my mind wanders... on a thought of a green sunset

Tuesday, January 31, 2006

Film Transfer Part 1

This is another post dedicated for cinematography. This time the following are for Niño’s project.

Members are Chadwick Payawal, Niño Paz, Manuel Piñera, Julius Saluria, Edwardson Tagura, Jude Pineda, Carlos Miguel Fabian, Bea Pitoy, Janica Singuilo, Kim Salvador, Anna Ramos and Cristina Ruiz.

It is titled “Hearts Unmasked”.

It had a nice opening, the feathers and hearts all floating and falling.

It had nice music - I even liked the song there.

Carlos confused me about two groups he was part of. See him for details.

Julius looked like Mr. Victorio (with a Mr. Bangayan attitude) - he was great.

Janica also did well.

Niño is the best sweeper I’ve seen in the movie.

Carlos did well as the “mi ultimo extra”. *peace CM*

I borrowed Niño’s copy of this movie. See him if you want to share the film.

Very short post! I was wondering if I should borrow more movies to watch. Yup. I will. Watch out for more cinematography posts. Ciao~

my mind fleeted at :9:14 pm ;

Monday, January 30, 2006

The History of Cinematography

     This post is dedicated to the end of my month, January. This dates back to the first steps to our final piece, the cinematography project.

Part 1: What’s the script?
     The cinematography project was assigned to be done on the Christmas break, so as early as late December 2005 we began shooting our first scenes. We had a different story - it was about a very tragic fate of a family, much like “Gulong ng Palad”. We began shooting some conversations that seemed going nowhere, because our resources were going down the sewage drain. We needed to change the story.

Part 2: What’s the script again?
     During the next shoot, I was not present, but I was flooded by the details on how they did a new story. It was a magic stuff such and so, which they did on Mary Caras’ grandmother’s house. They did some shoots that had a lot of bloopers, ranking first - Mr. Joemar Tano *clap clap*. He did well on the constipated look and a lot of cuts.

Part 3: Picturing Three Worlds in One Cemetery
     Who even thought of using Paco Park anyway? What the heck. Limitations! We dealt with it anyhow, doing some scenes and some more scenes objected by our executive producer, Mr. Chester Caras. I was the cameraman, and Mary said to me that we need to retake some scenes.
     How does the Underworld spell Paco Park? With almost fortress like features and old mossy bricks and some dark tunnelling passages, what would be best than to love your own Paco Park. Used by MaScians all through their years, it is much like ours. Five pesos lang.
     We needed a new weaponry world called Narvana. It sounded like Nirvana, I tried to make a little fun of it, but it was no use. We also needed some creepy graveyard thing. Just the place: Paco Park ole!

Part 4: The Director’s and Cameramen’s Greatest
     On the next shoot (go figure where we were shooting that day), the director and cameraman Mr. Chester Caras (also the executive producer and editor) came to supervise, improvise and materialize some scenes to finish the movie. Started at 10 and ended at 6.
     Here’s what happened:

The make-up for the demons went all crazy when Mr. Caras came. Talk about ethnic and diabolic.

Tano’s costume looked much more like a blue... never mind. Designed by June Salcor, what could you expect? It was nice.

We got to shoot the longest scene to take in the first part of the schedule, only to find out that it was erased by some person who does not rewind too well. At the end of the taping, before we all went for DoTA, the cast did the longest scene in a one take! The power of gaming - it improves people.

Mary and Leah got to wear their Darna-like and fairy-like costumes, in pink (for Leah) and purple (for Mary). They were teased by some children, which were backed off by Jude Villanueva.

We had lunch on a cemetery. It was a nice ambience (seriously, it was serene) and the breeze was as gentle as ghosts floating around.

Injuries were inevitable. I got hit by Mary on the forehead by her sword, Christian burst his lip, Leah got her gums whacked by June. It proved the dangers of swords, in metal or in plastic.

Camera tricks were as simple as record, pause, and record again. We love teleporting around.

Part 5: The Koreanovela Dub Session
     I was not present when they did this, so I know very little about this one. What I know is that June became my voice for the character, and they did the talk-before-you-hear dubs. They saw the effects beforehand. Aww.

Part 6: The Premiere
     I was not present here either. Hertz watched our movie first (we passed first, so we particularly had no choice) and I was away. Aww.

Part 7: The Home Version
     I borrowed Ma’am Okafor’s CD copy of our movie and watched it at home. At last! The fruits of our labor are presented in a neat movie. The effects were great (done by Mr. Caras) and I particularly like my orb. It was green.

     That’s the month-ender post. Tag if ever you come across the Wind Chill Factor. Ciao~

my mind fleeted at :8:26 pm ;

Sunday, January 29, 2006

The Celebration of the Past

NOTE: Please ignore my depression post. It was just a whimsical thought. Sometimes, in depression one gets logical and when one gets logical, he realizes things that sometimes can be depressing. It is a cyclic system.

Last Friday, I went to the MAPEH Department with Thea, each of us with a concern. Thea’s concern was the rigodon de honor (spelling check please, I’m not sure) dancers, and mine, well, was a disc. As the Department decided that the teachers will choose who will go to that dance for the upcoming prom, Thea closed the issue. I then went to my adviser and asked for the disc. I got our cinematography project.

We went to SM Manila, because Maritoni will celebrate her birthday today and she’ll treat us to bump cars. Nica and I were late because of the meeting, so we rushed immediately to Quantum to find the stomping again. We played some songs before Nica and I ate at Jollibee (we did not have lunch).

As the hopes of improvement in DDR rise, BDT was having a larger scale of songs, such as the slow Remember You, speedy Orion.78, speedier Paranoia, and the rapid Max 300. Remember You was a classic, it was played if you want to rest, because you only need a series of slow streaming steps.

Afterwards we had bump cars. We thought it was a long-term crash experience; however it counted for about 300 seconds of our lives there. I drove while CM sat, and we were running in circles (that screamed to everyone that I can’t drive a bump car), and we got some loose turns and heavy bump-and-grind crashes.

After a long day’s work and play, we all went home. I was a bit excited to go home because I wanted to watch our cinematography project. I was excited. ^ ^

I watched our cinematography project, measuring a 44 minutes and 52 seconds of work, that lasted almost a month of shooting, and hours of editing by our very supportive producer, Mr. Chester Lawrence Caras (Mary’s elder brother). The movie was nice. The effects were great, I’d say. However I was laughing all night because there was a bit of an aura that bellowed corny there, but I ignored it and concentrated on what funny events happened on the shooting. I’ll post it some time.

That’s all for today’s post. Ciao~

my mind fleeted at :11:37 am ;

Saturday, January 28, 2006

The First (Ever) Depression Post

     I have established time to write at my blog again. This year my ultimate problem is time. I can’t seem to have a lot of it.

     We do not have enough time left.

     A problem of the year - yes, it is time. Mine is consumed by schedules. Ever since I switched to an active lifestyle, I have enjoyed a lot of things; however I seem to have lost my control of my life.

     Crash.

     As I thought for a moment about my life, I realized that I was not appreciating time itself. Time will not top for me, and people cannot keep up with it. We must appreciate what time is given now.

     And I hope, time will be available before I am gone.

my mind fleeted at :9:26 pm ;

Sunday, January 01, 2006

New Year Cram Sessions

This is a very short - and I mean short post. Much is needed to be done other than posting (there are a lot of assignments and projects) and I need to finish them in one day flat. So I did some (or maybe few, because I only studied the 3 Student Times and will review Advanced Biology afterwards) today and will continue tomorrow, or the third day of January. Since it is the New Year - welcome to a crammer world.

For the past five days before I was not present within the walls of my dear sweet home. I (almost) lived at Cavite - at my cousin. I always enjoyed being there (since the only barkada of mine in the Gatdula lineage within my age was there, so I know I enjoyed the stay) and we did some stuff to kill time.

When I first came to Cavite I went to SM Molino to look for a fabric shop. I needed the cloth badly for my project on embroidery. However I did not found any shop, so I went up a floor and played Dance Maniax by myself. But because there were so many tokens inserted before I came, I danced out late in the night. So I came to the rendezvous point late.

My parents were waiting for me (I guess so) in Cavite. But when I went there late (why? Go figure) my parents already left, so I was obliged to sleep at Addas I, where my two aunts and a cousin of mine live.

I saw a John Grisham book there called the Summons. Since I was not yet sleepy, I read the book. As much as I wanted to finish it right there in one sitting (I expected to be finished by five in the morning), but my aunt came and said that I should sleep.

Waking up the next day, I was told by my aunt to decide whether I would stay there alone or go to my other aunt. I preferred to go away, since it was pretty lonely up there alone.

I went to my other aunt and had some chitchat. I then sent a message to my cousin and asked if I could visit (note the word visit here). He said yes.

I went there and had a lot of things to do and talk about. I rediscovered Ragnarok again (they are still playing the game).

We played DoTA (Descent of The Ancients) for the first time. It was so much fun! You need not build a community; you need only create a hero of your choice and wham! Attack in stead. I discovered that Sentinels are better to use than Scourges.

I went to SM Molino with my two cousins. They were planning to play PRO at Netopia, however there was a problem. The Netopia there did not have an Internet connection. Dismayed, we went to Quantum (they had one there) and we bought tokens.

I did more than 700 combos in Dance Maniax 2nd Mix there. I did Mind Parasite, Meaning of Life and In My Dreams. It was broken by a wrong note in Baila Baila though. Aww.

When night came, my cousins that I was with earlier played basketball. My other cousin (the youngest within the three of them) and I played with a firecracker than pops under contact of force, such as when to throw it hard on the road or step on it. We battled by throwing it in immediate areas near my cousin and we ran as sparks flew beneath us.

We slept on the carpet for the night. I was fine with that, because there was an electric fan and pillows.

The next day we did some old stuff, like playing PVP in Ragnarok. I read again my compendium of puzzles and trivia there. We roamed around the village a little while, and bit a few chocolate.

We went to Greenhills for some shopping. It was the last day of the Pyro Olympics, so we expected traffic on the way back to Cavite. While at Greenhills we split up to two groups, one group of me and my 2 cousins, and the other of my other girl cousin with her brother and his girlfriend. We had to explore the tiangge to search for quality yet cheap clothes and accessories. We searched two out of the four existing malls (the fifth is still under construction). We also played DoTA there at Netopia and nearly reached the closing time.

We ate at McDonalds with loads of gravy, rice and fries. We were dead hungry (it was already 9 PM and we had not eaten snacks except for some chips and Pringles on the way there) and we took a lot of time digesting, because it was already nearing 9:30, and the Pyro Olympics would end at 10. So instead of going there in haste and come about watching a blank and black sky, we decided to try the night market. Ooh, more shopping.

When we went to Bay Walk, we had some drinks in the Grill something which had a karaoke night, which allowed people to sing there, in high and flat voices or whatsoever. As we watched the okray show (the criticisms there was harsh and funny), I sipped my watermelon shake. We then decide to go for the road.

We encountered the traffic caused about the firework contest. From Roxas Boulevard to the Petron Station at Macapagal, it took us two gruelling hours in a car that was running out of gas and needed to turn off the air conditioning. It was like a creepy sauna in there. It was so late in the night too.

We came to the house at 3 in the morning. After some chitchat we slept again on the carpet, exhausted.

I wondered why the water bottle of the guinea pigs (which my cousins owned) remained full despite of the guinea pigs coming about for water. We discovered that the water bottle was not dripping out water and the guinea pigs were dehydrated for days! When my cousin fixed the tube the guinea pigs went to the water bottle and drank water like crazy.

I tried out some purple rice given by a neighbour. It was purple. It was sweet, and it was purple. At any case, it was, and will be, purple.

I came home readying for the New Year.

It was all that I could write for now.

Ciao~

my mind fleeted at :10:36 pm ;