Camiguin promo video goes viral

MAMBAJAO, Camiguin — The urbanite complains about being in Camiguin, which she describes as a “small, quiet and boring” place. She becomes speechless after an enjoyable visit to some of the island-province’s attractions.

The story is told in the latest promotional video of Camiguin, dubbed “#NoWords” (https://www.facebook.com/Camiguintourismoffice), and residents and local officials were surprised that it became an online sensation since it was released last week.

“We did not expect that it would go viral, and it’s been helping us a lot here,” Gov. Maria Luisa Romualdo said.

Target: Millennials

The video, which runs for 4 minutes and 22 seconds, is part of the “#FeelCamiguin” campaign conceptualized by the provincial government with the help of experts in creative media and public relations.

“We want to go full blast with our promotional campaign, and we were asking, how do we reach the hearts of the millennials? After all, they love to explore the world,” Romualdo said.

The provincial tourism office could not say what the immediate impact of the video was on tourist arrivals. More travel tour operators, however, arrived here for the Oct. 22-31 Lanzones Festival.

Last year, 629,613 local and foreign visitors were recorded.

James dela Vega, #NoWords producer, said the video was conceived after a workshop sponsored by the local government, which aimed at creating a new promotional campaign for Camiguin.

The participants adopted the #FeelCamiguin slogan to capture the experience of visitors and proposed to come up with a video. A foreigner, who has a business in Camiguin, came up with the hashtag, Dela Vega said.

It took two days to shoot various locations around the island. “It was challenging because of the limited budget and [time] constraint, but we managed to make do with what we have without compromising quality,” Dela Vega said.

The video features just a few of Camiguin’s tourist destinations, such as the Tuasan Falls, Mantigue Island, Ardent Hot Spring, Old Church Ruins, Sunken Cemetery and White Island (actually a sandbar).

Its main character, stage actress Joanna Marie Katanyag, who is also an artist and teacher playwright of the Philippine Educational Theater Association, said she was both excited and nervous when she was picked to play the role of a tourist.

Conquering fears

A “liberating experience” was how she described the series of shoots.

The airplane ride, for instance, was a hair-raising episode. “It was like a roller-coaster ride. I was only told to get on board an airplane, but they didn’t say it would do some aerial tricks,” Katanyag said.

She said she was afraid of swimming in deep water but had to do it according to the script.

“I have to conquer those fears for the project, and I’m happy that that shoot helped me conquer those fears,” she added.

Katanyag said she found it easy to assume the character’s persona.

“It was not hard to react in the scenes as you will really scream while inside the airplane. You would really express naturally your awe when you’re there,” she said.

“I just don’t wait for the director’s orders. I suggest nuances, acting attacks and ad lib to make the character more real and effective. And I also listen and apply the notes of the creative team in my acting,” she said.

According to the provincial government, the video team took a fresh approach to promoting tourism by showing how a trip to Camiguin, with all the wonderful experiences it offers, would leave one speechless.

A few days after the video was uploaded on Oct. 23, it has already been viewed thousands of times and shared by thousands of people online.

As of Oct. 30, it was posted by a certain Phil Lafranca on YouTube and had 23,964 views. In the Facebook page of the provincial government, it was viewed 980,457 times with 16,095 shares and 2,700 comments.

An article about the #NoWords video in Esquire Philippines magazine had more than 41,000 shares.

Last year, the “This is Camiguin” video was launched where it had 3,873 views on YouTube.