Studios are struggling over how keep actors and crew members safe as they jet around all over the world during a pandemic. The Mandalorian to the rescue…
Shows around the world have had to halt or slow down production thanks to COVID-19, as studios spend money to implement extensive safety procedures and social distancing guidelines. Many shows are back to work, but it’s different than it was before, and there are certain things that used to be commonplace that are now much harder to pull off.
First day back after mid spring lock down on Witcher S2. Learning to social distance with my show runner /Exec producer, Lauren Schmidt Hissrich. She can conjure narrative and character with a muscular control like the great Houdini. @LHissrich pic.twitter.com/HVHpuDPSd1
— Stephen D Surjik (@SSurjik) August 5, 2020
For example, location shots are more of a risk than they were before, since it’s harder to quarantine people when they’re moving around the world.
And that’s where The Mandalorian can be useful. The first-ever live-action Star Wars show uses some interesting technology that allows directors to shoot “on location” without ever leaving the self-contained safety of a studio.
Basically, The Mandalorian makes extensive use of a technique called StageCraft. Instead of having actors act in front of a green screen, the performers play their scenes before a 20-foot high, 75-foot wide and 270-degree semicircle of LED video walls. On those walls appears an image of wherever the characters are supposed to be — Tatooine, the depths of space, wherever — better yet, the image moves with the camera, creating the illusion that the actors are really there.
This kind of technology isn’t cheap, but if it means actors and directors don’t have to travel to far-flung locations to get their scenes, it saves money in the long run and is a lot safer to boot. “I think what is going to happen is that those things are going to be used a lot more for locations that you could travel to,” Solstice Studios president and CEO Mark Gill told CNBC. “So, you might be in a sound stage in Vancouver and recreate central London.”
We’re already seeing more studios take advantage of this technology. Before the coronavirus messed everything up, HBO used it to shoot the third season of Westworld, and now Pinewood Atlanta Studios, which has served as the home base on nearly a dozen Marvel movies, plans to build a permanent LED stage installation.
“It was coming anyway,” Gill said of this sort of LED technology. “It’s now been accelerated and everybody is pushing really hard for it.” And the sooner they get it, the sooner filmmaking professionals can work in a safer environment. I’m all for on-location shooting, but right now, this definitely seems like the kind of technology the industry needs.
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