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fuckyeahgoodomens · 1 year ago

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Oooh! A great Gavin Finney (Good Omens Director of Photography) interview with Helen Parkinson for the British Cinematographer! :)

HEAVEN SENT

Gifted a vast creative landscape from two of fantasy’s foremost authors to play with, Gavin Finney BSC reveals how he crafted the otherworldly visuals for Good Omens 2.

It started with a letter from beyond the grave. Following fantasy maestro Sir Terry Pratchett’s untimely death in 2015, Neil Gaiman decided he wouldn’t adapt their co-authored 1990 novel, Good Omens, without his collaborator. That was, until he was presented with a posthumous missive from Pratchett asking him to do just that.

For Gaiman, it was a request that proved impossible to decline: he brought Good Omens season one to the screen in 2019, a careful homage to its source material. His writing, complemented by some inspired casting – David Tennant plays the irrepressible demon Crowley, alongside Michael Sheen as angel-slash-bookseller Aziraphale – and award-nominated visuals from Gavin Finney BSC, proved a potent combination for Prime Video viewers.

Aziraphale’s bookshop was a set design triumph.

Season two departs from the faithful literary adaptation of its predecessor, instead imagining what comes next for Crowley and Aziraphale. Its storyline is built off a conversation that Pratchett and Gaiman shared during a jetlagged stay in Seattle for the 1989 World Fantasy Convention. Gaiman remembers: “The idea was always that we would tell the story that Terry and I came up with in 1989 in Seattle, but that we would do that in our own time and in our own way. So, once Good Omens (S1) was done, all I knew was that I really, really wanted to tell the rest of the story.”

Telling that story visually may sound daunting, but cinematographer Finney is no stranger to the wonderfully idiosyncratic world of Pratchett and co. As well as lensing Good Omens’ first outing, he’s also shot three other Pratchett stories – TV mini series Hogfather (2006), and TV mini-series The Colour of Magic (2008) and Going Postal (2010).

He relishes how the authors provide a vast creative landscape for him to riff off. “The great thing about Pratchett and Gaiman is that there’s no limit to what you can do creatively – everything is up for grabs,” he muses. “When we did the first Pratchett films and the first Good Omens, you couldn’t start by saying, ‘Okay, what should this look like?’, because nothing looks like Pratchett’s world. So, you’re starting from scratch, with no references, and that starting point can be anything you want it to be.”

Season two saw the introduction of inside-outside sets for key locations including Aziraphale’s bookshop.

From start to finish

The sole DP on the six-episode season, Finney was pleased to team up again with returning director Douglas Mackinnon for the “immensely complicated” shoot, and the pair began eight weeks of prep in summer 2021. A big change was the production shifting the main soho set from Bovington airfield, near London, up to Edinburgh’s Pyramids Studio. Much of the action in Good Omens takes place on the Soho street that’s home to Aziraphale’s bookshop, which was built as an exterior set on the former airfield for season one. Season two, however, saw the introduction of inside-outside sets for key locations including the bookshop, record store and pub, to minimise reliance on green screen.

Finney brought over many elements of his season one lensing, especially Mackinnon’s emphasis on keeping the camera moving, which involved lots of prep and testing. “We had a full-time Scorpio 45’ for the whole shoot (run by key grip Tim Critchell and his team), two Steadicam operators (A camera – Ed Clark and B camera Martin Newstead) all the way through, and in any one day we’d often go from Steadicam, to crane, to dolly and back again,” he says. “The camera is moving all the time, but it’s always driven by the story.”

One key difference for season two, however, was the move to large-format visuals. Finney tested three large-format cameras and the winner was the Alexa LF (assisted by the Mini LF where conditions required), thanks to its look and flexibility.

The minisodes were shot on Cooke anamorphics, giving Finney the ideal balance of anamorphic-style glares and characteristics without too much veiling flare.

A more complex decision was finding the right lenses for the job. “You hear about all these whizzy new lenses that are re-barrelled ancient Russian glass, but I needed at least two full sets for the main unit, then another set for the second unit, then maybe another set again for the VFX unit,” Finney explains. “If you only have one set of this exotic glass, it’s no good for the show.”

He tested a vast array of lenses before settling on Zeiss Supremes, supplied by rental house Media Dog. These ticked all the boxes for the project: “They had a really nice look – they’re a modern design but not over sharp, which can look a bit electronic and a bit much, especially with faces. When you’re dealing with a lot of wigs and prosthetics, we didn’t want to go that sharp. The Supremes had a very nice colour palette and nice roll-off. They’re also much smaller than a lot of large-format glass, so that made it easy for Steadicam and remote cranes. They also provided additional metadata, which was very useful for the VFX department (VFX services were provided by Milk VFX).”

The Supremes were paired with a selection of filters to characterise the show’s varied locations and characters. For example, Tiffen Bronze Glimmerglass were paired with bookshop scenes; Black Pro-Mist was used for Hell; and Black Diffusion FX for Crowley’s present-day storyline.

Finney worked closely with the show’s DIT, Donald MacSween, and colourist, Gareth Spensley, to develop the look for the minisode.

Maximising minisodes

Episodes two, three and four of season two each contain a ‘minisode’ – an extended flashback set in Biblical times, 1820s Edinburgh and wartime London respectively. “Douglas wanted the minisodes to have very strong identities and look as different from the present day as possible, so we’d instantly know we were in a minisode and not the present day,” Finney explains.

One way to shape their distinctive look was through using Cooke anamorphic lenses. As Finney notes: “The Cookes had the right balance of controllable, anamorphic-style flares and characteristics without having so much veiling flare that they would be hard to use on green screens. They just struck the right balance of aesthetics, VFX requirements and availability.” The show adopted the anamorphic aspect ratio (2:39.1), an unusual move for a comedy, but one which offered them more interesting framing opportunities.

Good Omens 2 was shot on the Alexa LF, paired with Zeiss Supremes for the present-day scenes.

The minisodes were also given various levels of film grain to set them apart from the present-day scenes. Finney first experimented with this with the show’s DIT Donald MacSween using the DaVinci Resolve plugin FilmConvert. Taking that as a starting point, the show’s colourist, Company 3’s Gareth Spensley, then crafted his own film emulation inspired by two-strip Technicolor. “There was a lot of testing in the grade to find the look for these minisodes, with different amounts of grain and different types of either Technicolor three-strip or two-strip,” Finney recalls. “Then we’d add grain and film weave on that, then on top we added film flares. In the Biblical scenes we added more dust and motes in the air.”

Establishing the show’s lighting was a key part of Finney’s testing process, working closely with gaffer Scott Napier and drawing upon PKE Lighting’s inventory. Good Omens’ new Scottish location posed an initial challenge: as the studio was in an old warehouse rather than being purpose-built for filming, its ceilings weren’t as high as one would normally expect. This meant Finney and Napier had to work out a low-profile way of putting in a lot of fixtures.

Inside Crowley’s treasured Bentley.

Their first task was to test various textiles, LED wash lights and different weight loadings, to establish what they were working with for the street exteriors. “We worked out that what was needed were 12 SkyPanels per 20’x20’ silk, so each one was a block of 20’x20’, then we scaled that up,” Finney recalls. “I wanted a very seamless sky, so I used full grid cloth which made it very, very smooth. That was important because we’ve got lots of cars constantly driving around the set and the sloped windscreens reflect the ceiling. So we had to have seamless textiles – PKE had to source around 12,000 feet of textiles so that we could put them together, so the reflections in the windscreens of the cars just showed white gridcloth rather than lots of stage lights. We then drove the car around the set to test it from different angles.”

On the floor, they mostly worked with LEDs, providing huge energy and cost savings for the production. Astera’s Titan Tubes came in handy for a fun flashback scene with John Hamm’s character Gabriel. The DP remembers: “[Gabriel] was travelling down a 30-foot feather tunnel. We built a feather tunnel on the stage and wrapped it in a ring of Astera tubes, which were then programmed by dimmer op Jon Towler to animate, pulse and change different colours. Each part of Gabriel’s journey through his consciousness has a different colour to it.”

Among the rigs built was a 20-strong Creamsource Vortex setup for the graveyard scene in the “Body Snatchers” minisode, shot in Stirling. “We took all the yokes off each light then put them on a custom-made aluminium rig so we could have them very close. We put them up on a big telehandler on a hill that gave me a soft mood light, which was very adjustable, windproof and rainproof.”

Shooting on the VP stage for the birth of the universe scenes in episode one.

Sky’s the limit

A lot of weather effects were done in camera – including lightning effects pulsed in that allowed both direct fork lightning and sheet lightning to spread down the streets. In the grade, colourist Spensley was also able to work his creative magic on the show’s skies. “Gareth is a very artistic colourist – he’s a genius at changing skies,” Finney says. “Often in the UK you get these very boring, flat skies, but he’s got a library of dramatic skies that you can drop in. That would usually be done by VFX, but he’s got the ability to do it in Baselight, so a flat sky suddenly becomes a glorious sunset.”

Finney emphasises that the grade is a very involved process for a series like Good Omens, especially with its VFX-heavy nature. “This means VFX sequences often need extra work when it comes back into the timeline,” says the DP. “So, we often add camera movement or camera shake to crank the image up a bit. Having a colourist like Gareth is central to a big show like Good Omens, to bring all the different visual elements together and to make it seamless. It’s quite a long grade process but it’s worth its weight in gold.”

Shooting in the VR cube for the blitz scenes .

Finney took advantage of virtual production (VP) technology for the driving scenes in Crowley’s classic Bentley. The volume was built on their Scottish set: a 4x7m cube with a roof that could go up and down on motorised winches as needed. “We pulled the cars in and out on skates – they went up on little jacks, which you could then rotate and move the car around within the volume,” he explains. “We had two floating screens that we could move around to fill in and use as additional source lighting. Then we had generated plates – either CGI or real location plates –projected 360º around the car. Sometimes we used the volume in-camera but if we needed to do more work downstream; we’d use a green screen frustum.” Universal Pixels collaborated with Finney to supply in-camera VFX expertise, crew and technical equipment for the in-vehicle driving sequences and rear projection for the crucial car shots.

John Hamm was suspended in the middle of this lighting rig and superimposed into the feather tunnel.

Interestingly, while shooting at a VP stage in Leith, the team also used the volume as a huge, animated light source in its own right – a new technique for Finney. “We had the camera pointing away from [the volume] so the screen provided this massive, IMAX-sized light effect for the actors. We had a simple animation of the expanding universe projected onto the screen so the actors could actually see it, and it gave me the animated light back on the actors.”

Bringing such esteemed authors’ imaginations to the screen is no small task, but Finney was proud to helped bring Crowley and Aziraphale’s adventures to life once again. He adds: “What’s nice about Good Omens, especially when there’s so much bad news in the world, is that it’s a good news show. It’s a very funny show. It’s also about good and evil, love and doing the right thing, people getting together irrespective of backgrounds. It’s a hopeful message, and I think that that’s what we all need.”

Finney is no stranger to the idiosyncratic world of Sir Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman.

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creature-wizard · 1 year ago

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Some things associated with New Age that aren't inherently bad

Since this blog can get kinda heavy sometimes, and because there's some people out there who think that anything remotely adjacent to New Age is evil and must be banished forever, I figured I'd write something on elements it includes that aren't necessarily bad.

Its general concept of God and divinity

New Age beliefs typically posit that God, or Source, effectively split itself into many different souls in order to have different kinds of experiences. There's nothing wrong with this model of divinity in itself, since it doesn't by itself imply anything hateful or suggest any kind of action that might lead to harm. Where it gets messed up is when people start claiming that if you're suffering, it's because you deliberately chose to have this kind of experience before you incarnated. That's just victim blaming, and it's wrong.

Energy healing

Energy healing on its own is a harmless practice, and many people do report feeling better for doing it. Dismissing energy healing as inherently bad in itself would be like dismissing prayer for recovery as inherently bad. It's really not. The problem is always when people start believing they should only rely on energy healing or prayer, or fall into the belief that pharmaceutical medicine is sinful or an evil conspiracy.

Listening to relaxing tones

No, those "healing frequencies" probably won't cure any serious ailments. But that doesn't mean they can't make you feel more relaxed or help you focus. You don't have to subscribe to any specific belief system to listen to these audios.

Glossolalia

The New Age practice of speaking in light languages is a form of glossolalia, which basically involves relaxing and speaking whatever sounds immediately come to you. Doing it can be cathartic and relaxing, and you don't need to subscribe to any specific belief system to do it.

Tarot reading

Reading tarot cards doesn't require subscribing to any specific spiritual belief system. Nor do you even need to be spiritual at all; you can read tarot cards with the perspective that what you're doing is prompting your own mind to consider things from new angles.

Meditation

Meditation is known to have beneficial effects, and doing it doesn't require subscribing to any particular belief system. Yes, it's a problem when somebody subscribes meditation as a cure-all, or use it as a form of spiritual bypassing, but that's a problem with the teacher, not the practice itself.

Eating more plant foods

Provided you don't have any allergies or intolerances, eating more fruits, vegetables, nuts, and the like usually isn't a bad idea. The problem with New Age is when it effectively moralizes food by decreeing certain foods "high vibrational" or "low vibrational," or when it's pushing conspiracy theories about modern processed food items being intentionally poisoned to block our psychic abilities or keep us dependent on the healthcare system. And obviously, it's appallingly ableist to tell someone that they could cure a chronic illness by switching to an all-natural vegan diet or something.

Belief in aliens

It's a big universe, and it's not unreasonable to think we're not alone in it, and that maybe there's beings who are observing us. The problem is when belief in aliens becomes part of a conspiratorial worldview that scapegoats certain groups of people for the world's problems, displaces real history, and misuses other people's traditions and beliefs.

Belief that things can and will get better

To paraphrase Terry Pratchett's words in The Hogfather, we sometimes need to believe in things that aren't true (such as justice and mercy) so they can become true. Believing that things can change makes people feel like their efforts are worth something. Meanwhile, when everyone's got a doomer attitude nothing will change for the better because nobody will even try.

One problem with New Age's optimism in specific is that they tend to believe that things getting better is contingent on converting a large number of people to New Age spirituality, which includes getting them to accept a large number of conspiratorial beliefs that target and harm vulnerable minorities, and/or distort and erase the actual spiritual beliefs of people from different cultures (many of whom are marginalized minorities and/or have been severely harmed by colonialism already).

Another problem is when you get the whole 5D ascension thing going on. 5D ascension is basically the New Age version of the Rapture, and just like the Rapture, it's always said to be right around the corner, but it never materializes. (If you'd like examples, here are predictions for 2012 and 2015.) Very concerningly, New Agers often list a number of physical and mental health symptoms as "ascension symptoms." They were claiming this as far back as the 2010s, when December 31, 2012 was supposed to be the big day. (Here's an example.)

Basically, hope and belief that things can get better is important - but it's also important not to hang our hopes (and medical decisions) on supernatural predictions that have already failed multiple times.

Wanting to promote compassion and understanding between people

This is a great thing to want! The problem with New Age isn't that they want to spread peace and harmony, but rather the way they want to do it without really listening to the people they supposedly want to help. You can't, for example, genuinely fight colonialism if you're engaging in cultural appropriation and misrepresenting their spiritual traditions - you're an active part of the problem. Promoting compassion and understanding begins with you shutting up, listening, and learning without imposing your own preconceptions or reacting from your ego. You're not doing this if you're looking for mythology to project aliens onto, or dismissing anything you don't want to hear as a conspiracy.

And here's some critical thinking tips before you go

When you're evaluating any belief system or practice, it's always important to remember that belief and practice are not the same thing. Most of the time the practices are harmless in and of themselves; the actual danger comes from the conspiratorial and morally polarized worldviews many practitioners also subscribe to. Nobody's ever died from putting rose quartz in their room or getting a reiki session. They have died from refusing evidence-based medical care because someone convinced them that the health care industry is a scam and will also separate them from Source.

When it comes to beliefs themselves, ask yourself what kind of narratives they're upholding. If they basically promote the same kind of conspiratorial narratives used by Nazis, witch hunters, or far right Christians to justify their hatred and violence, that's a pretty strong sign that this belief is bullshit. But of course, there's a pretty stark difference between believing that aliens could be out there, and believing blood-drinking reptiles have invaded the Earth.

#new age #beliefs #belief #spirituality #witchblr #critical thinking #discernment

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windandwater · 6 months ago

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People have always had the urge to sing and clang things at the dark stub of the year, when all sorts of psychic nastiness has taken advantage of the long gray days and the deep shadows to lurk and breed. Lately people had taken to singing harmoniously, which rather lost the effect. Those who really understood just clanged something and shouted.

—Terry Pratchett, Hogfather

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#bells #hogfather #christmas #terry pratchett #discworld #I hope you clang something and shout this winter whether you celebrate a holiday this month or not

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pigsongpearls · 6 months ago

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Hogfather / Hogswatch Paraphernalia

Source: Hogswatch Stamp Catalogue

Source Heroforge Catalogue

#hogswatch #hogfather #terry pratchett #gnu terry pratchett #discworld

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northwyrm · 6 months ago

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This year's book haul!!!

- The Hogfather by Terry Pratchett; I already own and love this book I just bought myself one with a fancier cover

- Yule be Sorry by Kim Watt; surprise from my family, no idea what to expect beyond dragons

- Dragon Songs by Vladimir Dinets; this one is being cited a lot in studies about croc vocalisations and mating so I wanted to read the source. Also I adore the title

- Dragons, Serpents and Slayers by Daniel Ogden; academic text about dragons yay

- Slaying Monsters for the Feeble by Annette Marie; sequel to another book my friend got me, we are starting a tradition

- Guards! Guards! by Terry Pratchett, a book I already love, but this version is ILLUSTRATED throughout!!!

- Dark Banquet by Bill Schutt; blood drinking zoology yay

- Vital Organs by Suzie Edge; fun morbid history facts

- The Penguin book of dragons; more dragon research

#books #northwyrmblogg

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thenightling · 8 months ago

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Christmas Ghost stories

I posted about this before but I'll post about it again. The song "Most Wonderful Time of the Year" has a line "There'll be scary ghost stories" and a lot of people assume it's talking about Charles' Dickens much beloved classic, "A Christmas Carol." Well, yes, and no. A Christmas Carol is probably the most famous Christmas ghost story but it is, by far, not the only one. In the Victorian era (and earlier) ghost stories were a very popular holiday tradition in the UK and US. In fact A Christmas Carol was not Charles Dickens only or even first Christmas story. He wrote several. You can find them compiled in the book "Charles Dickens Christmas Ghost stories." Some of these titles include The Goblins who Stole a Sexton (which is an early proto-type version of A Christmas Carol where some goblins kidnap a mean grave digger and show him the error of his ways). There's also the spooky story of The Signal Man. Here are some well-known old (and some recent) Christmas Ghost stories. Krampus (folklore and movie about the demon captured by Saint Nicolas, who gets loose once a year to punish wicked children). There are at least fourteen Krampus movies and he has appeared in animation and comic books. According to legend Krampus is the son of Hela (Goddess of the dead) and grandson of Loki (God of Mischief). Befana The Christmas Witch (Italian folklore, actually equatable to Santa). She was a friend of the three Wise Men and now distributes gifts to good children on Epiphany and leaves coal for naughty children. She fills stockings with candy and toys too. She's not wicked at all. She's kind and Santa-like. Yule Cat (Folklore). According to legend you are supposed to get new clothes for Christmas. And if you don't get (and wear) any new clothes, the Yule cat (which is a giant cat) will eat you. Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol The Goblins who stole a Sexton by Charles Dickens The Raven (poem) by Edgar Allan Poe. Very atmospheric and gothic but really about grief. It's set in December. Hell House by Richard Matheson (Movie version is called Legend of Hell House). This haunted house story is set at Christmas time. Gremlins (Steven Spielberg movie) Edward Scissorhands (set at Christmas and is a fable about the source of Christmas snow.) Nightmare before Christmas (Poem / children's book and stop motion movie). This is technically both Christmas and Halloween. Over the Garden Wall (TV mini-series). All the visuals in this gorgeous mini-series are based on vintage Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas New England postcards. Silent Night Deadly night (Horror movie) Christmas Slay Sleepy Hollow (1999 movie) - Originally released in November, despite the Halloween aesthetic the movie actually ends on New Years Day. Ghostbusters 2 - The movie starts the day after Boxing Day and ends on New Years Day. Rise of the Guardians - Though technically set at Easter, the movie features Santa Claus and Jack Frost (The personification of childhood fun) turns out to be the ghost of a boy who drowned while saving his sister. Dear Dracula - The children's book is about a child who sends Dracula a letter instead of Santa. The animated movie version is more Halloween-centric. Dracula (2006 BBC version) released on Christmas. Santa vs. Dracula (comic booe of Water (Movie) released in December. Nosferatu (2024 version of the movie) will be released Christmas Day.

Hogfather (Disworld book and TV mini-series) where Death has to take over for The Hogfather one year (Disworld version of Santa).

Mari Lwyd - South Wales Christmas tradition. A dead horse (actually people in a costume of a skeletal horse) shows up at your door and starts to rhyme at you, you rhyme back. And this back and forth goes on for a bit. If you run out of rhymes you have to let the ghost-horse in and eat your snacks and booze. There are many more but this was just a sample of the spooky fun of the Yule season.

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