You've Got the Look Doctor Who Confidential

So, what makes Doctor Who look so good?

Every week, Doctor Who is different.

That's one of the continual delights,

what the design department manage to achieve.

# A design for... #

It's not just a different location, or cast,

it's a whole different ethos behind every single episode.

So what's in store for the Doctor Who team this week?

Sit back and find out.

-What are they called?

-The Ood.

-The Ood.

-They're the Ood.

-The Ood?

-I thought of that name, the Ood!

-That's...ood.

I like calling them the Ood.

I was just, "We need a really simple name,"

and I just thought of Ood. And they were odd. It fitted them.

They're the squishiest, softest...

rubberiest things.

And the ears! You just want to bite them off.

And the back of the neck is also satisfying.

Earthquake in three, two, one... Earthquake!

COMPUTER: Emergency hull breach. Emergency hull breach.

Which section?!

Everyone. Evacuate the levels to 13. We've got a breach.

Cut there. One more, please.

The Ood are down to Neill Gorton.

Again, an incredible job, I think one of our favourite monsters.

The start point is script, as always,

and it says albino clone things

with...I think Russell described it as "mouths like sea anemones".

Fronds, I think I said. Coming from the mouth.

Big red dangly things.

With a translation device in their hands.

That was it. So we did some doodles as usual,

and sent them off to Russell.

We hardly ever talk, just email all the time.

Literally the first design, Russell said, "Great!"

It was one of the lucky ones where it was all agreed really quickly.

I sent a description, he emailed a drawing, and we went, "That's it."

I thought the fronds added to a ball would get around mouth manipulation,

-and mouth prosthetics.

-We did one as an animatronic.

It makes the eyes blink and the forehead move,

so it gives it facial expressions.

It's like having two remote-control cars either side of my ears.

The eyes of the Ood weren't eye level. When the head's on,

the mouth was here, if you like.

So effectively, the guys in the suits were blind.

They've got this group hive mind,

which is one of servility.

They need a function in life, they need to be given a function.

So they're happy slaves.

So when they turn nasty, it's really scary.

# Stop makin' the eyes at me I'll stop makin' the eyes at you... #

Suddenly, the face and stuff is really quite scary.

# Well I bet that you look good on the dance floor

# Don't know if you're looking for romance

# Don't know what you're looking for... #

-Watch me tentacles.

-Yeah, I know.

-They're very sensitive, you know.

They're a great design.

They're a bit like a squid, but they're rather kind of mooshy

and they're great to touch.

You've got to touch an Ood head.

There's something about the spongy stuff they use to make these things -

very tactile.

# Oh, you pretty things

# Don't you know you're driving

# Your mamas and papas insane... #

And in creating the look of The Impossible Planet,

the tone had to be set from the very start.

The big thing Russell said when we were having the tone meeting,

from the start, the word was "tough".

WIND HOWLS

The point of eight and nine is to go further with the Tardis

than we've ever gone before in terms of the threat and the danger.

So I was always... I always had this story in mind,

to go to one of those old-fashioned space bases

where you can't take the air for granted, and the water, and food.

And they're absolutely remote. Pioneers.

The script called for this planet to be really uninhabitable,

with this temporary base structure on it.

This wanted to feel real.

We wanted to feel like these guys were working,

as if they were working on an oil rig.

It has to have a feeling that what they're doing is very dangerous.

-The planet's moving!

-It's a working environment.

It's not very comfortable, glossy, futuristic sci-fi.

It's real, gritty sci-fi, if you like.

-Open Door 19.

-Science fiction shows with ships like the Enterprise,

they're all comfortable and marvellous, and in real life,

you look at something like the Mir space station or the shuttles

and it's cramped and the food's rubbish.

We wanted to put a bit of that into Sanctuary Base 6

and say look what it's really like,

it's not all anti-gravity and posh and shiny and beautiful,

it's really hard work.

-What's happening? Rose, what's going on?

-Come on!

I can't contain the oxygen field.

I wanted the idea of it all to be sort of flapping,

and the noise and the wind running through there.

Rickety old tub, is what that base is meant to be.

-It's rattling in the wind.

-It's a dirty place,

it's a dangerous place.

I think one of James Strong's greatest feats on this

is to get smoke all the time. It is like hell is underneath them,

and every shot almost there's smoke rising up in the background or the foreground. I love that.

It's so atmospheric.

The colours are very important.

You establish the colour of the black hole, we decided that would be red,

and that affects the lighting coming through the walls and windows.

Open Door 40!

Today we've been filming the scenes where Scooti

gets chucked into space, and dies.

SCREAM

-Action.

-Zach, got a problem.

-Scooti's still missing.

-'But it says habitation three.'

-That's where I am, and I'm telling you she's not here.

-I've found her.

'There's a scene where you see everyone looking up,

'from the spaceship, and they see her floating past the window.'

And that's the scene we're shooting today.

Report Officer Scootori Manista PKD.

Deceased.

We're filming that underwater,

to get the effect of her floating in the big dark black.

We're at Pinewood - that's kind of a big deal, really,

both in budget and logistical terms it's a big deal.

The stage itself contains a tank which is 20 metres long,

ten metres wide and six metres deep.

We wanted to come here and film underwater,

for the kind of... The dynamic that it would give the shots.

It's expensive, but the whole sequence has been an expensive one

for what will be a couple of seconds on screen.

# Take my hand

# Float, float on

# Come on, come on, come on

# Float on, float on... #

I wanted for it to feel like she was weightless,

and for her hair to be going, so these shots that we've done today

will give it a particular feel.

-# Float with me, baby

-Float, float on

-Yeah. #

The other options were to do it on wires in the studio and stuff,

but I think we felt in the end

you'd never feel like it was actually in space.

It's a much slower environment, but the shots are much more specialised,

so they take longer to set up.

It's potentially very dangerous, so there's lots of people involved to make sure it's safe.

'Clear the bubbles from your face.

'And do your hair...'

'The diving supervisor, Dave Shaw,'

is responsible for training all of the actors underwater.

There's divers down there with you, and they've got a mouthpiece for you with air.

'And again. And then look to the front.

'3, 2, 1!'

Countdown, 3, 2, 1, you take it out.

-Action!

-And hold your breath for a while.

Start all of their acting...

And then they film you in whatever pose you're meant to be doing.

'And cut. Cut, guys.

'Very nice, guys. Well done.'

And then they give a special sign

so that they can have the air returned to them,

rather than have them swim to the surface then swim down again.

It's really beautiful, because the water and the light

gives a really sort of...surreal, eerie effect.

Trying to be dead. It's fascinating.

I think the shots we got are fantastic,

and they're really dynamic, really different,

and when the Mill have cleaned up the bubbles and painted in the black hole

and space behind them, they'll look incredible. Really thrilling.

And very different, and probably when we put this sequence together,

one of the most expensive and sophisticated we've ever done on Doctor Who.

I think episode eight is lovely. It's such a triumph.

It's where you see the Mill and Ed Thomas and the design teams coordinating,

so the costumes match the walkways which match the location.

It's really got a feel to it of being knitted together.

Everybody's thrilled with the end results, and I hope everyone watching is too.

It's about to go even further in the next episode.

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd

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