A Reflection on Production

The production process was a lot easier and less haphazard than the experience we had at the time of our preliminary task, so Zara and I were very happy. Both of us weren't fasting, so Ramadan didn't affect us much personally that day, but it worked out in our favour - there was no unecessary social pressure - who visits a tourist site at 9:00am while fasting? Other than us, of course. So yes, I was personally at ease a lot more than I was the last time since I didn't need to keep my guard up much.

The first big problem we faced was the unforeseen road closures (welcome to Pakistan, the REAL land of the free and home of the brave) but Zara's mom was able to carefully maneuver us through the barricades (possibly illegally (hehehe)) Our second big problem was the fact that the guards didn't let our gimbal through, which was dissapointing to say the least, because our entire shoot was planned for the area of the Fort where our main filming aid wasn't allowed. Well, all we could do at that point was rely on the steadiness of my hands (very unreliable, but we tried). Still, at least we weren't bound heavily by time and could let our creative inspiration take control.

Throughout the process, I was excited about the usage of new aesthetically pleasing footage that would enhance our narrative. I enjoy shooting a lot - the only thing that was missing was more friends to make the experience enjoyable, but again, we were productive so that was good. We decided during the shoot that we would definitely reuse the footage from the preliminary again, because some really good shots just couldn't be recreated. With a new collection of footage, once we were absolutely sure we couldn't film more, or were too exhausted to do so, we decided to wrap. Zara details some specifics of the production experience below too: