Monthly Archives: December 2011
Bogeyman
The Bogeyman film was my first attempt at writing and directing. It worked on some levels and not so well on others, but it was a great learning experience.
As well taking on the directorial duties I also created the fiendish title creature, but in hindsight, if I was ever to direct again, and indeed I hope I do, I’d leave the FX duties to a trusted colleague.
Amongst the things that I created were prosthetic make-ups; a puppet version of the bogeyman; a sand effigy of the lead child actress as well as some set pieces and props…I was busy.
I’d like to reshoot the film one day, but next time without all the compromises that we had to make for such a low budget venture, but with all the exciting effects tricks that I had originally planned.
Oceanic
Oceanic is a dark twisted horror directed by Michael Pentney back in 2005. It starred the now late Iain Etchells and his multi tallented brother Neil for whom we aged to appear as Iain’s older self. This was the first project that I joined creative forces with Jez Hunt, we have since worked on many short films together including two features creating all kinds of weird, strange and surreal effects.
Oceanic was also the first project that I successfully used silicone to replicate human skin and it also started a creative working relationship which continues to this day with Alex Nichol, Michael Pentney and Jez Hunt.
League of Gentlemen
The hit BBC series The League of Gentlemen offered up many special effect challenges, some very disturbing others barely noticeable.
My most memmorable effects where realised through the poor mishaps of Mr Chinnery the Royston Vasey vet. From exploding tortoises to farting dogs, many animals sadly met their end to the caring and sympathetic hands of Mr Chinnery, played wonderfully by Mark Gatis.
However their was more than just veterinary mishaps for our effects team to contend with, we burned down the local shop, created storms over the visiting Papa Lazaroo’s travelling Fair, built man traps and provided the jokeshop with some deadly surprises to name but a few.
I began work on the League of Gentlemen when I was working for Emergency House Special Effects in Yorkshire back in 1999. Where has all the time gone? I was fresh off the Byker Grove programme still young and impressionable and admittingly pretty green, basically very unprepaired to take on the mountain of work that included modelmaking, atmospherics and fire effects.
Thankfully I had two very calm and experienced special effect supervisors to help with the physical effect gags, Evan Green-Hughes and Stephen Breheney, but it was with the modelmaking, the area of work that I enjoy most that I learned so much from doing. I admit, some illusions came of flawlessly, and others were well..take 2.
The League of Gentlemen was a wonderful working experience, one I’d hope to have again, and in their very own words it was “a f**king pleasure.”
Centre for Life
I was asked to create an Alien for the Newcastle based production company Superkrush to be filmed as part of a promotional advert for Centre of Life, an award-winning science centre full of exciting exhibitions, activities and events for all ages.
The model alien was sculpted, moulded and cast from silicone in just two days. The brief was to have an alien model that at first would appear to be real, but as the camera pulls away we see it as a floppy doll being played with by excited children visiting the Life Centre.
Soft Prey
Soft Prey is a short film directed by Nick Evans. It’s more of a comedy sketch and after reading the script I fell in love with the surreal nature and humour of the film.
My role was to create the ‘Soft Prey’ from which the film takes its title. Being more of a costuming job than a special effect it did offer up several challenges such as how to build a huge rubber suit which can one emcompass an actor and two appear at times to be two dimensional.