We are so proud to announce the achievements made by a number of our BMS students at the 2021 Emerge Media Awards!
The Emerge Media Awards celebrates and showcases the achievements of Canadian postsecondary students in journalism, photography, graphic design and communications disciplines. They seek out and recognize the best writing, editing, videography, audio, graphic design, communications, marketing and public relations work done at colleges and universities, and invite work from institutions in all provinces and territories.
Congratulations to our students Jane Diokpo who won second place in Commercial/Creative Photography, finalist for Video Documentary Katie Hoang, finalist for Commercial/Creative Photography, Media Website, and Print News Or Feature Story Lua Presidio, finalist for Commercial/Creative Photography Katelyn Snell, and finalist for Commercial/Creative Photography and Print News Or Feature Story Elizabeth Wang.
Meet our students, and learn more about their work below!
Jane Diokpo | BMS Year 2
Second Place winner in Commercial/Creative Photography
View Jane’s work: “Turn that frown upside down”
Can you please tell us about your work?
In modern society, people are more out of touch with their feelings than ever. For instance, we’ve been taught to suppress every non-happy emotion; from sadness to anger. I have depression, so sometimes it’s pretty difficult for me to hide how I feel. And it bothers me when people tell me to smile though I don’t feel like it, especially while my picture is taken. So this is my take on the expression ‘Turn that frown upside down’, where I literally turn my frown upside down (while my eyes and smile are already flipped). The gradient lighting represents an emotional spectrum.
In other words, my image’s concept is on society’s rejection of things that make us uncomfortable, such as any emotion other than happiness (e.g. sadness, anger). We’re taught to push down our emotions so we seem more put together on the surface. I emphasized on my image’s title ‘Turn that frown upside down’ by adding in vivid red and blue (anger and sadness, two emotional extremes) lighting, to symbolize varying emotions and turned my facial features/the entire portrait literally upside down. Over the course of this project, I noticed how prone I am of being self-centered when doing artistic assignments. During the process of making my image, I learned how to seek for and take people’s opinions into consideration on how best to portray the ideas I present in my artwork which in this case, was the exploration of society’s rejection of emotions.
What led you to submitting your work to Emerge Media Awards?
I heard about the awards from a UBC Media Studies page, so I decided to submit my work. Honestly, I did not think I would win so this is quite a fortunate surprise!
What does being an Emerge Media Awards winner mean to you?
It means the world to me. As a Media Studies student, I am incredibly honored to have been chosen for an award that seeks to represent students in our department. Additionally, to be acknowledged for my creative work (which I attached a lot of emotions to) is a dream come true.
Katie Hoang | BMS Year 4
Finalist for Video Documentary
View Katie’s work: The cloth that holds us together
Can you please tell us about your work?
One of the courses I took for my Asian Canadian and Asian Migration studies Minor over the summer was ASIA 495: Folk Cultures in the Asian Diaspora. Our project was to produce a digital research media film concerning folk cultures in our own home. When the pandemic hit, my family ended up spending a lot more time with my grandma and her cooking. By focusing on one of my grandma’s most popular dishes Bánh cuốn and the cloth that is required to make it, I used this film to explore in what ways my grandma’s food supported the family during the quarantine.
What led you to submitting your work to Emerge Media Awards?
Creating this film gave me the opportunity to get closer to my family than ever before. I was able to learn about all their stories, from Vietnam to their life in Canada. With everything that is going on with anti-Asian racism, I think stories like this is so much more important to share. When I received the email from BMS about EMA submissions, I thought this would be a good first step in sharing my work.
What does being an Emerge Media Awards finalist mean to you?
I had completely forgot about my submission, so it was a really nice surprise to find out I was a finalist. Even though I only received an Honourable Mention, I was happy that I was able to share my family’s story in the midst of everything happening.
Lua Presidio | BMS Year 4
Finalist for Commercial/Creative Photography, Design: Media Website, and Design: Print News Or Feature Story
View Lua’s works:
- Lua Presidio, David Kao, and Keegan Landrigan, The Guide to UBC
- Lua Presidio and Elizabeth Wang, Something I missed in a split between two
- Lua Presidio and Elizabeth Wang, Performance: Gender
Can you please tell us about your work?
I was nominated in three categories for the Emerge Media Awards: Design: Media Website, Design: Print News Or Feature Story, and Commercial / Creative Photography.
For the Design: Media Website, the finalist nomination was for the website The Guide to UBC. Yearly, The Ubyssey produces a print guide for First-Year UBC students that tries to cover everything they need to know about UBC, uni life, and living in Vancouver independently. With COVID, there was an obvious shift to the web, and the virtual version of the guide was born. The Ubyssey had a virtual guide before but it was in desperate need of updating. My role in this project was to create the UI design and supervise/coordinate with writers, developers, photographers, and illustrators to bring this project together. It was a four month long process with multiple revisions, but at the end of the day it looks lovely and I hope some First-Years found it helpful.
The works nominated for the Design: Print News Or Feature Story, and Commercial / Creative Photography, came from the same project but different aspects of it. Each year, The Ubyssey produces an issue about sex and relationships, but last year we decided to focus on gender and its impact on how we relate to others and ourselves. The goal of the issue was to explore themes and stories not usually presented in mainstream media and to give a larger space for trans and non-binary voices to express their relationship to their genders and how it affects their identities. Our team’s visual inspiration was “impressionism, but make it gender.” Running with that idea, we titled our project Performance to emphasize how gender is a performance we paint on and off. From the design perspective, I particularly love how the front and back cover tell a story of performing gender through images. The entire issue was inspired by the colors of the trans flag and purposefully took a softer approach.
The nomination came from one of my favorite pages from within the issue, but you can see the full issue here. For the photography aspect of it we were purposeful in our search for a variety of models of varying gender identities. I was the one responsible for coordinating all the models and the painting of their faces and bodies. This was an incredibly sensitive but important issue that I’m really happy I could be part of. When I saw it all come out I actually cried because it felt so unreal to see all of our hard work finished and displayed. We also produced a video to go with this issue that wasn’t nominated, but I feel is a really powerful complement to the issue. You can see it here. This was a really intense project that I was overseeing, organizing, painting models, doing the layout and design for, and helping produce the video as well as some photography. It was all completed within a month and although when I look back and there are a number of things in the design that I would change if I were doing it again, I’m really proud of everything we accomplished.
I would also like to say that none of these projects exist because of me alone. I’m so incredibly grateful for the different teams I have had the opportunity to work with, and it’s because of our collective effort that we are able to create such amazing things.
What led you to submitting your work to Emerge Media Awards?
The Emerge Media Awards seemed like a great way to share some of the work I have been doing for the past year and there was really nothing to lose. There is a lot of great work out there and I’m honoured to be part of the finalists.
What does being an Emerge Media Awards finalist mean to you?
It feels really amazing to be recognized for the work I have done. Being part of The Ubyssey for the past two years has been an amazing experience, but there is often so much going on and things are happening so fast we don’t really have a moment to stop and appreciate everything we accomplished. I believe in the work I’m doing and I’m proud of it, but there’s always that part of me that wonders if it’s really good enough or if I’m just tooting my own horn. Being nominated and becoming a finalist for the Emerge Media Awards is a validation of my work that I appreciate immensely.
Some of my other work can be found on my Instagram and I’m responsible for all the layouts of The Ubyssey from May 2019 – April 2021 found here.
Katelyn Snell | BMS Year 2
Finalist for Commercial/Creative Photography
View Katelyn’s work: Phantom touch
Can you please tell us about your work?
My piece is called Phantom touch and it was inspired by the distance between myself and my friends and family during this pandemic. I wanted to visually show how we’ve substituted human interaction and specifically touch for social media, and in doing so, have become part of the digital world. To elaborate, the hands on my body in the photo represent both the extension of my senses into the virtual world for connection but also how that has paradoxically amputated true feelings of bodily touch.
What led you to submitting your work to Emerge Media Awards?
I heard about Emerge Media Awards through an email from the Media Studies Program and figured it couldn’t hurt to submit. I had already produced the picture for a VISA class and I’ve been trying to get in the habit of submitting for more contests so it was a great opportunity.
What does being an Emerge Media Awards finalist mean to you?
I am very honoured to be featured alongside the other finalists for creative and commercial photography. This experience has definitely inspired me to put more of my work out there, even if it makes me nervous.
Elizabeth Wang | BMS Year 4
Finalist for Commercial/Creative Photography and Design: Print News Or Feature Story
View Elizabeth’s work:
- Elizabeth Wang and Lua Presidio, Something I missed in a split between two
- Elizabeth Wang and Lua Presidio, Performance: Gender
Can you please tell us about your work?
Performance: Gender is the alternation issue for our official student newspaper, The Ubyssey’s annual sex issue we produced last year in 2020. Last year, instead of talking about sex, we decided to shed some lights on Gender and the social/societal context behind the idea. In this case, we used a hand-painted illustration as the background and applied the same color scheme to the model as we body-painted them. We want to use process of painting to highlight the concept of “Gender is nothing but a social-constructed idea”.
What led you to submitting your work to Emerge Media Awards?
I came across the Emerge Media Award two years ago when I was serving as the photo editor at The Ubyssey. Earlier this year, I also received a newsletter from the BMS department regarding the registration details for the award, so I thought of giving it a try.
What does being an Emerge Media Awards finalist mean to you?
I’m really honored to be nominated as a finalist of the award, it provided me a chance to review and learn from other people’s work and enrich my own understanding of media.
