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PRODUCTION LOGS
Friday, November 11, 2005

Update 12-01 to 14-01
Update of Day 12-01 to 14-01
Friday 11 November 2005
4:19 PM


Apologies for not being able to plog for the past few days. Needless to say, the past few days have been very busy indeed. This one post shall cover the events of the past 2 days. To be cliché, Tuesday was the calm before the storm. Nothing big happened throughout the day apart from everyone prepping equipment. Official 'Police' lanyards were replicated, if I may say so, with much accuracy. Wednesday and Thursday, both damn big days, will be elaborated upon. While all main filming days at Graham Tech Warehouse have been technically completed with a marginally high success rate, a lot of discrepancies remain and shall also be discussed later.

WEDNESDAY:


Everyone came punctually at 12 to my place and we brought props all the way down to the cars (Ali's dad and my Mum's) Once at the place, we proceeded with starting the psychiatrist scene of the 15 min version while David, Jordan, and Luke choreographed the entire SWAT-Death scenes and prepared the uniform, equipment, and weapon sets. The psychiatrist scene was pulled off relatively 'okay' but I felt Bloke was not menacing enough. But I suppose its already a good enough performance. Group 2 came at 5:30 exactly. After getting everyone suited up and having the McDonald's dinner my mum brought, we begun. Everybody was really on task and everything was going quite nicely. My only grip was that all the SWAT people died the same way! They were either strangled or shot - I suppose being in a warehouse where there aren't many options with regards to equipment manipulation, that’s the best we could do. I vowed to do better tomorrow.

On a side note, I should mention Ben Soh's most selfless initiative on this day when he went to school on his own accord and begged Media Productions to lend us a camera. Keeping in mind that a small handheld is rather pathetic, he managed to get us a camera on Thursday. Although this eventually cost him his CCA when he got 'fired' from MPEG because of 'divided loyalties' to us. I was quite happy to use the big camera on Thursday although this eventually proved paradoxical.

THURSDAY

Went to school at 9 AM to collect the camera from a very understanding and nice Mr. Ling and the $1,500 from Mdm Dharma who seems to be less than pleased and rather cold towards me lately. I don’t blame her but I feel like shit about it. I do suppose that our schools long-winded bureaucracy, rather than her, is reponsible for the holdup thus far. Anyway, according to her, we'll get the last $500 'when we need it' and provide proper receipts to back it up. Which, in my interpretation, means 'we aint ever gonna see that shit'. Everyone came later today at 1 PM instead and we only left at 2:20 PM. I regret this immensely as the quality of our film was severely compromised by this delay. Once at Graham, we immediately got down to filming the psychiatrist scene for the 30 min version. Bloke's performance, as well as Ali's was great. We took very long though. We got down to doing the big action thing later with John Loh replacing Darren and Bloke replacing Asher who both couldn’t come. I'd have to say that Wednesday's shoot was much better. It seemed that everyone was a bit more 'on' for the first round. I suppose everyone was dying of fatigue.

As mentioned previously, the big camera proved paradoxical because of its sheer size and sensitivity, so much care had to be taken with its use that a lot of time was wasted setting it up and moving it about compared to the handheld. Although its quality sucks, it compensates for this shortcoming because of its versatility and ease of use. I regret to say that despite my best efforts, we still had to resort to strangling people although we did stab John Loh in the back (Literally) with a huge parang which someone 'koped' from a workbench and took home from the place! (Forgot who exactly koped it) Comparatively speaking, I think that Wednesdays shoot was much more dynamic and better organized compared to Thursdays which was rushed and incomplete.

DISCREPANCIES:

1. TAPE RECORDER: In the 30 min shrink-scene, Bloke is supposed to stop the tape recorder. We forgot to shoot this scene.
2. SMOKE: We did not remember to have Bloke smoke a cigarette from the ash tray as intended in the script
3. STRETCHER: We FORGOT entirely to do the stretcher scene whereby a cop actually survives the warehouse massacre! Wasted all of John Lui's efforts. Pity. This was a damn important scene!
4. GIRLFRIEND: We still have to shoot Jeff's girlfriend dying (This is gonna' be fun =P)
5. OBSESSION: We have not yet shot Jeff's obsessive scene where he sits in a coffee shop and browses over files all day
6. QUALITY CONTRAST: Some scenes for both the 15 and 30 min versions where shot on two VERY different image qualities. Some parts will appear very precise and clear, while others relatively 'hazy'. I have no idea how to solve this complication. I can say that if we had possession of the big camera on BOTH days, this film would have been 110% perfect. Now we have two versions which are good in some ways and bad in some others.
7. GLASSES: After killing the shrink, Bloke puts on the wrong glasses!
8. SMOKE: Jeff's smoke scene was done rather poorly

I can't think of anything else although some stuff will most probably crop up during the course of editing.

THANK YOU:

Special thanks to Bingei, Cao, Ethan, Asher. I'll honestly say that the 4 of them had REALLY crap roles. Bingei, Cao, and Ethan were cops that 'died' previously. They were on the floor for like 2 hours with fake blood (Dye, Soya Sauce, Ketchup, Barbecue, Chill mix) but never complained. You guys are the stars of the show. Apologies to Asher for making him come down so late and not give him a role. He didn't bitch about it and I respect that.

Also thanks to Reuben and John Lui for getting all the logistics ready. Reuben's hardworking attitude in dong all sorts of dirty, clean up jobs and getting NPCC costumes is really admirable and John Lui's practical help with blood make up was really really really awesome. Also appreciate all his help with medical props and being our resident 'medic' =D

Thanks also goes to Ben Soh and Ali for their big dedication to this project and coming down to meet me virtually every day to think of ideas and purchase props. Also appreciate Zheng Hao’s help. All the cool angles and nice variation in camera style would NEVER have been possible if it weren’t for him. Although I was wee bit pissed off with him for constantly taking stills, I must say that without him, this whole movie couldn’t have been possible. Additionally, I really do appreciate David and Jeff for training our entire SWAT team on tactics and choreography in a short span of 2-3 hours on their own accord without me having to ask them. Thanks to David for helping us out and providing so many cool props. Gratitude also goes to John Loh for agreeing to fill Darren's place so sportingly and getting stabbed by Bloke.

Not to forget, thanks to EVERYONE else who came down yesterday and Wednesday. Darren, Sean, Yar Tun, Kentay, Zheng Hao, Aizat, Tim Seow, Jordan, Luke, Bloke,

Above all, gratitude goes to Alastair's Dad who let us use his warehouse, sent us there, and staying up till 10 PM BOTH DAYS to watch over us. Ultimately, thanks to God because things were looking so damn bleak before this but everything, in a way, worked out more or less by the time it ended. While some aspects could have been much much much better and a lot of stuff could have been perfect if not for some unfortunate circumstances, it could have also been 1000x worse.

I'm grateful for that. Thanks everyone. This production would not have been possible without you guys. Thank you all! ^_^

- posted by BLT @ 12:11 AM
Comments:
Everyone of you guys were awesome and cooperative.
Its really my pleasure working with you guys, would certainly love to work with you guys again.
All the best to the rest of the filming and the editing.
Stay safe,
ACS Foreva

David
 
jordan koped the parang!
 
Jordan u better beware!
 
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