Oliver Wood: Water, Water, and More Water.

From ICG Magazine, Watership Down by Pauline Rogers (May 2000)

Compressed Nitrogen:
"The set piece was hung over an area with a drain," says Wood. "We would pour water into the set-- and I mean pour-- and shoot. The water would then be drained away and we would go again. To protect the fronts of the lenses, we used Nitrogen air blowers like the ones we used on Face/Off. These blowers were so effective, we could literally walk the cameras through a wall of water-- moving with the actors, to get the intensity of the action."

Mag change!
Off the island of Malta, production constructed a 100 percent scale duplicate of a U-boat, weighing in at some 600 tons. Additionally, two full sized, tops of subs were floated in giant water tanks. "These were two 220-foot long 'subs,' surrounded by gigantic towers that poured salt water rain on the action all the time," confirms Wood. ... "The cameras had to be completely covered in plastic. That meant it took about 15 minutes to change the 400-foot mags. Although well-protected, the cameras kept breaking down from the abuse."

Peter Donan on the miniatures:
"When doing underwater shooting, the miniatures were shot using available light, as we were working about 15 to 20 feet underwater," describes Donan. "In order to control the quality of the light on these boats, we had silks made that were almost 180-feet long by 150-feet wide. They were created out of sailboat spinnaker cloth. We used this material because of its superior resistance to UV [light] and saltwater... At one point, we even had to paint the tank's bottom black to cut down on bounce reflection. That way, we could get additional shape from the hull and prevent it from looking too lit."

Oliver Wood: Black Wrap Submarine

From ICG Magazine, Watership Down by Pauline Rogers (May 2000)

All submarine interiors-- both American S-boats and German U-boats-- were photographed on sets constructed on Soundstage Five at the reputed Cinecitta studios in Rome, Italy. "We divided the first-unit shots up into sections," divulges Wood. "We had a sub on set at Cinecitta, created 20 percent bigger than normal size, which didn't feel any bigger, since we still had to stoop to get through the doors. Because it was going to be filled with water most of the time, we had to go 110-volt DC [in terms of electricity]. To light it, we cut hundreds of holes over the top to focus tiny little [150-watt] Pepper lights inside. The biggest light on this set was a 300-watt bulb. There was nowhere to hang the lights.

"We took the studs out of some of the loud speakers and put magnets in, so we could stick the lights to the metal. That worked fine, when we were level. However, when the set 'shook' they would fall out. So we tried finding ways to screw things in. Whenever we saw a light in the frame, we struck a bit of black in front of it. Simple, but it worked. I really think this picture was made with Black Wrap. It was an integral part of lighting this whole project!"

Peter Biziou: Jet Engine Storms

From American Cinematographer, This Is Your Life by Eric Rudolph (June 1998)

In an attempt to get the water-shy Truman to turn the boat back toward shore, Christof orders up some nasty weather, escalating the tumult as the undaunted star soldiers forward. Finally, horrendous hurricane-force winds are dialed up from the Truman Show control room. To create the tempest, Biziou explains,

"We had two jet engines on trucks, as is common these days, which screamed across the water and just took the tops of the waves off and gave them a nice cresting. These engines are extremely noisy and smelly, but I'd recommend them any time; they're wonderful machines. It was a joy to see a proper thrusting wind. That, coupled with the blasting of fire hoses into the jet engine stream, which would just get energetically strewn across the whole scene, gave us some wonderful storm footage."

- Peter Biziou, BSC

Ueli Steiger: Rain Deflectors

From American Cinematographer, Monster Mash by David E. Williams (June 1998)

With artificial storms forecast throughout the Godzilla shoot, rain deflectors were essential in order to ensure the sharp images needed for the ensuing digital work. These devices typically incorporate a high-speed rotating optical glass disc mounted in front of the lens, which throws the water off via centrifugal force before the image is blurred.

"We had every rain deflector in the world on this show, and none of them worked very well. Panavision had several versions, including a little one for the Steadicam. We also had a deflector which blasts water right off the lens using compressed air. It works well for about 10 seconds before the air valve freezes shut. It's also very noisy. This was another reason to use zooms. Switching lenses would have required us to continually remove and reattach the rain deflectors, which takes far too much time."

- Ueli Steiger

Peter Menzies Jr: Lighting Rain & Flood

American Cinematographer, Photographing at Full Flood, by George Turner (January 1998)

"The backing was quite easy to light. Because it was on dry land, but in the tank in was always a struggle to move lights around. Then we tried lighting balloons, and they really helped us out. They were flexible, safe, and provided a beautiful quality of light. When we floated the balloons, the rain obscured the power cords coming down from them. We didn't have to worry about lighting from Condors or towers or anything else. To see all of those glowing balloons floating up over the set was pretty surreal! It could look absolutely beautiful when we backlit it, but a flood isn't a beautiful thing. We didn't backlight much because we really didn't want a theatrical look; we wanted it to look real. Also, if we had backlit the rain, we wouldn't have had the depth we wanted on such a large set. It was great to see the whole set without it being washed out by backlit rain. Most of the time I'd crosslight it, but sometimes we'd just throw 360 degrees of light with the balloons. Quite often, you couldn't even see the rain falling. Instead, you could just see it on the water's surface, which really enhanced the realism."

- Peter Menzies Jr., ASC