If you work in the creative industry, you probably arent in your role just to pass the time. The main reason for that is, its tough! When talking to the graphic designers from the , we all agreed that working in the creative industry has its challenges.
The Crown is a period show which follows the lives of the British Royal Family from the 1940s to the 1990s. Since the first season was released in 2016, it has captured a huge audience with more than a million泭people in the UK watching season 5 on its first day of release.
I chatted to , and from the about being a graphic designer for the high-budget multi-episode show.
Five seasons in, and each one consisting of ten one-hour episodes, the team have had a mammoth task designing a huge number of graphics for The Crown over the years.泭
The role of the graphic designer
Graphics is one of the newest departments in the world of TV and film, but what does the role of a graphic designer look like?
Camise explained: The first thing we do when we rock up is get the scripts and read through them. With a massive fat highlighter, we go through and identify anything that is adversely graphic – so Princess Dianna flipping through a magazine – to anything thats possibly a graphic, and wed try as best as we can to formulate a list that explains what our workload may look like.
To make sure everythings cohesive, the team then confirm with the creative designer on set and agree on which assets are important.
As The Crown is a period show, the graphics team rely heavily on the research team to make sure assets are historically accurately. So, the next step for them would be checking in with the research team.
Having previously needed to do the research themselves, this is new, and a massive help on the set. On previous jobs, you do your own research, whereas these guys are proper researchers. And it just means we dont have to spend three days finding the specific details, Amy explained.
That could be two weeks worth of work for the team just reading the script, speaking to the designer and liaising with the research team. And thats before they even open Photoshop or Illustrator.
Toby explained how versatile the graphics for The Crown have to be: It ranges from the Kremlin floor designs or an 80s Chinese takeaway menu to the life rings on the Britannia yacht. Every set has something different.
The TV and film industry is heavily perceived as very glitz and glam, but Amy said that isnt the case for the graphic design team: Theres a lot of background work. Things that youd never see like labels that need to be fixed or newspapers and paperwork.
The challenge: rewrites
Ive done a lot of episodic shows before, but The Crown is just different because of the sheer size of it. Toby told me.
Unlike smaller shows, The Crown doesnt have many budget constraints due to the success its had. The stakes are high and that means theres an increased chance of late changes the team must make very quickly.
When asked if things often change on set, Toby, Camise and Amy all laughed and said yes.
The Crown differs to most other jobs because of the rewrites. The rewrites are relentless as they have a script team working all the way through the show. Normally when you get a script, they kind of get locked. There will be the occasional tweak, but with The Crown, theyre constantly changing it, Toby says.
The team explained to me that even tiny elements can need updating. Itll usually just be two words that need swapping over. If Charles is reading that letter and its in shot, and you can see those two words, you cant get away with it, you have to change it. Theyll rewrite up until literally half an hour before the shoot sometimes.
The scripts changes can mean a calm day becoming a manic day at the flip of a switch. It all explodes and its all crazy again, Amy says
The challenge: not taking things personally
Toby explained that they can often spend a lot of time on a graphic for it to then not be used in a scene: Its the same with every job, somethings scripted, and they think its going to be very heavily featured. But then they end up cutting the asset out because they can get a better story without showing it.
Creatives often put their heart and soul into what they produce, and so it can sometimes be difficult to not take things personally. Particularly in the TV and film industry, this is something you have to overcome.
The challenge: being convincing enough, but not getting sued
When watching The Crown, you may wonder how challenging it is to recreate a set from the 1950s and make sure its historically accurate. Whether that vase would have had that pattern or if the floor has the correct shapes for that decade. Seems like a lot of pressure right?
The team actually said the complete opposite. With such a great research department, the graphics team dont stress about the historical accuracy. They have biographies for all the Royal Family. They could say what lipstick Diana used, what drink she drank at 5 oclock in the evening. Amy explained.
In fact, the pressure comes when the show gets closer to modern day because they are more people alive who may spot mistakes: Theres more eyes to scrutinise if weve not quite got it right. If you notice Diana is binging on the wrong bar of chocolate, then weve failed. Camise explains.
If youve got a newspaper in season 2 with some random politician pictured, you can use a photo of any man; people wont remember. Whereas now, people will remember whats his face who was the chancellor in 92. So you cant have some guy who looks kind of the same.
90% of the props the team design has to be as close to the original as possible so people dont notice its not the real thing, while also ensuring its different enough that they dont get sued.
Toby elaborates on the challenge: The Crown is changing the ways these big things work. From a legal point of view, the productions are getting more and more paranoid about getting sued, so they understand they have to spend money on that.
Camise summed up the issue: Weve got to get things as close to the real thing as possible, but different enough we dont get sued, but close enough so someone doesnt notice.
The challenge: dealing with logistic nightmares
Having worked on four seasons so far, the team have created graphics for sets dating from the 1950s to the 1990s. But was there a decade that proved more difficult?
They all bring up their own issues. You really have to think more creatively to get around things because its a historical show; you have to make it real. There are a lot of legal roads blocks you have to get around. So you have to create things that look real but pass clearances.
Going back to previous seasons where it was older stuff, our process would often be: get the real thing, scan it in, clear it up and edit it. But even that can be a nightmare because youre trying to match something thats so much older, and it has been in storage for however long, and lost so much quality. The older ones are almost like restoration work, Amy explained.
Toby added: Because we use digital means to make something look old, its an art in itself really. Thats more of a challenge for the older seasons.
Toby explained how being a graphic designer also throws up logistic issues: In season 5, theyre trying to tell a story with a certain paper trail. In the library of Windsor Castle, they get a specific book on the Romanov family and a specific book on the British Royal Family, and they want to juxtapose how they are the same.
But we can only use a certain amount of cleared photos, and some photos didnt get cleared in time. Its not difficult to design, its just the logistics of making it work. Its so painful. Thats not just The Crown either. That does happen on a fair few shows.
Being problem solvers is something this team have become accustomed to as quite often issues are thrown their way that create huge blockers.
Camise told me how the Harrods brand created some headaches: In season 5, we had a very interesting and complex backwards and forwards because we could say the word Harrods, and they could show it, but we couldnt show it in an italicised serif font, and we couldnt use their gold or green. So that was a strategic, logistic and design nightmare just because they go to Harrods!
The solutions: time
If youve seen any of The Crown, youll agree with me when I say the team clearly pulled it out of the bag with their graphics. But with so many challenges and obstacles, how did they overcome them?
Camise explained to me how season 4 differed, allowing them to be more prepared before they were even given the script.
Season 4 was lovely. We really fought to get our team in a lot sooner than we had in previous seasons, and we built up a stock catalogue of things that are generic to The Crown. So newspapers, magazines, chocolate bars, all the things we knew would be used. I think we had about four months where we just worked on building up a volume of graphics for the world of The Crown ahead of the things that always change.
The solution: team numbers
Camise, Amy and Toby decided that a larger team was needed for season 4. By bringing in a new team of assistants and a new graphic designer, they were more prepared for any challenges that would be threw at them.
The team had time to learn together, and to trust to support each other, which is invaluable to a job thats so big and sprawling, Camise explained. They were working cohesively and collectively. Its so fast and its so intense. The only way to function is to be dependent on one another. To lean on one another without feeling its a weakness; its a strength.
Camise told me how, traditionally in the TV and film industry, people are groomed to look out for themselves, and if theyve got a quiet day, they keep quiet about it. But their team are very much the opposite and will help each other out to overcome issues as a team.
We got a really great bunch of people together. Its a really strong team that were hoping to never let go, Amy added. For Season 5 the team included , , , , , , and
The solution: thinking ahead
With such a fast-paced show that can change at any time, the team adapted and understood they needed to be fluid with their ways of working. This meant the teams visual decision making and design under pressure grew with each series they worked on.
Because we know how intense the rewrites can be, we always lovingly gift our standbys a box of get out of shit graphics. Basically, its a load of documents that can be used for x, y, and z. Heres a box of photographs that can go anywhere, theyre all licensed. We accept our fate that we wont have the most amount of time, Camise explained.
The solution: collaboration
Just as the team work very closely together and collaborated amongst themselves, they also look outside of their team when certain challenges get thrown their way.
Amy explained their relationship with Alamy: The Crown is the newspaper show. They tell the story through a newspaper, and of course thats where 窪圖勛蹋fit in. Its a huge part of our job, for us its one of the first things we do when we get in. Whos organising the 窪圖勛蹋account? Whether its a big or small job, we cant generate everything. We need that facility, especially with photographs. The Crown is hugely reliant on photos.
Amy, Toby and Camise have shown first-hand what the role of Graphic Designer on The Crown is like – highlighting the importance of time, a strong team and being prepared. Collaboration is also a key attribute to the success of the team and plays a huge role in their work: I dont think we could do it without Alamy. Camise says
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