Guanajuato, Gto., February 28, 2019.- For the first time in the history of the College Documentary Contest "Identidad y Pertenencia" organized by the Guanajuato International Film Festival (GIFF) two short documentaries projects from undergraduate students of the bachelor's in Digital Arts of the University of Guanajuato (UG) were selected to participate in such contest: "Faroles" directed by Juan Pablo Hernández Valdez, and "Toci" directed by Andrea Alvarado Sánchez.

Both students of the Division of Engineering of Irapuato-Salamanca Campus mentioned their excitement for being selected to participate in the "Indentidad y Pertenencia" contest that has the objective to form new generations of narrators in Guanajuato, eager to show their traditions and those of their communities.

The contest is about creating a short documentary that reflects the interests and expectation of their creators. To film them, GIFF with sponsors and friends, provide filmmaking training workshops for the participants. Six teams from different universities in the state were selected in that call.

Andrea Alvarado Sánchez, UG student, mentioned that she will make a short documentary called "Toci" focused in the "temazcal" as a process for introspection and that it is also an important of the traditional medicine of the towns in central Mexico. 

While Pablo Hernández Valdez will create a short documentary called "Faroles" where he wants to portray that there still are safe points –the taco places—in a city flooded with violence like Salamanca.

Both students mentioned that the documentary film is a good tool to sensitize the society through a reflection of everyday people who have great stories to tell.

Both teams, Andrea Alvarado's and Juan Pablo Hernández's have students from UG participating; they will work in editing, production, photography, audio, and other functions that the film require. One of the students who will participate in the short documentary "Toci" is Pedro Luis Hernández who will be making the "making off", a documentary video that shows the production of the cinematographic work, on the matter, he mentioned that he is excited and proud for being part of the project.

Currently the selected students are in constant training through conferences and workshops on different cinematographic aspects, such as, argument, structure, production, photography, sound, editing, and post-production, given by experts in the field who after these trainings have feedback meetings from each project.

GIFF is held in two cities: from July 19 to 23 in San Miguel de Allende; and from July 24 to 28, in Guanajuato City.

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