Big Scene development post 4: The Oil Rig climax (Part 2 - Helicopters V Oil Rig)

 At long last, I'm actually animating part of the expanded Oil Rig battle! Specifically the additional Helicopter sequences, which involve certain characters as described in my screenplay.

One of the main new Helicopter sequences of interest is that of a Helicopter getting shot by a turret gun from one of the Oil Rig's towers. Although this is seen happening twice in the original film, the explosion effect simply covers the screen and it cuts away before we can see what happens to the Helicopter.

Presumably this was due to the cheaper special effects the film used, or it was just a directorial choice by Guy Hamilton or whoever was responsible for directing the aerial shots. However, with this project I decided I would at least include one or two shots of a Helicopter crashing into the ocean:

A production still of the Helicopter exploding in mid-air!

Inside the burning cockpit, the pilot coughs due to the smoke
and loses control of the Helicopter...

Initially, most of the Helicopter shots were to be done with bluescreen/greenscreen effects as I did not have a method of getting the Helicopters to move as I wanted them to. However, now I do have a useful technique to enable them to fly not just forwards but vertically.

One of my favourite elements of the expanded Oil Rig Battle currently being animated is that the character of Marc Ange Draco (as well as the Unione Corse) is taking part in it!

Marc Ange Draco (right), Toussiant (second on the left) and Draco's chaffueur (first on the left and in background) come under fire whilst fighting in Blofeld's office on the Oil Rig.

Yes, and I've already animated most of the sequence where he makes his arrival via the Rig's Helipad. Like in On Her Majesty's Secret Service, the Unione Corse will be using white Huey Helicopters. This helps to differentiate them from the US Marines' Helicopters.

Draco's Helicopter comes into land on the Helipad of Blofeld's off-shore Oil Rig.

Draco charges into battle, ready to assist his son in-law James Bond and CIA Agent Felix Leiter...

In addition to the Helicopter scenes, I also have to finish off the Frogmen sequences, which were mentioned in my post about DAF's lost climax.

This involves them swimming towards the legs of the Oil Rig and then swimming away once they've attached the limpet mines. And of course, there'll be some explosion effects to simulate the detonation of the mines.

As you can tell, most of these are complex special effect shots that will only make up small sections (or even shots!) of the Oil Rig Battle scene. Once they're finished, the next part on schedule will be the main parts of the fighting on the Rig itself, featuring Draco's Unione Corse troops against SPECTRE henchmen!

 

See you next post for an update on the progress for that section!

- The RetroCaptain