Remember the graduation video I was telling ya’ll about in the previous post? Yeap finally got everything exported proper and uploaded.

It has always been my dream since Secondary 1 to have my work presented to my school mates. On the last official day of Secondary School, this wish of mine finally came true and I got to show the graduation video to about a strength of 900. It’s pretty darn special because film-making has been my passion for a really long time and it’s so surreal that my first short film (that’s not created for academic purposes) was received by such a big audience.

I was kinda feeling a li’ll scared because the color projected on the screen in the hall was way different that what we’re seeing on our computers, so the intended feel and tone of the video was gone. The color contrasts and combinations were not as prominent anymore, making the video lose quite a fair bit of its aesthetic appeal. But as the video went out many people started laughing and laughing and boy was I pleased because finally, I made people laugh. And that deserves a press conference, the headline on The New York Times for 31 days straight and a Nobel Peace Prize.

A lot of great things happened after this film was screened that really made my graduation so special. Throughout the day people were coming up and congratulating me about the film, and it’s really heartening and gives you this sense of pride when even your harshest of critics tell you about how they liked the video. Congratulatory text messages were flowing in, and some of my teachers were also passing on their messages of congratulations to me, via Facebook or face-to-face. Getting praised by your peers and friends, that feels really good, But to get praised by your teachers, it feels different because the fact that the people who are your mentors are appreciating your content, that recognition just made me really proud about myself. There were also people asking for the video to be replayed, and others were asking where can they see the film again. A couple of juniors also asked me for a copy of the video. Getting compliments is of course really nice, but when people want to see your work again, it brings you an insane sense of achievement because somewhere, you know did something very right. And my mom and dad were saying the film was nice and looked “close to a movie”. It might seem like nothing much, but to hear those words coming from my parents, esp. my dad, means the whole world to me.

The video of course isn’t perfect. The color correction can be better, certain technical errors came out during shooting, and I didn’t managed to get some of the shots I wanted. As a passionate perfectionist, it’s a li’ll frustrating to see a few little details overlooked only during post-production and certain things not going your way and you can do nothing about it. It’s a great learning experience nonetheless as I was forced to work with what I have and improvise frequently when certain shots can’t be filmed in this short period of time. And not forgetting the support I received while embarking on this shoot. Without help from a lot of people, this video could really never be done. Thank-you Mr Alan Gwee for staying back every single day and helping me retrieve the camcorders and tripods (making him work for his money), Ms Patricia Ng for encouraging me throughout the filming process as well, and my best friend Shamemi for following and helping me for most parts of this shoot. The willing actors and actresses as well, without their help this would just be a How To Get Around SST video guide. And of course, the people who worked on the script, Pasakorn and Naveena. The monologue got plenty of praises and credits go to them for creating such a well-written and meaningful monologue that successfully bring back the memories each one of us have gained throughout our secondary school lives.

Thank-you all for the tremendous support and feedback that had happened since. It’s really a mind-numbing experience that I’m extremely grateful to get a chance to go thru, from the very first day of pre-production to the final screening. Good luck to all my fellow Sec 4s for our O-levels, and all the best to my juniors for your future!

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Lhu Wen Kai