Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1529668
Orlok's crypt and the interior of the Romanian monastery church were built on a separate stage. I had seen images of the painted monastic churches from Moldavia, Romania, and I loved the frescoes that covered them inside and out. When the production was scouting in Romania, I hoped to see them in person. Unfortunately, the monasteries were all right along the Ukrainian border, and with the war ongoing, the studio wouldn't let us go there. When Hutter first enters the chapel with the nuns, the feeling should be frighteningly strange and, while not wholly unfamiliar, should evoke the awe and wonder I felt when I first saw these unique monastic churches. When I proposed the design, I wasn't sure how I would recreate the frescoes. Painting wasn't a great option. Even if the film had the time and money, I wasn't convinced we could match a 15th century masterpiece. And we didn't have the time or the money. I thought about printing directly onto plaster, but that technology isn't developed enough to handle the curved surfaces and the extreme unevenness I wanted for the walls. That is when I discovered a product from Italy that could do the job. It was a digital print on an elastic substrate that is thin and flexible enough to be applied to uneven, curved surfaces—and it's thin enough that the texture of the plaster reads through the substrate. It had a matte finish once it was sealed, much like the frescoes I was trying to emulate. I'm not the first designer to use this company, but I am grateful to have found them nonetheless (and I will be using them again). The Art Department didn't have access to the original frescoes, so I asked Graphic Artist Michael Eaton to lay out the images we had selected and purchased from stock image houses. We also created the bespoke fresco that runs along the ceiling and onto the gable ends in the first room. There was quite a bit of retouching, overpainting and cleaning up to do with those images, but Michael did a fantastic job of it. Once everything was on the walls, we did some further retouching and added the (imitation) gold leaf to the halos. Ondřej Lipenský was the Art Director for the monastery sets, as well as the other set on this stage, Count Orlok's crypt. Ondřej A. COUNT ORLOK'S CASTLE, GREAT HALL. PLAN AND SECTION DRAWN BY HAUKE RICHTER. A B C