The Walking Dead's production designer Greg Melton explains how to devastate a stretch of Georgia highway, shares what goes into building a barn and explains what all that teaches him about surviving the apocalypse.

Q: In Season 1, you created a devastated downtown Atlanta. For Season 2, you got a stretch of devastated highway. How did they compare?

A: They were pretty similar, actually as far as getting them organized, and doing your homework and getting the blocking and positioning of things that need to happen as the scene unfolds. We got really great cooperation down here from the Georgia Department of Transportation to shut down a big four-lane highway, which was the biggest thing -- we needed something major. Once we had that, it was just a matter of trying to figure out how many cars would tell the story. I think at one point, on our biggest day, we put almost 200 vehicles into that set, which was over a quarter of a mile long.

Q: And then you have to dress each of the vehicles...

A: Exactly. It's all people who are fleeing, so they're filled with bags and lots of stuff. And then it's been sitting there for weeks, so we have to come through and do a real heavy aging pass on everything. And then we trashed the highway. Literally. We were dumping bags and bags of trash and things. Everywhere you could see. We created two or three wrecks with burnt grass in the median. I love doing sets like that because you just stand out there and you start putting things around. There are only so many floor plans you can do. And then you gotta stand there in that space and just make it happen.

Q: What's been the biggest challenge in Season 2?

Continue reading "Dispatches From the Set - Production Designer Greg Melton" »

The director of an upcoming episode in The Walking Dead Season 2, Michelle MacLaren, describes planning a zombie attack with military precision and why she'd prefer being eaten by ticks over seeing a fake rat. New Dispatches From the Set are released every week throughout the production.

Q: You directed the second episode of Season 1, "Guts." What's it like to go from downtown Atlanta to a rural farm?

A: There's a lot more bugs! And there's ticks! And gnats! And I'm covered in Deet all the time! I loaded up in Los Angeles, and I'm wearing all the bug-sprayed clothing that Amazon.com has been kindly delivering to me. But I would say that the biggest difference is the beauty, really. In the city, it has its own beauty but it has a lot of concrete and it was very hard and very severe: Skyscrapers, hard cement, that kind of thing. And then you come out here and you're in this gorgeous location -- everywhere you look is stunning, and I love the contrast to the horrible zombie world that we're in. So you've got the stark contrast between beauty and post-apocalyptic zombies and death.

Q: You've directed several episodes of (and are an Executive Producer on) AMC's Breaking Bad, which is known for depicting vast landscapes. Does this feel like more familiar territory?

A: We do shoot a lot in the desert in Breaking Bad. And there's a lot of starkness and it's gorgeous and a lot of light. Actually, I was looking at the light here the other day and it reminded me of New Mexico. It's just stunning when the sun's setting and rising. And a large part of that are the golden browns in the fields here.

Q: Last season you had to contend with rats. Which is worse: rats or bugs?

Continue reading "Dispatches From the Set - Season 2 Director Michelle MacLaren" »

The Walking Dead's executive producer and show-runner Glen Mazzara describes turning Rick into a bad guy, explains what The Walking Dead has in common with police dramas and shares the Number 1 rule for writing horror. New Dispatches From the Set are released every week throughout the production.

Q: How did your family react to the news you'd been named The Walking Dead's show-runner?

A: A lot of people are lining up to be zombies. I actually brought my sons over to Greg Nicotero's workshop, and part of me is I want to be made a zombie too. So maybe that will be a cameo some day, I don't know. My son seemed to have a lot of unique ways to kill zombies. None that I really am interested in putting on TV, but that's a big topic of conversation at the dinner table.

Q: You wrote Season 1 Episode 5, "Wildfire." How did that experience compare to helping craft a whole season's narrative arc?

A: Well, last year I wasn't available to staff Season 1. So I was offered a freelance, and really just enjoyed it. I saw what Frank's intention was with the show and sort of broke the story and wrote to fulfill that. So then this year he brought me on to staff and we hired a great writing staff and we really worked out the season arc. So a lot of it is just following that road map. There will certainly be surprises and deviations from that, but I think for the most part, the characters' journeys were discussed in depth at the beginning of the season. What's been surprising is that in the graphic novel the story that takes place on Hershel's farm is really only a few issues. We've been able to mine that for many episodes, and we're very excited about the depth to which we're able to push the characters, the different dynamics that we're able to explore.

Q: What particularly surprised you about this material?

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Consulting Producer and Special Makeup FX Artist Greg Nicotero discusses the dos and don'ts of making zombies, creating webisodes for online, and how The Walking Dead reminds him of Christmas. New Dispatches From the Set are released every week throughout the production.

Q: Congratulations on your Emmy nomination. What do you think made The Walking Dead stand out?

A: Thank you! I think we were able to push prosthetics into a place that we hadn't seen on TV before, in terms of the caliber of design and sculpture. There's nothing television about The Walking Dead. Last year we shot six mini-movies, and they just happened to play on television. And what I thought the most successful aspect of it was, people couldn't figure out exactly how we did it. Take Bicycle Girl. There were people who thought she was an animatronic puppet. There were people who thought we dug a hole in the grass. No one could really put their finger on how it was done. And as far as I'm concerned, that's what I want to feel when I see a movie.

Q: Have you created any signature zombies for Season 2 akin to Bicycle Girl?

A: If I tell you about it, it gives the gag away! But I will say one of the signature zombies we did for this season took us five weeks to build and is the most elaborate thing we did on the show. And we were working on it up to an hour before we were shooting it on-set. But there's a lot more to do this season in regards to the way the story propels itself forward. There's one thing that's really interesting that they've established, which is this herd mentality -- the idea that they travel in these big packs and that there could be hundreds and hundreds of walkers in these herds. The first episode we come upon one of these herds and it's just terrifying.

Q: How has the makeup evolved from Season 1 to Season 2?

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David Boyd, The Walking Dead's Season 1 Cinematographer describes putting on the Director's hat for Season 2 and explains what Hershel's farmhouse has in common with a crocodile. New Dispatches From the Set are released every week throughout the production.

Q: Tell us about the episode you'll be directing. What's it like to switch from cinematographer to director?

A: For me it's the same process, same prep, same thought. This'll just have me talking to the actors a bit more. Episode 207 is cool in that we see that Andrea, this girl can shoot, man. And then Lori, she's kept her s--- together through Rick getting wounded and all that stuff, but she's starting to come apart a little bit and by the end of the episode she and Rick put it all out there. As functional as you can be in the apocalypse, these two are going to be equals.

Q: Sounds like a mix of action and emotion. Which do you find more challenging?

A: I don't know. I like both, you know? I guess I'm more familiar with the action part of it. But I've always been aware of what actors are doing when, and what their moments are so that I have some way to see it. But this time around I actually get to participate in it with them -- get to talk to them, get to adjust them and listen to what they have to say. It's a great ensemble bunch and about half way through last season everybody realized we weren't "actor" and "crew" -- we were all human beings trying to stay cool. [Laughs] Surviving our own apocalypse, really.

Q: What have you learned about surviving the apocalypse then?

Continue reading "Dispatches From the Set - Cinematographer and Director David Boyd" »