Day 56: The Nap of the Century.

It was day two of the consumer research and this time, it was a full day and more number of consumers. The research was held at the R&D facility so any time I would have even a 10 minute break, it was taken up for quick face-to-face catch ups with my R&D colleagues so that all of us can save the 100 emails to convey the same 2 messages.

Which meant that by 6:00 pm or so, when the research finally wrapped up, I was completely spent. It didn't help that yesterday too we stayed up really late tweaking one thing or the other on the trailer and subtitles.

When I finally reached home, my in laws had arrived from India - with hands full of gifts as always. After a brief chat with them and since Madam was fully preoccupied with them as well, I excused myself and went off to bed.

From 7 to 8pm or so, I had one of the best naps of my lap.

It was not the nap of a tired person but the nap of someone who was tired yet super duper satisfied from the work that made her tired. In short, it was the nap of the century.

I woke up refreshed, happy and completely at peace.

And then, on a Friday evening, we sat down for the next mile of post production work, but that's another story.

444 more to go. 

Day 55 : Consumer Research High!

There was no respite in my fatigue levels but I dragged myself to a consumer research that had been planned. We were to meet 7 consumers and talk to them for about 45 minutes each, all in half a day. So one can imagine how hectic that would have been. And I had the good fortune of being the minutes taker as well as the videographer through it.

I braced myself for what was expected to be several long hours.

At first the fatigue didn't help, but once we got into the groove of it and especially after I started to see consumers getting excited over the particular project that I am working on, I caught on the excitement.

Needless too say, I came out of the research rather pleased with the whole thing.

I have to say that even as I enjoy my movie making hobby so much, I am pretty pleased that am in a career that I fully enjoy as well. Many, many things to be thankful for! 

Day 54: Work & Play

I was dead tired after five continuous day of 4-hour sleep and constant gazing at computer screens. In the morning, I didn't want to get out of the bed at all! My body felt like a truck had been over it and I just wanted to sleep and sleep and sleep.

But I dragged myself to the office because there was simply too much work to do! Once I got there, thankfully, I quickly got into the usual rhythm without much resistance from my tired body and mind. 

Once I got back home, I ordered home delivery of some really good food from Daawat Tandoori. The owner of the place must be given an award for the nicest service (on top of the yummiest food)- he had always been very attentive to details and flexible with what customers want but this time, he even said I can pay later when I mentioned to him my trip to the ATM to withdraw cash! Really, who says that in Singapore?! 

Anyway, back to the point. I ordered in food because we were to have a nice little film team gathering before our sound designer returns to Dubai tomorrow. While the gathering was for his benefit, he shut himself in the room revising the sound and hardly made his appearance outside. 

After a while, I insisted that he eat and we go on a city tour of Singapore because he was beginning to look like a zombie after the heavy duty post production marathon. Also, he had come all the way from Dubai but had not seen anything of Singapore, except my house and the heroine's house where most of the post production was done. So clearly, he needed some play and not all work.. 

So at 11:30pm or so, the two of us as well as the editor packed ourselves into the hero's car and he took us around Singapore. The visitors were given a glimpse of everything from Mt Faber to Little India and Marina Bay Sands to Chinatown. It was pretty nice and much needed break from the backbreaking days. 

It was yet another beautiful day with this amazing team and am definitely going to miss all this excitement! 

446 more to go. 

Day 53: Final Post Production Day!

It was the last day of post production work at the heroine's place because from tomorrow, I will get back to office and the rest of the film work was planned to be done at my place. So while technically it is not the end of post production, it surely felt so. So we made the max of it and once again kept up until 3 or 4 am.

In between we talked, laughed, ate, made merry and even built in some exercise - some of the boys had a push up competition and we girls practiced yoga together!

It was really, really fun and am sure to have withdrawal symptoms soon!

And to top it up really nicely, we fixed the trailer including music and final edit and felt really awesome about it! It was our first feel of a complete product and it felt oh-so-good!

Making this movie is most definitely one of the best experiences of my life!

447 more to go. 

Day 49 - 52: Post Production Awesomeness, All That Love & Tons of Gratitude!!!

Notice the three exclamation marks in the title - quite an unusual thing as far as my blog titles go. But that is HOW FREAKING EXCITED I am! The last three days had been crazy - I had been up and about with a constant adrenaline rush and on four hours of sleep daily (as opposed to my eight comfy hours, so it is a big deal).

This is because the editor, the sound designer and the music composer are in town and we have been working on the post production for my feature film! We started the work off in my place but then shifted it to my friend's house because of the expected late hours and Madam and we didn't want to get in each other's way. This friend is also the leading lady of the film and I have to say that she treated us like royalty as always. Unlike me who relies solely on our helper for home cooked food, she ensured that we were constantly fed and taken care of by cooking herself, on top of all the other work like dubbing, dancing, meditating, exercising etc. that she does. It was amazing!

Anyway, coming back to post production - it was SO COOL to see the movie coming to completion. It is a super, super simple film. Two characters - that's it. The two actors and three crew members including myself, the camera man as well as the cinematographer cum editor cum driver, drove around the Emirate of Abu Dhabi and pretty much shot this entire movie over a week. It is that simple and low key a production. Yet, I am SO HAPPY that it has turned out the way it has! Really, really thrilled about it which you would have figured from all the CAPITAL letters and the number of times I keep repeating a word like "really really"!

Every time an edit felt so smooth, every time a music fitted the scene like a glove, every time the completed sound of scene made it seem like it's been done by a full blown production house, I felt awesome! I loved how the dubs that the cast and I had worked so hard over the last few months sounded so good! The sound designer, a young chap and a first timer on our team, was so dedicated and good at his work! Oh, and I also loved how I had to dub a few lines (like you see, two lines) for a supporting character.

And then I got to see the first draft of the trailer which was amazing! I mean, the guy edited a two hour movie to a trailer in like four hours or so and it felt so right! Mindblowing!

It's been many many hours of back breaking work but I needed this. I so needed this. Just to spend a few days thinking of nothing else than my film and being amazed by the talents all around. We really do make a fantastic team and I can't thank God enough for making everything happen the way it did.

Last but in no way the least, the husband and Madam have been incredible supportive. The husband had to manage her all on his own the whole of Sunday since the helper was on her off-day, and every day I had been returning home well past 3am, so it was all him each evening. I was so guilt ridden throughout for being "selfish" but all credit to the husband that he didn't once complain!

And on Mother's day, when I returned home all red eyed and fatigued, I find this little gift set waiting for my on my bed, complete with flowers and a hand drawn beautiful card. Needless to say, I was an emotional pulp.

Indeed, I can't thank God enough!

448 more to go. 

Days 45 - 48 : Palace, People & a Great Business Trip!

I have to say the London business trip was one of the best so far!

For once, I actually had time to go out and explore the city not one day but two! This is a big change from sitting inside a hotel and shuttling to and from meetings all day, every day.

On day 2, May 2nd, my cousin sister who is based in London, came down to meet me with her family. I had a four hour break mid-day, so we had lunch together and then they took me to the Buckingham Palace and the St. James Park right next to it. We walked for hours in that area, taking in the lovely weather, watching the glorious tulips in full bloom, marveling at the the palace and the guards of course, being part of the numerous tourists and locals who were having as nice a time as us, and being amused by the antics of the ducks, swans, sea gulls, pigeons and what not in and around the pools in the park. It was perfect! I have been to London a few years ago just for a couple of days, but this time I felt like I immersed myself better - we even took the London Tube (even though there is nothing really to write home about on that one)!

May 3rd was choked with meetings but I enjoyed them because I got to once again meet with all the wonderful people from my team from the US, and it was fun!

May 4th was my flight back home. It was pretty eventless other than of course my routine movie marathon watching. I watched the English film "Her" (really interesting concept and acting but rather overboard with all that sexual stuff), a comedy called "The Heat" which was fun and the Hindi film "Phantom" which was way better than Kabir Khan's previous rubbish called "Ek Tha Tiger". Overall, once again I enjoyed my long flight and the only real "me time" I ever seem to get!

I got home in the morning on May 5th to a rather excited little Madam. The day was spent in recovering from the trip, sleeping away the fatigue, catching up on emails, playing with Madam and spending time with the dad and the husband as well.

It was a good business trip and it is great to be back home!

452 more to go. 

Day 44 : London!

I had a nice long flight to London where the highlight was the food (Singapore Airlines Indian Vegetarian is always great) and the movies (my favourite this time was Maari, the Dhanush film in Tamil). 

We touched down at about 3:30 in the afternoon and I was in my hotel at Holborn by 5pm. I quickly learnt two things - 1) This hotel is pretty centrally located and 2) The sun sets only at 8:30pm or so these days in London. 

This meant that I had enough time to explore the area before it gets too dark. I had been to London once for just a couple of days in 2010 or 2011, and I don't honestly remember much of the details anymore. So I wanted to take the opportunity to see a bit of the city instead of resting, which was what one part of my brain was asking me to do. 

So, soon after check in, I walked out armed with a map. I wanted to see the Thames river and the Covent Garden district which the hotel receptionist told me was the "nicest place near here". 

And that's exactly what I did. I walked around for a couple of hours, exploring Covent Garden, walking along the Thames, taking in the sights, smelling the flowers in the air (spring is indeed here!) and enjoying the glorious weather (it was nice, bright and sunny and at a perfect 15 celsuis!). After a point, I realized I was exhausted thanks to the long flight and the lack of rest, so I walked into an Indian restaurant, ordered myself chicken 65, chappathis and dal and topped it all with a really good steaming cup of masala chai. It was the perfect drink to warm me up as I embarked on the journey back to my hotel in the crisp, cool, breezy weather. 

By the time, I got back to the hotel, I was ready to drop asleep but also, feeling very warm and fuzzy because indeed, it was the best decision to push myself out of the door for that walk. I enjoyed it so much! 

Tomorrow, the work starts. 

456 more to go.