By Shannon Wei
KUCHING — Caritas Malaysia’s basic communication skills series came to an end when community representatives across the Malaysian dioceses gathered over Zoom for the final workshop on 12 July.
The series consisted of six workshops held between March and July, and explored the tools of basic Writing, Photography and Videography for social media.
The purpose was to train diocesan representatives in communication skills, using smartphone as a way to independently share news and information from their community. Through these skills, Caritas Malaysia hopes to promote local activities, projects and campaigns in each diocese to be shared on their social media platforms, including Caritas Malaysia’s national portal. This will also help share their learning with others and reach out to new and current volunteers, collaborators and benefactors.
The panel of trainers from SIGNIS Malaysia were, Karen Arukesamy (Writing), Kogulanath Ayappan (Photography) and Louis Clovis (Videography). They offered a wide range of industry-level knowledge and expertise to an average of 20 participants at each workshop.
Karen, who covered the first two workshops on Writing, is a former journalist with theSun and president of SIGNIS Malaysia. She shared with participants her knowledge and practice in basic writing for social media, web and blogs, and offered insights on how to achieve effectively the importance of the “5Ws and 1H”.
In the following two workshops on Photography, Kogul as he is called, discussed topics such as the rule of thirds, tips and tricks of mobile photography as well as the importance of photo captions and respecting protection rights. Kogul is currently the Head of Graphic Design Department with a leading online news portal in Malaysia.
The final two Videography workshops covered by Louis added on to Kogul’s expertise by expanding on video scripting; planning the shots, using transitions, lighting etc. Louis introduced various mobile video editing software, including equipment to enhance smartphone for video production. Louis is the Managing Director of New Media Technologies.
Participants also received assignments at the end of each workshop that tested their creativity, flexibility and new skills under the restrictions of MCO. In return, they received valuable feedback from these trainers. Participants are expected to receive a digital certificate as an appreciation and reminder of their commitment.
The programme was requested and jointly organised by Caritas Malaysia to support the diocese Caritas office communication needs. The basic communication skill series was planned and managed by Public Media Agency (NGO) in collaboration with SIGNIS Malaysia (World Catholic Association for Communication) who provided the media trainers.
