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Baybayin documentary

Next week, I will start filming my Baybayin documentary. Over the past 2 months, I’ve been busy organizing, writing and figuring out how to do this ambitious project. My biggest issue was, what kind of Baybayin film do I make? I don’t consider myself a scholar. I don’t have the funds or the time to travel all around the Philippines to document various scripts still used today.

So, what’s the story? I don’t intend to make a National Geographic type of doc that’s for sure. The truth is, I don’t know yet. That’s why I’m going to the Philippines at the end of the month to find one. I plan to interview quite a few people regarding Baybayin and Filipino culture in general.

A couple notes:

• This project is currently self financed but I’m open for sponsorships. I have a few ideas if your business is interested. Contact me at info (at) baybayin.com.
• I’m planning to attend a couple Baybayin related events while in Manila. Follow me on the Baybayin Facebook page for the latest about this project.
• Detailed updates about this project can also be found at BaybayinFilm.com
• Interested in taking part? I will be in Manila 4/23. Contact me at info (at) baybayin.com.

Diwata press release

(Cover design by Sandy Knight. Cover image by Christian Cabuay.)

I recently had the pleasure working with Barbara Jane Reyes on the artwork for her Diwata poetry book. She chose my piece, Masamang balita galing sa mga bituin – Bad news from the stars. It’s a perfect fit. Here’s the press release:

New from BOA Editions, Ltd.

Diwata

Poems by Barbara Jane Reyes

In her book Diwata, Barbara Jane Reyes frames her poems between the Book of Genesis creation story, and the Tagalog creation myth of the muse, placing her work somewhere culturally in between both traditions. Also setting the tone for her poems is the death and large shadow cast by her grandfather, a World War II veteran and Bataan Death March survivor, who has passed onto her the responsibility of remembering. Reyes’ voice is grounded in her community’s traditions and histories, despite war and geographical dislocation.

“Reyes has accomplished a masterpiece by conjuring and weaving the dialectics and elements of Malakas and Magandá – a Filipina poetics of the strong and beautiful. This alone merits praise. In majestic prose and deep story, in rhythmic caesura and hunter woman voices, in genius image brushwork and long and short line archipelago, we learn lessons for the 21st Century: that colonial invasion, the horror of cultural dismemberment, is not exhaustive: Asia, the Philippines, Manila spirit, all of us – can rebuild and continue in América, in many ways become whole again, by the alma and ceremonias, the tellings kept for centuries and beautifully recast in this book. I was mesmerized by the true Diwata that lives in these pages. Diwata – she instructs us, lures us, takes us deep into her jeweled river, then breathes into us our Creation Story – one we thought we could no longer remember, write, speak, or call our own.” — Juan Felipe Herrera

“Barbara Jane Reyes’ Diwata is a book that would have raised the hairs on the nape of Emily Dickinson’s head upon recognition of its poetic backbone. She injects Filipino words like calamansi, kastoy, and pananaghoy into the sinew of American poetry with panache and fearless abandon. Hers is an incomparable talent from which we cannot avert our gaze.” — Nick Carbó

September 2010 • 88 pages $16.00 paper • 978-1-934414-37-8

BOA titles are distributed to the trade by Consortium Book Sales & Distribution 1-800-283-3572

Press kits and other promotional materials are available upon request from BOA Editions. Contact Peter Conners, 585-546-3410 or conners@boaeditions.org

Balisong

Over the past few weeks, I’ve been experimenting with GML (Graffiti Markup Language) to analyze my Baybayin handwriting. If your familiar with XML, GML isn’t very different. In terms of use, check out this video to see what people are doing with it.

GML = Graffiti Markup Language from Evan Roth on Vimeo.

Besides stroke analysis, GML can be used as art. It was only natural that I combine the my interests in technology, art and Baybayin. Below is a piece I did on a 24″x24″ wood panel.

How it was made:
1. Capture my writing with the DustTag iPhone app

2. Export the tag to 000000book.com
3. Download the GML code
4. Load the GML code in GraffitiAnalysis desktop program

5. Adjust the many parameters, rotate and zoom to my liking then export the image
6. Invert the image in a graphics program

7. Blow the image up and stitch it to print on multiple pages
8. Cut out the graphic

9. Stain the wood
10. Wheat paste the graphic
11. Add the GML tags

Although I like the rough lines it outputs, I do hope a future release will export SVG files. Look out for my video on the 17 characters. Interested in GML? Check out all the links above and join the Facebook page.

The script is Balisong written in modified Baybayin. Characters from left to right are Ba-Li-So-Ng. What is Balisong?

From Wikipedia

A balisong, otherwise known as a butterfly knife or a Batangas knife or sometimes called Bente Nueve, is a folding pocket knife with two handles counter-rotating around the tang such that, when closed, the blade is concealed within grooves in the handles. In the hands of a trained user, the knife blade can be brought to bear quickly using one hand. Manipulations, called flipping, are performed for art or amusement.

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