Entertainment: I am the peak

Chapter 538 Making Guo Fan a Catch

Although the company's senior executives will be on vacation for a few more days, Li Qiutang's workload has indeed lightened considerably.

There's no 30 this year, and the executives from the autumn department all had a holiday on the Little New Year. The company doesn't have any films scheduled for release during the Spring Festival this year, so everyone can have a relaxing holiday.

Li Qiutang naturally brought her parents to Yanjing to spend the New Year with Liu Xiaoli. This year, with Liu Yifei not at home, the house was bound to be much quieter.

But before the Lunar New Year, Li Qiutang went to see Guo Fan.

"The Story of a Female Police Officer" will be released after the New Year, but the promised "Mulan" has not started yet. He is working on the script of "Mulan" in a haphazard way and occasionally takes on some side jobs.

He recently took on an outside filming assignment, which is quite interesting. Huazi Company asked him to shoot a VR short film.

To say it was filming wouldn't be accurate; it would be more accurate to say he was asked to experiment with the application of VR technology in film and television production.

After all, this area is still underdeveloped in China, and nobody knows whether VR can be used for filming.

Li Qiutang was also somewhat interested in this. He knew in his heart that VR would not be able to replace existing shooting technologies for the next ten or even twenty years. In other words, VR would not become the mainstream film and television shooting technology in the foreseeable future.

But Li Qiutang was very interested in the technology itself. He wanted to learn more about it and see where it could be applied in film and television production.

Guo Fan was filming this experimental short film in a studio in Huairou when Li Qiutang arrived and happened to meet Mr. Yu from the other company who came to visit the set.

Mr. Yu really didn't expect to run into the famous Director Li here. He was an outsider and didn't know that Guo Fan was a director of the Autumn Series.

After exchanging a few pleasantries, Li Qiutang expressed his interest in VR shooting technology. Mr. Yu listened with great pleasure and introduced him to VR, as well as their company's research and development in VR.

Mr. Yu mentioned that his company had encountered some difficulties in VR filming, so they sought help from professional film directors. They hoped that Guo Fan could use their VR technology to shoot short films with a cinematic quality.

The short film project has been underway for two months, but so far the results have not been ideal.

Based on Guo Fan's operational experience over the past two months, he summarized several pain points that existing VR technology cannot solve in film and television shooting:

"First of all, VR movies are not movies; they are plays. Movies are composed of individual shots, edited together in post-production. But VR movies are different. VR movies use 360-degree cameras, so it's impossible to shoot them using traditional film and television techniques. They have to be filmed in one take without any retakes. Traditional editing techniques are completely useless in VR."

"Secondly, VR movies combine the cinematographer and the lead actor. The cinematographer walks around the lead actor with a camera on his head, while the other actors act around the cinematographer. This profession didn't exist before. I didn't have a monitor to watch, so I didn't know how the performance was going on set."

"The most critical issue is that you can't set up lights on a VR set. It's 360 degrees, so if you set up lights, it will be obvious. Film is an art of light and shadow. If you can't even set up lights, how can you shoot a film with a cinematic feel?"

Guo Fan tried for two months, but now he wants to give up.

Li Qiutang tried it herself, and it felt awkward, extremely awkward!

In addition to the three points Guo Fan mentioned, Li Qiutang discovered that current VR cameras also cannot achieve "cinematic quality".

These cameras cannot achieve the imaging effects of professional cinema cameras in terms of resolution and bitrate.

One person can't possibly do the work of two Elisas.

In the end, Li Qiutang felt that VR technology should remain limited to games and scenic spot experiences, or perhaps be used by Japanese teachers.

Professional film and television production probably doesn't need VR yet.

Speaking of VR tours of scenic spots, Li Qiutang suddenly wondered if VR could be used in the preliminary site survey?

The location scouting team uses laser scanning to scan the initial scouting locations and generates 3D scene models in the studio. This eliminates the need for re-scouting and third scouting. The directing team can wear VR glasses to enter the scene at any time and freely explore the spatial structure, camera layout, and lighting simulation.

There will certainly be differences between VR models and real-world scenes, but these differences should be acceptable and can be addressed promptly during actual filming. Compared to the time saved, this investment is worthwhile.

Li Qiutang shared her ideas with Guo Fan and General Manager Yu:
"I don't know if the current technology can achieve the effect I want."

Both are tech enthusiasts, but this question is clearly more specialized and requires a professional VR vision engineer to answer.

Mr. Yu felt that this was a practical application of VR technology. In accordance with his and Huazi's working style, he immediately proposed to conduct an experimental collaboration with Li Qiutang on VR landscape surveying.

Li Qiutang said, "It's not certain yet whether it can be done."

Mr. Yu said, "Give it a try. Our company will provide you with technical support. Let's see if we can find a way out."

However, it was also mentioned that Li Qiutang and the technical team needed to discuss the concept and feasibility before cooperating.

Guo Fan is preparing for a war epic like "Mulan," and he might be able to use this technology, so he is very interested in joining the technology team.

The attempt to create VR movies was a complete failure.

After Mr. Yu left, Li Qiutang talked to Guo Fan about the situation of "Mulan".

Li Qiutang knew that Guo Fan wanted to make science fiction films, but due to various reasons, Guo Fan's dream of making films would be delayed for a long time.

Li Qiutang entrusted "Mulan" to Guo Fan precisely because he saw Guo Fan's potential in industrial production.

Sending him to Hollywood to study wasn't about having him specialize in low- to mid-budget films.

Guo Fan was actually reluctant to film "Mulan", but now a huge opportunity was presented to him.

"Disney is also making a live-action version of 'Mulan,' and we are a co-production partner. Disney wants to find a Chinese director to direct this project, and the company plans to recommend you."

For actresses, the Disney Princess series represents the biggest opportunity in the global film industry; for directors, directing a Disney Princess series is a prestigious achievement.

Guo Fan had to reconsider "Mulan".

If he is successfully selected by Disney, he will be the fourth Chinese director to enter the mainstream Hollywood film market, following Ann Lee, James Wan, and Justin Lin. John Woo tried but failed, and he is the first mainland Chinese director to break into the mainstream Hollywood market.

Even Li Qiutang couldn't achieve this.

But Li Qiutang also told Guo Fan: "The company is in talks with Disney to combine our two versions of Mulan into one, with our version as the main one. You've been to the United States, so you should know that those foreigners don't have a good attitude towards Chinese people and Chinese stories."

Guo Fan nodded.

"So you have to be prepared for both possibilities. If the deal goes through, you'll be the first mainland Chinese director to direct a Disney princess film; if it doesn't, you'll have to make your own version of 'Mulan' to go head-to-head with Disney's version. Anyway, we're not going to release 'Mulan'."

Just like the opportunity that presented itself to Zhang Yimou three years ago, this opportunity is now presented to Guo Fan.

Disney princess series, hundreds of millions of dollars in budget, global promotion and release – few directors can resist such temptations.

Guo Fan wanted to make science fiction films, but with this opportunity presented to him, he wanted to give it a try.

"I will be prepared," Guo Fan said firmly.

(End of this chapter)