Chinese Entertainment: Directors Start with the Fairy Sister

There's absolutely no need for preparation to portray Zhen Zhibing.

Little Dragon Girl = Liu Yifei;

Liu Xiaoli = strict rules and regulations.

The contradiction between lust and greed and one's own moral integrity and rules is exactly what Zhao Yanxi is playing at this moment.

"Action!"

The clapperboard rang out crisply, and Zhao Yanxi took a deep breath, leaning closer to that pristine face once more.

His fingertips trembled slightly beneath his wide robe, his breathing was deliberately heavy, and his eyes held a mixture of infatuation and guilt.

Just as they were about to touch, he abruptly turned his head, landing a burning kiss on Xiaolongnu's flowing hair scattered across the stone bed...

"Cut!"

"This one is approved!"

The seriousness on Zhang Dahuzi's face eased slightly, and he revealed a rare look of satisfaction. He turned to Yu Min and smiled, "See? I told you Xiao Zhao is a talented actor."

A group of busybodies who wanted to see the excitement also praised it repeatedly.

Liu Yifei pulled off the silk scarf covering her eyes, looked at Zhao Yanxi who was still lying on the side, and chuckled, "Yanxi, you acted quite well~"

"That's~"

Zhao Yanxi proudly raised her head and subconsciously reached out her hand to Liu Yifei.

After hesitating for a moment, the little girl still took his hand and stood up.

So soft, so tender, so smooth, so cool...

This was Zhao Yanxi's first reaction after shaking hands.

Fortunately, Lao Zhao was a man of the world, and after Liu Yifei got up, he didn't hold on to her like the novice did.

"Being able to hold hands with a fairy-like beauty makes me feel like I don't need to wash my hands today~"

"What a fairy sister~"

Liu Yifei blushed slightly, looking embarrassed.

Zhao Yanxi smiled and was about to say a few more words when she suddenly felt a prickling sensation on her back.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw that the god of death was indeed walking towards him.

"Hehe, well, I'm going to prepare for the next scene!"

Having said that, Zhao Yanxi moved with lightning speed.

"snort!"

Liu Xiaoli snorted coldly. This Xiao Zhao was originally a reserved and honest good kid.

Why did you become more outgoing after fainting from low blood sugar?

Could it be that something in his brain suddenly came over him because of low blood sugar?

...

Zhao Yanxi has another scene to film in the afternoon, and when he's not filming, he works as a part-time photographer.

In 2004, the crew of "The Return of the Condor Heroes" had already used relatively high-end cameras such as the Sony HDW-F900, which represented the best balance between technology, cost, and image quality at the time.

When Zhao Yanxi was a director in her previous life, these high-end machines had basically already been phased out.

Now that I'm starting over, it'll be a good opportunity to familiarize myself with it a bit.

Meanwhile, while getting familiar with the equipment, Zhao Yanxi was also estimating how much it would cost to make a low-budget film.

In the early 2000s, the most expensive part of making movies wasn't the actors' salaries, but the cost of the crew and filming equipment.

For example, you could make a low-budget teen comedy film without needing any big-name stars.

A new actor's salary for a single film may range from several thousand to ten or twenty thousand RMB. Add a second-tier star who can carry the box office, and the salary is close to one hundred thousand RMB, so the total salary is only 30 RMB.

The costumes and props for these actors were cheap, after all, it's a youth film, at most 5 yuan;

Unless there are rich kids in the movie who need to be provided with luxury cars, mansions, and other luxuries, Zhao Yanxi would never do something as stupid as using a Baojun as a BMW.

Finally, there's the most expensive part of the production – the cost of staff for photography, art direction, lighting, and sound recording, as well as the rental of filming equipment and post-production costs.

Although these labor costs have been relatively cheap in recent years, the sheer number of people required, and the fact that filming takes at least a month, makes it impossible to afford.

Even a small film crew has thirty or forty people. Their salaries plus a month's worth of food, lodging and transportation would cost around 500,000 to 600,000 yuan. Let's take the lowest value of 500,000 yuan.

Equipment rental and post-production (editing, color grading, sound mixing) are also considerable expenses, estimated to be at least 300,000 to 500,000 yuan.

In this regard, we could try to find a solution from our alma mater, the Beijing Film Academy. Since the student is graduating and starting a business as a director, the alma mater should provide some support.

We aim to reduce equipment and subsequent costs to 30.

In other words, even with minimal effort to save on actor salaries and drastically reduce the budget, producing a youth comedy film requires an investment of at least 115 million yuan.

Zhao Yanxi estimated that she had received compensation from her parents and had over 600,000 yuan in her own pocket. Once filming for "The Return of the Condor Heroes" was completed, she could earn tens of thousands of yuan from her two jobs.

If we scrape together the last bit, we should be able to raise 70 yuan, which is still 45 yuan short of making the cheapest feature film.

There's still a significant gap; we need to think of ways to make money.

Unfortunately, in the original timeline, he hadn't yet started getting involved with stocks at this point in time; he only truly began investing in stocks after graduating from university in 18.

To make money in the stock market, he could only buy stocks like Maotai, Tencent, and BYD. He knew that these stocks would generally increase more than two hundred times in the next twenty years.

But... these stocks are either not yet listed, or they are still hovering around a few dollars. Trying to make money through the stock market is basically a pipe dream!

"Film, television, and music..."

People cannot earn money outside of their understanding. Zhao Yanxi entered the directing department of Beijing Film Academy, and after graduation, he struggled in the film and television industry to raise investment, and eventually directed short dramas. His familiarity and understanding of society basically came from the film and television industry.

Therefore, if you want to make money, you can only do so through this circle!

As for songs, although he is a music lover and can sing many good songs, he doesn't play any instruments, doesn't understand music theory, and his singing skills are only considered good among ordinary people.

Singing at a friend's gathering is fine, but selling songs? You might as well sell your ass!

"Selling your ass..."

Zhao Yanxi's eyes lit up slightly; this was indeed a good way to make money.

In his past life, he was a fragile college student, but in this life, he's physically strong enough to seduce ten rich women in one night!

The problem is I don't have any connections... I can't exactly go around asking, "Do you want a job?"

...

Ultimately, unable to find a buyer willing to pay up, Zhao Yanxi could only think of the simplest method – hard work to get rich.

To put it bluntly, it's just typing.

In her past life, Zhao Yanxi was involved in both film and television and entertainment. To find material—and more often, during her university years, to kill time—she read a vast number of novels.

If this were in the original timeline, Zhao Yanxi wouldn't even remember reading any novels.

However, after his rebirth, the fusion of his two souls gave him photographic memory and exceptional memory.

The novels and films I read in my past life are like scenes from a movie, replaying in my mind.

With the help of this cheat device, writing novels is a piece of cake!

Making money through writing is the most direct and convenient way, but its only drawback is that it's not quick enough.

Online writers are still very poor. Whether they write about youthful romance or various classical fantasy, 99% of online writers are still struggling to make ends meet.

Only a very small number of online authors are able to earn a substantial income by selling copyrights or receiving publishing royalties.

Zhao Yanxi could only pin her hopes on the possibility that her novel would be picked up by a publishing house.

However, Zhao Yanxi was quite confident, after all, "his" novel was not his own novel.

These are all high-quality works that have withstood the test of the market and readers in their original timelines!

...

Dinner was exceptionally lavish, even including braised pork.

Everyone on the crew knew what this meant—it meant they would be filming night scenes tonight!

"Yifei, is it okay for actresses to eat braised pork like that?"

Watching Liu Yifei eat elegantly yet quickly, Zhao Yanxi asked curiously, "Aren't you afraid of gaining weight?"

He remembered that the female stars of his time, let alone braised pork, even had rice served in individual portions.

Some female celebrities, in order to maintain their figure, claim to eat only three mouthfuls of rice.

"What do you mean 'fat'?" Liu Yifei said, her hands still busy. "Being suspended by wires every day is exhausting, you know. I can always do some exercise later!"

"Haha, that's true~"

Zhao Yanxi smiled. Female celebrities in this era are still quite humane.

Regardless of everything else, Zhao Yanxi ate her meal while thinking about the first novel she wanted to write.

"Hahaha...hahaha...so cute!"

Just then, I suddenly heard the crew members around me burst into laughter.

Zhao Yanxi looked in the direction of the sound and saw Liu Yifei, still wearing her costume, lifting up her white veil and jumping around like a zombie.

When she hopped right in front of Zhao Yanxi, she turned around with a smug smile and said, "See, this way I won't get fat~"

"Haha, absolutely!"

A sixteen or seventeen-year-old girl, so genuinely adorable.

The scenes filmed that evening were a fight between Liu Yifei and disciples of the Quanzhen Sect.

Zhao Yanxi stood behind the camera, watching the script supervisors operate the chainsaw, using the white smoke from the chainsaw to simulate the billowing smoke and clouds raised when the Quanzhen Sect disciples drew their swords.

Liu Yifei was pulled backward by the wire, and the heavy wig she had worn all day was pressing down on her head so much that it was almost uncontrollably flipping backward.

Zhao Yanxi frowned slightly. After all, he was still just a child. Could he handle such a heavy filming workload?

If he remembered correctly, Liu Yifei's cervical spondylosis was caused by the heavy filming schedule of "The Return of the Condor Heroes".

We should still find an opportunity to remind her.

In the original timeline, having been a fan of the "Fairy Sister" for so many years, Zhao Yanxi couldn't possibly ignore her pain knowing it.

What's more, who knows, you might actually succeed in meeting your idol in this lifetime!