Rebirth: The Path to Hollywood Queen

Stunned judges

After watching Eva's finished film, the special effects artist Alan was shocked and decided to calm down and look at the material again. Just now his eyes were filled with shock, and he forgot to pay attention to anything else. Next, he began to watch carefully. Later, he discovered that Eva not only shot top-notch long shots but also did a great job in paying attention to details. She seemed to have done very careful planning with the art director, and the colors in this film are very beautiful. If I were to describe these colors, they would be stimulating, harmonious, hot, and outstanding. Both the actors and the background seem to be various colors of paint taken from a color palette and splashed all over the screen. It completely complements the theme of this short film—energetic, exciting, and hot.

Secondly, Eva trained the actors very well, and the heroine, Alsha, looked quite like Saoirse Ronan. Alan was completely impressed by Eva at this moment. That unique long shot was enough to make Eva the best newcomer of the year. So, when Eva came to the studio the next day, she found that the attitude of every special effects artist and sound engineer towards her had changed drastically. They seemed to be looking at Eva as if they were discovering a work of art with great potential. They all began to praise her in unison: “Hey, girl, we all watched the material you brought yesterday. Oh my god, how did you do that? It took five whole minutes! My God, I can't believe you're only 18 and you can take such a shocking shot! Please take my knees!”

When Eva faced their compliments, on one hand, she was happy to be praised, but on the other hand, she felt that there was nothing to be happy about; after all, she was not really 18 years old, nor was she a real "newcomer." Moreover, this is not a success. It won't be too late to be happy when she achieves real success. But she didn't show her complicated emotions on her face; she still tried to look happy. "I'm glad you said that. Thank you." Then, she started working on the post-production special effects and sound effects of the short film with the staff. Since it was shot in one take, there was naturally no need for an editor. However, Eva used film to shoot, and luckily it was only 5 minutes long, so she didn’t have to buy a lot of film; otherwise, she would really lose money. Although almost all movies are now shot digitally, which saves time and effort, some directors still insist on using film. After all, the texture of film shooting can never be matched by digital shooting. The post-production color grading of film shooting is also more realistic than digital shooting. Therefore, Eva is quite picky about post-production color adjustment. She said to the special effects artist, "I don't want to see the thin images like those on TV news, but I know that texture images require a lot of effort to adjust and are very expensive, so I don't need you to do that. Just help me make the colors more saturated." High contrast and bright colors—that was Eva's only requirement. After all, color is a way to reflect a person's inner world. In such a bright and brilliant atmosphere, the colors must be bright and colorful. The color contrast and saturation that Eva wanted to express were like a fairy tale. She hopes that the tone of this short film will be like candy, cake, fine wine, and strong medicine—light blue, light green, sweet, and greasy. Therefore, in the later stage of training, Eva spent most of her time struggling with the color tone.

As for the sound effects, it is relatively simple—just put the original soundtrack of "Spring Awakening" in. But generally speaking, for a short film of only 5 minutes, how complicated can the post-production be? Isn't it something that can be resolved in a few days? The most important thing is that there is no need for editing, which saves so much trouble! That day, Eva spent the whole day in the studio and was planning to return to her rented apartment after work. On the way, she received a call from Arsha. She said that a great coffee shop had opened recently and wanted to invite Eva to go there together. Eva agreed, and the two met at the coffee shop. Eva sat in the coffee shop, where Alsha had been waiting for her for a long time. She smiled sweetly at Eva, "Eva, how did the short film go?" Eva drank a large glass of ice water in one breath. She was really hot all the way here. "Not bad. I think it can be solved within a week."

Arsha suddenly winked at her and asked, "Eva, they all guess that you are... a homosexual, are you?" Eva turned her head to look at Arsha, "Why do you say that?" Arsha pursed her lips and smiled slightly, "Because you seem to hate boys." Eva paused for a moment, "I don't know, maybe I am, maybe I'm not." Arsha replied in surprise: "Oh my god, there are people in the world who are not sure about their s****l orientation." Eva was subconsciously amused by Arsha. She smiled slightly and said, "Is it necessary to be so surprised? But I do prefer to be with girls." Arsha smiled and confessed, "Although I am not gay, I don't mind changing my s****l orientation for Kristen Stewart, haha." Eva was stunned at first, then she couldn't help but encourage Alsha, "Then try your best... maybe you can really succeed." Although Kristen Stewart has just become popular around the world with "Twilight" this year and is known as the Twilight Girl, after her bloody relationship with the Twilight Boy for several years, she really likes women...

Arsha took a deep breath and said, "Stop joking. I didn't even have the chance to get to know them, let alone be misunderstood by them." Eva was much more optimistic than Arsha. She smiled and said, "That's why we have to work hard. The reason why dreams are called dreams is that they still require hard work to realize." Although at present, they are still far from those big names in Hollywood—not even one of their toes could be touched. But Eva always believed that this was the dream, the goal that needed to be achieved through hard work.

The main difficulty of this 5-minute short film lies in the early stage of shooting. So it didn't take too much time in post-production, and Eva and the studio's special effects artists completed the short film. After paying the final debt, Eva took the film back home. She then burned the short film into a DVD, filled out a resume, and took it to the organizer of the competition, officially submitting the short film. The next step is to wait for the organizer to select the shortlisted works, and the final grand prize will be announced. The organizer will hold an awards ceremony and the results will be announced at the ceremony. After submitting her work, Eva was on her way back to her rented apartment when she happened to pass by the small villa where she once lived in a wealthy area in the city center. Now the villa is deserted. Coincidentally, she happened to see a maid who used to work in the villa at the door. She was there looking at houses with a real estate agent, and Eva heard them seem to be talking about selling the house.

She was about to leave when the maid called out to her, "Miss Cody." Eva stopped and said to her, "Long time no see. Are you planning to sell this villa?" The maid looked Eva up and down. "Yes, Mr. Scott asked me to sell this house. His reason is that this villa will no longer be used frequently. But it's just right that you are here, Miss Cody. I sorted out some of the things you left behind. You can take them away." Eva nodded, "Okay, thank you." The maid seemed polite. "You're welcome. It was Mr. Scott's idea. But he's not here. You don't have to worry." Eva smiled and said, "I don't mind whether he is there or not. You know, we have no relationship anymore." The maid said with a hint of regret: "Here is Mr. Scott's contact information, if you need it..." "I don't need it, thank you very much," Eva answered decisively.

Perhaps in the eyes of the maid, Eva was a person worthy of sympathy. Without her sponsor, she might be devastated, so she wanted to help her out of compassion. But that was the old Eva, not her. She doesn't want to have anything to do with Alexander Scott right now. After that, Eva took away some of the things she had left there, including several photo albums, and left. And at this moment, at the Irish Film Institute, the organizer of this short film competition, the judges are reviewing the submitted entries and voting for the short films that will be shortlisted. Obviously, the uneven quality of the short films submitted has caused headaches for the judges on the jury. The inconsistent quality resulted in some short films being cut off by the judges after just the beginning because they were too mediocre. Some short films are just storyboards but are watched with great interest because of their extreme excellence.

At this time, Rosen, one of the judges responsible for screening the shortlisted works, was sitting in front of the screen watching them one by one. He watches about 10 short films every day and then rates them one by one. Before watching each work in the competition unit, he needs to first browse the resume of the participating director. At this time, he opened Eva's resume. To be honest, since he became a member of the selection committee, he has read countless resumes,