of the tafLabs and tafMedia team.
Songs: 1. Viva Love Forever – Mashup by Jeremy Chen & Andrew Lo. Original songs by Coldplay, New Order, & Alphaville. 2. Mind Heist – Zack Hemsey, from “Inception.” 3. All We Are – Matt Nathanson 4. Kings & Queens – 30 Seconds to Mars 5. Do You Remember – Jay Sean, feat. Sean Paul & Lil John
We’ve had an amazing week with everyone, and have much more video footage to come so keep staying tuned! Just because we’re all leaving Manchester College for another year in a few hours doesn’t mean the TAF spirit is over as well. TAFLOVE 365 y’all!
As you may know by now, this year is TAF’s 30th birthday! Even though you may not be at TAF right now, help us celebrate by sending us a short video telling us who you are, what years you went to TAF, and some quick birthday wishes and we’ll feature them on the blog!
You can upload them to your own account or ours on youtube:
user: tafshare password: what the “t” in taf stands for!
Email us at tafhelp@tafworld.org.
UPDATE: A post-TAF happy birthday video from “the original” Alex Yang!
