Jump in a Rickshaw with Tomas, producer, and Melissa, Art department from S.F. If I feel out of place here, I think Melissa has me beat henna palms down as she is 6'2" and definitely has a south side chicago accent. We meet with the production company for their Bollywood romantic comedy. Over the course of a few meetings, I get a real sense of chaos from the production... The meetings are still in the brainstorm stage, they aren't sure what effects they will need and everyone seems to have an opinion, except the director, who is really quiet and withdrawn. This should be interesting. The worse part for me was trying to remember everyones name, which I am bad at anyway, but was compounded by the Indian names.

Went to a Divalli party with the production company and etc. Divalli is the celebration of lights in India. For Hindus, it is the celebration of Laxmi, goddess of wealth and prosperity. It's roughly a combination of the Fourth of July, Christmas, and New Years all rolled into one. Kids run around the city lighting off firecrackers and huge exploding bottle rockets. (for a week!) Riding around the city in the rickshaws was interesting- as firecrackers would literally be exploding underneath you like a mindfield as you bumped through the city. Compound that with the fact that rickshaws usually don't know where they are going, and confusion and chaos seem to rule the holiday season.

I haven't had much time to explore the city yet, but we did go location scouting yesterday and I got to see a lot of the city through the window of our mini-van as we drove around. As if I haven't driven home the point yet, the disparity between affluence and crippling poverty is so astounding and on such a grand scale here that I have trouble coming up with any kind of metaphor to describe it. Pictures may do more then words.

That segways nicely into me talking about my good friend and excellent photographer Anthony Kurtz, who is in India right now and should role through Mumbai in about a week. I am looking forward to seeing him and he should have a multitude of beautiful pics of the country and perhaps I will be able to post some here with permission, although I am sure he will post to his own site as well. I have been taking some pictures with the iphone and the xl1, but I am realizing my limited DP abilities.

Speaking of DP (director of photography or cinematographer) - On this feature I am working on he is formally british trained and very smart. I am glad I read the book on visual effects cinematography so I can at least speak his language. I know this is all stuff I should know to do my job here, so some of the research is paying off but my head is swimming with all of the new information ("circle of confusion" - technical term describing the size of boke blur in an image, or state of my mind right now?) and I am not sure technically how I am going to pull off everything.

We are trying to create a comic book like effect for when the characters of the film go into dream/ fantasy sequences, although the metaphor keeps changing, sometimes they want to add it for effect, sometimes as a transition, and sometimes as device. I am going to film all of the talent on location with green screen scrims behind them. I am getting nervous of on-location green screening, because i think it will be hard to get even lighting, etc. I am also realizing what a dark art lighting is and how little I know about it, despite lighting things for years inside the computer. However, since the elements don't need to be "real compositing" just a vector treatment ala MK12's work, I am hoping I can get away with chewy mattes and less then perfect alphas.

There are also going to be some shots with a lot of roto-ing needed, 3d tracking (of which my software, PFHoe pro only goes up to HD resolution, and the film is being scanned at 2K ((which is 2048 by 1556 resolution!)), and I don't know if I can afford PFTrack) and some 3D modeling/animation elements. I am hoping it doesn't get too.... ambitious... to complete in 2 months when I come back in February. I have 60 days allotted for post production and I am thinking I might need every second.

I am lucky to have Melissa here, as she will create all of the production art and has been creating storyboards non-stop. Having someone to board out effects sequences is beyond useful. It makes me realize how important boards are and how it is worth it to take the time to get them absolutely detailed before you move with production if you have the luxury.

The shoot is being pushed back, (principal starts on the 22nd now) so my whole schedule may be re-arranged. I am going to try and complete every effects shot I can before I leave for home on the 22nd of december. Then I go back to SF in January and then wait for them to finish editing on the feature, however, they are still shooting in January! (the climactic shaadi (wedding) scene too, which I will be bummed to miss) Then they lock their edit and then get Melissa started on production art and then I come out and set up a mini post facility thing-y. I was supposed to go back for one month in Feb, but I think it might be more like two months starting in March. Information on this project has been really hard to come by.

Finally, I would still like some time to see a bit of the country. I know I will at least make it down south to Colaba in the next few days, that is the colonial/British part of the city to the south. While in Juhu Beach there are a few westerners but once we move, for the most part, I am living amongst the populist...

Tags: India, General Nerdery