Damn mosquito's!!

Mosquito's!! Its 5.50am at the moment and i have been awake since 3.30am!! Its really wierd that at the time of 3.30am each night i wake up. Its always bang on 3.30am! Usually i would go back to sleep straight away but the whole right hand side of my body was basically a giant mosquito bite!! SOOOO ITCHY!!! Plus I have a couple of things racing through my mind at the moment. Got some great advice on saturday night and I have decided to take it. Its amazing how someone can completely change the way you think by asking one, short, simple question!!

In 3 hours i will be asleep again having my wisdom teeth out. I hope i dont talk in my sleep because the dreams i've been having lately are a little on the crazy side but the same each night haha. I wont say what i dream about but it would be funny to hear haha. Im not nervous at all which is good because i have a fear of needles.

On thursday I will be having the last paid work for me. Working on Shortland Street so that will be cool. And then its off to the Bay of Islands for a few days with family and family friends from England! They've hired a wicked house right on the beach and I love Russel, its got a really nice feel to it!! So that will be nice to spend my last days with family and friends and in the most beautiful place :)

Will update later in the day when the drugs wear off hahaha.................

Universal choices

Today was the turning point of my life. I flicked a coin today and made a huge decision based on that 50/50 chance!! Some may call me crazy, others a fricken nutter!! hahaha. But so far, throughout my life, that decision making toss has proved right in every way!! I will leave the big decisions to the universe for the rest of my life if this one works out :)

Update, coming soon................

Valentines Day and Dentist!

Proabably the best valentines day i've had so far. Went out for dinner with Echo and some friends for her 27th birthday. The food was soo good plus it was all you can eat. You had to cook all the food yourself on a hot pot. Sophie told me that in China they call it hot pot. Funny that. But it is also called hot hot hot. So now, when i go to China i will be able to find the nearest hot hot hot hahaha. After dinner caught up with Vicky again. Thats always good.

Spent the morning at the dentist today. Expected to be told that i am going to be getting a couple of fillings. Got told that i have to have a couple of fillings :). But the one thing i did'nt expect at all was that i have to get my wisdom teeth out (no more wisdom!!) ASAP. One of my teeths roots is dangerously close to the main nerve in my face and if i dont get it out now there is a chance i may have a numb face for the rest of my life HAHAHA. I can just imagine myself talking like Sylvestor Stallone, maybe i will be the next Sly!! So that is booked in on Tuesday morning!! Great! Cant wait!! The dentist also said when he was looking at my x'ray that i have a jaw bone that looks exactly like the Terminators haha. Im happy with that resemblance!
Another thing i was told is that i grind my teeth when i sleep. They are really worn down for my age and i suggested its probably the dreams i have each night of eating peanut buttered chewing gum, THE best dream!! haha. So i may have to wear a teeth brace thing at night GEEK!!

So i have just got back and i have to go back again in an hours time to get a teethal. Which is a word i just made up then. If you dont get it, think "facial". Get it now, good. If you still dont get it it just means that my teeth are gonna be cleaned haha. Im pretty tired so will probably have a nap in the dentist chair because you cant talk when you've got 50 peices of equipment down your throught anyway :)

Have my first lacrosse game tonight in a couple of years and i am playing midfield. Can expect to come home with a few bruises tonight if i don't break anything. Will be interesting. Then Lost is on tonight at 8.30pm so cant wait for that! Its the first tv series ive been hooked on for years. Cant miss it haha.

Will update probably later after the game

Lance

Showreel

Most part of today was spent trying to put together my showreel. From now on i really should get a copy of everything i do so that later i don't have to ring 100 people. Lesson learnt. It is nowhere near finished yet but i am really happy at how it is gonna look. Its strange because the most professional thing i have shot so far was at film school. It was my end of year drama called CODA.

I also spent a couple of hours going over a shotlist for a short film i am doing in the next few weeks. Now i have just got back from playing badminton again. My smashes were by far the most powerful i done and i have no idea why. There is a possum up the tree at the moment and i have just had a close encounter with it. pretty cute thing but bloody big claws!! I will put a photo on the blog tomorrow.


Lance

Attach of the Bakini's

Yesturday i was filming girls in bakinis all day!

It was a very interesting day to be honest. I learnt a lot about myself, I am not like most guys, I am different. Now, Im not saying that I am gay because I really really like girls! So thats good. But I found myself out of place filming this competition and most men would kill to be where i was last night! But I just was'nt attracted to any of the girls at all. I mean, they were all extremely hot, dont get me wrong, but there was no beauty about them. I actually felt sorry for them. Some of the comments that people would yell out whilst they are on stage were pretty horrible, there was no respect. Anyway, lets just say it was'nt my cup of tea haha. Sound like an old man, i guess i just don't like seeing girls downgrade themselves. So finished there at about 1am and went home to bed. There was an after party that we were invited to with the girls but I ended up leaving as i was'nt desperate to go.

Today i had a meeting with Angelique about her short film we are going to be filming in a few weeks time. Checked out the house we were filming in and it has a very unique feel to it so am looking forward to filming in it. After that meeting and a damn good coffee I cruised to Amits place. We went and saw Jarhead which was a cool movie. Cinematography was awesome and too was the acting.

I then met up with Sophie and Simon and went and filmed at the lantern festival at Albert Park in the city. Such a nice atmosphere there with all the different cultures. Some of the lanterns this year were amazing and the fireworks at the end were insane. So finished there at about 10.45pm and i am now stuffed. My eyes keep closing and my head keeps going into random nods every now and then so i guess that is a sign that i should go and get some shut eye.


HAHAHA, thought i would end this blog with a little random photo that makes me laugh every time i look at it. This cute photo was taken in Samoa when I was there with Studio 2. This puppy was looking at me and i took a photo. It was good but i wanted the dog to smile. So, as a joke i yelled out to the pup, "SMILE!" and this is the result :)

Lance

Lost

Just a quick blog as i have to go shoot soon.

Im better now from a really bad stomach this week. Won't be eating chicken thats over 6 days old from now on. It was tasty tho :(

I watched the whole 1st series of Lost this week. What a geek!! Such a cool series tho and i would really reccomend people watching it. Went for a kayak as a break. Its really relaxing just being out on the water, quite far away from land and just sitting there listening.

Echo came over on thursday night and i taught her how to drive. She was a very quick learner which made it easy for me :). After teaching her how to do hill starts we then went to foodtown to get ingredients for the dinner she was gonna cook for me as a thankyou. Man, the dinner was so good! I now know how to cook stir fried chiken with toefoo (dunno how to spell it haha) and stir fried noodles! And the best part was smashing the chiken pieces with a big knife haha, although i would reccomend wearing an apren!!

Yesturday i had to go into town and buy another tripod plate as i had lost mine!! Its really funny tho because during the doco i remember saying that the tripod plate is THE hardest thing to lose out of all the gear you have because it permanantly attached to the bottom of the camera!!! How the hell did i lose mine because I havent lost my camera!!! Random!!

Anyway, better get going.
Have to go film a bakini contest and then go onto a private boat with them all for the day!
Its a hard job but someone has to do it!!

Lance

Bad Shape

Not feeling the greatest today. I ate some chicken last night and i think that is it. Have been throwing up this morning and I feel pretty bad. Would replace this for delhi belly any day!! This is the perfect oportunity to watch the series of Lost.

Lance

Coffee and lightning photos

Today was a pretty useless and non productive day. And I loved it!!!

Although its nice having time off and to yourself, if you have too much, and in my case I cant handle more than a days relaxation, you can start to feel useless. Its funny because a few years ago I would have a few weeks off in holidays etc. Now there is no way I could do that. I have to be busy. Even if its busy doing something I don't like doing.

But today wasn't too bad. I "studied" a couple of films today. One was one of my favorites "Unbreakable". Just love that film so much but most people don't like it at all. I guess I just love the thought of having super powers. I think that if I could have a super power it would definitely be invisibility. Imagine how much fun you could have with it!! I think the first thing I would do would scare the cats hahaha. Then I would go for a drive along the motorway in rush hour. hehehe, imagine the looks on peoples faces when they see the car driving with no one in it. hahaha, I am such a loser!! O, and then I would go to one of my mates church's when he is there and lift him up in the middle of a worship session and make him fly around the room, HAHAHA, soo evil!! Imagine!! I would do a whole lot more too. I am finding it hard to type because Gareth is trying to play the guitar and sing to take my mind off what I am typing. Plus he really cannot sing so it is really working!! The next film I "studied" was American Beauty. I love the pacing in this movie, plus, the music really is incredible. Each piece of music brings out the emotions and makes you feel exactly what you should be feeling at that point in the movie. Big ups to the composer!!

After American Beauty I caught the ferry to town to catch up with Alys for a coffee. Its so interesting hearing what she has been up to over the last year and a half. It made me really want to work harder to get to where I want to be career wise. We are gonna go surfing some time next week and film it on our bolex's because she wants to make a surfing video. Cant wait because I haven't run film through my bolex for a few months now. We worked out that the last time we saw each other was in November in 2004!!!! My god time flies!!! I love Wellington and am thinking (just an idea) I may move down there just for a few weeks, not too long, if I am struggling to find work up here. I have a few contacts down there and they said that there is work going so will have to see how things go over the next couple of weeks.

I emailed my photos of lightning to the paper today and they liked them. So you can expect to see my lightning pictures in the paper on Thursday. Here is one of my favorites. This bolt of lightning was by far the biggest I have ever seen in NZ! The storm lasted for about 2.5 - 3 hours! That little island is called flat island and you can see it from howick beach.

It makes me happy that people are actually going to see my pictures and hopefully at least one person will look at it and go "WOW!". I know when I took that photo I said more than wow! Lucky there was no audio haha, but there was on my video camera ahaha, better delete the audio :) Here is another of the best ones. I really have been waiting for a few years to take photos like these. Patience is a virtue.

Tonight Dean, Becs, Gareth, Max and I had a ping pong game. Ping pong is such a cool game! It takes a little bit of time getting into the swing of things but soon your skills come back. Its really annoying tho because Max and I have had a few games. to begin with I kicked his ass. Now tho, he kicks my ass! Turn of the tides I guess. I will get better tho and then once again I will reign supreme! haha.

So tomorrow I have a brilliant plan. Sleep in is the 1st thing on my agender. Then its off to the city to sort out my camera plate which got returned with some of the gear from scapa a couple of weeks ago. I hope I get it back otherwise that's another $100 down the drain for me :( And after that I will start to put together a show reel for myself which will be interesting. Considering that most of the stuff I do, I never see it. So have to make a fair few phone calls to a few people and get copys. Thats gonna be a mission. Not mission impossible but pretty close to it haha.

Its almost 12 at night now and I still cant go to bed. Ive been going to sleep at about 1-2am lately and then waking up at about 7.30-8. I find it really difficult to sleep past 9am now, which is a good thing because you get way more out of the day. Even if it is just relaxing.



Lance

Waitangi Weekend!!

This has probably, no, it has been the best Waitangi weekend I have ever had!!!!

On Saturday Me, Amit and Echo went up north for a road trip to look for locations for Nowhere to Love. We stopped at Pakiri beach which is north of Leigh and it was such a beautiful beach!! After about an hour of body surfing and playin in the waves we had to make our way. Was such a nice cool off after driving for a while. We then drove to Kerikeri and had the biggest icecreams I have ever had!! None of the towns we had come across so far had anything that we could use in the film. That was until we came across Helensville. The graveyard there was really nice and there was definitely a few nice angles to film from. So overall it was a fun, semi successful day.

Sunday, Amit, Echo and I met up with Troy, Angela, Emily and a couple of others at Hunua Falls near Papakura. So we had a picnic which I haven't done for ages. It was really cool just sitting there listening to the water falling over the edge and hitting the pool below. I was really wanting to go for a swim but I was too burnt from the day before. Echo took some great shots of people jumping into the water. I think Amit has put them up on his blog. After the relaxing time at Hunua falls the 3 of us drove home past Whitford to look for some more locations for the film.
On Sunday night I went to Marks for a BBQ. We then cruised round to my house for a few beverages and some shooting of my old air rifle. That was pretty cool and then came the possum. You can imagine what happened next :). No possums were hurt tho which is kinda good and bad at the same time haha.

Monday, monday, monday. What a monday!!!!!! In the morning I spent a good couple of hours cleaning the house from the night before. Which I actually didn't mind doing at all and actually found it quite therapeutic. I then did a very much needed sort out in my room because I was catching up with Vicki later on in the day and my room was a mess!! So now I can actually walk into my room without standing on something and breaking it!! Gareth came over during the day and we played a bit of ping pong. He then left and Vicki came over. Was really good seeing her again after such a long time. As soon as she left I went out to the deck and couldn't believe how beautiful the clouds were!!!! Probably the nicest I have seen from our house. So I grabbed the camera and decided to do a timelapse of the ocean and clouds. VERY NICE!!! Then, to make things better, a MASSIVE Fork lightning storm went past in the near distance. So then quickly repo'd my video camera, plus my stills camera, plus myself, a maglight, 3 lenses and 2 tripods onto the roof of my house and clicked and rolled away. WOW!!! What a storm it was!!! Got some wicked photos of lightning!!! Plus got about 1000 mosquito bites but soo worth it!! I have been wanting to get photo's of lightning like I did for about 5 years and today was the day!! So tomorrow morning I will send a couple of the pics to the local newspaper to see if they want to publish them. Fingers crossed :)

So overall was a great weekend and I am feeling really happy for the 1st time since I have been back from India. I am stuffed now and can feel the adrenaline from the storm wearing off so will cruise to my lovely bed, probably lie there for a while and then dose off into a nice relaxing sleep hahaha. Man I love my bed!!! I wonder if its legal to marry a bed, hhmm. Although the baby's would look a little odd hahaha. Look what I type when im tired!!!


Lance

Computer Geek!

Have just woken up after a late night!

Went to Troys and Angela's last night for dinner. Was really good catchin up with them. After that I went to the viewing of "The Last Year" which was the pilot series I worked on before I went to India. Bloody hell it looked really good!! I was really impressed by the whole thing! And also the acting was amazing by all who was involved. I am pretty confident that someone will pick it up. Was really weird seeing myself on screen!! Don't know if I liked it too much but maybe in the future when I have a few more wrinkles I will give acting a good go.

After the viewing we all went to Match bar on Pitt st. I think I have now found my favorite bar! Was such a nice atmosphere. Everyone was just relaxed and chilling to Opshop who were playing. Loved it!!

So next for me is a road trip tomorrow up north with Amit and Echo. Love road trips! Then on Sunday I am going to the Hunua waterfall for a swim and picnic with troy, Angela and a few others. I have always wanted to swim in that waterfall because its soo beautiful plus the water is crystal clear and cool :)

During badminton a couple of nights ago I had shooting pains going from under my right arm right down to my right little toe. Have never experienced something like that before and my right knee gave way yesterday whilst walking. I think it has something to do with my left shoulder tho because its spazzaming and is painful. I read up that if you pull something on one side of your body or hurt a nerve, it can affect the other side of your body!! So interesting. So I think I just pulled my left shoulder whilst playing. Man the human body is interesting!

Anyway, gotta get a WOF for my car today. Its overdue by only 4 months hahaha. So slack!!


Lance

City and Shooting Star!!

Spent the last couple of days in the city. When you don't have much to do being in the city is quite a good thing because you meet a lot of people. Met up for coffee with Jessica yesturday from the documentary i was filming so that was really cool. After coffee i went to catch the ferry home but it was cancelled so ended up seeing River Queen. I must say that i was really dissapointed with the movie although there were some pretty cool shots in it i liked. This morning i had a meeting for a job that is coming up later in the year and after that i went and visited Alex and Dan to see how things were going with the doco. I then went and saw Domino which stars Keira Knightley. I thought it was an ok movie but not the greatest. Some of the cinematography in it was beautifull and then some of it was really annoying by the way the camera moved. It was more shaky than Memories haha.

Just spent a good 2 hours in Borders book shop on Queen st looking at photography books. Some of the photo's in those books are incredible and really inspirational. I have decided i am going to focus more on my photography than i have been. I do want to become professional at it one day so i am now looking at a few courses. Will see how it goes i guess. And after seeing those books today I now have even more of a travel bug. Its like having an itch but you just cant get it!!! I guess everyone feels like that at some stage in their lives tho. After borders i met up with Echo and Sophie (crazy chinese camera chicks) haha. Was good to see them again and now Echo is coming up north for a road trip this weekend.

Tonight i have the viewing of "The Last Year" that i was doing lighting ass on before i went to India. I know that as soon as i see the scene with me as a computer geek i am just gonna sink into my chair. Cant believe i did that and Jerard did'nt even make me wear computer glasses so that makes me think that i am actually a geek!! Would explain a few things haha.

Shooting Star!!!! Saw an INCREDIBLE shooting star the other day and the REALLY wierd thing is that i was expecting it!! Freaky!!! Plus it was an overcast night!! So random, i was just sitting on the deck at about 2am in the morning and i knew it was coming for some reason. I just looked up and there it came through the clouds. It lit up the whole sky!! Pretty cool!!

Im going to Troys and Angela's for dinner tonight before the viewing. They live in the Heritage just down the road from TVNZ. Cant wait to just jump into the pool they have on the roof!! Its been sooo hot lately!! Plus I havent seen them both for a few months.


Lance