GREAT VFX
The creation of cataclysmic vfx
VFX WINNER
CHERNOBYL SKY ATLANTIC/HBO Sister Pictures, The Mighty Mint, Word Games
VFX producer Lindsay Mcfarlane discusses a process where the Chernobyl VFX looked to reflect actual events as closely as possible but always with the overt need to tell a human story first.
Vfx producer, Lindsay McFarlane has an exceptional credit list having worked on scores of high profile feature films. From the moment he read the Chernobyl script, he was “sucked in, in the moment with the characters and the horror. It has a European Art House stamp across it. It is easily the best script I’ve ever read.” But also a sense of foreboding, “a sinking feeling, whoever does the VFX is going to have to get it right but more importantly it’s a true story and we have a responsibility to the real people and if we snap out of that reality, it will lose its effect.” Mcfarlane recalls his first meeting with the writer and creator, Craig Mazin and director Johan Renck, “I ended up being flown out to Lithuania with Craig and Johan and going through the script and asking what they saw as being VFX and what live action, how they envisaged it and wanted to handle it. We sat in a room
for hours and hours running through it all as I got to understand their sensitivities and the nuances of the script.”
Mcfarlane comments positively on the development process and working with the director, “We had an inhouse team of artists who started as soon as we got back from Lithuania. We came from the perspective of the archive and eyewitness when it was available, and then added a visual language that fitted.” Mcfarlane did have plenty of reference material to work from. “There are lots of pretty good references of what the rubble looked like and eyewitness accounts from people there and we have a huge amount of historical source material. We wanted to tell a truthful story about the human experience, but we also didn’t want to be hamstrung on the need to be accurate.” But for other scenes, there are no visual references
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televisual.com Special Supplement Spring 2021
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