Sunday, February 28, 2010

Lantern Festival

Another week disappears - slightly more productive than last week. Graham Wallace helped us out with ADR for one of the scenes in the movie between Tarun and me. The whole process took longer than anticipated but Graham and Tarun were kind and passionate enough to lend extra time to the process. ADR works a treat and the scene has much better dialogue now without the inter cutting background music. I finished reading one of the scripts in my inbox and next one is lined up to read tomorrow. Besides that I did a good clean of my room and managed to take out some solid amount of clutter. Amazing how much you can pile on without realizing.

I managed to catch up with Angelique briefly at the Lantern Festival but soon parted ways to enjoy some awesome food {my favorite this time around being a Vietnamese dish - I don't know the name for it but it was beef wrapped in grape leaf}. The festival was PACKED. It has grown huge over the past few years. I remember that in 2003 - there were hardly any people checking out the festival but now it is an experience walking through the crowd. The problem this time around was entire families coming out to the event {which isn't a bad thing} with strollers for their toddlers and young kids. There is barely enough space to walk as it is and every time one of the parents with strollers stopped to look at something or talk- it would stop the flow of people immediately. Also the organizers need to be more creative with their stall layouts next time around - it was essentially the same as last time and walking through the place is like deja vu. Different varieties of food available was definitely the highlight. If only they had a weekly night market with all those food stalls somewhere in central city....sighhhhh.....

Here are some pics from the event.

Guys cooking mussels

Flames & Smoke

Crowds checking out the food stalls

Trying to walk

Nightfall = more crowds

More food

Lanterns

Lanterns Galore

Kids checking out a display

A better view

Kids amazed at the lantern displays

Climbing trees amongst the lanterns

This is the most crowded I've seen this road

Despair

Thats me for now
Amit

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posted by Amit @ 9:21 PM 0 Comments

Monday, February 01, 2010

Auckland Anniversary Day

It's a long weekend on account of Auckland Anniversary Day and I've spent majority of the time on 'The Moments In Between'. On Saturday, shot another scene for the movie and it was a smooth shoot. The performances were great and we managed to get it done in a couple of hours because it was just Sarah, Lauren and me. We were lucky that the weather was perfect for the shoot, especially considering that it's been bucketing down through later half of last week and even this entire weekend. Here are a few screen grabs from the shoot.

Caged

Trapped

Mistakes

Sunday was spent editing that scene and it cut together nicely. After that I went about compiling and stitching together all the scenes that we've shot, to make it look like one continuing storyline rather than individual scenes clubbed together on a timeline. So far it's working and the first 38 minutes of the movie are essentially locked for now. The task for today is editing another scene that we shot a few weeks back and once that's in place I'll be able to add another 2 scenes to the timeline. All in all - we are halfway through the movie and I'm pretty pleased with the way it is shaping up.

Last night went over to Devonport onto Mt. Victoria {it's more like a hill} to get a view of Auckland City since there were fireworks display at 10.30 PM. I was sort of apprehensive because when it comes to fireworks display Auckland is piss poor and the last couple of times I caught those - they were pretty poor and underwhelming. Thankfully the display was beautiful this time around and definitely worth the long drive onto the shore to get a more panoramic view of the city. Here are some snaps from last night.

Auckland Downtown & Harbour bridge

Fireworks lighting up the sky and water

Travelling through space and time

Mysterious conversations

Time to edit some more.
Later,
Amit

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posted by Amit @ 10:14 AM 0 Comments

Sunday, November 29, 2009

Weekend in photos

The weekend has been long and fantastic so I'll try and let the photos do all the talking for the most part. And to get things started here are a few arty pics I took over the weekend time frame with the theme being 'RED'





FRIDAY NIGHT:
Lippizanears play Jazz Music @ Wine Cellar Backroom. Underground music scene with the musicians improvising the pieces in front of a live audience. Fantastic music and a very unique experience. Also got to catch up with Tahi {one of the actors from 'FIVE'} as well as Andrew {one of the composers on 'FIVE'}.

To the Wine Cellar

Improvised music gig

Symphony of sound captivating the audience

SATURDAY MORNING:
I had to cancel this weekend's shoot and the workshop because of continuity issues with the talent. It looks like the next window of opportunity to shoot that scene will be somewhere late in December and if not in February. Canceled shoot meant I could attend the Grey Lynn Festival. Awesome food stalls and I tried atleast 6 different kinds of cuisines. I wanted to try more but my tummy was full. Some awesome drum pieces from different bands and some unique stalls where you could pick up some cool stuff. It wasn't cheap though and I managed to pick up 2 very small items that I needed for my room for $2 each.

Kids gravitating towards the drums

An artist making a sculpture

Hungarian Candy

People just chilling

Food stalls

A drumming band captivate the audience

Knights and kids

Group drumming

People checking out the stalls

Walking

Hula Hoops

Craft stalls

The main stage and the people

SATURDAY EVENING:
Boxing class as usual which also turned out to be one of the toughest classes in a long time. After the boxing class - the core bunch of us who have been doing it for a while went out for some drinks on Sale St. Cool venue - expensive but a good vibe and the food was awesome. Ended up coming home around 12.00 at night.

Steven, Kit and Kelly

Dennis waiting for the food to come through

Kit obviously telling something exciting to Kelly

People on the dance floor

Kelly, Sara and their friend {I can't remember his name} enjoying the amped up music

Me sharing a laugh

Dark and mysterious

Walking towards the car

SUNDAY MORNING:
The first order of the day was a catch up meeting with Kathryn - who is one of the country's top script writers and was also my colleague when we were teaching at South Seas. We hadn't caught up properly in almost a year and a bit, so it was a breakfast at The Fridge in Kingsland. The Chicken n' mushroom pie at that place is amazing. Very divine and one of the best pies I've ever had. Also bumped into Richard - one of the producers on 'Nowhere to Love' - the project that I was doing that got shelved in 2006. It was brief since he was rushing off somewhere but we intend on catching up sometime soon.

Quite morning in Kingsland

The Fridge

Sunday afternoon went into grocery shopping and doing some cooking. And earlier this evening I went and had drinks at The Malt, as Dave de Lautour - one of my friends {who was in the same acting class for a while} had come visiting Auckland briefly and was returning to LA tomorrow. It was a good catch up as I got to catch up with other friends from the acting class as well as from the film school.

All in all a fantastic weekend.

Time to catch up my beauty sleep as a 6 day week beckons.
Later,
Amit

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posted by Amit @ 6:52 PM 0 Comments