Ruston Banal is a Kapampangan-born visual-anthropologist cum film-maker who is an advocate of culture, heritage and tradition of the Kapampangans. He started out as an art photographer to some of the countries' top visual artists, documenting artworks and objects used for publication materials and biography-portfolio books.

Recently, Ruston Banal Jr. is a SONY WORLD PHOTOGRAPHY Awardee for his entry KURALDAL which was awarded in Somerset House, London, England last April 26, 2013.

On his entry to London, he also got the Best Photographer Award when he was admitted and took courses on the prestigious NIKON SCHOOL Center of Excellence in Margaret St, Nikon Professional School.

This July, he was invited to be part of the SEE.ME. exhibition by Emily K., where his photos will have the digital space to be exhibited in the New York City Gallery, New York City, USA.

One of his major works is a book for National Artist Napoleon Abueva where he is a main photographer that graced the pages of the biography of the Premier Sculptor of the Philippines. Aside from this, he is an award-winning photographer to some of the world's contemporary photo competitions and had several published photographs featuring his photo journalism and portraits.

A graduate of Fine Arts (magna cum laude) from the University of the Philippines Diliman with a major in Art History and Minor in Painting, he went home to Betis in 2006 and has been staying there for good because of Kapampangan cultural advocacies where he has a great passion. Banal is currently a lecturer of alternative film-making and Photoshop at the Far Eastern University of Manila under Depcomm and a former faculty of multimedia, Art History and Theory at the De La Salle University (CSB Design Foundation). He also holds teaching stints at the University of the East College of Fine Arts and Ateneo de Manila University.