Flights of Fantasy!

It seems to be an eternity since I blogged(although its just 18 months!), and now here I'm! Before you get confused with the profile photo of mine thinking that I have changed my profession, let me tell you that's part of "Flights of Fantasy!", which is the topic of my blog for today!

I couldn't find a better reason to write than the music video "Flights of Fantasy", which was made by team ITIS as part of the intra-company competition "War of the Videos"(WotV)- a mega-event of the extra-curricular gala, what we call as "Altus". This video although not technically brilliant, will still be special for me, just for the gusto shown by very few of us-(check the photo-Kaus, Anurag, Ria and me). As a matter of fact, the ones in the video were the ones who actually did everything! Oops, apart from the folks seen in the video, Niks and Majeti did help us a lot!

Let me give a jiffy of "Altus" for the mortals who haven't heard of it! As I mentioned, our company is divided into 6 cultural teams, namely - Aqua, Itis, Ventus, Ignis, Lamina and Terra. under the Altus umbrella, a variety of events are conducted, and typically an Altus cycle goes for 6-7 months. This was the 3rd cycle of Altus, and team ITIS, had almost been on the top, but Terra took a huge leap before the WotV, which was the last event of the cycle. The penultimate event (Spin of the wheel), nailed the hopes of ITIS team, and our plans for making the video which had started long before the "Spin", got dented. We had got our story in place with every day meetings, but soon after the event, many of us lost enthu as we couldn't be at top this time also! However, in a matter of 3 weeks, BOY! we fought, slogged, changed scripts at last moment, shoot, re shoot, broke our heads over the dimness of the light, the angles of the camera, the non-existence of helpers, the costumes, the various takes and retakes, "behind the scenes" in E-inn resort in E-city( I dropped a Rs.600/- white-forrest cake on the floor, the reactions of Majeti and Kaus on that and finally we ate the same later!), Tavarekere road scene which was shot on the morning of the Bangalore bomb blasts in the same vicinity and Ria madame showing her modelling skills in front of the camera when she had to mime "Aslam bhai", the school scene which was shot twice-once in Baldwin's (and this scene was not good enough), and then finally in SRV school,the L'Oreal Salon in BTM, the editing, the publicity, and finally we came up with what we called "Flights of Fantasy".

This video may not have won the 1st prize( we were 2nd of 5 teams which participated), but then we really acheived a sense of accomplishment, as for us those numerous moments which went by in making this video, will bring a smile on our faces in the years to come!!

Do check out the video - Flights of Fantasy!

And yeah, the icing on the cake- paintings which were sketched by Ria in an hour flat, that made even the judges go gaga over our video! Truly we owe Ria for the amazing work she did!!