Kingyo is completed. Goodbye, Toho Studios

The Maid (Luchino Fujisaki) in Kingyo

And so it's finally done. After an occasionally tedious post-production process that lasted for five weeks, I have completed my first attempt at a Japanese-language short film, KINGYO.

Sanja Matsuri 2009 at Asakusa

After hanging about at the Rei Ayanami-invaded Akihabara, I made my move to Asakusa. In truth, Asakusa was my primary destination, Akihabara was just a detour for me to buy my FireWire.

My friend Niklas had told me that a Matsuri (festival) was going on, so I wanted to take a look at it. I arrived at Asakusa at 3pm and already I could hear faint sounds of drums from above. The station was crowded with people moving to the exit, and as I tried to wade through the chaotic sea of humanity, initial curiosity giving way to excitement, I finally made my way out of the underground station and saw the parade.

I will now copy and paste Wikipedia's explanation of Sanja Matsuri.

Rei Ayanami invades Akihabara

I went to Akihabara earlier this afternoon to buy myself a firewire cable. As I walked out of the station, I saw a large crowd gathering nearby.

It was because of the Rei Ayanami cosplayer.

Running into Takuya Kimura at Toho Studios

Yes, my Japanese film, Kingyo's pretty much done

For the third day of the week, Maiko and I were at the Toho Studios, this time with coursemate Linto, who was helping to transfer KINGYO into HDCAM for a public screening at Shinjuku Wald 9 next month (will tell you guys about it when I have more info)

I never realized that making a transfer like this is such a long and tedious affair. Initially I thought it would just be a 3-4 hour affair, at most, I ended up in the studio for nearly nine hours. And no, the transfer still isn't complete.

As we waited for Linto to do the transfer, Maiko and I headed to the Toho cafetaria for lunch. It was just at the building opposite ours, but as we were on the way, I noticed a couple of production crew members walking about. And then when we reached the cafetaria, a Toho Studios employee (they all wear a black jacket with the white words Toho Studios written on the back) was speaking to a man by the entrance.

I couldn't see his face until I was entering the building. Then I saw his face, he was pretty tanned... Louis Koo-level tan, slightly taller than I am, and had a ridiculously familiar face.

A dream of a love story from my past, and the girl who went to Yokohama

I seem to dream a lot lately. Yesterday was strange. I woke up from a dream, and when I dozed off again later in the evening, I had another dream again.

Photos from the ONE LOVE JAMAICA FESTIVAL 09

At around half past 3 on Sunday afternoon, I went with Eric (my friend, not my dad), to Yoyogi Park for the One Love Jamaica Festival 2009. (additional photos of the festival can be found in Glen's blog and Neil's blog... which, at least, were taken with a real camera)

As I met up with him at the bridge near the Harajuku station, I saw a couple of guys offering free hugs.

Sweet Success - Interview with The Star

Just found out that I was on The Star today when Kien Keong told me about it via Facebook chat. Last week Sandra Low conducted an email interview with me, being one of the winners of last year's BMW Shorties with Chicken Rice Mystery. It's a great article worth a read because not just me, but Grand Prize winner Nazim, Audience Award winner Moe and co-Honourable Mention winner Maha were interviewed as well. Click the link below:

SWEET SUCCESS

My excerpt is here:

Happy Mother's Day, mom

For the four time in five years, I'm not around to celebrate Mother's Day with my mom. Of course, I usually say that I don't need a special day to shower my mom with affection or gratitude when I do that everyday with understated grace and subtlety.

Spotting a sumo wrestler in Italian restaurant

I was having dinner with my friend, Niklas, at an Italian restaurant in Takadanobaba (all-you-can-eat for 1500 yen, pretty good deal, had lots of pizza and pasta) yesterday evening. Then one particular customer heading towards the counter after his meal caught my eye.

The physique! The top knot! It was a sumo wrestler! More than a year in Japan and that was the first time I saw a sumo wrestler in the flesh! So I whipped out my mobile phone (which is much more reliable than my camera these days) and started snapping a photo... from the distance, because I was too intimidated to approach him and take a photo.

So you have to look closely at the photo (or click for larger version), behind Niklas and the two waitresses, there's the sumo wrestler!

Guy lying on the streets, wasted

Nearly a year ago (May 8th, to be exact), I had all-you-can-eat Shabu Shabu with two of my old Japanese friends, Ai and Iyo, whom I knew from my Perth days. I even have it on video.

Last night, another old friend of mine, Noriko, came all the way from Kyoto for a visit. (As I've mentioned, it's Golden Week) So I brought them (Ai, Iyo and Noriko) to all-you-can-eat Korean BBQ at Takadanobaba instead.

With my camcorder dead, I could only snap some blurry pictures.

How I spent the night at Toho Studios

As mentioned before, I've been doing the rest of the post-production of my Japanese film, KINGYO, at the famed Toho Studios.

Colonel Sanders dressed up as Neon Genesis Evangelion's Eva-01

Taken at the KFC restaurant near the Seijogakuen-Mae Station 成城学園前駅 when I was on the way to Toho Studios yesterday.

Tags: japan, tokyo, neon genesis evangelion, colonel sanders, anime,

Odd dream from an afternoon nap

I always seem to get the weirdest dreams from afternoon naps, I think. Just like moments ago, when I unknowingly slip into a nap while watching something and dreamed of someone who had plagued my mind for the past few weeks.

Brief visit at Toho Studios, and foreshadowing Tsuyoshi Kusanagi's arrest

So yes, I've totally buried myself into the post-production of my film, KINGYO, in the past week, managing to find my stride again, rediscovering the excitement I had for the project through editing (hate to find that spark when you were separated from it for so long!), experimenting more with the possibilities of split screens.

Back in Tokyo, back to editing KINGYO

I've returned to Tokyo since Sunday night. It's been a hectic few days. I actually had a film shoot in Klang on Saturday and had managed to do another quick short film with the help of Lesly and Han, that film was an experiment with the Nikon D90, which I saw Ming Jin and Lesly used for their short film, THAT DAY WE WOKE UP. To be able to complete another short film, what a joy!

LOVE SUICIDES goes to Paris (Paris Cinema International Film Festival)

Arika Lee in LOVE SUICIDES

Today was like an emotional roller coaster.

I woke up and saw a MSN message from Fei Ling, telling me that she couldn't do my short film, EXHALATION, due to the fact that she's swamped with work (girl has a day job). I've intended to shoot the short on Thursday, with Lesly's D90, and with Ming Jin producing, but of course, since the screenplay's tailor-made for her, once she can't do it, I can't really get a replacement. So I called it off, and was in some sort of melancholic funk, despite trying very valiantly to suppress such feelings.

Afternoon came, I remained busy editing WOMAN ON FIRE LOOKS FOR WATER, while my mind wandered. I was supposed to go to Klang with Lesly on Saturday (I'm returning to Tokyo on Sunday), check out the locations, shoot the places for an upcoming project in August. Then I thought... what happens if I try to immediately shoot a short film while we're looking at the locations! And voila, I felt better!

And then I received an email from the Paris Cinema International Film Festival telling me that my short film, LOVE SUICIDES, had been selected for presentation at the international competition this July. My jaw dropped open.

LOVE SUICIDES write-up on Twitch

Being a long-time reader of Twitch, I, was more than surprised and delighted when Todd did a write-up on my Yasunari Kawabata-inspired short film, LOVE SUICIDES.

There's coverage from a Spanish site too!

Thanks, guys!

CHICKEN RICE MYSTERY goes to Greece (Naoussa International Film Festival)

Dad (Chye Yang) pesters the Boy (Lim Ming Wei) into playing the PS2 with him in Chicken Rice Mystery


I actually received this email a couple of days earlier, and had posted it on Twitter (and Facebook) as well, about my short film CHICKEN RICE MYSTERY getting invited for screening at the Naoussa International Short Film and Video Festival.

It's the first festival screening of the film since last December's Dubai Film Fest. Here's the trailer of my short, if you haven't seen it before.

THAT DAY WE WOKE UP, a short film by Woo Ming Jin

I've actually put aside WOMAN ON FIRE LOOKS FOR WATER in the past two days to finish up my editing on an earlier short film by Ming Jin called THAT DAY WE WOKE UP.

WOMAN ON FIRE LOOKS FOR WATER shoot has ended

The two pictures above are screencaps from the film's raw footage, haven't done any colour correcting or anything



Wow, it's been a while since I've updated this blog. Despite having Internet access at Kuala Selangor, it was hard to really write about anything during a film shoot. Somehow, I just didn't seem to have the mood for it since all my attention's placed upon the film itself.

The 12-day shoot took place mostly in Kuala Selangor (except the last day, when we went to the famed waterfalls at Ulu Yam instead) and was an emotional roller coaster, and an intense physical exercise. We went to the jungle, to the river, to the middle of the sea, to shoot, then we shot at a salted fish factory and also a cockle factory. I was constantly assaulted by mosquitos during mornings and evenings (insect repellants can only help that much), and was also sunburnt.

It's all worth it though.

Ming Jin had gone off to Tokyo last night to attend his sister-in-law's wedding, so it's now up to me to edit the film.

Hopefully this will be considered as a worthy follow-up to Ming Jin's previous film, the award-winning THE ELEPHANT AND THE SEA.