So far...

Hi guys, it's Shawn again.

It's been a little more than a week since we got here, and things have been great so far. Here's what's been going on over the past week.

1) As mentioned on Kenneth's Vlog in the last post, I ran into some trouble at immigration because of some missing documents. Quite a memorable start. Still trying to forget that experience, though I think it's one of a kind. Haha. Not everyone gets sent to detention at customs. Fortunately I was released without incident.

2) Filming for HarvestFest. As mentioned on my first post too, we were involved in production the night after we arrived. It was a new experience for me because it was my first time ever seeing a 4K HMI and learning how to power it up with a portable generator. Both nights on set were windy as well, with temperatures dropping to 6 degrees Celsius, also a new experience, since I had to wear many more layers as usual. I personally prefer to shoot in tropical weather now. Less clothes in the way to worry about.

3) So, after those two days filming out in the dark and cold, we spent the better part of the week in the studio editing. While Wind as working on editing the film, I was tasked with another project; the instructional video for HarvestFest. It was interesting, bringing a normal, everyday-like instructional voice-over to life with motion graphics. Personally I think it helps to catch a lot of attention. I had Debbie and Kenneth with me to work on the graphics while I put them all together and animated them. It took three days to complete, with all the renders and re-renders, but I must say it was one of the most enjoyable projects I've ever done, which marks a great start to internship here :)

Our cosy little TV studio, where we work on video projects during the weekdays and multicam productions on weekends. 

A little sidetrack, with the internet curfew in place on weekdays and the ridiculously tough firewall, I must say that I'm a little surprised at how much more efficient and fast we can be with many distractions out of reach. Heheheh. Gotta do something about my own internet when I return to Singapore.

4) Places of attraction we've been to so far - Twin Peaks, Union Square, Palace of the Fine Arts, Golden Gate Bridge, Muir Woods. Let's not count the shopping malls and every restaurant that we've been to. That'd be... too much.

Up on twinpeaks, strong sunlight on a clear day coupled with strong cool winds gave me an unglam face LOL

Palace of the Fine Arts - HDR

As the story goes, the locals love the building so much, they made a cast of the original building and reconstructed it. I'm glad they did, and I'm envious of the people who live around it. It's sort of like a park to them, and it's beautiful. I took countless photographs here.

Union Square - Downtown San Francisco's version of Orchard Road. 

It is only when I got there that I realised why many people call Orchard road one of the best shopping districts in the world. Although prices here are cheap (because Singapore imports everything and makes prices shoot up), traffic's kind of a problem,with only one lane going in each direction, tight spaces, so on and so forth. BUT again, weather makes up for it :) 

The famed Golden Gate Bridge - First landmark Hollywood destroys whenever San Francisco comes under some sort of attack. 

The Muir Woods - Hiking here is a nice change compared to Singapore's nature reserves

The forests here may not be as diverse as in the ones back in Singapore, but their sheer size sure makes up for it. Temperatures here makes it cooling and the hike much more pleasant. If it was back home, I'd be sweating like crazy the moment I step out of the house...

5) Like my other friends here with me on internship, we're still adjusting to life here, like eating portions (though i think we're getting used to it...). When we first got here we couldn't even finish a meal without boxing it up and bringing it home to finish. Well... now we can... slowly.

The first days of having meals here were incredibly funny though, like Debbie not seeing the (XL) in the fine print of the menu, and ended up with a MASSIVE bowl of pho noodles. Everyone had a good laugh at that. The expression of surprise was priceless.

Debbie's huge bowl of noodles

That said, the food here is great so far, but for some chinese food, I feel that the food back home tastes better :D

6) The Boss trained us in taking public transport as well, so that we can be more independent on our own and run around to wherever we want to go on our days off.. The system here has its similarities and differences. But the part I like the most is that the BART (their version of the MRT) has much fewer people on the trains compared to sardine-can-Singapore. In fact, aside from the crowded streets in the shopping district, other areas are very devoid of people. We get the kind of quiet we want but could never get in Singapore.

Now if only it is as safe here as it is in Singapore...

I guess that's it for this post. The coming week is going to be a busy one, with preparations for shooting for a new short film going on. Stay tuned.

Signing off.