My Polaroid frame is out!!!

My competition Polaroid frame is finally out!! Now just needed to wait for the newsletter to be published :D I wanna thank Mint so much for being the agent between Impossible project and I. The printing process took a little while and you guys were patient enough to deal with all the troubles :) Thank you Mint! Specially Tracy and Joyce as they are the staffs who contacted and updated news for me. ❤

Photo taken by Tracy Cheng. She was so excited about it xD

Apparently they didn't print out the back -_-
I even doubt if they put my name on the package....

Whats happening?

It's been a while since I updated this blog, been busy hunting for a design job and been taking photos around. Made my own website www.fredacheung.net/home.php (coded it myself!!)but since its for Uni work, I needa make a better one later.

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Been taking some photos around with Renchy and I think I got him into buying cameras...-_- Here are some of the levitation and light drawings that we took over these two months. We might not be pro but we had fun :)

Renchy had a friend!

Another thing I have to mention is that we found a new cat of my neighbour's! We don't know what it's name is but I just call it Mimi anyway lol. Mimi was our family cat that passed away last year :( Thats probably why I wanna call any cat Mimi~

 

Darkslide

I have just registered Society 6 and now I can sell my artworks are online :D
My Art Store ♕
The refinements for IMPOSSIBLE project is finally finished(I did take my time and I felt so bad about it...-_-).  I put ♡Keith on my design as we took the floating shots the other day and it perfectly suited for the theme "Freedom", and everyone is gonna see Keith when they buy the Polaroid I designed now xD and I am gonna surprise him :P
I am surely proud that I get to design the Darkslide. I remembered when I took out the darkslide from my Polaroid film the first time and I wished that I could design it myself, it was just a dream and now it came true :)
Thank you Keith for staying late with me that evening to "Jump" when the rest of group was gone, I really appreciated it. I am so glad that I can make something good out of the floating shots :) 

Hot Springs

Hot Spring in Mornington tonight and it was actually awesome. Not just the relaxation,  its that I had a greattttt time with all my lovely friends ♡
I am actually exhausted now after the hot spring and I have to work on this frame design refinement.....gahhhh=_= I guess I will have to stay up for the night.

IMPOSSIBLE project contest

I still couldn't believe I passed all the I.T. subjects and as well won the 1st for the IMPOSSIBLE project contest!!xD Which made me really excited but then I realized that it was all somehow a trick (-__-"). Now they have asked me to refine the design of the package, frames and black card. There wasn't any problem until the request of "different layout for each frame" which means I needed to create 14-16 different frames for them to choose 8 out of them. It is a huge amount of work...I guess this all winning thing is just that they needed a graphic designer?(=w=)
Ah well...I guess this is what you have to do if you want your name out there :P

入圍作品：
《 飛翔 》 Freda Cheung

Here are two of the frame previews I have done and yeeeeeep I am taking them slow as I was too busy hanging out with Renchy ❤
Theme: All we need is freedom
The funny thing is that before the result I told my mum that I wasn't going win and she said coz yours is in black & white and the others are so colorful! And after I told her that I won, she was like, you won becoz yours in black & white, simple and neat so it stands out.
(=_______________=)"  Biggest joke ever.

❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇❇

Good influence for design(to me anyway): Music
This is where I got the freedom Idea from :D
Mayday - Tenderness

Light Painting

We had light painting the other night and we had a great time as light painting is some kind of activity that you have to wait to see what it comes out and you always get excited about the result. 

I love how every time when the painting didn't come out well, we all went "awwwwwww" and burst ourselves laughing, wherever the good ones come out and they all just went "WOW!!"

It is quite hard to draw in the air when you don't have a picture in your head but it always gets better one after another☺

Danga

Keith

Pauline and the Alien xD

Kelly

Here is all of us that night!

That's Juleh's new Doggy!! Called Gigi or something I can't remember -v- but its soooooo cute >v<

Here is for my Mr. Koo ❤ (apparently it's Mr. Ku -_- but I don't care coz Koo looks so much cooler!) Julie and Pauline went "Mr. Koo?? Who the hell is that?" when they saw this lol

Renchyyyyyyyyy ❤

Storyboard

I have made a list of Symbols of all the shots. They are highlighted as Red so it can stand out all the symbols and clearly stated what each symbol is meaning.

These are the first 3 pictures I have drawn for the storyboard for scene 8. Pic1 is a scenery scene of the traffic light that there's no characters in it. It is suppose to show the red light turned into green light. And followed by the Pic2, where Nick stopped and everyone else came and gone. Pic3 A close up of Nick looking depressed. Description will be shown under the pictures.

I had a ideas by arranging each picture. Should i draw the storyboard in a comic way or a proper way because to me, they are pretty much the same.

Scene idea

For the time froze part where the reaper finally turned back to it's true form. I would like you show this Taiwan MV below I have found really suitable for the time-freeze scene in my head. ("What's troubling you" by Soda green, MV produced by Grassjelly studio) Through the whole music video, they have used a slow motion effect and a frozen background.  It has used a gallery form to show the troubles that people have in their lives. The outsiders witnessed them, just like the reaper. In addition, the interesting part I have found is that this MV has a really powerful message, to the point that you could completely understand it without knowing Chinese. (Well, of cause you can turn on the English subtitles if you click the caption button :P)

challenge for the script

The most challenge for me is to cut down my 30 mins script into 10 mins. Then I would need to cut out some of Amy's parts as she was the supporting role, such as where we thought Nick didn't care about Amy at first but in the later scene it showed how much he loved Amy and how he did keep what she said in mind. It was also a chance for Amy to change her mind.

Scene 2

INT. Nick’s room

Nick was sitting in front of his Computer working on the design project that Danvis asked him to do. The cat is sleeping on the desk and Nick’s girlfriend, Amy ran in excitedly with a magazine.

Amy

Hey look! This is the Polaroid camera I wanted to get for a long time. It’s a SLR and you can fold it into a case when you don’t use it! And you can also use your own design for the case. I have drawn the draft for the case and I need to save money to get it…

Nick didn’t look at Amy or the magazine at all, he was just focusing on his work.

Amy

Did you even hear what I just said? What are you doing anyway?

Nick

I’m working on a web-design project, free-lance job for Danvis’ Company. They don’t have a web-designer so he asked me for help.

Amy

Oh k. I will leave you to it but please get some rest soon; it’s three in the morning already

Scene 6

INT. – Home - day

Nick took out a wrapped box on the table and pushed it towards Amy.

Amy

What is it?

Nick

Un-wrap it.

Amy un-wrapped and opened the box and took out a Polaroid camera with her design on it.

Amy

Oh my god! How…how did you even get my design?

Nick

I took it from you laptop while you were out last week. I was planning to give you a surprise so I pretended that I wasn’t listening while you were telling me about this. Do you like it?

Amy

Of cause I do! Thank you honey!

Nick

These camera and dinner thing was to make up for you as I was too busy with my work and didn’t spend time with you for the last few weeks. You didn’t mind and always even supported me in these weeks. So I want to thank you for that.

I have cut down the start where they picked up the cat in Scene 1, made a wedge that go straight into the climax where Nick got hit by vehicle.  I intended to confused the audiences that Nick had committed suicide not an accident.

I have eventually cut out 1/3 of the script, shorten the dialogue and canceled a few scenes. I think it should be 10 -15 mins movie now. I have made two endings that happened after the deal. That might go for another 10 mins.

Story plot

—-Interactive Movie

—-Two Choices for Audiences at the end of each scene

—-Movie – Reaper

—-Genre: Mystery-thriller

—-4 Characters – Nick, Danvis, Amy, the ghost reaper

—-Friendship, betrayal, hatred and revenge

—-Present + time froze

—-Place: City

—-Karma/cause + effect

—Nick(web-designer) and Danvis were friends since high school. One day Danvis asked Nick for help to work
with a design project in his company. Nick threw himself into the project and helped immensely,  however he
realized it was a trap from Danvis and Nick’s girlfriend, Amy. On same day that Nick found out everything, his mind
was tangled terribly and caused him a car accident…The Reaper appeared and gave Nick an offer to live again only if
he gave someone else’s soul in return. And when Nick died, he will need to pay for another price for this deal…

Character Development

Nick – determine, ultra, stubborn, passionate, creative

—Danvis – unscrupulous, elaborate

Amy – “Loyalty caused disloyal”, enthusiastic

—It turned out Nick has done something nasty to Danvis when they were young, that’s where this whole plan of

revenge begins. Will Nick be able to overcome the grudge and forgive Danvis and Amy then move on.

Two Ending:

1. —If he traded in another soul, when he died, his soul wont get into the reincarnation. He wont never go to hell
nor paradise, no rebirth, won’t be set free, won’t be a ghost, spirit or any other supernatural creatures, not even
a thin air. Absolutely Nothing, ZERO. And he will never know why Danvis did this to him. — 


2. If he said No to the
deal, he will have a flash back of his life, with family, friends, girlfriends and also what he did to Danvis. Then
he will be able to forgive Danvis and let go of the grudge, so he can go to a better place

Hints:

Pride is the reason to hold a grudge towards someone. But it is a punishment to yourself too. Sometime

forgiving someone and let go is a way to have a better life.

If you can let go, when you look back, you will be able to see the truth and reason behind some other people.

Bias and resentment always blocked the way.

Story from a friend

I had a friend who was an University student and worked as a freelance Graphic Artist. Let's call her Nicole. Few years ago I was having lunch with her and some Asian guy walked into the restaurant and he looked familiar but since China town is quite small so there is no surprise running into someone you have never talked to but still recognise their faces. However, Nicole looked a bit awkward after she saw him and she told me this story afterwards.

Apparently this guy, Danvis, was Nicole's client once and he has asked her to design a poster. (and some other graphic designs as well but I caoudn't remember what the products were.) During the process, Danvis kept telling Nicole to re-do the design and she still did what she has been told every time. Yet, Danvis ended up stop requesting the services from Nicole half way through and didn't even pay her for what she has done. (The clients are suppose to pay for designers even if they didn't end up using their designs. They have to pay for what the designers has done, not the only the product.) Nicole was a bit upset about this but she thought optimistically that she has learnt a lesson from this client and it could be one of her experience too. However, later Nicole found out that Danvis has even used her design she sent to him as his windows messenger's profile picture. That obviously means that he stole her design and claimed that it was his! Not merely the profile picture, Danvis has stole her concept of design and created the final poster.
This was actually the worst thing you could do to a designer. It was a swindle! And I was so angry for her after hearing this but still what could I do about it?

As I said China town was really small and I finally met Danvis through an event. Since everything you put on the internet is no longer a secret, he soon knew that I studied Multimedia. He told me that "his company" was currently recruiting folios and asked me if I could send him mine. I immediately rejected and told him that I didn't know his company and what they were looking for or working on. This made  me wonder if he was still doing the same thing to some of the designers.

This incident has been kept inside me for a long time for some reason. Reminded me to be alerted to these people/companies that came unknown origin. Therefore I chose to rewrite this story and made it a base-line for the main character. Additionally making these characters friends at the start, the feeling of betrayal was worse than just a "business related" strangers. I believed this feeling was strong enough to turn a normal good person to an evil villain.

characters

My idea was to create a story with a human making a deal with the reaper but unlike the people who make deals while they are still alive, I am going to make the deal after they have died. To order to have a desire to sell your soul after dying, is to have some of the negative emotions.

I am going to put some of my personality and interests into the main character so I could get into the emotion or environment while writing the script.
I am a cat lover so as I wrote in one of the previous blog, If I were the reaper and wanted to monitor you, I would have turn into something that you could trust. Therefore, turning into a poor stray cat will definitely be tempting me to have it as their own pet due to human's sympathy.

crossover

To mess with the natural order, we need a story to build up with. A story of some other "souls" that will make a reaper disobey or playing tricks on. I need a story that has different emotions and they have to be extreme. The emotions that can change a person to turn into either a hero or a villain. Just like what two-face said in the movie "Dark Knight", "You either die a hero or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain."
The video below is a group project in my third-year of Uni. The character - Julie in the trailer has found a book and everything she wrote in that book came true. She was getting addicted to the feeling of being a "god" and when she realized what she has done, its too late. What is done can't be undone, she has to pay for the price.

Lilith by John Collier

"Supernatural" natural also had crossroad demon which makes deals with humans so I did some research on it and I found this "Deal_with_the_Devil". Basically is that you can offer your soul in exchange for diabolical favors.

In Christian view,  demons are believed to have the ability to posses orinhabit the body of humans and some believe demons to be actual physical beings that can take the form of anything(including small children. ) such as Incubi and succubi.
Christians also believed that Lilith was Adam's first wife who later became a succubus.

Up to this stage, I have an outline of my story that is to crossover the myths of reaper and demons. The reaper can offer humans to sell their souls in return of their favors.

research for reaper

There are different versions in every religions about the afterlife destinations, including...

• Transcendent places: Heaven, hell, limbo, purgatory, underworld, Yomi
• Reincarnation: after the death of the body, is believed to return to live in a new human body, or, in some traditions, either as a human being, animal or plant. (wikipedia)
• Spirit/ghost: Manifestation of the spirit of a deceased person, without "meat-suit" body. In some religions, they would stay in the human world.
• Zombie: Contrast with spirit/ghost, They are typically depicted as mindless, reanimated corpses without souls.

Reapers don't belong to any of them above. They are the medium between human world and transcendent places. They kept the natural order in balance and their jobs are to collect every soul under order of God of death. It is also given the name of the Angel of Death or Devil of Death or the angel of dark and light stemming from the Bible. In Chinese mythology, Reaper is called Ox-head and horse-face "They are the first people a dead soul meets upon arriving in the Underworld; in many stories they directly escort the newly dead to the Underworld" They worked for Yama.

Ox-head and horse-face in Chinese mythology

According to these research, reapers always work under orders of superior, which means in a way they are no differences to human beings who work under their bosses. Therefore, I was thinking if everyone has to work under orders, why not try the opposite.  Try disobeying, try rebellious, try messing up the natural order, try making up a total different mind rather than following boring rules! If we can't do something like this in actual life, at least we can write a story about it.

Inspirations - (Supernatural) Reaper

As I love all these mystery and horror stuff, the American TV series "Supernatural" is one of my favorite.

In the drama, they have Demons, Lucifer, Angels, Ghosts, Vampires, Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, Leviathans and Shapeshifters...etc, all these monsters in the myth, they even named the character and told the story after different religions. Such as Lillith which was Lucifer's second-in-command.

The reaper in it's true form

One of the character that interested me is the grim reaper.
"Reapers are servants of Death. They assist in maintaining the Natural Order, and are completely neutral, not aligned with Heaven or Hell nor Purgatory."(reference)
Their job is to escorting souls to where they belong.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=44tcCTzodhw

The reaper turns into a girl named Tessa

Reapers(in Supernatural) tried to convince the spirits to let go and come with them but they couldn't tell where they were going.
Reapers were able to change the appearances to different forms.

If I were the reaper and wanted to monitor you, I would have turn into something that you could trust, such as a person, a pet...etc.

Inspirations

I have been watching horror, mystery and thriller movies since I was young. For all the horror movies, you will always have to guess why the ghost died? who is the killer/murderer? who is behind everything. Its always the same ending. Found out the story about the ghost, thats it. To be honest I'm getting bored of this concept of a movie. Therefore, if I would have to make a movie, I would make one that the audiences get to choose different endings.

Research :

Movie - interactive by talking


Website - interactive by clicking
http://www.survivetheoutbreak.com/

For the interactive movie about, I reckon it is a great idea that you can interact with the audiences during the movie. Every decision you make will create different endings. Put it this way, it is more like those personality test you see in magazines and website, every choice you make would finalize what kind of person you are.

I think it is very important to have different perspectives in a story. To look at things in different angels and positions.