Huayu: As a child star, I just want to be famous

Chapter 522: Special Effects Era
Xu Ke was obviously moved.

But the past experience was too painful, so he still didn't dare to make up his mind, and just said, "Don't bewitch me."

But the agitated expression on his face had already betrayed him.

Cheng Er smiled and said, "I think what Director Chen said is correct. Times have changed. Today's audiences like works with fairy tale themes."

Guo Fan also joined in the fun, "Yes, I also watched The Legend of Zu. The special effects style in that movie is so Chinese. To be honest, I like it too. If it can be inherited and then filmed with a good story using today's special effects level, it will definitely have the potential to be a big hit."

Ning Hao also nodded repeatedly.

While Xu Ke was hesitating, everyone had already walked into the film and television base and stood in front of the door of the film and television city's grand theater.

A large group of people were waiting there, and when they saw the directors, they hurried over to greet them.

"Director Chen, and several other directors, good afternoon. We have been very excited since we heard that you all were coming to inspect. Now we have finally arrived."

The leader was Shao Yufei, the person in charge of the film and television base. Chen Linfeng had seen him many times before.

Chen Linfeng laughed and said, "Old Shao, we are so familiar with each other, why do we need to use this trick?"

Shao Yufei's already smiling face became even brighter. "Director Chen, you are right, but we must be polite. Besides, many of the people behind me want to come and see you because of your reputation."

As soon as he finished speaking, there were responses from the crowd behind him.

Indeed, quite a few people came here just to join in the fun.

They work in a film and television city, and usually come into contact with the people in the film and television industry the most. Most of what they see and hear are stories about Chen Linfeng, so they are really curious.

"Hey, no matter what, there's no need to make such a big fuss."

Chen Linfeng was very familiar with this kind of scene. After spending some time, he was able to deal with it easily.

Afterwards, several directors and their team members were arranged to go to the hotel to rest.

The next day, led by several film and television base leaders, Chen Linfeng and others visited some newly built projects at the film and television base.

Also traveling with them were several people with special effects for mythical beasts.

These advanced studios always have to be used by someone, and those who work on special effects especially need to know how to use them, so they came early and were among the welcoming staff yesterday afternoon.

In order, everyone visited the green screen studio, the latest motion capture technology, the latest set workshop, the super-large underwater shooting base, etc.

When Chen Linfeng was in college, he did underwater photography, but it was not as simple and convenient as it is today.

The improvements brought by new technologies are still visible to the naked eye.

What he values ​​most is the set-setting workshop.

In fact, this thing has existed in the past, but the difference now lies in the application of 3D printing technology.

When you need to shoot science fiction, fantasy, fairy tales, or other props and scenes that do not exist in reality, you can print them out quickly.

In his previous life, when Guo Fan was filming "The Wandering Earth", many props were printed in this way.

Now, when Guo Fan saw this thing, his eyes lit up instantly, and he obviously thought of something.

It’s similar for other directors. Even if you haven’t seen other advanced studios or post-production digital imaging centers, you’ve heard about them.

This thing alone is really mind-blowing.

Chen Linfeng and his team tried it out directly on site.

In the background of the Shenshou Special Effects Company, there are many prop drawings in the style of oriental mythology and fairy tales, as well as ancient building models constructed through 3D scanning.

They directly uploaded the digital models of the "Zhu Xian Sword" and the "Hanging Temple".

Then, several directors watched as the "Zhu Xian Sword" and the smaller "Hanging Temple" were quickly built.

Xu Ke picked up the "Little Hanging Temple", looked at it back and forth, and marveled at it.

"This thing is quite powerful. It is perfect for making some imaginative things and backgrounds."

When Xu Ke was speaking, his eyes were wandering, as if he had thought of something.

Obviously, what he saw and heard today gave him a great shock.

When those people instigated him yesterday, although Xu Ke was tempted, the lessons of the past were too painful, so he thought to himself that he should still discuss it with others.

Now, Xu Ke has finally made up his mind to give it another try.

Chen Linfeng also lamented that in his previous life he was outside the circle and had no idea to what extent cutting-edge technology had developed.

All I know is that from reports, more and more crews are choosing to shoot in studios, and green screen cutouts are being used more and more.

In Chen Linfeng's opinion, real-life shooting must be more realistic.

Green screens and studio sets should be used more as supplements, that is, to give full play to imagination when realistic conditions make it difficult to achieve.

Including the set workshop, the green screen can actually solve certain background problems, but that is a long-distance view. If it is a little closer, it will easily make the audience feel uncomfortable.

The set workshop is still needed to build the close-up, and on this basis, the details are improved through post-production special effects to maintain authenticity as much as possible.

Just like what "The Wandering Earth" did.

The film and television base is so large that you can’t visit it all in one day.

At the end of the day's visit, the five directors gathered together to chat in the evening.

Let’s talk about the daytime tour.

Ning Hao is already ready and will shoot a new movie at this film and television base in the future.

"It is indeed convenient. No wonder Director Chen is willing to spend so much money."

What he is interested in is the logistical support here.

For him, saving trouble is the most important thing.

Xu Ke does not hide his desire to restart the "Shushan" project.

"Like you said, the special effects are already in place, but the story..."

He looked at Chen Linfeng and said, "Director Chen, when the script is written, can you help take a look? I trust your ability the most in this area."

Chen Linfeng asked, "Do you have any ideas?"

"I've been thinking about this in my mind for years. I'll show it to you when I write it down."

"Okay," Chen Linfeng nodded in agreement, and couldn't help but say, "In fact, the story of Shushan is somewhat old, but the setting of that fairy world is really gorgeous. This is timeless. I think telling a new story based on the setting should be the best choice."

"Director Chen thinks the same way? I have always thought the same way."

Xu Ke felt like he had found a close friend.

Now we want to restart the "Shushan" project and also strive for the other party's investment.

Xu Ke's mind moved, and he said, "In fairy tales, the role of the female fairy is the most crucial. When it comes to female fairies, the first thing that comes to mind is Liu Qianqian. How about letting her play the leading role?"

Chen Linfeng smiled and said, "You have to ask Xixi whether she wants to act or not."

Cheng Er said jokingly, "Director Chen respects his wife, so he must ask his wife's opinion."

Chen Linfeng glared at him and spoke nonsense.

In fact, as someone who has always had a very good relationship with them, Cheng Er watched the two of them from dating to marriage, and he knew best that Liu Qianqian always listened to advice on major issues.

Guo Fan was silent for a long time, and suddenly said, "Teacher, I saw a lot of things today, and I feel that the conditions for a science fiction movie are basically in place. I still want to make a serious science fiction movie."

Everyone was chatting and laughing when they suddenly heard this sentence. The others didn't know why he suddenly said this.

Only Chen Linfeng had a premonition in his heart that some people would eventually have some ideas.

"Have you made up your mind?"

"Think about it."

"Okay then. Now that the Time Traveler project is over, come and find me if you have any ideas."

Guo Fan raised his head, "Teacher, do you agree?"

"Whether I agree or disagree depends on whether your idea is sound. My own students want to make progress, and I can't stop them, right?"

"Teacher, you are so nice." Guo Fan came up and licked his face to please him.

"Go away, don't use that on me."

Chen Linfeng waved his hands impatiently. This guy was the most shameless. He must have had a similar personality in his previous life.

No wonder he could do something like taking down Wolf Warrior out of nothing.

In the following days, Chen Linfeng and others visited the film and television base, and several directors with new ideas had already begun to conceive.

During this period, the city leaders of Ping City also came to inspect.

It's hard to say that the timing is so coincidental.

Several leaders who came to inspect showed very enthusiastic attitude towards Chen Linfeng.

He was much more enthusiastic than the leader I met that year.

Yes, the status is different.

Back then, Chen Linfeng was used as a news partner to attract people to watch, but now it is different. The leaders really want to get familiar with Director Chen and establish a good relationship with him.

Not to mention anything else, just the resources that Director Chen has, his own influence, and the strength of his companies are enough to make these city leaders extremely enthusiastic.

After staying in Ping City for about 5 days and making sure that the film and television base met his standards, Chen Linfeng went back.

Immediately afterwards, the preliminary preparations for the project "Now You See Me" began.

The script had already been written.

On Emily Ken's side, Chen Linfeng handed the script to Pitt and passed it to Disney, and it was approved in almost no time.

From then on, in Hollywood, Pitt would find someone to take charge of auditions of actors and selection of some behind-the-scenes staff.

There are also some exterior scenes required by the script, and Pitt will do the preliminary work.

Then there is the domestic situation.

There are not many outdoor scenes in "Now You See Me", most of them are indoor scenes.

Chen Linfeng handed over the relevant preparations to Sister Mei, with assistance from other team members.

He is only responsible for accepting the final results of both parties.

Up to now, with these preliminary work, his team has been able to handle most of his repetitive and low-tech work.

Of course, in the later stages, Chen Lin will have more control.

After all, it involves the final effect, so we have to pay more attention to it.

He has been following since the later stages of Joker.

Although the filming took place in the United States, a lot of post-production work, including editing, special effects sound effects, color grading, etc., was transferred to the country.

Not only does it save money, but it is also an important part of cultivating domestic industries.

Nowadays, the overall technology and level of domestic films are at least two years more advanced than in the past.

Here, Longlin and Qilin companies play a huge role.

Chen Linfeng himself has driven the development of related industries and trained nearly 10,000 practitioners over the years.

Not to mention his colleagues who have become competitive because of him and are trying every possible way to improve their level.

This is most obvious in TV dramas.

The special effects of many domestic fantasy and mythological dramas nowadays are at least at the level of the past 16 years.

Especially the Dragon Scale drama, which is almost a landscape that has never been seen in domestic dramas in the past. Of course, in the past, when the pay was not high, the total investment was not high, and good special effects could not be used.

The investment is high, and the pay accounts for a higher proportion, but we still can’t afford good special effects.

Only Dragon Scale, because of its system and company philosophy, can use special effects that are far better than its peers.

This also led to changes in other companies.

After all, the visual effect is something that the audience can see at first glance.

No matter how much you explain, it's useless.

After seeing the good ones, who would want to watch your brainless special effects?

Everyone only likes the good ones.

Therefore, nowadays, the special effects level of the entire domestic drama is very good.

The export of domestic dramas to Southeast Asia is now growing at an increasingly rapid pace, which is inseparable from this.

Roll, roll them all up for me.

Chen Linfeng likes watching current domestic dramas, especially those produced by their own companies.

Such as "Zhu Xian 2" and "Barbarian Era".

These are dramas that did not exist in the previous life, but were filmed by Long Lin.

Especially "The Wild Age", a TV series derived from "In Search of the Gods" and "The Wild Age", is a key project launched by Longlin this year.

It seemed that a company had filmed "In Search of the Gods" in the previous life, but in Chen Linfeng's eyes, it was the same as if nothing had happened.

The screenwriter of Long Lin asked Shu Shang Ye Hu himself to co-write the script. With the addition of powerful special effects, the new drama became a hit as soon as it was aired this year.

Several 85 flowers who participated in the show, including Yang Mi, Jing Tian, ​​Liu Shishi, Shu Chang, as well as young actors like Zhang Junning and Wang Kai, all saw a huge increase in the number of fans.

In this era of soaring film pay, only Long Lin can put together such a lineup.

Influenced by this, those who had been hesitant and unable to make up their minds to use part of the profits to replace the initial film remuneration costs also began to follow Long Lin's operation.

After all, Long Lin and the others can really eat meat, so how can I not be greedy?

Of course, those who make yin-yang contracts to launder money or engage in capital operations will definitely pretend not to see it.

However, the overall situation has begun to change, and these operations may not necessarily become the mainstream in the industry.

In late September, Chen Linfeng had dinner and chats with familiar friends.

Domestic relationships cannot be severed. It is not a good thing to float in the sky for too long.

Especially for Chen Linfeng, he has aspirations for the future.

If one wants to have a good historical evaluation, he must have a large number of people supporting him. It is not enough to have achievements alone.

Typical examples are Mr. Guo and a certain Hu. They have no students and no support, but the result of having a large number of student fans is that they can completely tamper with and distort historical evaluations, saying good things as bad and bad things as good.

There are also get-togethers between directors.

On September 9, Zhang Yimou called and said he wanted to get together.

Chen Linfeng simply called a few more people.

Chen Kaige, Jiang Wen, Feng Xiaogang and others were present.

In fact, according to past habits, although these people have a decent relationship, they usually don't chat in private.

They are not from the same place and are not in the same circle, so they can't communicate with each other.

But Chen Linfeng doesn't care about this. The new era must have new atmosphere.

He has good relationships with every circle. After all, only his company treats everyone equally and employs people from all circles. Besides, Chen Linfeng's current achievements are different, and Zhang Yimou still owes him a favor.

There is no choice but to do as Xiao Chen says.

"Finally I get to see you. You are such a busy man, are you finally free?"

As soon as he came up, Jiang Wen started complaining.

Some time ago, he called Chen Linfeng out for dinner several times, but nothing came of it.

"I'm sorry, I'm a bit busy. I have to do post-production for the movie I just finished filming, and I have to prepare for the new movie. I have to sort out all the work before I can get together."

Chen Kaige asked curiously, "I heard about the movie you just made. It's about the Joker, right? What's the new movie like?"

Feng Xiaogang and Zhang Yimou also looked at him curiously.

After "Inception", the whole world is really curious about Chen Linfeng's new film.

"The new movie is about magic and thieves."

Chen Linfeng briefly told the main story.

Feng Xiaogang sighed. "I don't know what's wrong with your brain. How come you always come up with such novel stories?"

As soon as he heard the story, he thought it was good and the audience would definitely like it. As a commercial film director, he has this sensitivity.

Zhang Yimou and Chen Kaige also nodded. Without talking about the ideological content, just listening to the story was indeed very novel.

Only Jiang Wen said nothing.

"Hey, just come up with a random idea first, and then slowly fill in the details. Isn't that how everyone does it?"

Chen Linfeng just mentioned it briefly, and then asked, "What are you guys busy with now?"

He looked in the direction of Zhang Yimou. The other party was still as taciturn as before. During the party, Zhang Yimou usually listened more than spoke.

"I heard that you were going to film the Battle of Diaoyucheng. How is it going now?"

"It has been filmed for half a year and the post-production is almost done now." Zhang Yimou replied.

"So when will it be released? Will it be during the Lunar New Year?"

The others immediately paid attention.

In today’s domestic film market, Xiao Chen is naturally the dominant player.

The summer season has almost become his world. He releases a movie every summer and is not afraid of Hollywood blockbusters.

He opened up the Spring Festival period, and Xiao Chen has been the biggest winner in the past two years.

In addition to these, we have to count Zhang Yimou, who is, after all, a veteran strongman and should not be underestimated.

Zhang Yimou thought about it and said truthfully, "The plan is to release it during the Spring Festival."

There is no need to hide the time, because everyone knows that the competition for the Spring Festival movie season this year will definitely be fierce.

Feng Xiaogang said with regret, "Alas, it's a pity that my film is not suitable for the Spring Festival schedule, otherwise I would definitely compete with Yimou."

Chen Linfeng asked curiously, "Are you talking about 1942? When will Director Feng be releasing it?"

"Just the past few days."

"Ah? You've been so busy these past few days, how did you find such a time?"

Feng Xiaogang explained, "We originally wanted to release it on September 9, but after thinking about it, we decided to postpone it for a few days. It would be better to release it during the festival holiday."

Chen Linfeng nodded to show his understanding.

September 9th, everyone knows what time it is, and "18" may be somewhat related to it.

It's normal to postpone it in the hope of earning more box office revenue.

"Then I'll go and show my support."

Feng Xiaogang smiled brightly, "Hey, Xiao Chen, you are so considerate."

Chen Linfeng waved his hand and said, "Remember to send the film to the Golden Rooster Awards Organizing Committee when the time comes. It will be just in time."

Speaking of this, the other directors became curious.

"It has been rumored for a long time that the Golden Rooster Awards have undergone major changes. Will they really not be the same as before? Is this a joke?"

Chen Linfeng said seriously, "After working so hard for so long, if we still make a fool of ourselves, it will really become a joke."

He explained, "From the preliminary selection to the final award, it is all decided by everyone's vote. It's not entirely based on the quality of the film, but at least we can't let completely unknown people, actors who have starred in bad films or have no level, stand up to receive the award."

There are thousands of juries, most of whom are over 40 years old, which makes the overall tendency of the awards slightly biased towards art films.

But with at least 2% of the judges being young people and 3% being middle-aged, they can at least somewhat pull the strings and leave room for highly acclaimed commercial films.

There is also a 70-year-old retirement system to replace new blood.

Overall, it is perfect enough.

The only thing Chen Linfeng is worried about is that it is not commercial enough, which will lead to no one watching and insufficient participation of the judges in the voting, and the show will gradually fail.

This is also one of the reasons why he recently came out to meet people for dinner and chat, to attract people.

Come with a few more heavyweights, especially directors.

With more big directors coming, those stars will definitely be willing to come as well.

The industry's doubts about the Golden Rooster Awards cannot be eliminated by just talking about reform.

After all, outsiders don’t know the specific situation inside, and even if it is announced publicly, many people don’t actually care.

There also has to be enough stars present to carry the scene.

Fortunately, Chen Linfeng has always had enough face, especially now. Just for his face, many people will come to join in the fun.

The same is true for these people today.

Chen Linfeng spoke, and everyone agreed that they would take time to participate.

After this topic was over, everyone returned to talking about movies.

Chen Kaige just tried to make a commercial film this year, and the results were only average.

He was quite distressed and didn't know what to do next.

The market is changing too fast now. If he wants to embrace commercial films, he can't keep up.

As far as he knew, he was not the only one who thought so.

Chen Kaige simply asked directly, and the target of the question was Chen Linfeng.

In his opinion, the one who is best at making commercial films is Xiao Chen, and what is particularly commendable is that he can also make art films.

His skills in terms of pictures and shots are almost on par with those of their predecessors.

Therefore, Chen Kaige could really ask the question. If it were someone else, they wouldn't even want to think about it.

"I do have some ideas about this answer, but I think it's better to wait until Director Zhang's movie comes out and we have concrete examples before we can say anything."

Chen Kaige was a little anxious, "Just tell me directly, even if there is no specific case, I will believe you."

"Uh, okay,"

Chen Linfeng sorted out his words, "I think Director Chen and Director Zhang both have a problem, which is that you don't quite understand the audience's ability to understand."

"Oh?" Chen Kaige was fine, and Zhang Yimou also perked up.

Even Jiang Wen's expression changed. He realized that he had the same problem.

"How to say?"

(End of this chapter)