[HN Gopher] Fake town built exclusively for filming TV and movies
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Fake town built exclusively for filming TV and movies
Author : PaulHoule
Score : 117 points
Date : 2023-08-30 12:18 UTC (10 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (petapixel.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (petapixel.com)
| bonestamp2 wrote:
| Here it is on google maps: https://goo.gl/maps/Z2cu4zwuYGZTrHhB7
| dkga wrote:
| On the other extreme, if you ever want to see the actual
| (charming) city where Brazilian tv and cinema productions
| portraying the colonial period (16th-19th cent) are filmed, it's
| called Tiradentes, in Minas Gerais. Definitely worth a trip if
| you are in Rio or Sao Paulo.
| h1fra wrote:
| I understand the need but it bother me so much to recognise a
| studio when watching a tv show (or cheap movie). It's like the
| Wilhelm scream, it immediately reminds me I'm watching a
| something.
|
| Especially the paramount studio
| https://www.paramountstudios.com/new-york-backlot.html
| tootie wrote:
| I just did a studio tour in Hollywood and the tour guide
| mentioned that a lot of their most famous productions were done
| elsewhere because high brow directors hate the backlot. I
| gather most of the usage nowadays is for TV. Big budget films
| are either on location or just done on completely fabricated
| soundstages and/or CGI.
| civilitty wrote:
| Parks and Recreation drove me crazy because they used b-roll of
| the Pasadena City Hall exterior as a stand in for Pawnee City
| Hall, simply because it's what everyone in the LA area pictures
| when they think "impressive city hall"
| Mountain_Skies wrote:
| The exterior of JJ's Diner is of a shopping center in
| Atlanta. Easily recognizable to locals because of the
| presence of Galaxy Trading Company (part of Starship
| Enterprises), which was a headshop.
| eddieroger wrote:
| City Hall was not accurate, but several other exteriors
| actually are in Indiana in the Indianapolis area, and as a
| Hoosier, I let the City Hall thing go for it. The building
| that housed the accounting agency that Ben repeatedly almost
| worked at is 9333 North Meridian, and the office building
| where Dennis Feinstein had his office is on Carmel Drive.
|
| https://parksandrecreation.fandom.com/wiki/Filming_Locations
| dmix wrote:
| Reminds me of when Stanely Kubrick had an assistant take
| hundreds of pictures of doors in London to find the perfect
| shot of a hooker in a doorway:
|
| https://old.reddit.com/r/StanleyKubrick/comments/vhlcha/a_qu...
|
| Although Eyes Wide Shut was still filmed mostly on a studio set
| in London where they recreated Greenwich Village, his other
| films took quite an interest in perfecting the settings.
| Someone wrote:
| > his other films took quite an interest in perfecting the
| settings.
|
| Kubrick took quite an interest in perfecting all aspects of
| his films.
|
| https://collider.com/stanley-kubrick-the-shining-scene-
| guinn...:
|
| _"Stanley Kubrick movies are notorious for having multiple
| takes. One instance is in Eyes Wide Shut, when Tom Cruise 's
| Dr. Bill Hartford walks through a door. He just walks through
| a door. That's it. 95 times Cruise walked through the same
| door. It is not surprising, then, to know that the Guinness
| World Record for "Most Retakes for One Scene With Dialogue"
| belongs to Kubrick's The Shining with a whopping 148 takes."_
|
| One of the actors in that scene was a kid.
|
| Another example is
| (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barry_Lyndon#Cinematography):
|
| _"After "tinker[ing] with different combinations of lenses
| and film stock," the production obtained three super-fast
| 50mm lenses (Carl Zeiss Planar 50mm f/0.7) developed by Zeiss
| for use by NASA in the Apollo Moon landings, which Kubrick
| had discovered. These super-fast lenses "with their huge
| aperture (the film actually features the lowest f-stop in
| film history) and fixed focal length" were problematic to
| mount, and were extensively modified into three versions by
| Cinema Products Corp. for Kubrick to gain a wider angle of
| view, with input from optics expert Richard Vetter of Todd-
| AO. The rear element of the lens had to be 2.5 mm away from
| the film plane, requiring special modification to the
| rotating camera shutter. This allowed Kubrick and Alcott to
| shoot scenes lit in candlelight to an average lighting volume
| of only three candela, "recreating the huddle and glow of a
| pre-electrical age.""_
| throw0101b wrote:
| > _Kubrick took quite an interest in perfecting all aspects
| of his films._
|
| When he directed the Apollo landings I heard he was such a
| stickler for detail he insisted on filming on-location...
| drexlspivey wrote:
| The scenes shot with these Zeiss lenses look gorgeous. The
| whole scene is lit up by the candles only, he needed super
| fast lenses to capture enough light. The whole movie
| actually is only shot with natural light.
|
| https://youtu.be/KT7IYpjcpD4?si=bmDsRtDhclICdHTU
| JohnClark1337 wrote:
| Done way better than a lot of modern "natural lighting"
| movies and shows, where the picture is so dark that you
| can't tell what's going on.
| dkga wrote:
| To this day I cannot think of any other movie that is
| exclusively shot with natural light.
| jacquesm wrote:
| Indeed, it is an absolute masterpiece. That whole movie
| in general is but that scene is without equal.
| nier wrote:
| So the only light source in the scene right after, the
| one where she goes out on the terrace, is the moon?
| bonestamp2 wrote:
| Yep, that paramount backlot is is is so many commercials...
| like every cell phone commercial that has a street scene.
| NikkiA wrote:
| 'giant' is a bit of a stretch for 5 buildings and a small park.
| PhilippGille wrote:
| Doesn't it count as 5 blocks, not 5 buildings?
| https://petapixel.com/assets/uploads/2023/08/4_Backlot-Drone...
| vuavu wrote:
| [flagged]
| [deleted]
| JoeAltmaier wrote:
| Two blocks by one block. So, interesting and impressive. Perhaps
| 'giant' is hyperbole.
|
| I'm mostly struck by how perfect it looks. No dirt, no dents, no
| scratches, no rain-streaked windows, no rust. Not like any place
| I've ever been.
| evan_ wrote:
| it's bigger than most fake towns built exclusively for filming.
| JoeAltmaier wrote:
| Pioneertown in CA is about 10 blocks by 5.
|
| But yeah, most are much smaller.
| damnesian wrote:
| This would be the perfect setting for a "the Road"-style Twilight
| Zone episode. The ragtag group of survivors have fended off
| starvation, thieves, murderers, rapists, nasty weather, wild
| rabid animals, etc. and stumble on to this scene, thinking wow,
| we made it to that fabled city where everything is still ok.
|
| And then they discover it's all fake. Including, of course, all
| of the provisions- food, drink.
|
| In the last moments we see a band of marauders arriving, sneaking
| up next to the root beer stand...
| jareklupinski wrote:
| the marauders hold up the survivors and start threatening them,
| but one has an itchy trigger finger...
|
| BANG!
|
| - is written on the flag that unfurls from the barrel a la Bugs
| Bunny
| Animats wrote:
| The US military builds dummy towns for training purposes. This is
| called "MOUT" training, for Military Operations in Urban Terrain.
| The current ones look like towns in Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, etc.
| The National Training Center at Fort Irwin, CA has the biggest
| one.[1]
|
| (There's a very good reason for that sort of thing. Most infantry
| casualties are among soldiers new to combat. Very realistic
| training means that most noob mistakes happen at a training
| facility, not in combat. Armies that don't do this have huge
| casualty rates at first.)
|
| [1]
| https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2013/05/its-a...
| dkga wrote:
| So this is where Tackleberry trains now, not that old strip
| with the fake houses...
| RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote:
| This is not only good for reducing infantry casualties but also
| reducing civilian casualties.
|
| Once the panic response sets in, it is likely that they will
| fire on anything without fully assessing.
|
| Training in similar environments can help soldiers avoid a
| panicked response and more logically assess the situation.
| Eduard wrote:
| this is so grotesque to read. Imagine a fake all-American
| town constructed in China, and someone commenting "This is
| not only good for reducing infantry casualties but also
| reducing civilian casualties."
| shepherdjerred wrote:
| What's the alternative?
| [deleted]
| yamazakiwi wrote:
| I've done combat training in one (a 3-story aluminum sided
| building furnished like a large office) and they had rigged
| the whole building with an interactive surround sound system.
| Once the course started and we got up to the building, I
| thought I heard music coming from inside. We opened the door
| and Metallica was blasting at 120db and none of us could hear
| each other. We had to communicate using signals while
| navigating the course with fake hostages and combatants etc.
| all while Master of Puppets was assaulting my ears. You
| couldn't escape it either, we were being sound-gunned on
| every floor and every room.
|
| Anyway, just thought I'd share since Sound is something
| people forget when imagining training in these buildings and
| the experience was invaluable.
| constantly wrote:
| This is extremely unsafe and seems like grounds for a
| lawsuit, if it were reasonably possible to do this. For
| reference only 7.5 minutes per day at 120db will cause
| permanent hearing loss. Disgusting that they made you do
| this.
|
| https://www.osha.gov/laws-
| regs/regulations/standardnumber/19...
| pdntspa wrote:
| You can sometimes see some of these on the 5 when passing
| through Camp Pendleton in north San Diego County
| runjake wrote:
| Google Maps link, for those curious:
| https://goo.gl/maps/Pnyjs4RsQbdzrFbY9
|
| Edit: N 35deg20'58.0" W 116deg35'39.1"
| msla wrote:
| 35deg20'58.0"N 116deg35'39.1"W
| js2 wrote:
| > From the beginning, shooting a movie on a public bridge [Pont-
| Neuf] in the centre of Paris was complicated. The production team
| wanted to block off the bridge for three months, but the
| application was rejected. Instead, a model was created by the set
| designer Michel Vandestein.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Les_Amants_du_Pont-Neuf
|
| > In the middle of farmland they constructed the Pont Neuf, the
| familiar facades along the 14th-century quays on the Left Bank,
| the Samaritaine department store on the Right Bank, and that
| portion of the Ile de la Cite, in the middle of the Seine, where
| the bridge crosses the island to set off the Square of the Vert
| Gallant, the garden at the island's western tip dominated by the
| equestrian statue of Henri IV.
|
| https://www.nytimes.com/1992/10/06/movies/review-film-lovers...
|
| More information about the set:
|
| http://lemuseedufake.com/leblog/2015/04/les-amants-du-pont-n...
|
| (I recommend this film BTW, for the spectacle of it if nothing
| else.)
| bregma wrote:
| Looks like the photos were taken before the Gorn attack.
| megmogandog wrote:
| exactly what I thought as well, though I wasn't sure
| [deleted]
| jonatron wrote:
| You can see both the old and new Eastenders set on Google maps:
| https://www.google.com/maps/@51.6583379,-0.2755948,240m/data...
| The old one has now been demolished though
| youngtaff wrote:
| And Coronation St in Manchester
| https://maps.app.goo.gl/9PVXb4q9xXLzJeje6?g_st=ic
|
| Wonder if they'll be an Aussie along in a minute to add Ramsay
| St
| mgkimsal wrote:
| I can't see the old one in the link you sent, only seemingly
| new.
| Philip-J-Fry wrote:
| Go to the left and you'll see the old set
| muwtyhg wrote:
| There are two areas labeled "Albert Square" One near the
| center right and one near the upper left of where that Maps
| link starts.
| jjkaczor wrote:
| CTRL+F 'hallmark' = No results...?
|
| One would have thought that would be the main location, as dozens
| (hundreds?) of these have been filmed in Canada. Sets, tons,
| plots and actors are all generic and interchangable...
| faveStar82 wrote:
| They shoot a bunch of Hallmark xmas movies in my town near
| Ottawa Canada. There is a half-abandoned strip mall that is now
| filled with Christmas crap and fake snow. They shot I think 4
| movies there last year.
| jjkaczor wrote:
| Aha... for some reason I thought they did most of that in the
| GTA, makes sense though.
| chromaton wrote:
| Assembly Atlanta has 135 acres with indoor studios, plus outdoor
| streets to simulate New Orleans, New York, Tribeca, and "Europe".
|
| It's under construction, but close to completion.
| echelon wrote:
| Georgia has ranked #2 in US film production by some metrics,
| and it continues to steal hundreds of productions from
| California every year [1].
|
| Last year Georgia was host to nearly 500 movies and TV shows
| [2], and has been extensively used for some of the biggest hits
| and blockbusters: Avengers: Infinity War, Avengers: Endgame,
| Spider-Man: No Way Home, Black Panther, Stranger Things, The
| Waking Dead, Ozark, Halt and Catch Fire, etc.
|
| Disney, Marvel, and Netflix have major productions here. Winona
| Ryder was even my downstairs neighbor for a bit during the
| Stranger Things shoot.
|
| Last year they built a fake White Castle a few blocks from me
| and then tore it down about a month later [3]. It was so
| disappointing as everyone was hoping for a real White Castle.
|
| [1] https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-
| news/can...
|
| [2] https://www.gpb.org/news/2022/08/01/georgia-film-industry-
| se...
|
| [3] https://atlanta.urbanize.city/post/white-castle-edgewood-
| ave...
| deaddodo wrote:
| Georgia doesn't "steal" business from California. The vast
| majority of the production houses in those productions are
| California centered with California staff, and many of the
| actors fly out to Georgia to film their on set scenes.
|
| It helps local business in Georgia during filming and gives
| local talent a chance, but the majority of the money still
| flows back to California. Same goes for Germany, Vancouver,
| Croatia and all the other places that offer subsidies for
| filming there. Movie productions are ephemeral and exist
| temporarily, it's not like having a major corporation
| headquartered in your town.
| Maken wrote:
| It's fascinating that something like that is being built at a
| time when most blockbusters are essentially animation films.
| lapetitejort wrote:
| And we are seeing the backlash to that, hence real sets
| struggling to be built up in time before movie-goers are
| permanently soured on blockbusters.
| Philip-J-Fry wrote:
| Ground breaking CGI used to be a selling point because you do
| things that weren't before possible.
|
| Nowadays everything is more or less possible in CGI and it
| has lost its appeal a bit. Now it's appealing to advertise
| the fact you're doing things for real.
| brandall10 wrote:
| Right, both Nolan and Gerwig made a point of that this
| summer. And Cruise has been making a point of that for
| awhile now.
| echelon wrote:
| CGI is sometimes cheaper, and usually logistically simpler.
| "Fix it in post" lets you wrap up the production sooner and
| spend less time on set.
| ninth_ant wrote:
| A lot of viewer time -- and thus money -- is coming from
| serial shows these days.
|
| There are a tonne of mid and high-budget shows that are set
| in grounded settings which can utilize sets like this.
| UberFly wrote:
| This entire thread is a mine-field of really interesting rabbit
| holes.
| TylerE wrote:
| Perhaps the most interesting of these is Pioneertown, CA. It's a
| real fake real town. Built in the 1940's to look like a town from
| the 1880's, so in that sense it was a fake town. But it was a
| real town, lived in by mostly movie people. The saloon, when it
| wasn't used for filming? The actual town bar. Peak population was
| 500 or so. Many many movies and tv shows filmed there.
| amayne wrote:
| I lived across the street from Warner Brothers Ranch. It was
| surreal to watch a show like the Sarah Connor Chronicles and see
| a town blow up and look out my window and see the same church
| steeple. My nightly walk took me past the backyard of the
| Wanda/Vision home. Apparently I was trapped in the Hex.
| Physkal wrote:
| Reminds me of the ending of blazing saddles.
| Multicomp wrote:
| Reminds me of the old Desliu 40 acres backlot, now long gone.
| There are websites covering the history.
|
| http://retroweb.com/40acres.html
| gabereiser wrote:
| VFX Walls and virtual sets like the ones in use @ Narwhal Studios
| [1] are pretty common now thanks to Unreal Engine 5. Used in
| productions of The Mandalorian, Book of Boba Fett, Obi-Wan
| Kenobi, etc. I think this, combined with outdoor sets like the OP
| posted about, are the future of movies. Instead of high CGI
| compositing, do the CGI compositing pre-production and film like
| you would a normal set.
|
| [1] https://www.narwhalstudios.com
| pacetherace wrote:
| I don't think it is that giant. It is basically the downtown of a
| small town.
| jrm4 wrote:
| Ironic the mention of "The Truman Show" town, which is a real
| place; a town in Florida called (perhaps unimaginatively)
| Seaside.
|
| https://www.visitflorida.com/places-to-go/northwest/seaside/
| tzfld wrote:
| Something similar in Hungary but modeled for another age:
|
| https://www.google.com/maps/@47.4406321,18.7271297,187m/data...
| bell-cot wrote:
| Reaction: But building anything resembling a real town, where
| real people could actually live, is still _de facto_ illegal in
| Canada.
| [deleted]
| Dig1t wrote:
| I was triggered by the off-center "Police Department" sign, but
| then realized that it is off center so you can put the town name
| in front of it. Like "$TOWNNAME Police Department"
| JafCo wrote:
| Agree -- I would have biased toward a two-line arrangement,
| with space for the town name on the upper line, centered
| independent of length, and "Police Department" on the lower.
| coding123 wrote:
| They probably should have put that on the next line because now
| for it to be centered $TOWNNAME is going to be within 7-12
| characters to work
| jedberg wrote:
| Growing up in LA, we had a few of these around. The most famous
| of course was Universal Studios, where you could pay for a tour.
| But my favorite was Paramount Ranch.
|
| A bunch of stuff was filmed there in the 50s-70s, and it was open
| the public. I actually used it to make a movie with my friends in
| high school. It was pretty cool to have a prebuilt town around
| that was basically empty.
| annoyingnoob wrote:
| I guess being around LA as a kid has me jaded. Not sure why
| this is news worthy. This is how its been done for a very long
| time.
| dylan604 wrote:
| The Paramount Ranch _was_ cool if you grew up watching those
| titles. Otherwise it was just an odd grouping of buildings.
|
| It's all charcoal now though
| jedberg wrote:
| > It's all charcoal now though
|
| I heard. :( So sad. A piece of my childhood. That same fire
| actually took the homes of some of my childhood friends too.
| Heartbreaking.
| bonestamp2 wrote:
| Yes, the Westworld Church is the only thing standing there
| now.
| seydor wrote:
| like cinecitta
| ada1981 wrote:
| This is the same outfit NASA contracted for the moon landing
| footage!
| add-sub-mul-div wrote:
| "Me and my brother, we hid up in the rafters when we were kids.
| We seen the whole thing!"
| mcpackieh wrote:
| NASA hired Stanley Kubrick to film the Moon landings but he
| insisted on authenticity so they had to film it on location on
| the Moon.
| blackoil wrote:
| That's what Space Jews want you to believe. There is no moon,
| it is just projection by space lasers.
| whartung wrote:
| Nearby are the old blimp hangers from the remnants of the MCAS
| Tustin. They've been used for many things (including storing
| blimps, of all things) in the past several years. But notably
| germane here, they were used for the lunar set for the mini-
| series "From the Earth to the Moon" (well worth folks time to
| watch, IMHO).
|
| The interesting part is that partly because the buildings are
| so big, they were able to tie helium balloons to the actors to
| mimic the lower lunar gravity. My tinybrain math skills puts
| those balloons at about 16 ft in diameter (assuming they were a
| single balloon, I have no idea). Those hangars would have no
| problem accommodating large balloons like that.
| pawelmurias wrote:
| They have placed a giant fake moon in orbit exclusively for
| filming moon landings.
| thelock85 wrote:
| Fun Fact: Tyler Perry of "Madea" fame built his own studio
| outside of Atlanta, initially to support his desire to make
| movies/shows that were harder to sell in Hollywood. It's 200
| acres of diverse sets and backlots including an 80% scaled White
| House.
| agrippanux wrote:
| I'm pretty sure that's the town in the series Wednesday as well
| tssva wrote:
| The town for Wednesday was built in Romania. Almost the entire
| series was filmed in Romania.
| chrisbrandow wrote:
| Even crazier, there's a company that built a fake town right in
| the middle of a real town!
|
| https://www.universalstudioslot.com/backlot
| bonestamp2 wrote:
| Yep, there are several in LA: Warner has two. Sony has one.
| Paramount has one. There is one outside the city too.
| kjkjadksj wrote:
| If you go hiking about four miles into the santa monica
| mountains, you can visit the M*A*S*H set and see some of the
| left over trucks and some historical markers.
| bonestamp2 wrote:
| Yep, that's Paramount Ranch for those interested. There's
| not much left of it after the last fire that went through
| there though (Woolsey fire I think it was).
| chrisbrandow wrote:
| ;-)
| w-m wrote:
| Studio Babelsberg in Potsdam has four "metropolitan"
| (Berlin/Paris/New York/London) streets:
| https://www.studiobabelsberg.com/en/backlots/metropolitan-ba...
| crooked-v wrote:
| The Courthouse Square part of that backlot is the same
| courthouse from Back to the Future, with a different paint job
| and some aesthetic tweaks so that it can be used in other
| filming without being distractingly recognizable.
| hateful wrote:
| I see those sets constantly and always annoy the wife
| commenting on them.
|
| It was in the Twilight Zone episode "Where is Everybody?"
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Khvo6TH-DXc
|
| I remember watching it more recently and when he runs down
| the alley I wondered if he was going to buy that almanac.
| bhewes wrote:
| Ah I wondered where the Jack Reacher TV series was shot, mystery
| solved.
| jldugger wrote:
| Interestingly no mention of the giant green walls. Pretty sure
| those are there for shots that might catch the road leading out
| to empty space.
| dwardu wrote:
| isnt that the back to the future set?
| ClassyJacket wrote:
| I thought it looked like Hill Valley too
| TylerE wrote:
| https://www.google.com/maps/place/Universal+Studios+Blvd,+Un...
| jedberg wrote:
| That's on the Universal Studios backlot in Universal City, next
| to Hollywood.
|
| It's on the tour when they aren't filming other movies there.
|
| Amadeus filmed there too.
| sumtechguy wrote:
| Think they are in the process of tearing down the WB one
| (christmas vacation, bewitched, partridge family,
| wandavision, etc) to make room for sound stages.
|
| The universal one is unique if you know what to look for. It
| pops up in a lot of older TV shows. It is kind of neat to see
| it in twilight zone before they built some of it out.
|
| There are quite a large number of vids on youtube where
| people go inside the buildings. Most end up being storage for
| stuff or setup areas for different productions.
| CharlesW wrote:
| > _The universal one is unique if you know what to look
| for. It pops up in a lot of older TV shows._
|
| Recent ones too:
| https://hiddenremote.com/2018/02/28/travel-good-place-
| neighb...
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(page generated 2023-08-30 23:00 UTC)