I had a fantastic time the last few days being on the set as a dance choreographer of a few hundred thousand dollars commercial shoot. The female model, Dunia, was a gorgeous 180m tall beauty! I think my head ended up at her waist! You can imagine my horror when they told me the guy could not make it for the practice on Friday... Picture me, a 159m short dwarf spinning her (20 cm taller than me!) over her head and dipping her. An impossible task rite? But I did it! Salsa style on tippy toes, hopping all along the way! Yah, and then gotta sound and look professional too... Hmm I think I managed to sound pro without much prob, but I sincerely hope I looked confident hopping professionally around Dunia!
On the day of the shoot, my 2 extremely tall charges looked marvelously expensive. Few thousand dollars gown, silk shirt, blink blink... But they looked beautiful in the shoot. The director, Humberto is a really funny guy. In his eagerness and zest to direct, he kept falling off the directing chair at the end of every shoot, nodding his head furiously. The assistant director, Roslini (I think?) speaks a load of languages... Spanish, Malay, Italian? I think he has a talent of breaking the ice, making the models relax and feel comfortable, cracking jokes... The camera men, lighting experts and all just seem to know when to adjust this or what equipment goes where without needing to exchange words! I had a little culture shock when I first came, dunno where to stand or when to move, but soon got the hang of it... Still, it doesn't look like they're working. These guys look like they live here and that this was what they were made for...
Yesterday's shoot was outdoors. We went to the integrated resort to shoot, and found that the resort have not been built yet! So we built a platform, watched a jazz band play against the silhouette of the city skyline, while my charges imagined what a great romance it would be to walk along the yet-to-be-built boardwalk of the resort where they see the Singapore flyer (singlish for Ferries Wheel). After that we counted mosquitoes and got a butt massage while the van drove us bumpily out of the construction site towards the indoor stadium for a night of celebrity-dom and cultured dance.
Upon reaching the indoor stadium, I was greeted by half-naked men (the kind with abs - we call them models)! ... And a running cockroach. The cockroaches were a curious commodity... They had a propensity to offer themselves as free souveniors to take away from the stadium, for the thrill of hearing the female shriek or male yell when they pop out of our bags. Thankfully, nothing of the sort happened, but I was entertaining myself with such thoughts before we began shooting. It wasn't until the shooting began when I recognized that one of the models acting as the news-hungry papparazi was actually Justin Lim, who used to teach modelling at Xen, and then did his model's graduation at Actfa.
Anyway, Dunia and Claudio was pretty amazing. Especially Dunia. She juz simply looks stunning, and she'll out-shine anyone because of her height.. If she towers over you, she is kinda the first thing you look at, duh. I think I'll have to wear stilts, do cartwheels with stilts, hop around like a mad dog and set my already fiery red hair on fire before anyone will notice me beside her.. haha!
I also managed to talk to more of the ppl in the shoot, they are really great and friendly ppl, who do their job really well. I can feel the happy and relaxed vibe in the team even though they were fighting against time to finish the job. I highly recommend Chris, the producer, and her team at the Shooting Gallery to anyone who is looking for someone good to shoot commercials! =)
