Oh, What A Circus #1
6:52pm Back around the other side, I can clearly see that there was activity earlier in the afternoon – the low rise block of flats has had alternating stripes of red and blue paint exploded over it. If you look closely, you can see barrels suspended just below the gutters. (I found out later that there had also been ground based explosions which came up to meet the gutter barrels.)
Low-rise flats, with red and blue paint from earlier
Canon EOS 350D, EF-S 18-55 USM @ 33 | ISO 400 | Av | 1/640s f9.0
6:59pm Although the filming is now over for the day, we can see the crew are still working. Gear is being stowed away for the day. There’s no sign of Carol amongst them. By now, I’m about the only observer left around.
Crew, wrapping things up for the day
Canon EOS 350D, EF-S 18-55 USM @ 27 | ISO 400 | Av | 1/800s f9.0
7:03pm I spotted a single barrel suspended at the top right corner of the main face of the high-rise block. I decided to fit my new zoom lens and try to grab it.
" One blue barrel, hanging on a wall… "
Canon EOS 350D, Sigma 70-300 APO DG Macro @ 263 | ISO 400 | Av | 1/2000s f7.1
A few seconds after I took this shot, I was approached by a local.
7:04pm "Can I have a shot?" he asked.
"Oh no", I thought!!! "My lovely new camera…"
"This guy wants me to … hand it over … so he can look through the zoom lens!" 
I mumbled something but he simply took a few steps back and posed for me. 
What he really wanted was for me to take his photograph! I think he might have thought I was with "the media". You have no idea the relief when I realised this… 
I never had time to modify any of the camera settings – I simply framed the portrait and released the shutter. He thanked me and went on his way, fair chuffed with himself! 
"Can I have a shot?"
Canon EOS 350D, Sigma 70-300 APO DG Macro @ 70 | ISO 400 | Av | 1/800s f7.1
The whole encounter was over in about a minute. I never did get his name.
very good pics, i like the way u got the shot of the man
Comment by karl — Sunday, January 14, 2007 at 8:10 pm
Great pics – glad I found your site. I read somewhere that this was the most expensive TV commercial ever made although I believe more money was spent on relocating families during filming and repairing the damage afterwards than making the actual film. The total bill was around £16m ($32m). Scott
Comment by Scott — Tuesday, August 21, 2007 at 7:42 pm
Hi Scott – Thanks for your comments. As I understood it, no families were relocated. The two blocks which were “painted” were already empty and each has now been demolished, so presumably they didn’t require cleaning. Adjacent residences were covered in white netting (as can be seen in several of my shots) to protect them from the worst of any drifting paint spray. It was reported that a team of about sixty people worked for five days to clean up the mess left from the water-based paint. Additionally, the producers laid on several events for the residents to make up for the inconvenience. I recall hearing of a party in the local community centre and a trip to the seaside. I can’t see any of that amounting to a significant amount of the budget.
While it’s not too obvious, there was some post production CGI carried out – I’m sure the cost of that would have exceeded the cleaning costs, etc.
I don’t recall ever hearing a figure, but £16m does seem pretty high…
Comment by Gary — Tuesday, August 28, 2007 at 2:18 pm