Chapter 192 - Disbelief
Parkour was the most popular extreme sports in the world. It used daily life environments as the sports ground and one has to rely on one's own physical fitness to control any known and unknown environment quickly, effectively and reliably.
Parkour first emerged in France. It entered China around 2000. After more than ten years of development, parkour has become one of the most popular sports for young people in China, and a national parkour competition has been set up with a very high reward.
As an emerging fashion sports brand, Senqi's market positioning was young people who like sports. Therefore, elements of parkour were integrated into this commercial to achieve the publicity effect that resonates with the target audience.
Silver Horse Advertisement Company invited Lu Chen to endorse Senqi. They have also chosen to use a professional stunt double for the parkour scenes, and planned out every detail meticulously. No one has expected that something would go wrong on the first day of shooting.
In fact, for parkour, injuries were simply a common occurrence, especially when there's no adequate protective equipment, it was easy for something to go wrong. Although Coach Wang Hai was a professional, he couldn't avoid accidents.
But for the director, it was really bad.
They were in a hurry to complete this commercial. Silver Horse Advertising and Senqi have a contract agreement. If it didn't appear on the screen within the specified time, the company’s reputation and interests would be greatly damaged.
Otherwise, they wouldn’t be in a hurry to start shooting on the second day of National Day.
Coach Wang’s injury made the following shooting work very troublesome. Although it wasn't difficult to find professional parkour athletes in or around Jinling, it wasn't easy to find someone with the same height and body shape as Lu Chen.
Parkour was more suitable for young people with small body and flexible movements.
Lu Chen was 180+ cm tall! (TN: About 6 ft.)
Wang Hai struggled to stand up, his head lowered, his face full of shame: “Director, I’m so sorry.”
He was a professional, but he made a very low-level mistake. It was pure carelessness.
This wasn't the first time that Coach Wang worked as a stunt double, but it was the first time something went wrong as soon as the shooting started.
It wasn't a big deal if he sprained his ankle, but it wasn't good to delay other's shooting work.
The director said with a wry smile, “Forget it. It’s not your fault. Who can guarantee that no accident would happened?”
“I’ll have my assistant take you to the hospital. It’s better to take an x-ray to look at the bones. We’ll pay for the medical expenses.”
Reputation was very important in this line of work, unless one was a big-shot figure. Otherwise, being harsh and merciless wouldn’t work, especially for stunt doubles. They risked their lives to make money and would have to be responsible for work-related injuries
The director of the commercial, surnamed Zhong, has been in the industry for many years. He understood how to do things.
Wang Hai quickly waved his hand and said, “Don’t bother, I just hurt my muscles. I'll be able to recover after two days of rubbing some medicine oil. I don’t need to go to the hospital to waste money.”
His character was really straightforward.
An assistant brought the oil and rubbed it for him.
Director Zhong sighed helplessly and asked, “Do you know anyone who can come and help?”
“Director…”
Wang Hai hasn’t answered yet, and Lu Chen, who just came over, said, “Let me try!”
Director Zhong was speechless: “Mr. Lu Chen, if you get hurt, it will be more troublesome!”
If there’s something wrong with the double, they could replace him with another double. But could the leading actor be changed if something goes wrong?
That's absurd!
There was even a fire of inexplicable irritability in his heart, and he didn’t want to explain more to Lu Chen.
Lu Chen smiled faintly and said, “Director Zhong, I often exercise. I think I can do the simple parkour. How about we shoot the first scene of jumping over the carboard box first, and if there’s no problem, we shoot the second one?”
He added: “It’s better than waiting like this!”
This sentence poked the director’s weak spot. The shots they took in the film and television city wouldn’t be wasted. If they couldn’t finish shooting today, they would have to continue shooting tomorrow. They would have to pay for the time and energy, not to mention the rent.
Then try it!
Director Zhong gritted his teeth and said, “OK, you must pay attention to safety. Never try to be brave!”
The first scene was to jump over cardboard boxes full of flowers, which was really not very dangerous.
Lu Chen said with a smile, “I know.”
Now that a decision has been made. Director Zhong no longer hesitated and immediately asked his staff to start preparing.
“Get the camera ready. Put it in place!”
“You guys, don’t stand here and watch the excitement here. Keep the tourists away here!”
“Makeup artist, make up for Lu Chen…”
Ten minutes later, wearing a Senqi sportswear, stepping on Senqi running shoes and carrying a Senqi sports bag, Lu Chen, who was fully equipped, stood on the sidewalk and made several warm-up moves.
At the entrance of the flower shop, more than ten meters in front of him, three large corrugated boxes were stacked. The roses in the box were as delicate and beautiful as fire, still with morning-plucked dew.
To Lu Chen’s left, the cameraman was controlling a high-definition digital camera and was pointing the lens at him.
The assistant cameraman was standing by, ready to push the track at any time.
“Attention, all units!”
“Street chase, first scene, first take.”
“Action!”
With the director’s order, Lu Chen immediately stepped forward.
Since experiencing that strange and long dream, he basically came out to exercise every morning, jogging plus practicing martial arts, regardless of rain or shine.
Thus, jogging has already become an integral part of Lu Chen’s daily routine. When he took his steps, his movements were very skilled and smooth, without the slightest stiffness and discomfort. He rushed to the front of the cardboard box between his breath.
The next moment, Lu Chen’s left foot stomped heavily on the ground, the extremely elastic sole requiting a heavy force. At the same time, he raised his right leg out, causing his whole person to soar into the air, instantly jumping over the flower box that was no more than one meter high.
Then land on the ground steadily!
In order to ensure Lu Chen's safety, the director specially arranged to reduce the height of the cardboard box.
It turned out that this was obviously not necessary. Lu Chen’s jumping ability was excellent, even better than Wang Hai!
“Good!”
Director Zhong could not help but shout. He was overjoyed.
Simply jumping over cardboard boxed on the ground was something that many people could definitely do, or even do easily.
However, from starting, running, boost, jumping to landing, Lu Chen made all his movements in one go, as smooth as floating clouds and flowing water, giving people a sense of pleasing feeling. It seemed very unusual.
As Lu Chen said, he exercises regularly, otherwise it was impossible to jump so beautifully!
At this moment, most of the worries in director Zhong’s heart disappeared in an instant.
Applause broke out around the scene, and members of the shooting team were all applauding Lu Chen’s performance.
There were few stars with such excellent athletic ability.
Although it was simple to run and jump, it could also show an individual's athletic quality and ability.
However, things were not so simple, when Director Zhong looked back at the footage, he couldn't help but smile bitterly.
He found that he had made a neither big nor small mistake.
The original arrangement was for the stunt double to jump, so the camera was always shot from the side, but now that Lu Chen was personally doing the action, the side shot was meaningless or even defective.
In addition, Lu Chen ran a little fast. The camera did not keep up well, so the footage taken was not good.
Director Zhong could only invite Lu Chen over, explain the situation, and ask him to do a retake.
Lu Chen nodded to indicate that there was no problem.
Director Zhong was very impressed by Lu Chen’s cooperative attitude. There were not many artists like him who respect the director and take their work seriously. Many young people who are new to the circle are very impetuous and very self-righteous.
Those who make commercials such as Director Zhong, were often overwhelmed by some star artists who like to play big names.
In the second retake, Director Zhong arranged two camera positions, one on the front and one on the side, and increased the number of people pushing the track to improve the speed.
This time's shooting was completed successfully, and Lu Chen’s performance was still impeccable!
But the second scene was troublesome.
Lu Chen needed to quickly run on the sidewalk, jump from a flight of steps, then using the railing, jump over the flower bed that was more than 2 meters wide, and finally land on the grass. The difficult of this task was not anything that an ordinary people could accomplish.
Just now, Wang Hai twisted his foot while doing this move!
Director Zhong was very worried about a repeat of the tragedy. After all, Lu Chen was not a professional parkour athlete or even an enthusiast, so it was undoubtedly a great challenge for him to complete this action.
He thought about it and said to Lu Chen, “Maybe we should use compositing for this action?”
Compositing was the use of green screen technology and wire work[1]. With it, any difficult and thrilling actions could be accomplished.
This was certainly very troublesome, and the effect would certainly be not as good as the actual shot, but it was better than Lu Chen having an accident.
There was a special green screen studio in the film and television city.
Lu Chen, of course, knew the meaning of compositing, and couldn't help laughing and said, “That’s too troublesome, Director Zhong. Let me try it first. If I can do it, let's shoot it directly. If I can’t, then let's think of another way.”
Director Zhong thought about it and agreed.
It was mainly Lu Chen’s performance that gave him a lot of confidence, otherwise it would certainly not be allowed.
Although it was a practice, Director Zhong arranged all the filming crew for real shooting.
Facing the close up shot, Lu Chen was not the least bit nervous. He continued to run along the sidewalk, rushed to the flight of steps leading to the small square in the blink of an eye, and suddenly jumped high!
At this moment, everyone's heart was raised!
However, they only saw Lu Chen in the middle of the air, his right hand pressed firmly against the top of the railing, and with the help of his arm strength, he smoothly flew forward, crossing through the more than two meter wide flower bed, like a hawk that had spread its wings, gliding through the air then landing on the grass.
The next moment, Lu Chen’s body squatted down to absorb the force of the landing. He pressed the ground with his left hand to stabilize his figure, then jumped up again like a spring full of strength, and jumped into the square freely.
Everyone was dumbfounded!
Wang Hai stood up in disbelief, ignoring the pain in his ankle.
Lu Chen has just completed a series of movements, not to mention ordinary people, even professional parkour athletes couldn't do better than him!
Has he really never played parkour before?
Wang Hai didn't believe it!
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[1] Wire work - read it HERE.
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