edited together my fav part of the 100 gecs boiler room show. the full thing is up on youtube but i wanted to add this to my yt music playlists. took the intro from dumbest girl alive and then peppered in some gun shots throughout the songs also a surprise at the drop. i should have tried to eq out the blips they used around the drop but that didn't pan out so shrug ig

We got to briefly stop and see around a real live sound stage! We weren’t allowed to take any photos of the inside as the show was still filming (they’d stopped for lunch!) but it was so fascinating seeing how they make these 3 camera sitcoms. The set was made up for “Bob <3 Abishola” (spelt with a heart symbol I’m not just being lazy haha) which is a typical sitcom like Big Bang Theory or Young Sheldon or Friends. They’re called 3 camera sitcoms because typically they only use 3 camera angles! One on the character speaking, one on whomever they’re speaking to, and then one for the wide shots with everything in it. The sound stage is laid out in a grid fashion, with 4 sets on each side of a narrow passageway. This passageway is referred to as camera alley because this is where the cameras will be! As with before, the sets don’t have ceilings on them to allow for lighting and the cameras are in a fixed position so as to not see the lights. It takes about 5 days to film one episode, and the sets are left as they are throughout the whole filming season as most of that time is dedicated to set up! After this the tour of the backlot continued, we drove past a few more famous locations! They have a massive jungle area with real plants from the jungle (as the climate will allow for it!). This was ESPECIALLY of interest to me as this was the area where they filmed the iconic T-Rex chase scene from Jurassic Park!! Warner Bros. let’s other studios use their facilities too, which is why some of the locations seem above are used in things like Breaking Bad, Jurassic Park and Spider-Man. They also have a big pit which can be filled with water to create a lagoon, or with dirt to create a graveyard. Versatile! After the outside lots - which were MASSIVE - we navigated to a warehouse area of the tour which had costumes and props on display. It was very cool to see! Costumes from Interview with the Vampire, Batman, Crazy Rich Asians, Space Jam, and of course a whole host of DC superheroes. They even had some from Game of Thrones/House of the Dragon. The costumers were intricately made, the detail was outstanding! For example on Aquaman’s suit there’s tiny iridescent scales all over. The props were cool too as they were primarily the Batmobile and other Bat-items from across the Batman movies. They had this cool area from The Hobbit which showed how they did the forced perspective trickery to make the Hobbits look small and Gandalf look big! The studio tour really made a point to showcase every aspect of the filmmaking process, detailing how costumes and props and sets were made. The amount of afford put in to each and every part of filmmaking is insane, no wonder it takes so long to make because so much detail is included, things you may not even see or notice unless you’re looking really close! Sam Warner (one of the Warner Brothers) advocated for the use of Vitaphone, the process of using sound in cinema, and it was fascinating to see how they would make the sounds for shows. For example, in the Spider-Man kiss scene, to prevent the fake rainwater from going up Tobey McGuire’s nose, they used a combination of cotton wool and Vaseline to plug up his nose! However this meant that he couldn’t speak properly, so he re-recorded his lines using the sound system to make himself sound clearer over the rain. If you go back and watch the film, you’ll notice that Kirsten Dunst as Mary-Jane only lifts the mask up to below Spider-Man’s nose, to prevent the cameras from picking up on the cotton wool! They also had things such as wooden boards and fake shoes to amplify the sound of actors walking on set, as typically the sets would have plastic floors to prevent the actors’ footsteps from drowning out their lines. Thus by dubbing over the footsteps, the sound department can control how loud they are and change the volume depending on the scene. Such cool stuff!! From storyboards to green screens to motion capture to physical makeup, it was incredibly to see behind the scenes and had given me an even greater appreciation for all those involved!

Off on another adventure ! Technically my third since I last updates this blog (sorry!) but I’m off to LA with my sibling to (amongst other things) go to the Five Nights at Freddy’s Blumhouse showcase at Universal Studios horror nights 😬 it was a looong day of travelling but honestly we were very lucky and it went very smoothly. I left Dundee at 08:00 UK time to fly first from Glasgow to Heathrow, then Heathrow to Los Angeles. Before security at Glasgow Airport there’s an IRN BRU shop and I had to restrain myself from buying EVERYTHING but I did get some socks lmao. Heathrow was busy and trying to find the underground station that takes you to the terminals was confusing (turns out the underground trains that go to London ALSO go to the terminals but the signage made it seem like they were separate. Same with the lifts to the lower levels but we figured it out eventually!). The Virgin Atlantic flight was incredibly comfortable! Not sponsored but there was a decent amount of feet space, there was regular snacks and meals and drinks offered, plus inflight TVs and the cabin temperature was very well regulated. I was worried about being cold on the flight cause Dundee/Glasgow was about 8C and LA was 26C so I didn’t reeeeallly want to cart about jumpers. Plus the flight staff were so lovely. The flight was nearly 11 hours and unfortunately I struggle to sleep on flights but there was plenty of entertainment so it was gucci. Hopped off the plane at LAX WITHOUT a dream in our cardigans because even at 20:00 LA time (which is approx. 04:00 UK time) nighttime it was 20C still. The traffic outside was INSANE like I’m SO glad we opted to use the bus to the designated outside taxi point because honestly it was SO busy. Couldn’t imagine trying to drive and there was just layers upon layers of roads spanning across 14 lanes and up over each other! Madness! Got to the hotel, we’re staying in the Burbank area and are literally 5 minutes from the Warner Brothers Studios. Earlier in the week (Monday so literally two days before lmao) our original hotel cancelled so this one was a LOT more expensive but it’s in an ideal location so at least there’s that. We were exhausted when we arrived so essentially collapsed into bed! Was super lucky that there was no travel issues (and that we missed both the storm in the uk and the earthquake in California oops)

love the jeans 🩵