Domestic Scenes

Our actors and actresses braved the scorching heat in our garage to complete filming for the month in the Bay Area. We are now headed down to Southern California and the East Coast, where will will complete the rest of our filming.

Nearly a dozen domestic scenes were filmed this weekend. Notable scenes include Qiu Jin’s husband and his drinking buddies, wedding p...Read more

Hakone Day 2, Datong School, and Sun Yat-Sen

Day two of filming last weekend took us again to Hakone Gardens in Saratoga. We filmed scenes of Qiu Jin discussing political ideas with a group of Chinese female students. The actresses’ kimonos were prepared expertly by Yuki, who is a master at tying the obi! Hakone Gar...Read more

Hakone Gardens, Overfelt Gardens, and Secret Society

We had a 16-hour film shoot spread across three locations: Hakone Gardens in Saratoga, Overfelt Gardens in San Jose, and our Qing Dynasty House Set in our garage! Filming and photography yielded a lot of good footage and photos. Thanks to everyone who came out and participated! Tomorrow, we do it all over again, alth...Read more

Chinese Women’s Army

At Vista Point, we filmed scenes of Li Jing as Qiu Jin practicing Tai Chi and reading by a tree, mirroring those we shot in April with Melissa as Young Qiu Jin. The following day, we were at Berkeley’s Tilden Park for the Chinese Women’s Army. ...Read more

Li Jing at Vista Point

We’re headed to Berkeley for the evening. Tomorrow morning, we’ll be filming the Chinese Women’s Army scene with Li Jing and thirty extras. Here’s a photo from today’s shoot at Vista Point, between Edgewood and Highway 92.

Priming Walls

This morning, we primed the walls in our Chinese house garage set. We’ll be painting the walls in the next few days. This weekend, we’ll be filming several dramatic recreation scenes with Li Jing and members of Qiu Jin’s Women’s Army.

Enjoy this short 12-second time-lapse photography movie of us priming the walls.

Building our Chinese Set

We spent the weekend building our Chinese house set in our garage. With help from our neighbor, Jerry, we got all of the walls raised and set up by the afternoon! Right now, we’re sealing the joints and screws with joint compound before we tackle priming and painting the walls. Soon, our furniture will arrive, putting the finishing touches on a late 19th-cent...Read more

Melissa as a young Qiu Jin

Yesterday, we photographed and filmed Melissa, who is playing the role of a young Qiu Jin. Melissa was very patient as we fought through the cold, harsh and unforgiving wind at Vista Point and San Jose. More photos from our shoot to come soon. Thanks to JP, Sammy, and Melissa’s parents for their assistance in yesterday’s events.

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China - Impressions

The day we arrive in Beijing, the sky is surprisingly blue. It's a much prettier image than the overcast gray I remember from my last trip back in 2001. Considering the amount of work the Chinese government is doing to make a good impression for the Summer Olympics, I wouldn't be surprised if they were building some giant Total Recall machine that would purify the air and create perfect skies in time for the opening ceremonies.

Security is noticeably heavy at Tiananmen Square. The area is teeming with police, soldiers, and...Read more

In-Flight Entertainment

Being stuck on a 15-hour flight and not being able to sleep really sucks. After going through all our iTunes downloads, I turned to the airline's movie channel, and got caught up in the epic adventures of one Scandinavian hero of lore.

Anything with Angelina Jolie in it tends to lower my expectations for a movie, so I have to say I was pleasantly surprised when "Beowulf" turned out to be pretty decent. Sure, there are lots of cheesy parts, mostly involving breasts, both male and female. In one scene, after a mass...Read more