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fuckyeahgoodomens · 1 month

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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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rosyblooom · 13 days

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I just finished watching Daisy Jones and the Six and I wanted to ask if you could write a Charles SMAU where his wife passes away from illness and leaves a video behind for him to find happiness. They can have a little child together please. Thank you😊❤️

when i die, i want you to live | cl16 smau

PAIRING: charles leclerc x wife!reader SUMMARY: after battling illness, y/n unexpectedly succumbs to it much sooner than expected, leaving behind her husband and their daughter. 8 months later, charles is not coping very well, so your best friend hands him an envelope addressed to him from you. WARNING(S): mentions of death, sad A/N: ooh i love that show!! anyway, this is my first ever request (!!), so hope it's as u imagined 🫶

creds to @classiclitfreak for proofreading!! <3

yourusername posted to her story!

[ caption 1: I sure hope so!😌 ] [ caption 2: my heart is so full🥹💕 ]

charles_leclerc

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charles_leclerc Today, 27 years ago, is the very special day that brought me my beautiful wife and best friend. Forever grateful for that. Happiest of birthdays to you, Mon cœur ❤️

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yourusername

liked by charles_leclerc, carlossainz55, yourbestfriend and 263,719 others

yourusername had the loveliest birthday with my dearest people!💕thank you for all the birthday wishes, they've been such a joy! 🥹 here's to another beautiful year, here's to 27🥂

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Three weeks later...

tmz_tv

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tmz_tv Tragic news emerged in the early hours of this morning as Y/N L/N-Leclerc, a renowned fashion designer and philanthropist, passed away unexpectedly, just three weeks past her twenty-seventh birthday. Her untimely passing has left her family and friends in shock and disbelief.

In a statement released by her family, it was revealed that Y/N had been battling illness for an undisclosed duration. However, medical professionals had initially estimated a longer prognosis, making her sudden passing even more devastating.

During this profoundly sorrowful time, we extend our heartfelt condolences to Y/N's family.

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username wow and to think she was always so smiley even with all this going on behind the scenes

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scuderiaferrari

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scuderiaferrari Due to personal matters, Charles Leclerc will not be continuing racing for the remainder of the season. Ollie Bearman, our reserve driver, will take his place instead.

This was not an easy decision, and therefore we ask that you handle this news with respect and sensitivity.

Our thoughts and support are with Charles Leclerc and his family during this challenging time. 🙏❤️

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8 months later...

Charles enters the living room, ensuring the door closes softly behind him to avoid disturbing his little girl. Running his fingers over his beard, he examines the envelope in his hand and sighs. Y/N’s best friend pressed it into his hand at a dinner party the previous evening, insisting he watch it as soon as he finds the time. And here he is now, holding the thin envelope.

If someone had told him when he was younger that he’d get emotional over something as simple as seeing his wife’s handwriting on paper, he would have scoffed in disbelief. Not him, that would have seemed absurd. Yet here he is, feeling a lump form in his throat over mere black ink on paper.

As peculiar as it seems, he brings the envelope to his nose, and memories of Y/N flood his mind. He can almost feel her soothing touch as she works the knots out of his back after a gruelling day of racing. Inhaling, he feels Y/N’s sweet scent—it is as comforting as her smile.

A smile tugs at Charles' lips as he pictures that infectious grin that lit up his wife’s face at the most unexpected moments. It was one of the things he loved most about her—she had a way of bringing brightness to even the darkest of days.

Shaking his head, he snaps out of the trance, shifting deeper into the living room until he sinks into the welcoming embrace of the couch. There, he retrieves the laptop resting on the coffee table, feeling the weight of the moment as he opens the envelope and extracts a flash drive from within. Rolling it between his fingers, he inserts it into the side of his laptop with a determined motion.

Once all is in place, he watches a file labelled “To my dearest Lover, brightest Heart, and deepest Soul” materialise in his list of files. The sight catches him off guard—his throat constricts, making each breath a struggle, and his eyes well up, though he fights against the tears. Not now. He can't afford it. Allowing himself to be consumed by grief would mean losing precious time, time he needs for his daughter waiting in her playroom down the hallway.

He takes a moment to regain composure, squeezing his eyes shut, focusing on the rhythm of his breath until the tension in his chest begins to ease. With a sharp intake of air, he opens his eyes wide and taps the file, revealing a video. Running his teeth over his lower lip, he hovers the pointer over the play button, then taps the mousepad with a steady hand.

The video opens with Y/N seated on the very same pale couch he’s currently occupying. He places both hands onto the soft sofa, yearning for a connection, a way to feel her, even though he knows he can’t—touching the past is impossible.

Y/N walks toward the camera, readjusting it before taking three steps backward and retaking her seat. Inhaling deeply, she hesitates, her mouth opening, then closing again, like a fish out of water.

“Mon cœur,” Charles whispers, moving the laptop onto the coffee table.

“Hmm,” Y/N drops her hands into her lap and smooths down her flowery dress. She stares directly at the camera, tilting her head sideways with a crooked smile. “I don’t know where to start.”

Her eyes widen. “After all this planning, I still don’t know where to begin.” She lets out a few chuckles and then purses her lips. “Well, I suppose greetings are in order?”

Her expression softens as her brows furrow. “Hello, my darling, my world, my everything.”

“Hey,” Charles whispers, his throat tight with emotion, barely allowing sound to escape.

“Although I'm very happy to see you, if you’re watching this, it means you're not living as I want you to,” Y/N's voice trembles, causing her to pause and swallow. “I know it’s hard, baby. I don’t expect this to be easy on you, but I don’t want you to spend the rest of your life looking back at us in sadness, you know?”

Charles leans forward, elbows on his lap, eyes fixed on the screen, his face tinged with a faint shade of red.

“Remember our first date, when we had to cancel our reservations at that restaurant because you felt sick on the way there?” Y/N bursts into laughter but quickly stifles it, her hand covering her mouth.

“No, no,” Charles pleads softly, shaking his head, “please don’t hide your beautiful smile, my love.”

“It’s not like there was anything you could do about being sick, but I remember feeling miffed because I already had a stressful day, so for you to cancel just like that, it irritated me,” she reminisces with a nod. “But you were quite pale, so I wanted to make sure you got home alright. And we walked, barely talked,” she giggles, the joy reaching her eyes, “but then this little kid appeared, his name was…”

“Benny,” they both say simultaneously, a faint smile tugging at one corner of Charles' lips.

"Boy, was he excited to meet you, his idol. It was like seeing a completely different person. You became someone entirely new for this little boy whom you didn’t even know. Nobody forced you to take time out of your day when he came running, his arms wide open," Y/N says, extending her arms along with the words. "You could’ve just walked away. I mean, you had a reason to: you were sick."

Pausing for a moment, Y/N sits up straighter, leaning forward and shaking her head. "But you didn’t. You put on a brave face, and you turned into Benny’s hero and so much more. I think we stood there with his parents for about half an hour, and you didn’t complain once. And that’s when I knew."

Y/N nods, crossing her legs and slinging one hand behind the sofa. "That’s when I knew you could be the man I was going to marry. And turns out you were," she says, smiling sheepishly. "The love you have for people, for our daughter, it’s… it’s so profound, it’s boundless. So don’t limit it. Don’t you dare limit yourself just because I’m not around anymore."

Her expression turns serious as she exhales. “You’re such a bright light. You bring happiness and purity into people’s lives—into my life,” Y/N presses her hand against her chest. “I don’t want you to dim it. I want you to shine for as long as that candle burns. Don’t let it die prematurely because of bad happenings. There’s so much more to love, to live, to enjoy. And while you may not see me at your side anymore, holding onto D/N, I’m right here.”

Charles sniffles, folding his hands over his mouth as he swallows his sobs, while Y/N points to her heart.

“I’m with you forever and always. I’m protecting you and D/N, and I’m watching over you, making sure everything’s alright.” Y/N releases a sigh before chewing at her bottom lip with a wistful smile. “And part of that means making space for more love, for you. You have a big heart, you know? There’s enough room for you to find happiness with someone new. There’s no shame in it, and there’s no guilt in it. It’s what makes being alive such a beautiful thing: your love is yours, and it’s not confined to just one or two people. You can spread it, and still, our love will remain unchanged.”

Tears stream down the sides of Charles' cheeks as he struggles to maintain his composure, his eyes fixated on the screen as if afraid that if he peels his gaze away for one second, his wife will disappear.

Y/N briefly looks off to the side, her attention seemingly caught by something in the room, before snapping her head back to the camera with a bright smile.

“It seems I have to go,” her shoulders sink.

Charles leans forward, the screen mere inches away from his face, as he strokes the outline of Y/N’s face on the screen, whispering desperately, “Please don’t, mon cœur…”

“I love you so, so much. You and D/N are the most precious gifts, the greatest joys I have had the privilege to experience, so please, please,” she claps her hands together, moving them back and forth, “please…when I die, I want you to live.”

Y/N rises from the couch and walks towards the screen, her eyes unwavering for even a moment. “Give my little girl all my love, and kiss and hug her extra tight for as long as you can, for me.”

Offering one final smile, she blows a kiss at the screen. “I love you. Please don’t stop. Don't stop loving and don't stop living.”

The video freezes with Y/N frozen in place, a beautiful smile etched onto her lips, filled with the purest form of love.

Feeling suddenly overwhelmed, Charles collapses, the weight of the world pressing down on him. He drops his face into his hands and releases all of it: sob after sob after sob. There’s something liberating about finally letting go; the burden pours out of him, leaving behind a fragile yet tranquil Charles as he gazes at the still shot of his beloved wife, whom he adores so deeply.

A soft click draws his attention to the door just in time for it to creak open slowly, revealing his little girl standing there, her favourite yellow teddy bear clutched tightly in her arms.

“Papa,” her voice floats like a gentle breeze.

Charles smiles, opening his arms wide as she runs towards him. He's momentarily winded as she reaches him, but he quickly regains his composure and lifts her onto his lap.

“Hello, my love,” he whispers, touching his forehead to hers.

Her tiny hand pats his cheek, her expression filled with concern. “You’re crying?”

Charles shakes his head, trying to reassure her. “Happy tears,” he explains, “look.” He points at the screen, where Y/N's serene face is frozen in time.

“Maman!” D/N exclaims, slipping from his lap and heading towards the screen. Her small hands tap the screen eagerly as she calls out, “Maman! Maman! Maman!”

“Yes,” Charles swallows, ignoring the pang in his chest as he shifts his focus to his little girl. “You want to see Maman, huh?”

He rises from the sofa and lifts D/N into the air, settling her on his hip. “How about we go take a look at the photo albums, okay? There are lots of beautiful pictures of Maman in there, alright?”

“Maman! Maman! Maman!” D/N continues to exclaim, squirming excitedly in his arms as they walk through the door and down the hallway into the living room.

f1gossipofficial

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f1gossipofficial Nine months after the tragic passing of his wife, Y/N, Charles Leclerc has been spotted for the first time on a beach in Spain with their shared daughter.

Witnesses who captured the photographs above mentioned that he appeared to be coping well, and fans respectfully gave them space while appreciating the sight from afar.

We're glad to see Charles out and about again, and we extend our best wishes to him and his family as they continue to navigate these changes.

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4:44 ────────────ㅇ 4:44

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