Thread by @ebenbolter

#TLOU ep5 BTS pt1:
Our biggest set-piece required a huge cul-de-sac with 16 houses, fully controllable at night and with privacy to shoot, so we built it:
1) Back-lot site
2) Road and foundations beginning to take shape
3) On-site with scale model
4) Final build with stand-ins

#TLOU ep5 BTS pt2:
'Night Exterior’ for a cul-de-sac in outer KC with no electricity, meant my only motivation of light would be the moon. Our aesthetic is grounded in reality so we had to design large scale naturalistic moonlight, but still allowing the audience to see (1/2)

The complication was weather. Calgary is famous for high winds, rain and snow, so we needed a moonlight solution that could withstand this. My gaffer and I settled on a ‘net’ of lighting, 400x 6-foot bi-colour LED tubes, in grids on 4x cranes that allowed wind to pass through.

This ‘net’ of top light gave me controllable moon fill-light, but the secret of good moonlight is back-light. For this I surround the set with ARRI s360 LED sky-panels. 2x per crane, using the 30 degree egg-crates to prevent cross-shadowing.

Another key part of making the cul-de-sac feel like a real location was physically building the inside of the sniper house, so we could tie Joel’s perspective to what’s happening down below without having to cheat and use blue-screen. All in camera.