Chapter 101


    "Thank you for your attention. After flying over to visit some wet markets that sell dog meat and visiting


    various dog meat farms of various sizes, this is the storyline and storyboard that we came up with. We


    were captivated by the idea of conflicting views of ourmon society to that of the local people,


    especially the older generation where eating dog meat is still a part of their tradition and culture,” I


    paused a little as I changed the slide.


    I could tell that I still had the attention of everyone in the room and that was a great step forward


    presentation with their killer questionster on, but for now, I wanted toplete telling them the entire


    story that I had in mind.


    “We still want to push for a clear message to ending the cruelty of the dog meat trade and farming


    while showing that we’re not actively advocating for the destruction of cultures and traditions. We n


    to do this by incorporating the real trend that this activity is in fact losing its poprity especially among


    the younger generation. Naturally, we believe that this tradition would cease to exist anyways as dogs


    take on another role in society as people’s pets and friends,” I exined patiently.


    My exnation earned few nods from the audience and that gave me more confidence to go on. It


    seemed like Ace’s storyline was heading in the right direction and now I just need to make sure that the


    storyboard that I had on the slide portrays that storyline well.


    “As for the storyboard that we have in mind, we’ll start by showing footages around the theme of dogs


    as a man’s best friend before shing to show the conditions in uncontrolled dog meat farms. We


    believe that the contrast would be quite disturbing and will help capture people’s attention. We will then


    go on to show the tradition rted to this issue such as scenes from markets and local restaurants


    before transition to show the downfall of this trend over time by showcasing the newer and younger


    generation including people around our age, then teenagers and then children with their new


    rtionship with dogs as apanion rather than food. Then we’ll end with introducing the foundation


    and instructions on how the viewers can make their donations while keeping that as subtle as


    possible,” I exined beforeing to the end of the storyboard on the presentation slide.


    There was a brief moment of silence as everyone seem to take in my presentation. Ace seemed quite


    satisfied with my presentation although he did notment on anything.


    “Anyments?” Ace asked the other in the room.


    “Is that your idea for the storyline? It’s very like you,” Jeremy asked with a smile on his face.


    “You can tell?” Ace replied lightly.


    “Yeah…it’s very…well positioned to resonate with many people,” Jeremymented openly.


    I guess after working with Ace for a while the team had gotten used to telling which was his work even


    without Ace standing up to take credit for it directly. Even I knew that all of Ace’s work had a touch of


    him and was quite unique from the others. I bet all of his works were sessful because I have never


    heard of a project that Ace supervised that ended in failure or was not well received by the audience of


    the public before.


    “That’s my storyline that Karina adapted, and that storyboard is pretty much her independent work


    based on a few sentences of the storyline that I gave her. Not bad, right?” Ace said with a grin.


    “Right…not bad at all,” Richard chimed in with a nod.


    I felt like praises were being rained on me from above and suddenly the sun was out and shining. ForContent protected by N?v/el(D)rama.Org.


    Richard to say that my story was ‘not bad’ felt like a hard-earnedpliment. I bit on my lower lip a


    little to keep myself from smiling like a fool right in front of everyone.


    “Thank you,” I murmured as I headed back to my seat.


    “Well, that is that. Do we have a consensus already on the storyboard or do we want to put it to the


    vote?” Ace asked as he leaned back casually in his seat.


    “No need. We’ll go ahead with what you and Karina had co-developed. We’ll all do our part now for the


    detailed design, budgeting and all that. There are many technical things that needs to be sorted out for


    sure on the filming and production side,” Richard said sternly.


    “Great. That’s that then. I’ll leave it up to Karina toe up with a more detailed storyboard. Of course,


    you’re wee to mash in some other ideas from the other teams as well. I think they’ve got some


    good ideas for more emotional scenes here and there,” Ace suggested before wrapping up the


    meeting.


    “Ok. Thank you,” I replied determinedly.


    Suddenly, I had my work cut out as part of Project Alpha and it was a very big part as well. The


    storyboard will determine almost everything about this project. It would be a hit or miss and I was


    determined for thismercial to be a massive hit.


    …


    I was in Ace’s office when I received a call about his schedule from senior secretary. Every week or so


    she would give me a call to recap Ace’s schedule especially the parts that required him to interact with


    external parties.


    “A business trip? Aha…ok…” I said as my hand busily jotted down some notes about the uing


    business trip.


    The secretary gave me additional details about the trip including who Ace was expected to meet as


    well as some requirements that the client had slotted in.


    “Chase Creatives will also be there?” I eximed in absolute surprise.


    Why would the client invite both Ace and someone from our biggestpetitor in the industry to go on


    the same trip? Is this some kind ofpetition or something?


    --To be continued…