1ST TENTACLE

STEADICAM ASSEMBLED! Joe and me put together the contraption in less than an hour.Distribution of weights were designed on heavy the camera is. Meaning, you have to change the poundage when you change lenses. The giant telephoto extensions for the bolex add five pounds, while the wide-angle attachment somewhere between two to four.

The battery that I use which can take up to nine hours straight shooting, is another giant waiting to be carried.

We did test shots of extensive tracking and dolly movements. Configuring and re-configuring the weight.

JOE: Normally it would take months for somebody to get the hang of it. But you did it in a few hours. Honestly Im not surprised since you were able to do long tracking shots that looked like steadicam shots so I guess you know the basics inherently.

So the question that pops into mind is why did I get a steadicam when I can already do steady shots right? I don’t know but the equipment looks very cool! (Of course I know. I can make my steady shots look a lot steadier! )

2ND TENTACLE

Massive re-editing on the COMFORT WOMEN documentary’s been finished. We have an official title, EXORCISING DEMONS. First cut was 3 hours long. Parred it down to 2 and 30.

3RD TENTACLE

I’m into the 2nd act of the script that JOE commissioned me to do. Having a great time doing it. It’s a blast to write something, knowing that you wont direct it. In the past whenever I write a scene I stop dead in my tracks and then take out the calculator, “ HOW THE HELL AM I GOING TO DO THAT? HOW MUCH IS THAT GOING TO COST? “ Then you start dialing and making inquiries about so-so location, so-so equipment and such. By the end of the day I go back to the view screen and delete the scene, COSTS TOO MUCH!

Joe has given me CARTE BLANCHE on the entire story. Insisting that I should insert my trademark, black humor.

I said that I’d try. I believe that the humor should be found in the premise and not inserted for humor’s sake. If I don’t find it in the material then it’s not there! But the story is primed with so many possibilities that it takes me time to explore every avenue possible!

4TH TENTACLE

Just finished the re-mastering of a music video I did years ago. I did this MTV for 50 thousand pesos. Really dirt-cheap. That measly sum covered everything and quite frankly I wasn’t that happy with the finished cut. So now after 5 years I went back and did my special director’s cut , TINGGA EDITION.

Using the state of the arts digital equipment at my disposal I was able to shape it into what I always wanted it to look like. Now I know how GEORGE LUCAS must have felt like.

But there’s no massive re-structuring done, like HAN SOLO shooting first. Besides it’s just a damn music video! What can you do?

I don’t know if I should even submit it for airing. Probably just put it in my demo-reel.

5TH TENTACLE

I’m being commissioned to do a documentary about the URBAN POOR. I don’t know how much the budget will be but this would be a civic duty kinda thing. Armed with the latest technological equipment, I will land on their homes when they least expect it and shoot every inch of their abode. My camera will glide and swoop from the rafters and into the very soul of the least forgotten half hammered nail on their flooring. I will show the humanity in those impoverished structures, ‘ THE HUMANITY! THE UTTER HUMANITY OF IT ALL! “

First it was the COMFORT WOMEN, now the URBAN POOR. Am I becoming a social realist?


7TH TENTACLE

Also spending a lot of quality time with SELINA. Since I’m in the CAVE most of the time I put her to sleep on the couch with the SIMPSON’S 3RD SEASON DVDS playing.THE SOUTH PARK DVD was conveniently lent by CESS to her dad. I wouldn’t be shocked if there was a secret command not to have it returned. Anyway I’ll just go and get a new one and watch it when the kid’s not around.

8TH TENTACLE


CESS: “ Now why are you doing that? Shouldn’t you be shooting or something? “

FLIM: “ I need a g>VACATION. And this is what im going to learn during my free time. Other people study languages and cooking but I’m going to study this!

CESS: “ And how much did it cost you to get that equipment and those things what ever you call them? (Pointing at the new machine and the various cables that come out of it)

FLIM: “ You wouldn’t want to know.”

CESS: “ Have you checked your students grades yet? “

FLIM: “ Yep. I’m going to do the tally of their final grade after I animate the hind tentacle of the KRAKEN

I have been sitting on the strong>WORKSTATION for about a week now as I study the basic rudiments of COMPUTER GRAPHICS ANIMATION. It is true that it does take some time from me, from doing the commissioned script and the shooting of my two projects. But since the sem- break already started I figured this is the best time to do it. Im not going to hike off to some distant cordilleira mountain to discover the inner me, or go to the beach and get a tan! I can get that while waiting for a cab.

Joe told me that I could easily just pass it off to the computer graphics division. That’s true but I want to do it on my own. Delegating spfx elements to a third party is a common practice in the professional world. You shoot the main plate and then pass it off to the SPFX team and then you sit down with them and express thru words or drawings what you want them to do.

They then build something and after a few days you are called to check on it and you either like it or hate it or it brings you to another tangent

While doing it on your own, aside from saving you tons of time communicating and shuttling back and forth to the studio, gives you complete creative control. You are no longer under the whim of the technoids.TECHNOID: “ Sorry Direk, we can’t do that shot it’s too complicated.”

TECHNOID 2: “ Ohhh that’s going to take a lot of rendering time.”

TECHNOID 3: “We can do that but we need to boost our production budget.”

By investing on the software and the hardware’s I can save a lot of money in the long run. Now I have a computer graphics division in my studio and I don’t have to deal with those TECHNOIDS ever! Of course I have to go thru tons of books that weigh heavier than those damn yellow pages and I have to cram and click my way thru PERDITIONS FLAME before I can come up with something passable.

But I would go thru PERDITIONS FLAME before I give up! In fact when I look at the mirror I ‘m beginning to resemble…

OHHH GOSH! I AM A TECHNOID! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!