I’m Really a Superstar

The tasks had been assigned accordingly.

But everyone was still a little confused.

Sun Han was a little taken aback. “Using cigarettes to make a 3D model?”

The old-young-sick-injured group’s Comrade Old said, “And making a lung?”

“Yes. Everyone please make the most of your time now,” Zhang Ye said. “I have to say this beforehand, but whoever can work overtime today, please do so. Also, if there’s no compelling reason, could the four of you from the Public Service Announcement Department stay overnight? I will be staying myself as well, so let’s be prepared to work all the way till morning! This will be a difficult battle as we don’t have much time until the deadline, so we can only sacrifice our rest and sleep!”

“Alright then.”

“I’m fine with that.”

“I will follow Teacher Zhang’s instructions!”

The four of them all acknowledged the need to work overtime.

His request for overtime was actually only directed towards the Public Service Announcement Department employees as the others who came to help with the production still had their basic duties to fulfill at work and it was unfair to ask them to do the same.

Soon after, everyone started getting busy in the office.

Lungs?

Using cigarettes to create a 3D model of lungs?

No one understood Zhang Ye’s intent nor could they see what this advertisement would be about, but everyone executed their tasks accordingly as given by Zhang Ye. If Sun Han or any other person had given the orders, it might have been possible that not everyone would have put in their full trust and simply followed the instructions. But it was who Zhang Ye stood before them. First was his reputation and fame as a calligrapher, advertiser, literature writer, world class mathematician, etc, a whole host of titles to his name. Second, everyone knew he had a bad temper; even the newcomers to the television station felt intimidated. In the group of personnel which had come to help out, there were two people who had just joined the television station this year. When they started, Zhang Ye had already left the station. Even though they had not met or worked together before, they had still heard the countless stories concerning Zhang Ye—when he chased off a guest teacher during the lecture on the Three Kingdoms, his scolding of the leader, beating up the leader’s son and creating trouble during a live broadcast. All of this led to his reputation preceding him. He was a legend to them.

With a variety of other reasons, many people instinctively feared Zhang Ye, knowing that he would even scold their mothers if it came to such a point!

“Where’s the machine? Where is it?”

“Don’t gather around here! It’s too crowded!”

“Old Zhou, bring the guys and go to table three to work.”

“Someone get me a pen. Mine’s out of ink!”

The office was filled with the sounds of people working. Zhang Ye did not slack off either. He got Sun Han to bring him to the soundproofed recording studio where the ad would be filmed. By rights, the studio was not booked for the Public Service Announcement Department today, but after getting special approval from the station, Zhang Ye brought along his team to claim the recording studio for his own use after some haggling. Although the props were not ready yet, he had already begun outlining the settings as he took a notepad and pen out to do the storyboarding.

He opened up the game ring to buy a Memory Search Capsule and ate it to speedily find the original ad from his previous world. When he opened his eyes again, Zhang Ye immediately proceeded to draft the storyboard. He divided it into five key panels, sketching it out on the notepad. It was drawn very simply and crudely and looked like something that only Zhang Ye himself would understand. Every panel was labeled with some numbers, like time durations and other notes. All of this information would help him to better plan his production work. Since it was not the first time he was involved in advertisement production, he was familiar with all the tasks and planning involved. As such, he appeared very professional in handling his work.

“Teacher Zhang, does this background look suitable?”

“That part won’t do. Use a computer to create the background instead. I need it to look gloomier. Get them ready and don’t forget the smoke effects that need to be composited in. I need more variations of the smoke effects too. This is what both of you specialize in, right? OK, I will tell you in detail how the smoke should look like. It has to appear wispy, a little lighter, not too concentrated…”

In the blink of an eye, it was already time for lunch.

Some of them went downstairs to eat lunch while Zhang Ye and many others continued to do their work in the office. When Sun Han saw this, he got someone to order takeout to be delivered over so that everyone could eat.

Afternoon.

They finally got their hands on all the cigarettes.

“Unpack them!”

“Unpack everything.”

“Place them one by one into this box.”

Zhang Ye had to split his focus, sometimes checking on the progress at the fifth floor office, and at other times, heading to the recording studio to supervise the prop modeling.

Eventually, the background music was finished and ready. Two staff members brought three melancholic sounding arrangements for Zhang Ye to listen to. But after listening to them, he rejected them all and said, “These aren’t acceptable. I’ve already said I want at least 20 pieces of music to pick from. Please try a little harder! I need the music to be even slower!”

The female staff said, “But there are only these few music pieces in the library that fit the requirements you mentioned.”

Zhang Ye said, “Then don’t get them from the library.” He looked at Sun Han and said, “Let the relevant departments in the station help out with this. Compose a piece of suitable music that we can use.”

Sun Han was already sweating from fatigue. “Alright, I will try my best to get them to do so.”

Zhang Ye quickly told him, “Don’t try your best. You need to get it done no matter what. The ad will be a standalone piece and won’t involve any narration, so I don’t think I need to highlight the importance of the background music. The music will unite the whole ad and set its tone. It is the most important piece of the finished product, so we can’t mess this up. Tell the station that we need some technical people to help us out on this. When you find them, let them come look for me. I will explain the requirements in detail to them. If even they can’t do it, then we will pay an external company to get it done!”

Seeing Zhang Ye be so serious, Sun Han also straightened up. “OK, leave it to me!”

Zhang Ye’s attitude had infected the others and made everyone feel very tense.

This was who Zhang Ye was. No matter what the issue was, whether it was his own problem or a problem he promised to help someone else with, he would not prioritize one over the other. He was the type of person who would do his best at whatever he did. This attitude of seeking perfection was rooted in his fundamentals since he debuted. He did not like to fool others, and had his own understanding and pursuits, especially when it came to art. Everything else could be discounted, but this was not one of them!

One hour…

Three hours…

Five hours…

It was already evening and time to clock out.

A large group of the staff from the other advertising department had already left. From 3 PM in the afternoon until 7 PM now, people had been gradually leaving and only a handful had voluntarily stayed behind to help out. It was only because Sun Han had spent all day talking and persuading many of them that they did not all leave at once. But this was clearly not a good long-term plan. At around 8 or 9 PM at night, many of the television station’s departments had already switched off their lights and left work. The 5 or 6 people from the other departments who had stayed behind to help out could no longer endure it. After working on such a high tension job with a tight deadline for hours on end, who could endure it!?

They left as well.

Only Zhang Ye, Sun Han, and his team of the “awesome quartet” stayed behind.

Zhang Ye was not distracted by any of these issues as he continued to work on the 3D lung model which had already taken shape. He tweaked it a little here and there but was still unsatisfied with how it looked!

It didn’t seem right!

It just didn’t feel right!

The model was very similar to the one that was shown in the PSA from his previous world. The shape looked almost the same but it somehow lacked the same feel. This was a model of a pair of lungs that were made from thousands of cigarettes stacked together, but it obviously did not portray the feel of what lungs were like. Zhang Ye turned it around, looking at it from different angles, and even used a camera to test shots of it from multiple perspectives, but it still did not seem right!

Finally, Zhang Ye discovered the problem!

There was something wrong with the depth layering! This lung’s arrangement looked too precise from the front! The cigarettes displayed at the front of the lung should have been unevenly layered, but right now it was just a flat surface. It had lost the essence of a three-dimensional object. That’s why it did not have the feel of a lung!

They were done for!

A problem cropped up!

Zhang Ye took a deep breath and couldn’t help admitting that this was a very big error on his part. He had thought too simply of it when he conveyed the requirements to the modelers. As it took time for the model to be assembled, Zhang Ye hadn’t notice this problem earlier. But it seemed like it was too late now as the cigarettes used for modeling the lungs were fixed one-by-one onto a frame with glue. This made it almost impossible to do any modifications to it now as the glue had already dried and the cigarettes were all solidly in place!

Sun Han looked at him and asked, “What’s the matter?”

The employee with the flu said, “Teacher Zhang, what happened?”

Zhang Ye did not look too good as he explained, “There’s a flaw in the design. We can’t use this prop anymore. We have to remake it!” This demonstrated how difficult it was to create an advertisement, because the tasks thought to be simple and easy to execute would sometimes turn out to be utterly difficult. It would have to be done all over again, and sometimes, it wasn’t even as simple as redoing it once!

Old: “Ah?”

Young: “What?”

Sick: “This…this looks quite good though.”

Injured: “Yeah, what’s wrong with this?”

The four of them were dumbfounded.

It was getting so late already. Midnight was soon approaching. They had spent the entire morning and afternoon rushing, but now it looked like their hard work for the entire day had gone to waste?

Zhang Ye said, “We will redo this!”

Everyone was in despair now. They knew it was over, that this task would not be completed on time. A day was indeed not enough. Up until now, they still did not know what the ad would look like. But more importantly, the only prop to be used for the ad was even facing a design flaw? Wasn’t this adding fuel to fire!

Sun Han also blanched. “The modelers have already left. H-h-how will we be able to remake this now? Besides, we’ve run out of cigarettes too. We wasted quite a lot of them when we were creating this model! Why don’t we just make do and use this to finish our task first!”

Zhang Ye shook his head and said, “That won’t do. Even if we use this model for the shoot, it won’t have the desired effect. I know everyone is tired, but let’s endure a little more!”

The intern girl clenched her teeth and said, “I’ll go get the cigarettes! I know this brand and I’ve seen it at the 24-hour convenience store downstairs!”

The other staff members meanwhile continued busying themselves with work but it was obvious they had also felt the despair because of this problem, and were no longer holding out much hope for the project. So many of them had spent the entire day and night to make this model of the lungs, but there were only a few of them left now, and they felt totally drained and tired. Further, the modelers had left the office as well, so what else could they do? They couldn’t even finish if they pulled an all-nighter, right?