conflate the adrenaline rush of the Grand Prix with the competitive intensity of a globe - trotting , high - stakes reality show and compelling personal stories and closed book , and you ’ve get " Drive . " This new Fox series succeed a diverse group of people coerce into vie in a secret , illegal grouchy - country road wash .
In Hollywood stenography , what " drop off " is to " Survivor , " " Drive " is to " The Amazing Race , " but with much high stakes – there ’s a $ 32 million prize and deadly penalties for some – and one other major remainder . Despite the transcontinental setting , very slight milage is add together to the odometers of the miscellaneous fleet , which features a Ford Taurus , a ' 69 Chevy Impala and a dilapidated gardening motortruck . Nearly all the drive in " Drive " is done on a soundstage , with actor suspended in car rig in front of agreen projection screen .
" Because of engineering science , we can actually make a cross - country road race and shoot it all in Santa Clarita , " quips Tim Minear ( " Firefly , " " Serenity , " " Wonderfalls , " " Angel " ) , co - creator of the serial with Ben Queen . " We ’ve created a whole new manner of doing thing , " adds executive manufacturer Greg Yaitanes . " We ’ve create virtual surroundings , so we do all the driving without taking the car and people on the route . One of the signatures of the show regard this railroad car - to - car effect that nobody ’s ever seen on television and even in pic . "
Early on , Minear and Queen turned to Zoic Studios , the particular - effects company Minear had worked with on " Firefly , " " Serenity , " and " Angel . " " [ Minear ] wanted to make it unique , visually interesting , with the center of ' 70s elevator car chases tie to 2007 engineering science , " state Zoic ’s Loni Peristere , the ocular effects supervisor on " get . " " It took a while to count on it out , " cede Peristere . " We were demand to come up with a way of photographing computer - render images that was unique to the serial , apply cinematic rules to CGI . " And in this existent - world setting , there was much less room for error . " It ’s not spaceships andvampires . Everyone is aware of what drive looks like . It had to look real . "
Peristere ’s team finally devised what he name the"Drive " core , the position of " an omniscient camera not visibly bound by rigs and capable to move from the undetermined road into a close - up of a character and back out to the road without visibly cutting . The original pilot had an chess opening that was about seven moment long without a undivided cut , " he observe . But when the pilot was refashion after script and casting changes , the succession was broken up into six pieces to let for flashbacks with various characters . " It ended up act better , even though it was depressing for me , " Peristere chuckles . " Still , it uses a technique that ’s never been done before . It introduces a new kind of picture taking for the mankind to see . "
" They put cameras all the way around a photographic camera car on the main road to get the environment . These background plateful are not just rear - screen projections , " Minear points out . " It allows you to move anywhere in a practical environment . you could move across into move dealings and then into another gondola . " Obviously , cameras ca n’t pass through windshields , so successiveness dart with stuntmen in stunt cars on the open route have to be matched incisively when the activeness picks up on the green screen stage , and this requires specialised equipment and a pile of planning .
Peristere ’s photographic arsenal let in the aforesaid " impression car that we can mount up cameras all the way around , a Caddy Cam – a Cadillac Escalade with a jib arm on top of it that can go all the way to the priming or reach above the cable car – and numerous specialized lenses . There are also two or three versions of each slipstream vehicle : " an on - the - road version with touch window and an on - the - stage version without any glass that we can move in and out of . "
The on - microscope stage cars are suspended on especially - built rigs he callsair casters . " These are opus of steel that the cars are elevated on and on the bottom there are little hydrofoils so the cars in reality be adrift – they turn and move really well . you may push them with your digit , " Peristere note . " This way we can put two cars side - by - side while they ’re being moved in any direction and we can go back and forward to the actors within . "
In the next discussion section , we ’ll find out how the " driving " actors adapted to driving in front of a gullible screen .
Adapting to Green Screen
Some plaster bandage members adapted to the fleeceable screenland process more easily than others , news report Peristere , who direct or mold closely with the directors on those episode . " You have to give them a little drive coaching job . When you ’re on the route it ’s never straight and narrow , it ’s always bumpy and fluid . The wheel has little give and you ’re constantly correct for the route . We also had to teach them that when you drive you ’re see six car lengths ahead of you and when matter that are happening in their vicinity they have to track with it , " he excuse . " I ’d say , ' Do n’t draw a blank you ’re ride a elevator car ! ' "
Peristere praises Melanie Lynskey , who play Wendy Pattrakas , a Modern mama in a minivan on the rivulet from her scurrilous husband , as " the globe ’s estimable practical number one wood . " The former " Two and a Half valet " actress only get wind to repel three age ago . " I had a terrible phobia of driving , " she allow in . " I hold out [ in L.A. ] for four years and took cabs everywhere I went . "
A green screen newbie , Kevin Alejandro , who portray newly - release con Winston Salazar , come up the gullible screen process intimidating at first , " but they ’ve done a really respectable job of restrain the urgency and talking us through it . "
" You get used to it after a while , but it ’s an acquired skill , " reflects Kristin Lehman , who plays the closelipped Corinna Wiles . " It ’s like any improv , " adds Michael Hyatt , who as Susan Chamblee is one of three Hurricane Katrina survivors racing together . " We all acknowledge how to drive . We just do it on point . "
Their public presentation and other ingredient of every prospect must dead rival the footage previously shot on the road . " We have to match everything – lighting , depth of field , fog , route detritus . We have to recreate things like reflections . Everything is choreographed , " states Peristere . He uses a 3 - D computer program called Maya " to pre - visualize what the chronological succession will look like . We built in the highway , the cars , the character , and the camera equipment so this cartoon reading will have the same constraint as the tv camera car on locating does . It ’s like a three - dimensional storyboard that lets us know what ’s possible so there are no surprises . "
However , problem do arise that take to be fixed in Emily Price Post - production . This process takes twice as long as on " Battlestar Galactica , " Peristere report , because it ’s hard to simulate real life . On the other hired hand :
However , Peristere keep , " When we need to dissipate something very specific we do send a small unit to other parts of the land to take photographs we ’ll employ to create matte paintings . In the first sequence we went down to New Orleans duringMardi Grasand in episode three we station a building block to Georgia . We do those establishing shots so it ’s clear that we ’re not in L.A. "
Other position are entirely computer - generate , such as the lighthouse name and address in the first installment . " A year ago we would n’t have been able to create a totally CG - environment like that with ultimate photorealism that allows ahelicopterto total in and out . You wo n’t see too many of those shots because they ’re not punk . But we are using them , " says Peristere . " We have another one coming up in episode five where we have a virtual camera flying over Wendy as she ’s moving through a rural area that we ’re not capable to inject in . "
We ’ll see how " Drive " contender are tracked in the next section .
Tracking Competitors in
" Drive " employs another state - of - the art creature to establish where the competitors are in the race : orbiter graphics . " Google Earthwas definitely an inhalation for it . Our world isGPS ; it ’s a way we understand where we are , " notes Peristere . " We ’ve made a good deal with a orbiter party and we ’re using real satellite effigy and we ’re paint them to take their resolution up so they cultivate for program telecasting . "
Pinpointing where the characters will be in the story at the end of the initial 13 - episode trial is a scrap more of a mystery . Minear hope that there will be " a natural fillet point at 13 , " and then if we get picked up we ’ll end up the first race . I do n’t desire the audience to feel like they ’ve devastate their clock time . After that , there are direction to drift cast member into another backwash , give them another function . You get out some people were working for the race . Some people will die if they do n’t behave . Some people will fall behind . Some mass will win and new people can be added at any time . The race will evolve , the thespian will germinate , and the things that they ’re racing for can commute . "
That kind of fluidity has marked " Drive " from the start , since the original airplane pilot was scrap along with most of the cast . " It ’s the same story , we ’re just getting into it a bit other than , " Minear explains . " In the original airplane pilot we started on the road , and we did n’t really impose the worlds from which these citizenry come in . In the new version we do so we ’re more emotionally connected to who they are . They ’re just much more clearly limit character . "
In the original pilot , Taryn Manning ( " Hustle & Flow , " " 8 Mile " ) dally Ellie , a character now portrayed by Mircea Monroe ; man now play the freshly - created role of Hurricane Katrina heroine and struggling player Ivy Chitty . " We found Taryn so interesting and we want to discover a seat for her , " explain Minear , who tapped his " Firefly"/“Serenity " star Nathan Fillion to take the role of Alex Tully , the landscaper searching for his kidnapped wife . " He ’s Harrison Ford and James Garner put together … [a ] quintessential lead valet de chambre . "
" He ’s just an intermediate guy who ’s being forced into something that he does n’t actually want to do , " Fillon sum up Alex , who is presented with a fearful ultimatum : come through the race or his wife die . " Alex ’s past , which will be reveal over the row of the sequence , will figure prominently into why he was chosen and who chose him , " notes Minear . " Every character has either a despairing reason or a cryptic reason that will be let out over the class of episodes . " Adding to the enigma , " There ’s something that each of them can do , and it ’s not always of necessity the affair that seems patent on the surface . "
If this all seems rather Machiavellian , it ’s by design . Unseen creature master are pull all variety of string . " Did you ever see that Michael Douglas movie " The Game " ? There ’s a certain element of that to it , " references Minear . " There are masses behind the drape that are either allied with or working against certain team . Sometimes they may seem benevolent , other meter they may seem bad . There are proctor along the way , and some people are in their pocket , " Minear continue .
He and Queen also took care to avoid being influenced too much by " The Amazing Race , " though " there will be certain crossover component , " yield Minear , who became hooklike on the reality show after watch out a set of DVDs . Queen aver he was more inspired by route movies like " The Gumball Rally " and " Two - Lane Blacktop , " but found them emotionally wanting and minute in scope . " This is the car - chase movie that I never got to see . "
For lots more entropy on " force back " and related to topics , check out the contact in the next section .
