Filming: Boxer Training, 29th January 2022

So today was....somewhat successful but there were a few hiccups.

3 people were meant to arrive: Roshaan Wasif, for having a DSLR. Najam Ul Hasan, for acting as coach to Boxer (Jawad). Jawad Sohail Dar, the Boxer himself.

I had informed a time of 11am to reach my home and everyone had reached by 11:20. We gathered equipment and headed off. I packed some really big lights, a tripod stand with a removable monopod, and some extensions. Roshaan just brought the DSLR. Jawad and Najam were only informed to bring or just come wearing attire that one would wear at the gym.

When we reached there, the first hiccup was the angles and how I wanted to actually go about it. I didn't quite plan in advance, so some form of storyboards would have been tremendously helpful to have. Though I did make some, it didn't really seem to work when I tried to apply it practically, as I hadn't been to the area much. So filming for pretty much everything took longer than it should've because I was experimenting and trying angles and motions.

We did all shots in order. First the outside one, Jawad going inside, etc. But then the second hiccup arrived. The management staff present there today were people I had never seen before and were quite annoyed by the presence of my crew and of filming, and questioning when I had sought permission for such a task. I elaborated my situation and told them I visited last Friday and also asked yesterday to confirm that it was indeed allowed, but I made a mistake, which was that I didn't write down the names or contacts of the people I took permission from. I expected the same management to be present today, which was an oversight on my part. They were only somewhat convinced when I described their facial features, and let me use the gym, but they still were quite annoyed, so we had to film in a bit of a rush.

At first we headed to the basement, which was the floor with the punching bags. There was a huge mirror there as well. The main problem with filming here though was the fact that the lights weren't LED's, but instead were tube lights, and their flickers showed up on camera. It wasn't on all lights, but it was on most of them, hence why lighting was limited and why there was so much noise on the footage.

Future note: In a later filming session I was able to use the school's DSLR and actually get hands on experience with how to use one properly. In this session the ISO was set to auto, hence the noise. But in the upcoming session with the actual fight, there was next to no noise, despite being an even lower light environment. Learn how to use the camera first, folks!

The staff grew more annoyed the longer we stayed there, so we just kept telling them 5 minutes, and the remaining things we did in a big rush. In the basement with the suiting up and actual boxing shots we spent about 20 or 25 minutes, and on the floor with the weights, about 7 minutes. Then the floor with the treadmills, 30 seconds. Just took it and left.

Hence why each action only really has one angle, otherwise I would've preferred having more variety.

But whatever, filming was complete, there wasn't really anything that we missed out on, and if there was then I could either repeat footage or slow it down by 2.5 times to bring it from 60 to 24 fps and extend whatever we had.

Made the edit, had lunch with them, then got to work planning the rest of the video. Piece by piece it was coming together.

But for future projects I should remember to take contact info so I can actually prove to people that 'hey I was allowed to do this by this person'.

Looking back at this image...I could've brushed my hair better. Or shaved. Or both. But whatever I don't really take images for social media anyways. There's not a single photo of me online!

Well until now. Left to right is Roshan (Camera owner and helper), Me, My brother just having lunch with us, Najam (Coach), Jawad (Boxer).