"cs^2"

T

Ticonderoga

Member
Demo Clip:
It has been six months since I last updated this thread. Finally I am able to show something--watch the demo (with subtitles) in 720p here: http://vimeo.com/638776

This project is still very far from completion--we haven't gotten our original score composed yet so the clip above uses music from Soundbooth CS3, and special effects such as muzzle blast are yet to be added.

Synopsis:
A handgun found in a back alley led Hong Kong policeman Albert Chan into a case of cross-border kidnapping. Only during the deadly standoff between him and the kidnapper however did he realize nothing was what it seems...

Stage of Production:
Currently in post-production. Primary shooting was done last July, retakes were made just two weeks ago.

Background:
"CS^2" is a project I initiated with the promotion of indie film making in Hong Kong in mind. Despite all the great movies from Hong Kong many of you have seen indie film making in Hong Kong is very lacking. With this in mind I intentionally selected a very diversify cast and crew--we have actors from casting company, school kids as well as were-strangers from the internet. This is also true when it comes to location and time--the film involves indoor and outdoor, day and night scenes.

Technical Aspect:
We shot everything in one day, using one Canon XH-A1 + Brevis35 + indiFOCUS setup. Lighting was achieved with about a dozen high-powered CFL (ranging from 240 to 525W tungsten equivalent) + cheap Chinese brand light stands.


696577831_93ad058fa1.jpg


701849827_053bb20273.jpg


696577977_427cfc19ee.jpg


696578061_8acd4dd444.jpg


696577871_d4058e1a7a.jpg


702460518_b3ebcc44ee.jpg


696578137_50b20d0f16.jpg


701849845_d3aaeed4fd.jpg
 
Last edited:
Demo Clip
It has been six months since I last updated this thread. Finally I am able to show something--watch the demo (with subtitles) in 720p here: http://vimeo.com/638776

This project is still very far from completion--we haven't gotten our original score composed yet so the clip above uses music from Soundbooth CS3, and special effects such as muzzle blast are yet to be added.


Behind the Scenes
Here are a few behind the scenes photos from the January retake of CS^2. It is a shame that we didn't have a photographer during the primary shooting last July, as we had a much bigger team of cast and crew back then.

Our camera setup: Canon XH-A1 + Brevis + IndiFOUCS + Canon FD primes. The microphone on top of the camera is a Nady CM-2S in a Rode SM3 shockmount.


One of our lighting setup. The light shown here is a Chinese brand light stand fitted with a 400W-tungsten-equivalent CFL--costed about US$50 in total. Getting the right equipment in Hong Kong is hard--the black foil we used, for example, has to be ordered from United States because you can hardly find a store selling them in Hong Kong.


As for the boom microphone we opted for the solution best fitted for our budget: a Rode videomic, mounted on a Rode boompole and connected to a Zoom H4. We tried to rent something better and failed, but that is another story.


More here.
 
Interesting.

I was expecting something like Mandarin, but Cantonese will do. After watching the clip, I felt this was part of a long series about a serial killer who wanted to kidnap little children.
 
Thanks for the encouragement. I really like cop drama, and making one is definitely a lot of fun despite the hard work involved.

And yes the plot is political. The storyline goes as follow--an agent of the Chinese government told Hong Kong police that the child of a high-ranked official was kidnapped from China. In the end however it turns out the kidnapper was smuggling the child for the official, who got caught by the Chinese government on corruption charges.

One lesson I learned from this project is that it is not easy to write a script that fits into the budgetary and time limitation of a small indie project. I have to make a lot of compromises that I wish I did not have to make to make shooting of the script feasible. The whole film would come down to six minutes, which I think is reasonable given that we only shot for one day.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top