Camera Operator, and “Phil”: Johnny Vong

For the 10th anniversary of the movie Space Zombies:  13 Months of Brain-Spinning Mayhem!, Triple Take presents “Where are they now?” posts from some of the Space Zombies cast and crew.

Now on to Johnny Vong, our camera operator, who also paused to play the small role of “Phil the cameraman”:

Johnny worked in the Toronto motion picture industry as a Unit Stills Photographer over the past decade (and more). Notable films he has worked on include Bruce McDonald’s The Husband and Kate Melville’s Picture Day.  Awhile after Space Zombies came out in 2004, Johnny went to work as the New Media Marketing Coordinator at The National Ballet of Canada.  After that, he was the Digital Producer at Canada’s Ballet Jörgen and the School of Performing Arts (Dance Program) at George Brown College.

In 2011, he traveled to Sierra Leone, West Africa to shoot still photography on the feature documentary Flying Stars. His photographs served as support material for the producers who were invited to the Pitch This competition at the 2011 Toronto International Film Festival. The film became the first-ever documentary project to win top prize at the competition. The photographs also won the International Photography Award (Sports Editorial Category), and were featured in National Geographic, and on the CBC.

In 2013, his short film The Marvelous Girl, which he wrote and directed, screened at the Cannes Film Festival (Short Film Corner). The film went on to have its North American Premiere at the Montreal World Film Festival, and its U.S. Premiere at the Fort Lauderdale International Film Festival. It also screened at the GLOVEBOX Short Film & Animation Festival (Boston), ReelWorld Film Festival (Toronto), and was the opening night Canadian film at the 10th Annual ReelHeART International Film Festival (Toronto) where it won the award for Best Dance & Music Related Film.

He is currently a Master of Fine Arts (MFA) candidate in the Film and Television production program at the University of Southern California – School of Cinematic Arts and holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA) in Integrated Media from OCAD University (Toronto).

Don’t forget you can buy or rent Space Zombies on iTunes…and there’s also the novelette adaptation by Regan W. H. Macaulay available through lulu.com.