Intriguing look at an alternative approach to the design of the surfaces on a car from BMW, but why stop at cars.

Imagine these sculpted fabric surfaces applied to buildings and architecture!

As a kid, this (Valley of Gwangi, 1969) was one of the most awesome things I had ever seen when it appeared as the Saturday night movie on our black and white TV*. This movie, along with the Seven Voyages of Sinbad and Jason and the Argonauts were quite magical. I knew that they were models and miniatures, but I didn’t care because they were beautifully crafted and to me, seemed full of life. It was not until my teens that I discovered that the same man, Ray Harryhausen was responsible for these films, along with a whole host of other fantastic visions.

Sadly, Ray Harryhausen passed away yesterday. The obituary in todays Guardian does a better job than I ever could, but it wouldn’t be hyperbole to say that cinema has lost one of it’s true greats.

*It was the mid-seventies in a tired seaside town in North Yorkshire and I would have been approx six years old. Colour TV had been invented (I’m not that old), but only a few of the neighbours had it.

The Sport Authority digital set, built and lit by Lightwell to a design by BDA.

First look at the new digital sets I prepared for Sport Authority. Sport Authority broadcast betting analysis via the web and use the Tricaster system to incorporate live action with digital sets.

Unlike true VR systems in which the cameras can move, the Tricaster makes full use of locked cameras and so keeps costs down and technology accessible. The main downside, is the lack of parallax effects but this is reasonably offset by the quality of lighting and materials that can be achieved by having fixed background plates.

More details to follow.

Batman Begins storyboard by Martin Asbury

I recently spotted some production copies of storyboard panels from Goldeneye for sale on ebay. I was thoroughly outbid as the price of each A4 copy for the iconic scenes eventually sold for more £80 each (not bad for a photocopy with drawing pin holes in each corner. I am fascinated by storyboards, not only for the draughting skills they exhibit, but their incorporation of design, direction and cinematography.  A quick Google search soon revealed that the artist behind these particular panels was Martin Asbury. His website is a storyboard goldmine!

Al Jazeera Arabic news channel recently upgraded their studios for HD broadcasts. I was delighted to be asked to provide the animated newsroom backdrops for the screens behind the presenters on the night-time bulletins. Other project committment meant that I hadn’t been able to take this project on initially, but when a window opened in my schedule I seized the opportunity to work with one of the worlds biggest broadcasters. By this stage, the deadline wasn’t far off, so I set about designing and preparing these set extensions in record-breaking time.

The final design comprises a double height space backed by office and control room spaces with views through to an atrium space beyond.

Update April 12, 2013 – This project has now been added to the Lightwell website

BBC News output underwent a comprehensive re-brand by Lambie Nairn in the spring of 2008. My contributions to this were the animated studio backdrops that played out in the Barco screens along three sides of the two studios. Working on the designs through my company, Lightwell and in collaboration with Jago Design (now BDA Set Design), we developed a digital environment comprising a newsroom backed by offices, galleries, control rooms and various ancillary spaces. The scene, along with animated characters, lifts and monitors was delivered in kit form and assembled by BBC News Graphics who applied the final blur effect along with the etched glass graphic effect.

BBC Ten O’Clock News – The left side corner of Studio N6

The space depicted in the backdrops is almost entirely self-enclosed apart from views through to small exterior courtyard and atrium spaces on each of the three sides. We had planned to use similar lighting for both the day and night-time versions of the scene. Different times of day would be indicated by changes to the lighting in those exterior zones and by switching off lighting in parts of the interior. Studio tests immediately revealed that this only produced dark patches from certain camera angles within the studio. We also soon realised (though it seems blatantly obvious with hindsight) that our scene could never go darker than the material surface of the screens, which in turn were being hit by quantities of diffuse spill light from the ceiling light boxes and lighting grid that resulted in a grey tone in place of blacks. I was stuck for ideas and with the re-launch fast approaching, set about experimenting with different lighting levels and different coloured lighting. Nothing was working as we had planned.

By late February 2008, we were short of time and in need of inspiration when, one morning during the school half term holiday my son started watching Lord of The Rings: The Two Towers. I walked into the room just as the scenes of the night battle were beginning. There on the screen was the solution I had been searching for.

The Two Towers scene featuring the night-time Battle of Helms Deep.

Studying this particular scene revealed a tightly controlled, silver-blue monochrome palette. The only exceptions to this came from the yellow/gold accents of the flaming torches. Borrowing this idea, I applied a similar lighting palette to the newsroom backdrops – it worked. We achieved a sufficiently well-lit interior, maintained similar levels of detail and texture to the daytime scene, but described a night-time condition throughout. Studio tests resulted in a sequence of refinements to the hue and contrast levels, but ultimately we had arrived at the final solution for our lighting design through a chance viewing of a scene from a movie being watched by a kid on his school holidays. I am a huge fan of serendipity.

The final night-time version of this digital set is below. The blue hue acquired a shade more red, whilst being slightly more saturated. The yellow/gold accents are similarly more saturated and bold.

BBC Ten O’clock News – Centre Panel

The designs I prepared were only ever expected to last a couple of years and were to be superseded, not by an updated design, but by a whole new building, studios and headquarters at Broadcasting House in central London. In the event, this stop-gap design has, in various incarnations been in use for five years. Reports on the web suggest that on Monday 18th March,  all BBC News will come from the new studios at Broadcasting House.

Lucky for me that it has lasted this long, it meant that I got a design on-screen in a James Bond film as some BBC news footage appears in a scene from Skyfall! I wrote a little more on this in an earlier post, BBC News makes an appearance in a Bond film

BBC Ten O’clock News backdrops as they appear in a scene from Skyfall

For more information, visit my company’s website – lightwell