Thursday 12 July 2012

CREATING VITORIANA PART TWO

After service was so rudely interrupted last week by a smug round of back slapping here at the Rookery following the very positive review of CO2, this week we are posting the second part of Tim Hart's musings on the creation of Victoriana. Take it away Tim!



So the 'Agency of the Eye' (named after an English literature concept) uniforms were based on what Domonick wears in the trailers (although his is modified with accoutrements for his rogue nature). Basically a black, long half-cape coat with a decent hat and the eye-masks.

The masks were a nightmare for design. After varying designing and redesigns on bits of old till roll from work (where I do a lot of my thinking). I came to a conclusion that the full face mask, although offering anonymity was starting to look like an aid to bizarre fetish. Especially when I was trying to work out what kind of mouth pieces to have and everything was looking quite Gimpish. For a family friendly story, I had to reconsider rapidly.  So I decided to lose the lower half of the mask and go for a Venetian style one. This idea was reinforced by a photo I saw of Saskia wearing one and it got me thinking about the old Domino masks worn by people like the lone ranger and Zorro. Especially as I have to be able to reproduce it as a prop for the filming of the trailers. The solitary eye motif was must on the mask, representing the all-seeing watcher of London. It represents a lot of things.

The script for the issues had been given to George and I eagerly awaited to see her fantastic creation based on my ideas and she didn't disappoint. A full page of Agency members, all varying styles of dress with pinstripe (a nice evolution from the earlier Agency images in the comic where they are still very normal looking Victorian dress). But she had taken my crude biro picture and turned a sow’s ear into a silk purse. The mask now covered the entire top of the head from the nose up and the lens eye were now almost camera like aperture. If (God Willing) I get a live action film, these will look bloody amazing. It's a nice feeling when things come together like this.

Thanks Tim. 

There will be more about Victoriana over the coming weeks. Stay tuned for updates.

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