The Doctor and Ruby Sunday in Doctor Who episode The Devil's Chord, to which Irish company Windmill Lane contributed visual effects. Photograph: Natalie Seery/Bad Wolf/BBC Studios
Growing up with “classic” Doctor Who meant watching television that hinged on adventure, possibility and otherworldliness while also manifesting as a knowingly British product, laced with the DNA of the BBC. Some people frown at the mention of tax breaks, but once you’ve seen them granted to developers of multistorey car parks and purchasers of holiday homes, it’s hard not to be glad when they become the cornerstone of an industry that allows talented creative people to be talented and creative right here.
In a reel available online, the Dublin post-production and VFX company breaks down how the episode, starring Ncuti Gatwa as the Doctor, was lifted by its 1960s London cityscape and another backdrop of a London in the grip of nuclear winter. Other effects included the addition of streams of floating musical notation used to suspend companion Ruby in the air. Members of the Windmill team also worked on next weekend’s episode, Rogue.
According to State development agency Screen Ireland, “robust VFX pipelines have been key to Ireland evolving as a VFX hub with fluid infrastructures”, with this “allowing both rapid scalability for large sole vendor projects and a solid framework for multi-vendor work”. I think that means things are going well.
Failure to do so could both trigger a loss of international business and perhaps even prompt some Irish-produced projects that would have filmed here to up sticks to the UK.