Working with Jessie Leong Again: Oriental Stereotypes

I have previously made two fashion films for two different students, both in London and Leeds. Jessie Leong was so happy with our work on Challenging Orientalism that she wanted me to make another video for her with different models and different locations but a similar aspect. I wasn't planning on saying yes due to the amount of work i had to do by this point for my FMP but she had complimented me on how good the last video was and that we had worked so well. I felt for my professional practice and future career opportunities i didn't want to turn this down.

Jessie had mentioned that she wanted the same style film and it would still be challenging orientalism but in a different way. The locations would be a karaoke bar in Leeds and a small library in the City Centre. I could only commit a couple of hours towards filming on the day she wanted to shoot so i only had a limited amount of time at both locations. The library was the first venue and i didn't have more than one hour to film. Out of the three models, i only really had time to film one and parts of the other two. I found a lot of symmetrical angles i wanted to explore, it was a very traditional and intimate library that I could picture in a Wes Anderson film. I had a lot of fun looking for specific angles that I could capture the models posing for whatever Jessie was asking them to do. I used the tripod for many of these shots as the venue looked so beautiful i wanted the audience to be able to take it in.

Each girl had an oriental themed make up. There was a team of a make up artist, fashion stylist, photographer, 3 models and myself. We headed to the next location called Mix Karaoke Leeds which was a Karaoke bar. We were allowed to shoot in whichever rooms we wanted by there were only two specific rooms i had time to explore and use. 

I used the 5D mark III, just like in every other film i've done so far, with the standard lens it comes with, 24-105mm f/4 lens as well as 50mm f/1.8 lens. Because of the brightness of the library i was able to use the 24-105mm and focus more on the wider or close up shots, rather than the light. In Mix Karaoke the rooms were a lot darker so i only used the 50mm f/1.8 because the other lens doesn't let in enough light, therefore the images will be under exposed. 

I was filming one of the models in a room whilst Jessie was photographing her, Jessie wanted the flashes in the film but again stressed that it wasn't a behind the scenes film so didn't want to be in it. I was able to get extreme low angle shots and beautiful silhouette angles. The second room i filmed all three models working together in a hello kitty pink room. It was accidental i'm sure but it really enhanced the oriental factor of the shoot. 

Jessie had a fast paced Japanese type of electronic music that she liked. I knew that it was going to be a different kind of edit to the one i had previously done for her. The cuts were going to be extremely quick. It was a challenge as i've not edited anything that would be quick, i filmed the shoot in 50 frames per second for the first time as I wanted to slow footage down and speed parts up. The edit took me 2-3 weeks as i didn't have that much time to edit it due the the amount of work i had.