H.P. Mendoza

What is your craft? 

Filmmaking. Specifically, writer/director-/cinematographer/editor/music composer/animator.

Tell us about a favorite project. 

It's a tie between shooting video for The Teachers Guild and a documentary about marriage equality for the Civil Marriage Collaborative.

What is your secret power? 

Music. It helped me get stories from people in Africa, the Philippines and Cambodia and it helps me create rhythm for the final films I create about them. If you want me to elaborate, I can sing about it for you.

Describe a mentor of yours. 

My mentors are often people outside of my field, and I have so many. My most recent mentor was the program director at OpenIDEO, Molly McMahon, a person whose life experience didn't just inspire me to continue going out into the world and doing more "things", but to also spend time in your own world and not just practice empathy, but to inspire empathy in others.