The final challenge
June 12th 2013:
We've all been called into the living room of the dorm. It's been a whole two weeks since the last challenge. Sitting down on the couch, we all wait for EVE to turn on and give us the challenge. Soon she turns on. "Hello, trainees. Well done on getting this far into the show. I am here to give you your final challenge. You have all been through a lot. You have shown us your abilities when it comes to performing, modelling and teamwork. Our final test will put this all together and add on top of that, a little bit of acting. Your final challenge is this. You are each to write and produce your own original song for the group. You will then record these songs together and create a music video for each of them. Following that, the M/Vs will be posted online. From there you will earn points depending on how you do in several categories. These categories are:
Production: 50 points max
Acting: 50 points max
Storyline: 20 points max
Song: 50 points max
Audience Rating (Viewer count+like count): 100 points max
JYP Opinion: 30 points max
The total score will be out of 300. You have been given a month to create and record your songs, and another month to create your music videos. You will each receive a budget of 100,000 USD to create your music video. You are to edit the video yourself with assistance from the staff.
The winner of this challenge will have their song feature on the group's debut mini-album, and have a proper M/V created after. I wish you all the best. Good luck in the final challenge, work Hard!" With that, she shut off.
"Two whole months of preparation. That's quite a lot of time, but not enough to create a music video and song" Hyun-Shik states. he is generally quite good at creating Music videos and directing, so he understands the difficulties that we have in making them. I decided that the sooner I get on with it, the more time I will have to work on the M/V. I already have an idea in my head, now I just need to make it work. It shouldn't take me long to make the song as I have made it once before. The music video, however, may take some time as I have never made one before. but that problem can wait until I make the song and record it.
The next day I head straight for the studio after school. I am going to begin on the song immediately. I wanted to stick with the theme that the group is going to have, which is a kind of militaristic, historical style. Raise the Standard was good, so I will use a song that I created in my last life that has a similar theme. It had always been one of my favourite songs that I made for a boy group, and I'm happy that I get to be part of the team that performs it this time. Sitting down at the desk, I begin immediately to craft this song. I will recreate it, and perfect it.
A week passes, and I have finished making the backing track. All that's left to do is record the song. I have written down the lyrics and distributed them in a way that I believe will work. Later on, if my song wins then the distribution will have to be changed to fit the right number of members, but that should be fine. The song that I am using is WONDERLAND, which is a song I made for ATEEZ in my last life. This time, it will serve Vanguard, hopefully.
I make a quick call, and organise the first run through to prepare for recording with the others. Most are still working on their songs concept or the backing track, so they are surprised to hear that I'm ready to record already, but after a few seconds they realise who they are talking to. Two days following we gathered together for the first run through. I play the song for them as they follow along with the lyrics. A few of them are nodding their heads and some of them are lipsyncing along to try and get an idea of how it works. "Yo, this song is awesome!" DongBang states.
"I like it too" agrees Youngjae and Kyu-Bong at the same time. I smile, thankful that the others appreciate the song. "What are you calling it," Hyun-Shik asks me. I had already thought about this. I decided that I want to keep the original name which had been decided upon by the members of ATEEZ. I did this to help me remember the people responsible for bringing my songs into the world. there were some songs that I had decided will be renamed, but I will try and keep the names of most of them as a mark of respect for the artists that sang them for me in my past life.
"WONDERLAND, I will call it WONDERLAND," I tell them. They all smile and nod their head. "Good name, I like it" Hayashi comments. It takes us 3 days to finish the recording. I then spend the rest of my time helping the others by providing small pieces of advice and recording my vocals where they need them. I also work on the MV for my song. I've never created or directed a music video before so it's going to be hard for me. With a budget of 100,000 USD, it's going to help a lot. But I still have to figure out the storyboard and get crews and other factors sorted. It takes me three weeks, to get everything sorted out before I can finally begin recording for the MV. Most of the others have finished recording their songs now, and have begun planning for their MVs. Hyun-Shik being the most experienced in terms of cinematography and other similar subjects has already caught up and overtaken me. He has begun the recording process. He began by filming our individual scenes whenever he could and scheduled group sessions at points where we were all free. It seemed to work as it only took him just over a week and a half, and he is already onto editing. I decided to take a page from his own book and work similarly. I had my ideas and concepts sorted and now just needed to put them into action. I started with the individual scenes, which went smoothly. The group sessions were a little harder as I had to teach the others the choreography for the song as well. Ultimately. I managed to get the recording finished and had it edited with two hours to go until the deadline. I submitted it and lay back in my seat sighing. I hoped the others got done on time too. I was interested to see how their projects would turn out.