Yeryung Son손예령

I make videos, photographs, and documentaries.

How you show something can reveal what it really is.

The work

Title card of I'll Handle It with the Official Winner laurel of the One Earth Young Filmmakers Contest 2026 Full film · 6 min
Writer · Director · Editor

I'll Handle It

An experimental documentary that turns AI on itself. I used AI to make a film about AI's environmental cost, so it's made of the thing it criticizes. With the deadline approaching and my mom nagging me about it, I turned to ChatGPT for ideas, and the middle of the film is a real, unscripted screen recording of that brainstorm. I'd rather leave people sitting with the problem than hand them a fake solution. It won the Sally Stovall Award for Creativity at the One Earth Young Filmmakers Contest (428 films entered), in a category that ran from grade 12 through graduate students.

One Earth interview
One Earth award ↓Chicago screening ↓
Short film6 minScreened in Chicago, September 27, 2026
An unfinished painting beneath a waste-warning sign The painting left on the street among garbage bags
Photographer

This Is Not Waste

An unfinished painting left at an apartment dumpsite, under a warning sticker. By itself it looks like a work. Next to the trash bags, it just looks like garbage someone threw out. Same canvas, and a single label decides which.

The sticker, translated: “Residents who put out this waste, please contact the security office. CCTV will be checked.”

Grand Prize, Seoul Youth Biennale, Youth Artist Division.

Gallery Guide feature ↓
Photography
A hall at Changgyeonggung Palace, from the Changgyeonggung episode of Korea's Palaces Used to train 300+ guides Changgyeonggung episode
Director & Editor

Korea's Palaces

I guide English tours at a heritage institute. When the institute launched a new public-interest program, I proposed a guide to watch before you visit: four episodes, each pairing a Korean king with one from somewhere else, so it's easier to remember. Out of the program's open submissions, two ideas were chosen, and this was one, built from primary court records, now used to train the institute's next guides. A palace doesn't change, but how you see it can.

Program selection ↓
DocumentaryKorea History Explanation Promotion Agency
A quietscenes edit pairing two misread characters 2.7M+ total views Open on TikTok ↗
Founder & Sole Creator

quietscenes@quietscenes_

A TikTok channel where I make character edits for the ones other people misread. I pair them with music that shows the version I see. The ones I've spent hours on (Rumi, Jinx, Elsa, Zoey, Jinu) all had their real selves buried under a label someone else gave them, and I keep choosing them because they feel like things I've felt but couldn't say out loud yet. What I love most is when strangers write about their own moments of feeling unseen, and the comments turn into a quiet room where people tell each other the truest thing about themselves. That's the part I didn't expect, and can't be thankful enough for.

Self-taught in After Effects2.7M+ views14K+ followers

These two are different.
One I made with people, the other made room for other people.

Video coming after October 23 SESIFF · Bali · Bogota Stop-motion
Co-Director · Co-Cinematographer · Co-Editor · Korea Unit

KORINCO

This one was a team. For four years I've helped elementary students make stop-motion films, moving from assistant teacher and dubbing to camera, and this year to co-directing, co-filming, and co-editing the Korean unit. Kids from Korea, Indonesia, and Colombia each turn their own culture into a short, and the combined film became the opening film at a festival in each country: SESIFF in Korea, the Bali International Short Film Festival in Indonesia, and the Bogota Short Film Festival in Colombia.

Press coverage ↓
CollaborationFour years
Yeryung giving the opening speech at the Fayston Short Film Festival 1st edition · Opening speech
Founder · Festival Director

Fayston Short Film Festival

It started in my environmental club: after we signed an agreement with a recycling company, I wrote up a plan for an environmental film festival and brought it to my school. It became the first Fayston Short Film Festival, which I founded and directed. I liked making videos alone, but I liked this too, because it was other people's stories getting a stage. For the second edition, I opened it online to high school students across Korea and took out the rankings. Instead, three professional jurors write feedback on every film. A ranking ends with the festival, but feedback goes into the next film. And when the festival is over, I want it to stay a place where the sixteen filmmakers keep talking about film.

First edition, October 17, 2025: 15 films entered.
Second edition, October 25, 2026, online: 16 films.

Jurors for the second edition: film director Chung Yoon-chul (Marathon), producer Jung Moon-gu (The Attorney, The Thieves), and Grégoire Rouchit of the Clermont-Ferrand International Short Film Festival.

First edition on the school’s YouTube (0:11–1:30) →
Film festival

Record

Awards and selections

  • Aug 2026Sally Stovall Award for Creativity, One Earth Young Filmmakers Contest (428 films entered)Winners page ↗Winners’ breakfast
  • Aug 2026Grand Prize, Youth Artist Division, Seoul Youth BiennaleFeatured in Gallery Guide, August 2026Gallery Guide, pp. 138–141
  • Apr 2026Selected for the National Heritage Promotion Program, a 2026 public-interest program of the Korea History Explanation Promotion Agency: 2 of 11 proposalsProposal, translated: “Production of an English video guide series for foreign visitors to Gyeongbokgung.” Score 75.2 of 100; selection threshold 70.In KoreanResults

Press

Korean articles open with the relevant part highlighted. My name in Korean is 손예령.

  • Jul 2026Chung-Ang University News: KORINCO 2026 report naming me as the Korean unit's directorKey line, translated: “Yeryung Son (손예령), who had worked with the program for the previous three years as an assistant instructor and camera operator, took on directing this year.”In Korean. Also reported by JoongAng Ilbo, Munhwa Ilbo, Newsis, UNN, Point Daily, eNewsToday, and Smart Economy.Source ↗
  • Oct 24, 2025The Public: KORINCO 2025 among the opening films of the 17th SESIFFKey line, translated: “The opening program had four films, including KORINCO Museum.”In KoreanArticle ↗
  • Aug 2025Gyeonggi Cultural Foundation: KORINCO 2025 announcement naming me among the high school assistant teachersKey line, translated: “Sixth graders led the production, with three high school assistant teachers, Yeryung Son (손예령) among them.”In KoreanArticle ↗

Screenings

  • Sep 27, 2026I'll Handle It, One Earth Global Awards Celebration, Davis Theater, ChicagoPhotosVideo

Roles and service

  • Jul 2025Hospitality Team volunteer (BIKYbee), 20th Busan International Kids & Youth Film Festival (BIKY)Photos
  • 2024–25Intern, Seoul Youth Biennale2024 exhibition, Mulberry Hills, Seoul, through January 2025Photo
  • 2024–Co-founder and Co-leader, EcoCirculators, school environmental club: recycling partnership with SUPERBINSchool–SUPERBIN agreement signed in 2024. Members sort and store clear PET bottles, and SUPERBIN collects them. One pickup: 10.6 kg.Photos
  • 2023–Youth Cultural Heritage Guide, Korea History Explanation Promotion Agency: English tours at Gyeongbokgung PalaceCompleted the six-month Korean Historic Palaces Explanation Course, September 2023Certificate & photos