4:45am.... I should learn to sleep first before i start to blog.
Btw... Daryl Bryan Lim... are you there?
--------------------------------------------------------------
I called Kang Sheng up the moment i heard there's a moderately huge special effects job coming up. He's been wanting to come along all these while but zzz... docpro project ruled his day.
So i called up our old friend Kwang Wei since i figured he should be pretty bored of Xue Li already and thankfully he agreed to come.
btw kwang wei im sorry for making you wait half an hour at Outram MRT lmao.
It was a Wednesday night and Jimmy said this time was gonna be more tiring and spectacular than the day before's big ass explosion.
The shoot was for the same Chinese Drama the other time and Kwang Wei recognised some of the actors immedietely. I dont know the names. Maybe he could tell me again some day.
It was at Teck Lim road too. Saw plenty of chickens. Some are quite hot. I think Kang Sheng will have his full of hor fun there.
I came by Uncle Jimmy's office at Whampoa Drive block 74 in the late afternoon to help him with sorting out the equipments he needed. And in case you were wondering, yes that's the exact some fucking block where that murder, that seems to be presented quite propaganda-ishly in the news now, happened.
While there he was preparing a few bombs as well.
It's pretty cool walking around his office, which essentially is a HDB flat, and looking at all his stuff. Where else can you find a room full of pistols and rifles laying about in boxes and on your rack are explosive mixes and the other corner are mattresses and trampolines and on the cupboard are spare parts for an M16?
I watched Uncle Jimmy stabilize his explosive. He explained to me what he's doing and why he's doing and all that. It was interesting and i took out my cigarette roller.
"STOP!"
I stopped.
"Dont smoke here. If this catches fire my hand will fucking blow!"
Ooops. I asked him how he made his gunpowder and he continued rolling his bomb.
"It's one of those things that I really cannot tell anyone because this can really kill if it falls into the wrong hands."
One of his friends were there at the same time and he related to me how easy it was to make bombs and even told me what to use and what else to put together to make a deadly weapon. Not that I would like to blow someone up but if the situation arises....
Kwang Wei and I were tasked the usual thing... carriers and fetchers. Our effect this time were sparks.
Mediacorp had their crew design and build a makeshift alley with REAL flourescent lighting. One guy will chase the other through this alleyway, find that there's wooden rack of flourescent at the end of the alley, then fight a bit, hitting a few lights along the way and then BAM! One super kick to the bad guy and he flies through the rack, breaking all the lights and falling into the alley behind. After that, a fight as the lights in the area flicker and spark.
That's me! So cute!
It was a pretty heavy night. In addition it was an overnight shoot. I didnt know that but then i had school int he afternoon the next day so i didnt really bother.
There was quite a bit of equipment to use so Kwang Wei and I were running up and down again and again and again.
And i dunno... its just my bad habit... but once i know someone else can cover for me I'd let that happen. So in the end I find myself letting Kwang Wei do the running while i stay at the van pretending to be busy looking for the equipment. hahahahahahahahahahahahah. no la not that bad la.
Uncle Jimmy pulled me one side while we were setting up the wires and testing the circuit.
"Eh the Kwang Wei very helpful person....."
Then Uncle Jimmy watched as Kwang Wei ran around doing his duty.
"I think he should come more often.." Uncle Jimmy says.
Steady ar Kwang Wei!
The first spark was due. I didnt really have a clear idea on what will happen so i followed the camera crew around and huddled where they huddled - infront of the tube.
Uncle Jimmy was there too so that means it should be safe.
The director started shouting so i knew they were starting. I squeezed myself to the corner to protect myself from any sparks. But then Uncle Jimmy suddenly stood up and walked away.
"I cant be there if you are there." he says.
Heh?
I framed up my shot and started rolling. Then i felt someone put a cupboard box over me. It was Uncle Jimmy. He also handed out more opened boxes for the camera crew and the started to huddle behind this paper shield.
Oh shit. I wanted to move away. But the director was already shouting again. Too late. My box started to fall off me. I squeezed my ribs to the wall to hold the box.
"ACTION!"
Badguy kicks, good guys evades, kick slams into flourescent tube and BAM!
It was a pretty spectacular spark considering the size of the charge - 2cm. I loved it.
Then....
"...... chao cheeee baaaiiiiiiiiiIIIIIIII!!!!......"
The pieces of the tube rained all around hitting everything around. I have no idea what the fuck it was made off but i know i made my hands itchy after that.
Throughout the night I had my fair share of spark effects. If i were to choose between a big ass BOOM like they day before and spark effects, I'd choose sparks.
They're cheap, beautiful, easy to set up and spectacular when done right.
For example yesterday....
i dont know where they got this bike from, but they messed it up back into its asshole. They were dragging it across the floor, doing side-falling stunts on it, falling off this bike and lettingit fly into big ditches.... by the time we were done it was leaking fuel, both side mirrors crushed, engine cover smashed and mud guard crumpled.
In this effect they had a stuntman get punched across the chest while travelling down the road, he falls off onto the road, the bike skids, and flies into a set of fuel tanks.
This spark effect is supposed to represent "metal hitting metal". I dont think it works....
This happened on Tuesday night. That night i was helping Uncle Jimmy set up a fuel tank explosion. He taught me how to make one and i saw everything he did with my own two eyes. Simple idea but difficult to pull off. And no i will not announce it to the world because I want to have this advantage, thank you.
So after the bike hits the fuel drums... what else but...
..doing some funky action....
...and then...
... the initial blast.... you get hit by the blow....
... and then turn around to look at the red fireball.
btw.. I didnt notice till before we left at 7am on Thursday mornign that Rui En was on set with us, lol.
Is this her or am I just imagining things because she reminds me a lot of my ex-girlfriend and they look the same.
Going back to Wednesday night, it was running late... around 1am and Kwang Wei had to go.... just when the "big spark effect" was about to come.
Luckily i managed to psycho him back and we started to fix up the rack of lights at the end of the alley where the bad guy would smash through.
It was gonna be a sequence of six sparks; left, right, left right, etc from the bottom up.
The rest of the crew were gone off for a break so it was only us, the stunt people, on set. Uncle Jimmy took this quiet time with us and thought us how to wire the effect, how to tie them together, how to mask them properly and most of all, taught us about neatness.
Everything that Uncle Jimmy does has some order to it. Every wiring job that i see he does has the exact same pattern and the exact same order. Everything is so neat and firm and blends itself into the set. Beautiful! In fact, his orderly attitude is widel known (and respected/feared) that after the shoot, some of the crew members helped bring his machines back to the van. When Uncle Jimmy and I went back to the van we found all the equipment lined up, in two rows, from light weight to heavy weight. Even little bits and pieces like gloves and tape were placed in a military-type formation. If I were to yell out "Dari Kiri Cepat Jalan" I swear the equipment would march itself back into the van.
Uncle Jimmy also has this funny style of working. He does not "use" his boys. He teaches them. And I'm not saying that to be funny but there are times we get a lot of flak for any little mistakes we do. I got fucked because..... well i cant think of anything except that i'm stupid and slow compared to him. When he's rushing for time he is rushing for time. There wasnt even time for me to open up a bottle of water to drink! i could hold it in my hands for a while before he comes and asks me to fix a connection or tells me to coil up a wire or bring him the wire box or present some effects from the effects box for the director to look and choose.
And those three pictures you just saw is him stepping on a shoulder of one of his boys while he fixes up a spark effect on the rack. To some it looks like communism. But if you think a little bit, this is trust. And Uncle Jimmy has been showing this a lot to me. He gives me his van keys. He leaves me in his loaded up van with real Glocks and Revolvers while he goes up to do something, he passes me dummy weapons overnight, he hands over his bag that contains everything that protects him legally, including his phone, to me for entire shoots..... it's an honour for me. But i stil wonder... WHY?
Why did he once say,"I do NOT want you to be a stuntman. I want you to be a Stunt Director."?
Why is he giving me this privilege????
I digress. But back to Kwang Wei's special effect that he fixed together with Jimmy Low since i was too busy with my camera recording some awesome footage.
Well.... it took us an hour to set it up. Another hour to wait for the shot to happen. And two seconds for all that to go in smoke.
Stuntman's face protection - cellotape.
One take. One chance. One spark in a fraction of second. And one very pissed Mediacorp cameraman because i accidentally knocked his tripod with my knee before the shot rolled.
... and all that for breathtaking frame.
Well done.
.....
A few hours later the only stunt people left were Uncle Jimmy and me. It was about 630am and the sun was rising.
I had just completed one of Uncle Jimmy's major tasks given to me.
He wanted me to wire up six wires. What will happen is that there will be a sequence of sparks. The alley is divided into six parts. And two sparks will be fixed for each layer all the way to the back which will then end with a big spark down the middle. Every second, one layer will be burst, then the next, then the next, and so on.
The wiring must be correct and there is no room for mistake. We cannot have 3 go before 2 or 6 go before 5.
It was a mess of wire-crossings. One of the cameraman got back from a break and saw what i did on the floor and he went,"Aiya! All sotong already!" and tried to look for his wire to the camera.
Uncle Jimmy was all the way on set fixing up the explosives while i was at the control box discovering that some of my wires werent tightened properly and was lost
in the mess of wires. I got it all fixed before Jimmy came back but in the state he saw me in got him very anxious.
The director came in and talked to Uncle Jimmy about his effect. Jimmy assured that everything will be fine. He came back and asks me...
"Is everything correct?"
The sun was rising already and any retake would mean another half an hour... by then the sun would be fully shining.
"yea.. evrything is okay."
"STANDBY!"
I prayed.
"AND.. ACTION!"
BAM!
BAM!
BAM!
BAM!
ZZZPPOOWW!!
I made it. The director was happy.
In the van, Uncle Jimmy was enthusiastic. Even more than normal. Probably because he was over-exhausted and i was acting the same.
He was driving me to my doorstep when he said,
"Audi... Job well done. Today was very intensive but job well done."
"Thanks ar, Jimmy."
"Nevermind. Next job I'll call you again. Now you go home and sleep."
"Okay.. zhoi-gin, Jimmy!"
"Good night.."
And sleep I did.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Then i came late for AFP.
Btw... Daryl Bryan Lim... are you there?
--------------------------------------------------------------
I called Kang Sheng up the moment i heard there's a moderately huge special effects job coming up. He's been wanting to come along all these while but zzz... docpro project ruled his day.
So i called up our old friend Kwang Wei since i figured he should be pretty bored of Xue Li already and thankfully he agreed to come.
btw kwang wei im sorry for making you wait half an hour at Outram MRT lmao.
It was a Wednesday night and Jimmy said this time was gonna be more tiring and spectacular than the day before's big ass explosion.
The shoot was for the same Chinese Drama the other time and Kwang Wei recognised some of the actors immedietely. I dont know the names. Maybe he could tell me again some day.
It was at Teck Lim road too. Saw plenty of chickens. Some are quite hot. I think Kang Sheng will have his full of hor fun there.
I came by Uncle Jimmy's office at Whampoa Drive block 74 in the late afternoon to help him with sorting out the equipments he needed. And in case you were wondering, yes that's the exact some fucking block where that murder, that seems to be presented quite propaganda-ishly in the news now, happened.
While there he was preparing a few bombs as well.
It's pretty cool walking around his office, which essentially is a HDB flat, and looking at all his stuff. Where else can you find a room full of pistols and rifles laying about in boxes and on your rack are explosive mixes and the other corner are mattresses and trampolines and on the cupboard are spare parts for an M16?
I watched Uncle Jimmy stabilize his explosive. He explained to me what he's doing and why he's doing and all that. It was interesting and i took out my cigarette roller.
"STOP!"
I stopped.
"Dont smoke here. If this catches fire my hand will fucking blow!"
Ooops. I asked him how he made his gunpowder and he continued rolling his bomb.
"It's one of those things that I really cannot tell anyone because this can really kill if it falls into the wrong hands."
One of his friends were there at the same time and he related to me how easy it was to make bombs and even told me what to use and what else to put together to make a deadly weapon. Not that I would like to blow someone up but if the situation arises....
Kwang Wei and I were tasked the usual thing... carriers and fetchers. Our effect this time were sparks.
Mediacorp had their crew design and build a makeshift alley with REAL flourescent lighting. One guy will chase the other through this alleyway, find that there's wooden rack of flourescent at the end of the alley, then fight a bit, hitting a few lights along the way and then BAM! One super kick to the bad guy and he flies through the rack, breaking all the lights and falling into the alley behind. After that, a fight as the lights in the area flicker and spark.
That's me! So cute!
It was a pretty heavy night. In addition it was an overnight shoot. I didnt know that but then i had school int he afternoon the next day so i didnt really bother.
There was quite a bit of equipment to use so Kwang Wei and I were running up and down again and again and again.
And i dunno... its just my bad habit... but once i know someone else can cover for me I'd let that happen. So in the end I find myself letting Kwang Wei do the running while i stay at the van pretending to be busy looking for the equipment. hahahahahahahahahahahahah. no la not that bad la.
Uncle Jimmy pulled me one side while we were setting up the wires and testing the circuit.
"Eh the Kwang Wei very helpful person....."
Then Uncle Jimmy watched as Kwang Wei ran around doing his duty.
"I think he should come more often.." Uncle Jimmy says.
Steady ar Kwang Wei!
The first spark was due. I didnt really have a clear idea on what will happen so i followed the camera crew around and huddled where they huddled - infront of the tube.
Uncle Jimmy was there too so that means it should be safe.
The director started shouting so i knew they were starting. I squeezed myself to the corner to protect myself from any sparks. But then Uncle Jimmy suddenly stood up and walked away.
"I cant be there if you are there." he says.
Heh?
I framed up my shot and started rolling. Then i felt someone put a cupboard box over me. It was Uncle Jimmy. He also handed out more opened boxes for the camera crew and the started to huddle behind this paper shield.
Oh shit. I wanted to move away. But the director was already shouting again. Too late. My box started to fall off me. I squeezed my ribs to the wall to hold the box.
"ACTION!"
Badguy kicks, good guys evades, kick slams into flourescent tube and BAM!
It was a pretty spectacular spark considering the size of the charge - 2cm. I loved it.
Then....
"...... chao cheeee baaaiiiiiiiiiIIIIIIII!!!!......"
The pieces of the tube rained all around hitting everything around. I have no idea what the fuck it was made off but i know i made my hands itchy after that.
Throughout the night I had my fair share of spark effects. If i were to choose between a big ass BOOM like they day before and spark effects, I'd choose sparks.
They're cheap, beautiful, easy to set up and spectacular when done right.
For example yesterday....
i dont know where they got this bike from, but they messed it up back into its asshole. They were dragging it across the floor, doing side-falling stunts on it, falling off this bike and lettingit fly into big ditches.... by the time we were done it was leaking fuel, both side mirrors crushed, engine cover smashed and mud guard crumpled.
In this effect they had a stuntman get punched across the chest while travelling down the road, he falls off onto the road, the bike skids, and flies into a set of fuel tanks.
This spark effect is supposed to represent "metal hitting metal". I dont think it works....
This happened on Tuesday night. That night i was helping Uncle Jimmy set up a fuel tank explosion. He taught me how to make one and i saw everything he did with my own two eyes. Simple idea but difficult to pull off. And no i will not announce it to the world because I want to have this advantage, thank you.
So after the bike hits the fuel drums... what else but...
..doing some funky action....
...and then...
... the initial blast.... you get hit by the blow....
... and then turn around to look at the red fireball.
btw.. I didnt notice till before we left at 7am on Thursday mornign that Rui En was on set with us, lol.
Is this her or am I just imagining things because she reminds me a lot of my ex-girlfriend and they look the same.
Going back to Wednesday night, it was running late... around 1am and Kwang Wei had to go.... just when the "big spark effect" was about to come.
Luckily i managed to psycho him back and we started to fix up the rack of lights at the end of the alley where the bad guy would smash through.
It was gonna be a sequence of six sparks; left, right, left right, etc from the bottom up.
The rest of the crew were gone off for a break so it was only us, the stunt people, on set. Uncle Jimmy took this quiet time with us and thought us how to wire the effect, how to tie them together, how to mask them properly and most of all, taught us about neatness.
Everything that Uncle Jimmy does has some order to it. Every wiring job that i see he does has the exact same pattern and the exact same order. Everything is so neat and firm and blends itself into the set. Beautiful! In fact, his orderly attitude is widel known (and respected/feared) that after the shoot, some of the crew members helped bring his machines back to the van. When Uncle Jimmy and I went back to the van we found all the equipment lined up, in two rows, from light weight to heavy weight. Even little bits and pieces like gloves and tape were placed in a military-type formation. If I were to yell out "Dari Kiri Cepat Jalan" I swear the equipment would march itself back into the van.
Uncle Jimmy also has this funny style of working. He does not "use" his boys. He teaches them. And I'm not saying that to be funny but there are times we get a lot of flak for any little mistakes we do. I got fucked because..... well i cant think of anything except that i'm stupid and slow compared to him. When he's rushing for time he is rushing for time. There wasnt even time for me to open up a bottle of water to drink! i could hold it in my hands for a while before he comes and asks me to fix a connection or tells me to coil up a wire or bring him the wire box or present some effects from the effects box for the director to look and choose.
And those three pictures you just saw is him stepping on a shoulder of one of his boys while he fixes up a spark effect on the rack. To some it looks like communism. But if you think a little bit, this is trust. And Uncle Jimmy has been showing this a lot to me. He gives me his van keys. He leaves me in his loaded up van with real Glocks and Revolvers while he goes up to do something, he passes me dummy weapons overnight, he hands over his bag that contains everything that protects him legally, including his phone, to me for entire shoots..... it's an honour for me. But i stil wonder... WHY?
Why did he once say,"I do NOT want you to be a stuntman. I want you to be a Stunt Director."?
Why is he giving me this privilege????
I digress. But back to Kwang Wei's special effect that he fixed together with Jimmy Low since i was too busy with my camera recording some awesome footage.
Well.... it took us an hour to set it up. Another hour to wait for the shot to happen. And two seconds for all that to go in smoke.
Stuntman's face protection - cellotape.
One take. One chance. One spark in a fraction of second. And one very pissed Mediacorp cameraman because i accidentally knocked his tripod with my knee before the shot rolled.
... and all that for breathtaking frame.
Well done.
.....
A few hours later the only stunt people left were Uncle Jimmy and me. It was about 630am and the sun was rising.
I had just completed one of Uncle Jimmy's major tasks given to me.
He wanted me to wire up six wires. What will happen is that there will be a sequence of sparks. The alley is divided into six parts. And two sparks will be fixed for each layer all the way to the back which will then end with a big spark down the middle. Every second, one layer will be burst, then the next, then the next, and so on.
The wiring must be correct and there is no room for mistake. We cannot have 3 go before 2 or 6 go before 5.
It was a mess of wire-crossings. One of the cameraman got back from a break and saw what i did on the floor and he went,"Aiya! All sotong already!" and tried to look for his wire to the camera.
Uncle Jimmy was all the way on set fixing up the explosives while i was at the control box discovering that some of my wires werent tightened properly and was lost
in the mess of wires. I got it all fixed before Jimmy came back but in the state he saw me in got him very anxious.
The director came in and talked to Uncle Jimmy about his effect. Jimmy assured that everything will be fine. He came back and asks me...
"Is everything correct?"
The sun was rising already and any retake would mean another half an hour... by then the sun would be fully shining.
"yea.. evrything is okay."
"STANDBY!"
I prayed.
"AND.. ACTION!"
BAM!
BAM!
BAM!
BAM!
ZZZPPOOWW!!
I made it. The director was happy.
In the van, Uncle Jimmy was enthusiastic. Even more than normal. Probably because he was over-exhausted and i was acting the same.
He was driving me to my doorstep when he said,
"Audi... Job well done. Today was very intensive but job well done."
"Thanks ar, Jimmy."
"Nevermind. Next job I'll call you again. Now you go home and sleep."
"Okay.. zhoi-gin, Jimmy!"
"Good night.."
And sleep I did.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Then i came late for AFP.
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Audi
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Filmmaking
,
Jimmy Low
,
My Life
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