Up top there, we had to sort of...
do some more grader work and flatten out some of the hill.
It was a bit of a slope and we had to sort of flatten it all out and...
make a big space up there...
which is about the size of a rugby field, maybe a bit smaller, for...
the caravan park up there.
That's Steve Harvey.
He's in charge of maintaining and setting up our caravans.
When we bring units up here like the campers and the Swagman and the trailers...
we've gotta water them up, power them up, make sure they're basically all go.
On a site like this you've really gotta take care of the sanitary side of things.
Obviously the toilets and things like that.
It's just home away from home, really, just like going camping at Christmas.
So the actors all, sort of, hang out up there so they keep away from us.
A nice little hideaway for them. It's the best spot on set, to be honest.
Power for the site comes from that power line.
It sort of runs down, we've got a temporary box here to set up for the power...
there's a 63 phase which feeds most of the construction site.
We will be drawing too much power for this site for this thing to handle...
so we've got generators to help, sort of, spread the load a bit.
We've got in this one, at this stage, four generators...
split into four corners of the location...
and we're basically just providing lighting power.
Whenever anything else crops up, we'll jump in and...
provide them whatever else they need.
The tents are set up for two reasons. There's a couple of big tents over there.
The far one is the wicker tent, which is for getting the native extras ready.
The other tent is for catering for the crew.
We've got 400 people, cast and crew, to feed today.
For that we need two catering trucks...
infrastructure of power, water.
We've also got a coffee truck on location so people can...
die and live on flat whites.
Welcome to the coffee truck.
If it wasn't for the unit department, the crew wouldn't have somewhere to eat...
they wouldn't have power or water, the set wouldn't be able to be built.
Yeah, hey, we're the backbone of this whole industry.
So that's the end of this video diary. Now we're gonna keep these going.
We're really having a lot of fun making them, but we actually thought...
it might be quite good to send out an invitation...
to all of you folk who watch these. If there's anything that you want to know...
about the production of the film... King Kong is obviously what we're making...
but either about Kong in particular or about filmmaking in general...
why don't you let the KongisKing website know about it...
and we can carry on doing these video diaries and start incorporating...
some specific answers to questions that you may have...
or things that you want to learn about.
Fire in the questions. We're here and we'll read them...
and we'll see what we can do.
So, it's day 53. We're still shooting on our Skull Island village set.
It's interesting, some of the things you have to deal with, with filmmaking.
And one of the things you may not know about is that the studio...
often arranges visits of the press while you're filming.
That gives the press an opportunity to visit the set...
to describe what they see on the set...
to interview the actors while they're actually working.
And today we're hosting a visit of a group of international press.
And it's fun to see them down here in New Zealand.
And they're having a look around...
and you'll be able to get to meet some of them.
- How are you guys? All right? - Well, thank you.
Nice to see you.
They're just really excited to be here.
A lot of them have traveled from Europe and Germany and Switzerland.
And I'm very happy to have traveled to the far side of the world to follow it.
And I look forward to writing an article...
for the people in little Denmark, you know, about this great production.
We try to get them onto set as often as we can...
which can be quite tricky. We work closely with the ADs...
to see where we should and shouldn't stand.
Going on the set for about three minutes before we're told to get off...
because we're in Naomi Watt's sightline.
But I'm sure we'll get another chance to go back on.
Look, it's exciting. It makes me want to be an extra, for about 10 minutes.
When we do interviews, when we manage to get actors, we try to get them to commit...
to about a 20-minute interview, which they will do with all 16 journalists.
They've gathered you all, and I feel like I should do a sermon.
So you're Jack, right?
- I'm Jack. - So what kind of dude is Jack?
Obviously, the journalists just love getting an opportunity to speak to the actors...
and hear about their experiences with Peter.
At the moment, the questions seem to be quite general.
Jack, can we start, please...
by getting your take on the whole King Kong thing...
as a kid when you first saw it then.
Well, I think I saw the remake first.
So when did you see the original, as it were?
The original? I saw it when it came out. When was that '75?
- No, 1933. - Oh, the original.
None of the journalists have read the script.
They all know that the movie's based on the '30s version.
So they have something to reference.
That's completely different to the 1976 version, where all the villagers...
- lived behind the wall. - Yes.
Have you got a special question that you want to ask him?
- Lf you wanna get in there... - No. Not right now. I'm...
You're just going to sit back and listen?
Within a group of 20 or 16 journalists that we've got at the moment...
you've probably got about four or five journalists...
that ask the main group of questions.
I will ask to Naomi Watts...
how does it feels to be eventually compared with...
somebody like Jessica Lange?
Or to the other girl of the '30s movies?
And fortunately for this group...
they're actually a really smart group of people...
so they've asked really good questions.
- Why is King Kong timeless? - "Tameless?"
- Timeless, timeless. - Why?
I mean, everyone has their own take on what makes it...
- timeless and magical. - Timeless?
Timeless. Sorry about that.
- He's a foreigner, I know it's difficult. - He grew up in the wild.
- I know. - We have a shot... A shot... You know.
As soon as I leave here I'm going for an elocution or an electrocution.
Because I said "tameless" and you said "yes"?
It's tough to have a whole lot of journalists together...
because everyone's looking for their own angle for a story...
and everyone's in exactly the same situation...
listening to exactly the same words from everyone.
Can you tell us about the excitement you're clearly feeling...
as your Kong, the beast you are creating...
is developing, and you're quite cunningly keeping from us?
- Yes, we have noticed. - For really obvious reasons.
We haven't... To be completely honest with you...
as of today, I haven't seen Kong myself.
I don't know if you have known the film called Godzilla...
but we do this, like, King Kong versus Godzilla in Japan.
King Kong, the king of all monsters...
even better than Godzilla. He's stronger and smarter than Godzilla.
Godzilla's a stupid lizard.
King Kong is almost a man, a giant man.
A Sasquatch, if you will.
The whole day has been one surprise after another...
as far as I'm concerned.
But it's been great just to be on the set and see the scope of the thing.
I think it's very impressive.
It's this impressive gray wall I just am looking at right now.
You know, it's so amazing.
It must have cost them a lot of million dollars.
So they're really just here to soak up the environment...
get a sense of what filming is like...
get a sense of what Peter Jackson's like as a director...
how the actors like to work, a little bit of the story.
But it's really a preliminary feeling-out how the movie is...
and working out what kind of coverage they want to do...
and how they want to use their interviews in the future.
It'll probably start covering next month.
I think I have a deadline of next week or something, to get the first thing out.
Because people in New Zealand, they have vested interest in all of this.
They take all of this, Peter Jackson's work, very personally...
so I think they're going to be wanting to follow along...
the whole process of the thing.
- Thanks, Peter. Nice to see you. Thanks. - Thank you. Nice to meet you.
- Thanks, mate. - That all right, thank you.
So it's the end of day 58 today.
We've been plowing through your requests.
This is just a few of them.
But they're the ones that specifically wanted to know about the Art Department...
and the on-set Art Department and how they get ready for a day of shooting.
So for Anthony, Mark, Jordan, Bob...
and all others that wanted to know about the Art Department...
we've had our cameras following our team over the last couple of days.
Yesterday we were on the Skull Island set...
and today we're back on the jungles of Skull Island.
So they're two very different days...
and we thought we'd just follow the Art Department around...
for a couple of days and show you what happened.
You may think that the Art Department builds a set and that's it.
But that's not it.
We're constantly revising sets, building new sets...
always just trying to stay ahead of the shooting crew.
And, of course, on the day the shooting crew, they get to the set...
the set needs to be redressed, turned around...
and that's why we have an on-set Art Department.
The responsibility of the on-set Art Director and his team is...
to make sure that the set is exactly as Peter wants it.
Maybe another one here so they... 'Cause that's the step...
they're obviously gonna come up.
He just adjusts things on the day...
so that it suits Peter and what he wants to shoot.
Look, Peter wants one of these skeletons over here...
just in the foreground of this wide angle...
as the heroes come through. You're gonna see it here.
Well, we're just working out the lens size. Then we can build...
something that works for the shot.
The Art Department for the Camera Department is...
a very important member of the team.
They create all this stuff and we just tear it up and go:
"Mate, get that out of there, will you?"
And they just take it away. It's fantastic.
So you see what they're doing here.
They've removed all of this...
'cause we're walking about here with a Steadicam.
And then when we're back over there, it's all gonna have to go back in.
And no one's gonna say "please" or "thank you."
It's just the job you took. What can you say?
We have, you know, standby chippies, standby props...
standby painters, standby greens...
so that anything that needs little repairs on the way through...
or if paint gets knocked off anything, they would fix it up.
If we have to move a whole bunch of rocks down there...
they seem to get knocked a wee bit so...
it's kind of just damage control, really...
so it's nothing too detailed but just to make sure...
there's no big patches of white showing.
- You missed a spot there. - For example.
One of the things he really likes is to dress to camera.
There is the other choice.
This is actually Murray but there is Wayne...
who's on the other ruin. And I think we should get Wayne.
- Wayne? - And just see if he's a bit better than Murray.
Murray is a bit stiff, isn't he?
Well, Wayne's all curled up...
and it might look more...
- you know, more of a stiff ceremonial... - Right.
Rather than someone who looks like he's just been shot.
So, Wayne, you finally made it.
Pete likes him so we're gonna poke him in the spot where Murray is...
and see how he performs.
He's happy.
He might have been a bit bleached from the sun.
We'll probably do a bit of treatment on him, to knock him back...
and dust him up and gravel him up...
to make him look like you've been here for some time.
Can you hear now?
Vietnamese torture, tying him up like that...
and then they untie them, and they can't stand up.
No, it's just a bit of masking.
Where I was told to take these was right up to the top.
So bring up some rib in here.
Oh, you gotta love that, son.
- Nice. - Are these gonna look funny...
lined up like that or is it gonna look quite ceremonious?
He's got ammonium in him, destroying him.
So they're busy.
They're not just sitting there looking at it.
They're usually very, very busy.
And all the ground dressing, all the shells...
all the detritus from their eating...
which is mostly fish-based.
Well, we'll walk on them and break them and just sort of...
do whatever it needs to make them the right color...
or texture. We just, sort of, work on them...
off-set and throw them on...
and if it's still not right the on-set crew will do it.
We use various different types of sand, depending on the set that we're working on.
If it's a dark set...
you know, we'll go for a darker sand.
Whatever really suits the part.
Right here, we have these larger rocks.
We also have painted these. We paint them with a blue base...
and then a black overcoat, so you get this color that we have now.
They were...
these here. That's the difference after the paint.
What we do is, kind of, intermingle all of them together to get...
the visual we're looking for, more of a natural look...
where people can walk by and not see that it's been placed there.
So we also get what's called mingimingi...
and such things like that from the bush around the area around here.
Since we're not shooting on location...
everything from the largest rock wall to the tiniest leaf needs to be built.
Mount Crawford was really physical, heavy, hard work...
like lugging rocks and sand and stuff around.
And not have any greenery.
We have a huge nursery out the back that we built especially for this movie.
...which is located just directly behind the studio.
You can see Kong stage directly behind me.
Because you can only leave them in a studio for a certain amount of time...
before they start to look a bit sick.
So you have to take them back out into the nursery...
and bring in new ones and feed them up again and make them healthy.
'Cause film sets aren't really the kindest places to bring plants into.
Just with all the lights and extra feet that are around on a crew.
So you're better off going for more native plants.
...a good 20 different varieties of plants.
All of those are living specimens grown in bags right here...
and then when we put them on set, we make sure we keep them well-watered.
Besides that, the moss would be the other major live specimen.
Lots and lots of living mosses.
But we have a bit of fun...
with some synthetic things as well.
Our number one...
fake moss is this Fun Fur...
and it just comes in mats.
We burn it with propane to get it curly...
and it actually gives a really real look.
Well, Wellington's pretty good for a beach for us.
Most of it is very light...
so what we have to do is paint it all back so it doesn't...
hang out in the lights.
So you're not getting lots of spots of white...
which would look a lot like all this polystyrene that's here...
which we have to paint back, as well.
Taking photographs on set is probably one of the most important things...
that the on-set crew do for them and for us off-set...
because that's for continuity.
You may have to go back to that same set...
or maybe rebuild it two months later.
And it's amazing what you forget without a photograph.
Everywhere you go, you need to know what it was...
so that you just don't make those wonderful continuity mistakes...
that people are looking for all of the time.
I've just taken a photo of the skeleton down there in the dressing.
So if we do have to return here...
we can match how it was.
Here we all are.
Not the butthole again!
I wanted to touch it to see how real it was.
- Very real. - Very real.
I think it will be available...
for hire at the weekend.
Well, as you can see, the Art Department is constantly in motion.
And it's time to move on to the next set.
So hopefully that gives you a bit more of an idea of the Art Department.
And we're gonna keep going through the questions.
There's lots of good ideas here, so we're inspired.
We'll keep these production diaries coming. Keep the questions coming.
We've already got a few ideas for the next week or two.
So, look forward to seeing you again soon.
So here we are.
It's day 62, and we're shooting on the shoreline of Skull Island...
which is our wet set in the back lot here.
And this is another one of our requests from the viewers, if you like...
and this one was requested by a lot of people.
A surprising number of people, actually, wanted to know about the cameras.
The type of cameras that we're using, and how that they work.
This is a 35-mil motion-picture camera...
and today it's got a 32-mil lens on...
and a filter, which is an 81 EF...
which is gonna make the daylight slightly cool...
because this is a predawn sequence.
And we're filming right behind you.
So for Hines and for Brian and Keith and Mark and Phillip and Peter...
and many other people, this video diary is gonna focus on our cameras.
Then what happens is, the light comes through the lens through here.
I'll take this off.
Then what happens is, it hits that mirror, and that mirror spins around like that...
24 times a second. When it hits the mirror, the light travels up here...
into the eyepiece, so the operator can see. And then when it spins around here...
it exposes the film, and that's where you get our pictures.
This is the first shot of the day.
- 164 alpha, take one. A marker, guide track. - Mark.
B marker.
- Set! - Set!
And action!
Camera reload.
This is loading the camera, readying the camera.
But if you look in here, you can see...
a little gap in there, that's the camera gate, that's where the film gets exposed.
And then what happens is, these pins come out...
they're called the registration pins.
They hold the film steady, and the film stays exposed.
And then pull down forward, come down again.
And that happens three or four times a second.
This is an LCS, which stands for Lens Control System...
which is essentially just a remote focus device...
which enables me to step away from the camera and pull focus remotely...
without actually needing to be anywhere near the camera.
If you can imagine, you got a manual camera at home, and you're taking a photo...
you got to focus it up.
Well, in this situation with a motion-picture camera...
actors may be moving, or the camera might be on a dolly...
and it will be tracking in or moving...
so the focus needs to be adjusted constantly during the shot.
And that's what the focus puller does.
The other thing a focus puller does is they're responsible for the camera...
like this little 235.
This is the ARRICAM LITE, it's one of our cameras that we're using.
It's a lightweight camera, great for hand-held.
Now you got your exposed film counter.
So if your roll stops, it let's you know the footage remaining.
And reset. That's my reset button.
Over here we have the battery pack, which isn't actually part of the camera.
It's just an accessory.
That's like a digital tech vision.
The sound, that comes out through the front from those two horns.
Down here we have the frames per second.
That's all changeable there.
One to forty frames. That's the on-off button.
We have three cameras on this setup.
We have a 65-mil camera which Simon Harding is operating...
which is filming a reverse of Naomi to Adrien.
We have Race on a 40-mil...
filming a slightly wider shot of the same activity.
And I am on a 20-mil lens, which is a wide-angle lens.
These are different focal lenses for different shots that you may wanna compose...
depending on the drama of the situation.
The higher the number, the longer the lens.
For instance, if you shot from the same spot, the same subject with a 50...
and then changed to 100, you'd have a much tighter shot.
What if we put a 28 and just open it... Just open it up.
- 28 will be good. - Yeah, 28 will be good.
- Yeah. - 28, try that.
20 to 28, going wide.
This is the T-Stop, the aperture.
T-Stop's measured once the light's traveled through the lens...
whereas in an F-Stop on our stills camera...
the light's measured before it comes through the lens.
And this is the zoom.
It moves around there.
That's tight in there, 290. And now it's at 24.
This is your focus scale here.
And that's it.
The magazine refers to the film holder.
These are 1,000-foot mags.
The other ones are a bit smaller, they're 400-foot mags.
The reason we have the 400 and 1,000 is because...
Cap's on.
...the 1,000-foot mags are very heavy...
so 1,000-foot is for production mode, 400-foot is for hand-held.
One magazine. Four hundred feet of unexposable...
So here we have 350, of exposed mags.
Four hundred feet would have...
four minutes of shooting on it. That's at 24 frames...
which is the normal reel time.
We can go at high speed up to 150 frames...
which means this would last 60 seconds, at the most.
- And cut. - Cut!
That's good. That's great. We can check that. Thank you.
Thank you very much, everybody. We'll check that.
During the shot, you can get a bit of dirt buildup or a scratch.
What I've got to check for is... Just see if it's clear, basically...
and that there's no damage.
If there's no damage to the film, that way we can move onto the next shot.
Those camera gate's clear?
And thank you, everybody, that is a shooting wrap.
I heard that...
Viggo slept with his sword...
to get into character, so I sleep with my camera.
Don't touch my camera.
So, here we are on Day 66.
We're in the Opera House in Wellington...
which is an old theater...
which is pretending to be an old theater in the middle of New York sometime in 1933.
But that's not why we're talking to you at the moment.
We're actually doing the first web diary sequel.
Now, the other day we did cameras...
and then that sparked a lot of inquiries.
Hanzhi, Al, Andrew, and a bunch of other people said:
"Oh, well, that's nice, but what happens to the film after it leaves the camera?"
And so we thought, "Okay, well, let's just shoot a sequel...
"to last week's web diary."
And so, we're now going to follow that roll of film.
It's B432.
And we're going to follow its journey...
from the time it leaves the camera...
all the way through the system, so you can see what happens to that roll of film.
The journey of the life of roll B432...
starts onset, during the shoot.
This roll, incidentally, is a scene between Colin Hanks and John Sumner...
at Skull Island cove.
- Yeah, very nice. Thank you. - Thank you. And action.
And...
cut.
Camera reload.
Once Peter yells, "Cut"...
the magazine containing our roll B432...
is then taken off the camera...
and put into a case by the camera assistant, and is then taken to the camera truck.
It comes back to the darkroom, where I download it...
and can it...
and send it off with a runner...
to the lab, where it gets processed.
Hey, mate. How far away are we?
It's already begun.
I've just brought in these exposed rolls of film.
So the processors would grab the neg...
Ioad it in total darkness...
and run it through the machine.
While that's happening...
we're preparing for it throughout the rest of the lab.
Once that's finished in here, the negative is cleaned...
then it is printed...
so then you have the negative...
and you have an unexposed print.
And then the negative is transferred in telecine...
the print is processed and then screened...
by Lynne and I in the link theater.
I look at the color in here, in the theater...
and then go around to telecine...
and just check...
make sure that everything is looking pretty much the same.
This goes on to the telecine itself...
and this is what converts...
the optical film into a video signal.
The spare is called a, well, it's called a spare telecine.
It's scanning at 2,000 lines all the time...
and can actually feed out to high-definition...
and to standard-definition tapes...
and to the Avid hard drive, all at the same time.
So we don't have to record anything afterwards.
The Avid is what digitizes the material for editorial.
And then that's all dispatched on a small FireWire drive.
- For you. - Thank you.
- See you. - See you.
It comes back to us on a FireWire drive.
And we have these rather nice little...
Bond, James Bond cigarette cases, which has a...
40 gb FireWire drive.
So the media comes back to us on that.
And that media, which is a copy of the film...
is really what we deal with, mostly.
So, this media is picture-only.
We get sound as a media file from another source.
We put the two together.
We break all those... Every shot in the film down.
We add lots of information.
We send that on to the editors.
We normally get the footage the next day after it's been shot.
It takes sort of a day for it to go through the whole process...
of being developed, put onto videotape...
ingested into the Avid...
Iogged, broken up...
sunk with the sound that was recorded separately...
and then, finally, about a day later...
we get it in our system and can go through it and edit the footage.
So, when it comes time to view the film that we shot...
it gets called "rushes" or "dailies"...
I think that's a BritishlAmerican thing.
I think Americans call them "dailies"...
and the Brits or New Zealanders call them "rushes."
But they are usually viewed in the cinema...
although, what I've taken to doing now is to watch them on DVD.
Usually, there's so much footage that...
rather than sit in the cinema for a couple of hours at the end of each day...
Andrew Lesnie, our DP, and a few other people...
watch just one take from each shot...
to make sure they're happy with the lighting...
which is obviously where Andrew's interest is.
For me, I ultimately want to watch all the takes...
because that's where the performance comes from.
The easiest way for me to do that is to have the dailies on a DVD.
And then I can watch them at my leisure.
Like, I'm here on set at the moment, and I can...
just pop...
the DVD in, which is our dailies...
and I can just have a look at it at my leisure.
As I'm sitting here working during the day...
I can check up on what we did yesterday or the day before...
and make sure that I'm happy with everything.
I also get a copy of these to take home with me.
It's a good way to look at the dailies...
because I can just jump from take to take.
I can, you know, find my way around.
There's menus...
and you can just pull up a particular bit. If there's something I want to look at...
if I want to just double-check that we've got a moment...
then it's a great way to access and find things.
So, thank heavens for DVDs.
Day 68 and we're inside the Wellington Opera House.
Of course, in the movie, we're in the middle of New York.
A lot of you have asked about New York, Art Department, conceptualizing...
and how we're going about creating the city of New York in New Zealand.
So people like Marc, Charles, Don, Adrien, Sarah, Jesse, Chris...
Ignaz, what a funny name. Never mind.
I'm sure you're happy with that name.
So, for those people...
we thought we'd just do a sort of a catch-up...
on where things are with New York today.
So, that's a huge kind of thing to take on.
So, you know, we've done a lot of work...
sourcing period photographs and really studying them as hard as we possibly can.
You know, to do with architectural details, to do with signage.
"The Rubber Flow..." "The New Watson Rubber Flow Stabilizers."
I mean, this stuff's great, because you can't make that stuff up.
This is, like, really archaic and cool...
and that's a good, nice, big look for any billboard thing.
We've even studied the amount of people per block, if you like, because back then...
it was one of the most heavily, densely populated cities in the world.
So we're sort of catering for that sort of amount of extras.
I mean, it's just full of detail...
so part of the research was, you know, a very quick visit there.
We got up at about 5:00 in the morning...
and the nice folks at the Empire State Building...
took us on this tour up to the very top.
We're in the Empire State Building.
It's March 4.
March 4, 2004.
I really wanted to have a look at what it was like...
to be on the top of the Empire State Building.
And I wanted Naomi to look at it, too because obviously in the movie...
that's where she's gonna be at the end of the film.
This is what we're gonna have to duplicate.
On the blue screen stage in New Zealand you're gonna be doing this stuff here.
I expect it's more the computers need to be doing this...
Good wind reference we're getting here.
We're getting a really good feel now.
It's really important that New York to me is not stylized...
or anything other than the absolute, realistic New York.
And we're going to go into a lot of detail...
to try to be as historically accurate with the buildings as possible.
There's been considerable differences...
between present day New York and 1933 New York.
A lot of which is what we see is the amount of high-rise buildings...
that have been added to the city.
One of the things we find is the skyline of 1933 New York...
is a lot different than what we see today.
And then of course, there's a big research thing.
We found, looking at a lot of, you know...
New York sets that have been done before that they appeared quite clean.
And we want to make ours gritty.
We're set in the 1930s in the depth of the Depression.
It's a gritty story and we really wanted to give it a lot of texture.
Conceptualizing started about a year ago with some art work that was done.
Jeremy Bennett did an exercise of really conceptualizing more of a color palette...
and a visual look for New York.
Not so much the technical, building-by-building side of things...
but just what it could look like, mood wise.
This is the first day of the shoot, in three weeks and four days.
And the first day of the shoot.
So I guess actually, you know, in some respects this is almost the...
It's just sort of nervous laughter.
This is obviously, you know, a different view...
than what I saw and experienced.
It's a lot grimier, dirtier, smoggier...
certainly the first portion here that we see in the docks...
it's not the New York that Mayor Giuliano would want to portray to the world.
All of these illustrations are done in Photoshop, made to be, that is...
so we can build up, you know, really quite detailed and complete illustrations...
which do capture the essence and the flavor of the time.
A lot of people are thinking that New York in New Zealand is kind of a crazy notion.
Why don't we go to New York City and shoot it for real...
but of course, the reality is that...
shooting in modern day New York as 1933 is almost impossible.
I mean, the city is hard to shoot in at the best of times...
and to actually dress large sections of it...
and control large sections for a period film is very, very difficult.
So what we're doing is we're building a back lot in the Hutt Valley.
This is Times Square.
And as you can see behind me, this is the subway.
We're gonna blue screen the bottom of those both...
to give the illusion that you're going down the stairs into a subway.
But then, this later on becomes Herald Square.
We have to put another facade on the building there.
We change it around a little, it becomes Herald Square.
And across the street, we have Macy's.
I think this street here is 46th Street if I'm correct. I could be wrong.
We have Broadway somewhere, and then there's Fifth Avenue...
I think there's Broadway...
and then Fifth Avenue and there's 44th Avenue...
and heaps of... There's so many street names around here, mate...
that we don't know.
Yeah, you get lost in New York.
So all that exists in one complex of streets and avenues.
And there's also gonna be a certain amount of set turn-arounds we do.
I tell you what, that's a good corner...
to have the big wrap-around awning on the corner to the side.
It's good to have that detail. You probably should throw it in there.
For other scenes we could just pull it off. We could just have it off.
Yeah, 'cause it does finish the Empire State Building.
Yeah, so it'll have a square corner.
Once you put the awning and the wrap-around and change it...
- it changes the feel of it, doesn't it? - Yeah.
So it's probably worth doing that.
And the main thing that we wanted to get...
is that we wanted New York to look like it wasn't a back lot, you know.
And I guess in doing so...
we were relying a heck of a lot on computer graphic extensions.
The buildings are only built to a certain height on set locations...
and digitally, we construct the buildings within the computer.
Apply different materials and textures to make the building look realistic...
and continue that on also throughout the distance of the street.
So for a shot that may be constructed within a specific location...
we may have to digitally extend the street all the way down to the horizon.
It's an actual 3D model that's built down to the finest level.
We can fly around the entire city.
Any place he wishes to go within the city...
he can take his camera down onto that street.
We have constructed everything throughout the entire island.
So, the digital effects are just as powerful a tool these days as physical building.
And as you can see, our New York is really gonna be a very careful blend of the two.
Our shooting in New York happens in January, February next year...
and so around that time we'll be able to expand on this early look...
and show you a lot more detail about how we're going about it.
Hey, I'm Steve.
We're at the Wellington Zoo today...
with the second unit.
So, yeah. We're just having a pretty cool, cruise-y day at the zoo.
Mostly, it's...
This morning's been a study of culinary habits.
- Here comes somebody up the way. - Yep.
Fascinating. It walks.
We're here at the zoo...
...because we're getting some footage for the beginning of the movie...
which is the zoo. It's supposed to be a depressed New York zoo.
I have to say, most of the animals in this zoo are not depressed.
It's actually a really lovely zoo...
and the animals seem pretty happy, generally.
I'm talking real-life adventure.
The pursuit of the extraordinary. I'm telling you, boys...
they're gonna have to dream up a whole new bunch of adjectives...
when I turn this picture in.
The other sequence we're trying to get shots for is when...
Denham is trying to impress investors with some safari footage that he's shot...
with him and Bruce Baxter...
sort of posing in front of lions and tigers...
trying to entice them with meat.
But the lions and tigers actually are, kind of, looking bored and not really impressed.
At least, that's my understanding of what it's supposed to be.
But we'll be filming the actors against a green screen.
And we'll be shooting the lions and tigers separately.
And then, obviously, they'll be put together in post-production.
Hopefully, we'll get some good footage.
Hi, I'm Suzette. I'm a team leader here at Wellington Zoo, and I've been...
coerced into looking after the film crew today.
So, just keeping an eye on things.
- Nothing. - It didn't even blink.
It was a thought.
Trying to get some animals to cooperate.
If I bang a food bucket, then they'll probably look this way...
and it might give you their attention.
Come on, guys. All right.
The scientific approach.
Sante!
Come on, guys.
Well, you know.
That's about as good as it gets.
Yeah. Let's go.
They aren't listening.
Okay. We're on the move.
Because of the candid nature of shooting animals...
We're going to go for lions.
...it's actually a bit difficult to set things up.
Is there a problem with this mag?
Potentially, yeah.
We tend to just quickly rush, and set the cameras up...
and shoot what we see happening at the time.
Do you see me shooting?
Well, monkeys, for the zoo sequence, are sort of really important...
because obviously there's a sort of a relevance to King Kong, there.
And we're going to go down to Monkey Island, shortly...
and try and get some of the smaller monkeys...
that sort of leap around the place and swing from limb to limb.
We're also trying to get some... I think there's some giraffes and zebras.
Peter's decided he wants to have spots on the zebras.
Which may be useful for the safari footage, as well.
Seriously, though. We're actually here shooting some plates...
for Carl Denham, out on safari, to match the background.
We've been trying to get some footage of animals behind bars...
which we don't have too much of now...
which is actually quite good for us, but not for you.
Because most zoos, nowadays, they don't put them...
in these small enclosures with bars.
Whereas, in the 1930s, that was the norm.
I think there's some intention that in post-production...
they'll put some bars across using CGI.
We've even got a little set of bars which we brought with us...
Solid steel.
...in the hope that we can possibly use that in some scenarios.
It's gone out of the sun.
Now officially a shade bear.
Sun-sensible.
Sun...
That's right. Sun-sensible bear.
Yeah.
It's been a great day.
You just get to hang out and feed a few animals.
Yeah. It's been good.
Welcome to Shoot Day 70.
Six more days till Christmas vacation.
Yeah, six days till Christmas and we're filming in the Civic Theater.
And we chose the Civic because...
it's New Zealand's grandest old picture palace.
Also a live theater as well...
and it just seemed that if we were trying to find an amazing theater...
to represent New York in 1933 that this was really the place to do it.
So it's authentic to that time period.
But yeah, we're not saying what Broadway theater...
because it wouldn't match any Broadway theater if someone was a stickler for detail.
They'd say, "That's not the way the Ziegerfield looked."
You know, so we're avoiding that.
But it's pretty impressive.
The theater's pretty bad-ass, I like to say.
A lot of extras today.
Big work for all of the A.D. S, the wardrobe and the make-up department obviously...
to get these people ready to go. They look actually wonderful.
Well, the clothes are utterly fabulous, as you can see...
and the guys look absolutely elegant, don't they?
So everyone's thoroughly enjoying it.
The furs, and the beautiful gowns, and the hairstyles.
Nice to see you. Wave at the poor.
All these girls look hot in their little outfits.
It's King Kong, the Eighth Wonder of the World.
Let's go to page 2.
Page 2 is all about King Kong with Miss Ann Darrow.
The Eighth Wonder of the World.
Now, is the Eighth Wonder of the World Miss Ann Darrow or King Kong?
- I'm from the Tribune, he's from the Times. - Yeah.
I'm sure no one reads the Tribune, though.
How many extras have I got today?
We got 230 but it feels like about 1020.
Just listen up. You guys at the top...
if you can watch what's going on that would really help me out.
What we'd like to do...
you guys on the outside are going up the stairs...
you guys are going straight through, you guys straight down the guts...
and you guys around to the right hand side, all right?
Excuse me. I know your film is very important.
You don't know what you're gonna see...
but you know it's gonna be something amazing.
As is exactly what it turns out to be.
And that Denham down here is the guy that captured him...
and he's the center of everyone's attention.
So some of you...
This is the first shot of the day. A big, wide establisher.
All the panters coming to see Kong and boy, are they in for a surprise.
Start rolling.
They're talking, folks. Let's hear it.
This is great. This is the only time when we can actually talk...
and not get told off. Perfect scene. We should have the scene...
And action!
We can probably sing as well.
We're making movies and we can make as much noise as we want.
Well, you know, camera malfunction. What can I say?
Contrary to popular opinion, it was not me that shrieked out in terror.
All right, action.
This is like the shooting of Jack Ruby or something.
He's holding his heart.
It is like the shooting of Jack Ruby. That's right, it's the Jack Ruby murder.
This roll will be excellent.
We're getting through and it all looks very nice...
and well, it's pretty much what one would imagine...
a big, glitzy theater in 1933 to look like.
- You coming? - No.
We're getting good at this.
- You're going to come again? - No.
Let's go back upsatirs.
So, we've just finished Day 73...
and the crew are moving back down to Wellington from Auckland.
The Civic's all done now...
and we've got three more days...
of shooting before our Christmas break.
And there's a good chance, though, on this travel day...
for me to catch up with the most popular question, I guess.
And one of the most popular questions has been...
people asking for more information about conceptual art.
So, for Adrien, Alexandros, Chris... two Chrises, Danny...
Dwayne, Janie, Jessie, Johnny...
Mickey, Sarah, and a lot of other people...
who've asked about the process of conceptualizing the film...
and then how that's taken through to production design...
I thought we'd just, you know, look at a couple of examples.
The thing with conceptual art that I enjoy mostly...
is the inspirational value.
For instance, you know, we always knew that in our movie...
we wanted Kong to fight a T-rex.
So, one of the very first things that I had our conceptual artists draw up for me...
were a whole series of pictures of Kong fighting a T-rex.
The one in Newsweek that we released is a good example of that.
The design of Kong is not the final design of Kong.
The T-rex doesn't really look like the T-rexes in the movie...
because these are not creature-design drawings.
These are just inspirational mood and atmosphere.
How it works is Gus and I will get a very detailed brief from Peter...
as to what he would like to see...
sort of regarding the next set build.
And Gus and I can go away and do whatever we want.
And that's generally called a "first pass."
And we'll come back with...
however many paintings...
and get a very clear, succinct critique from Peter.
Sometimes we have the opportunity to do a second or third pass...
depending on what we've missed or...
what he's seen and liked and possibly would like to change.
You sometimes get ideas...
for the choreography of the fight based on their drawings.
I just love them to be doing stuff for me with no rules, with no instructions, really.
Just come up with some cool images.
And that's a really valuable way...
in which conceptual art can actually feed into the creative process.
It's very inspirational.
And then it obviously informs the designing of the film.
I mean, for instance...
you know, we have the scene in our movie...
and from the 1933 film, the log chasm.
And so we had to, obviously, look at the idea of...
what is the log chasm.
I didn't want it to be fundamentally anything different than the original film.
So it's a chasm with a fallen tree across it.
But I wanted to make it a little bit fresh...
so we explored the idea of just making the forest look different.
And I thought these roots and the way the vines...
hang over the edge of the cliff was interesting.
You're always just trying to look for things that you haven't seen before.
I always thought that the tree...
rather than being horizontal like it is in the original film...
I thought it would be fun if the tree was actually on an angle.
So you had to go uphill to climb over the tree.
And then on the other side of the chasm...
I wanted to just get a sense...
some vague trace of the ruins on Skull Island.
So, I'm standing next to the design maquette...
for the log chasm.
We've built a variety of scales...
trying to analyze what is required...
for the log chasm...
and the log across the gap.
And we've worked up those scales...
interacting with Peter and the art department as we've gone.
With the log chasm, as with all our big sets...
the interpretation from thereon, it's just about size.
The concept art is sort of our bible.
On each set, it's different.
But in terms of the build itself...
the texture in the logs...
the color of the mosses on the logs...
it's a great tool for anyone who's working on it.
Whether it's the sculptors, or whether it's the painters or the dressers...
everyone has their, sort of, base reference.
In this case, we have the side of the chasm they approach from...
Kong's side of the chasm...
and the log that spans the chasm.
This is our version of the famous log scene...
which was obviously used in the original film...
and in the 1976 remake.
So, how can we do without it?
It's one of the iconic moments in Kong...
and it's obviously a scene that...
most people will be expecting to see.
And we don't want to disappoint them. So we've built this mechanical platform...
with, basically, a big rubber tree.
And then the idea is that we've...
programmed moves into the computer-controlled platform...
that simulate, roughly, what Kong will be doing when he shakes and wobbles the tree.
Higher!
And then there's one more step that follows the shooting on stage...
and that's the building of the production miniature.
Now, the maquettes that we use for the design...
are never actually filmed.
And so, what will happen with the log chasm now...
is that we've finished shooting the set...
and now Richard will continue the process...
and he will use what finally got built on set...
to form the basis of the miniature that he'll build...
which is then based also on the earlier maquette...
and the production design conceptual art.
What we'll do now is turn this maquette...
over to John Baster...
who is our miniatures supervisor.
And he will utilize it...
to build the final landscape model.
And his production miniature, which is going to be huge...
will incorporate the deep chasm...
it'll incorporate the towering cliffs...
the depth. It'll have everything that wasn't possible for us to build onstage.
But it will match, ultimately, what did get built onstage...
so we can blend the two together.
It's a fairly straightforward pipeline that we developed over Lord of the Rings...
and it's great fun for me, because it allows me...
to feel the design coming together slowly...
and to have input at various stages...
and to really try to get the best of everybody's ideas...
to finally gel into what ends up on the film.
So, it's Day 76, which is significant for us...
because it's our last day before we break for Christmas.
And it's... You know, we've had a fairly busy...
intensive 14 weeks of shooting.
I know I feel quite tired.
I'm looking forward to the break.
Well, there have been so many great sets.
My most favorite would probably be the diner.
The New York diner, because it reminded me of home, and it was just fabulous.
First night shoot...
dump tanks.
All that water crashing down on deck.
And Andy falling overboard.
And no one yelling "Cut," and all the boxes being thrown down.
And there was Andy, hanging off the boat.
Legend!
Oh, man. What a night!
My most memorable moment...
I can't tell you that one.
No, I can't tell you any of the memorable bits, actually.
Yeah, most of them happen on the weekend.
I can't tell you the most memorable off-camera.
That's a secret. For me, and me alone.
I don't know, I liked so many things.
I think my most memorable moment is...
I'm freezing to death out there in the swamp...
with Colin Hanks and everyone else freezing with us.
That was kind of memorable, 'cause it was freezing.
I was cold for days.
So, yeah, that would be the one.
And this, of course, is quite memorable.
I mean, my least favorite moment on the movie shoot...
you know, has definitely gotta be today.
In that water, man, freezing our asses off.
I mean, we do have wetsuits on and stuff...
but when you're not really moving around...
you're not really creating much insulation in your wetsuit.
It gets pretty darn cold, and we were in there for a while...
and the waves just coming in...
and I swallowed a bunch of water and stuff...
and I almost vomited at one point.
That wasn't a lot of fun.
To celebrate the end of this first block of shooting...
we're having a Christmas competition for the crew...
which basically involves guessing how many setups...
we have shot since the shoot began.
A shot is a camera angle.
If we have a setup and there's four cameras on it...
that means there's four setups.
Every time we move a camera...
change a lens...
do a different speed, officially that's a setup.
Okay, in honor of it being our Christmas break, we are running a competition.
And it is a shot count competition.
I think it's between 5,000 and 7,000 shots.
Personally.
What do you reckon, boss?
22,000, easily.
22,000 shots! Jesus.
1,921.
200,000.
No, 200,036.
I've got absolutely no idea whatsoever, I'm a runner.
I could tell you how many afternoon teas I did.
But shots? I don't know, bro.
All right, so, if you remember...
the contest was to guess how many setups...
all units have shot since the beginning of the shoot.
That's 14 weeks ago.
Very interesting results.
First of all, we will announce the names of the people who were the wrongest.
One of the wrongest people was Sarah Weinberg...
who estimated that, since we have begun shooting, we have shot two setups.
I don't know what planet Sarah's from.
Please, you've been working too hard...
to notice we've actually been rolling film occasionally.
The results, the numbers, the main unit...
in the 76 days, we've shot 1,126 setups.
The second unit...
have shot 437.
But then there's the miniature department.
And the miniature department, since shooting began, has shot...
3,355 setups.
The winner of the competition, who wins the travel voucher...
with a close guess, not correct, about...
35 shots too low.
With 4,872 shots, was Mike Minogue.
I guess I was wrong, though.
I thought being a runner would hinder me, but obviously it helped a lot.
The largest waterfalls start with but a single drop.
Thank you so much for all of your hard work in the first 14 weeks of shooting...
and obviously everything that goes before that.
And have a great Christmas, you really deserve it.
Thanks so much. Thank you.
Hello, loyal viewers of kongisking. Net.
We'll see you next year. Have a great holiday.
All right. Merry Christmas. And have a happy New Year.
Right, merry Christmas, happy New Year, and see you next year.
And I lost the point!
I lost that because I was talking to you, because you're more important, and, well...
funnily enough, and I truly believe that.
Have a happy, safe holiday. See you next year.
Have a safe holidays. Seasons greeting to you.
- Cheers. - Merry Christmas.
Just say to you all, have a fantastic Christmas.
Enjoy yourselves, be safe.
Enjoy.
Well, merry Christmas everyone, and happy New Year.
Have a very, very happy Christmas and an extremely merry New Year.
We've been working very, very hard. We're looking forward to this nice break.
But have fun, be merry, be happy...
be safe, and we'll see you next year. Bye.
Hi, everyone. This is Bob and Ned...
and, of course, I'm Naomi...
playing Ann Darrow.
And I just wanted to say happy holidays.
Have a great time, and a happy New Year to you.
I'm going to be around a lot more next year...
and the guys have been chasing me in the jungle...
and I've been doing my Christmas shopping.
But, seriously, I'll be around and I'll see you somewhere...
maybe on the top of the Empire State Building.
- Going to say goodbye to everybody? - Yeah.
- Going to wish them all a merry Christmas? - And a happy New Year.
- And a happy Hanukkah, and a happy... - And all that.
- Kwanzaa. - Kwanzaa, that's right.
What else is going on around this time of the year?
I don't know. There's probably a bunch of stuff.
Yeah, whatever you feel like celebrating...
- Celebrate it well. ...celebrate it hard!
- 'Cause that's what I'm going to do! - Yes, for sure.
And I don't care if you're naughty or nice.
Skull Island is done.
- Skull Island's done. - Yeah. 2004 is done.
2004 is done.
Bring on 2005 is what I'm saying.
We'll see you when we get back.
- 2005, bring it. - Later. Bring it.
Okay, here we go. We're shooting now.
Whatever you want to do, do it now.
Yeah, do some movement.
But don't move too much.
Good.
There we go.
We're done. Our Christmas break!
Thank you.
Thank you, folks. That's a wrap, and...
Merry Christmas, happy holidays to you all.
Look forward to Christmas Day...
or as we call it in the business, the old TA 25.
Yeah. Yeah.