TRMP Chapter 76

Jiang Yifeng sent the designed logo to Long Li.

Long Li also arranged a meeting time with Jiang Yifeng—as long as Jiang Yifeng also approved of Long Li’s new perfume, they would begin preparing to register the company and trademark and start production.

Jiang Yifeng invested capital, and Long Li invested technology and time. The two hit it off.

“Chu Yuan, it means a new beginning.”

When Jiang Yifeng spoke about his new business to Xie Jingshen, his eyes sparkled.

He was too embarrassed to mention last night’s events to Xie Jingshen, but he wanted to see Xie Jingshen, so he used the new business as an excuse to chatter on and on, like a little loudspeaker.

But Xie Jingshen loved seeing Jiang Yifeng full of energy.

Especially when Jiang Yifeng was working hard for their future, Xie Jingshen felt his heart soften completely.

Jiang Yifeng could do very little; he only had a little money. He couldn’t invest in movies or build iconic buildings, but he used his best efforts to create anchors—using the limited money to create opportunities to meet Xie Jingshen.

“You like money so much, how come you’re so willing to spend it now?” Xie Jingshen leaned on his hand, watching Jiang Yifeng with a smile. “Jiang Xiaofeng, how much have you spent?”

“…” Jiang Yifeng subconsciously pinched the corner of his clothes, calculating in his mind while waving his hand magnanimously, “That little money is nothing, it’s always going to be spent.”

—But he would rather starve to death than pay ten yuan for a meal delivery fee.

Xie Jingshen watched Jiang Yifeng’s affected generosity, his raised right leg retracted slightly, and his cheek moved closer to Jiang Yifeng.

“Jiang Xiaofeng.” Xie Jingshen looked at Jiang Yifeng, his expression gentle but hiding a hint of danger that Jiang Yifeng sensed, “Only willing to spend money on me?”

“Yeah, not really, I have to work hard to make our meetings happen.” Jiang Yifeng’s eyes crinkled into a smile.

Xie Jingshen wouldn’t readily tell Jiang Yifeng what he was doing, but Jiang Yifeng knew that Xie Jingshen wasn’t idle.

He would casually mention that he had invested in a movie, or that he was preparing a new project. Although it sounded like a normal work process, thinking about the main business of Xie Jingshen’s company, one would know what he was doing it for.

Jiang Yifeng knew.

So Jiang Yifeng had to work even harder.

Jiang Yifeng smiled while holding his phone, and the smile in Xie Jingshen’s eyes deepened.

His gaze wandered over Jiang Yifeng’s neck. If Jiang Yifeng wasn’t separated from him by a world, he really wanted to use his teeth to leave another mark on his neck.

—That bit of skin was so thin and tender. When he lowered his head, he could see the blue veins. His teeth against the skin could even feel the breath existing for him.

Xie Jingshen was silent for a moment. He felt that the frequency of his excitement had been a little high lately.

Jiang Yifeng felt a little creeped out by Xie Jingshen’s gaze. He covered his legs with the quilt and continued to tell Xie Jingshen about the big scene they would be filming tomorrow.

“I won’t look for you in the morning. I want to watch Director Zhao film the one-shot scene.”

“Do you want to be a director?” Xie Jingshen wasn’t asking Jiang Yifeng for the first time.

But Jiang Yifeng’s answer was different this time, “I don’t know, I just think I should learn more skills.”

“Even if I’m an actor, I need to know which position I should be in for which shot.”

The person with the deepest grasp of the rhythm of the entire play is the director. No matter how wonderful the character sketches the actors receive, if the editing is a mess, the only result is failure.

“If I can’t play a very important role, I’ll strive to be the best version of myself in every shot of the editing.”

Jiang Yifeng’s eyes narrowed slightly with a smile.

He had chosen the path of an actor.

Since he was going to walk it, why couldn’t he have some ambition?

Jiang Yifeng arrived at the set early the next morning.

He familiarized himself with the layout of the entire set and carefully read the introduction to the scene.

Since everyone’s scripts were different, Jiang Yifeng borrowed Guan Shaodong’s script to read and familiarized himself with the content to be filmed in this scene from his perspective.

It was a scene where Guan Shaodong confronted a minor character.

However, this confrontation was very exciting.

The minor character came to rescue someone, but the other person was being held by Guan Shaodong. The minor character fought five people alone, while Guan Shaodong had to rely on his intelligence to subdue people—ultimately making the minor character succumb to him and give up using force to take the person away, instead exchanging with Guan Shaodong.

This scene was mainly to allow the male lead to win the city lord’s appreciation.

And when this scene happened, Jiang Yifeng’s “dead soldier” had already died, so he couldn’t accompany the male lead, forcing the male lead to rely purely on his wits.

After the scene was set up, the positions of dozens of extras also had to be carefully worked out.

Jiang Yifeng didn’t understand the reason for the positions before filming. Zhao Jinming and the action director repeatedly instructed the scene several times. After everyone stood still, they repeatedly ordered a few times with a megaphone, still worried.

The martial arts performers stood in front, while the rest were scattered in the back.

The positions of the main actors were set. A dozen large and small cameras were hanging in different positions in the air, while another cameraman held the camera and stood at the front.

Jiang Yifeng sat behind the screen. He felt that the atmosphere in the whole room was extremely oppressive.

When Zhao Jinming shouted “action”, the whole room suddenly moved.

The minor character entered the door. The camera slowly retreated, and the martial arts performers stepped forward, kicked out by neat martial arts moves. The camera slowly turned its angle, capturing the opponent’s movements on the screen.

The minor character grabbed someone and threw them into the crowd, then twisted someone’s arm. He held the last person by the neck and slowly moved forward, threatening everyone with the hostage.

In the camera, Guan Shaodong walked slowly down through the crowd, fanning himself, looking like a playful young master.

However, everyone’s expression in the camera was solemn, staring intently at Guan Shaodong’s movements. Guan Shaodong slowly stepped in front of the minor character.

Jiang Yifeng was just watching outside the camera. He felt like he even had to hold his breath.

The rhythm of the whole scene was very fast. The scenes that should have been divided into more than a dozen shots were merged together, which made the whole scene appear extremely oppressive and smooth.

The scenes recorded by all the cameras were proving the scene shot by that one camera. Zhao Jinming kept adjusting the other cameras, but the main camera still followed the movements of the two.

Jiang Yifeng saw such a large scene for the first time.

He had seen other people shoot long takes before. It was very satisfying, one shot to the end, and the whole picture was clean and neat.

However, he didn’t expect it to be so shocking to watch live.

His gaze was fixed on the two people in the camera.

Every line and every action of theirs was related to the quality of the long take.

Even Guan Shaodong’s attitude was more restrained than before filming.

A few minutes seemed longer than a century.

When Zhao Jinming shouted “cut”, Jiang Yifeng realized it.

His back was covered in sweat, but a very unique excitement and wonderful interest surged in his heart.

—He also wanted to try.

Jiang Yifeng said softly in his heart.

He also wanted to try this feeling.

It was a pity that Jiang Yifeng, a minor character, was not worthy of shooting such long takes at all.

The two main characters in the long take were Guan Shaodong, the absolute male lead of this play, and a minor character who was once a famous martial arts star in China. He switched to being an action director in his early years, but now he was making a special appearance in this play.

The distance between Jiang Yifeng and the long take was not only the distance between him and the protagonist, but also the distance between him and big productions and big directors.

After all, small directors often film long takes without distinguishing between importance and inappropriateness.

“Look, at this scene where Guan Shaodong walks down in the camera, we will render the others in the later stage, leaving only Guan Shaodong alone and a few people on his side who won’t block the picture, so their expressions are very important.” Zhao Jinming pointed at the camera and said to Jiang Yifeng, and Jiang Yifeng nodded, looking very serious.

After Zhao Jinming finished speaking, he saw that Jiang Yifeng still seemed to have a bit of unfinished business, so he couldn’t help but narrow his eyes and smile, “What’s wrong, want to shoot?”

“Yes.” Jiang Yifeng nodded sincerely.

“That’s a bit difficult. You have to know that even traffic stars like Gu Miao find it difficult to get dramas with long takes.” Zhao Jinming shook his head. “You have to take it one step at a time. You’re popular now, but you’re still a long way from getting to this point.”

Zhao Jinming mentioned “Gu Miao”, and Jiang Yifeng’s emotions gradually cooled down, but he said that he was popular, and Jiang Yifeng was a little confused.

His traffic was indeed increasing, but he was still far from being a real traffic star.

He couldn’t be called “popular”.

Thinking this, Jiang Yifeng flipped through his social media to take a look.

With just one glance, Jiang Yifeng blankly put down his phone.

He couldn’t understand why there were suddenly so many comments in his comment section—the number of reposts, likes, and comments was unbelievably high.

Jiang Yifeng searched his name. There were still people discussing him.

Marketing accounts on the square were discussing him and Guan Shaodong, or him and “Mu Yu Ge”, while passersby had cut out a lot of Jiang Yifeng’s pictures, put on an “A Bao” filter, and promoted their handsome guy.

Jiang Yifeng silently looked at his “A Bao” colored self.

His lips were so red that they were about to drip blood.

The outline of his nose was almost worn away.

But it seemed that every popular star could get this kind of treatment.

“It seems that I really…” took a solid step on the road to popularity.

Jiang Yifeng rubbed his eyebrows.

He waited for Zhao Jinming to shoot a few more shots before completely ending today’s scene.

Jiang Yifeng saw that there was still a lot of time left, so he called Luo Qi.

“Brother Luo, about what you asked me to contact you before…”

“Why are you calling me at this time!” Luo Qi stood behind the spotlight, looking at the little stars on the stage, and couldn’t help but lower his voice to speak to Jiang Yifeng, “Didn’t you say you would call me when you were done? Didn’t you only ask for one day off?”

Luo Qi was a little worried that Jiang Yifeng would fly out to find his unreliable boyfriend as soon as he took a leave of absence.

His words made Jiang Yifeng subconsciously think of the marks behind his neck.

He raised his hand and touched it—the tooth marks had been covered with a band-aid and hidden by his slightly long hair.

But Jiang Yifeng was still a little guilty.

“Director Zhao invited me to watch them shoot a long take.” Jiang Yifeng squatted on the side of the set and said in a low voice, “It just finished filming.”

Luo Qi paused.

He had originally prepared a lot of follow-up work for Jiang Yifeng.

Various TV dramas, magazines, variety shows, and interviews.

Every star has to go through this step.

Especially the stars of their small company, in order to quickly turn their popularity into money, the methods are even more aggressive and intense.

However, Luo Qi was suddenly a little uncertain at this time.

Since Jiang Yifeng could gain Zhao Jinming’s appreciation, that proved that Jiang Yifeng might be able to go further on the road of an actor—an actor who can stand in the top resource circle of the entertainment industry will only bring greater benefits to the company.

Then Jiang Yifeng, could he be that person?

The author has something to say:

President Xie: Money is omnipotent, especially in the film and television industry.

President Xie: I’ll film a hundred!