2002 news archive
17 December 2002
Mini Filming Session
Ashley hopefully completed his filming requirements for Devious yesterday afternoon when a short scene of him dangling from a precipice was filmed. The 50 feet drop was in fact rather less in reality; consisting of the garage roof of one of the team. A CSO-of-sorts backdrop was used and shots taken from above and below to hopefully create the look of danger once the various effects have been added. Ashley now has severe problems holding on to anything (pens, handrails, sanity) since his hands were wrenched somewhat by the exertion of trying not to fall a terrifying 1 foot drop. He is expected to make a full recovery but is milking the injury and attention. His autographing capabilities will be diminished for a while and this he regards as his most awful disability.05 December 2002
Last week of UNIT exhibition at Southampton - Devious Dalek pic shown on BBC websiteThe BBC Cult website features an interview with Roy Brown who's organised the UNIT exhibition at the Millais Gallery in Southampton, as well as photos from the exhibition. The opening shot on the article is actually of one our "Devious Daleks" lent to Roy for the six week period !! The pair are no strangers to the BBC since they were 2 of the 3 we lent the Beeb for their Comic Relief sketch a few years back.
The only difference between the two we lent is that the one in the picture ("Chico") still has the paper-made eye front made by the BBC effects department to convert it's eye to match the BBC ones at the time. Although it's only a paper sticker it's a reminder to us of the time it spent at Pinewood Studios and when we have to remove it for our own filming then it'll no doubt go to a glass case somewhere! (as if). Still, it was a welcome surprise to see the photo on the BBC site, and good to read the interview with Roy. The exhibition is well worth a visit, as Ashley found out last Saturday!
01 December 2002
its that dalek again!As there's not much happening this weekend down the ol' shed (maybe I'll work on dalek no8 later but for now I'm too knackered) I thought I'd add a short note to the news section. Firstly, I travelled at great expense and at great inconvenience (yes, I used SouthWest Trains) to go to Southampton yesterday to see the Daleks at the Millais Gallery. Our two looked pretty damn good surrounded by over a dozen others. Very menacing. The room was large and cleverly lit, with the dalek army in neat rows standing in the middle. Sleeping. Awaiting the call to invade. Well worth seeing if you're in the area. The exhibition runs until the 14th December - open every day except Sundays - entrance free. For a link to their site see our links page, or a previous news item.
Secondly I received details of the dalek's day out in Lewes having made the local press. Apparently we're front page on the Sussex Express, and there's a web version here...
23 November 2002
daleks invade Lewes !!!23 November 2002 - The 39th Anniversary of Doctor Who (good luck to David Price's "Dimensions On Tyne 2" Convention this weekend)
New pics in Filming - November section
Millais Dalek Exhibition featured on BBC Dr Who website
DALEKS INVADE LEWES!! - Minding my own business shopping in Lewes this Saturday I stumbled across a dalek. As you do. Well, I'm fairly clumsy at the best of times. My first reaction? - oh it's a dalek. Hmm. Well, the thing is, I've seen so many (there's 15 or so to see in a week or so when I visit the Millais Gallery in Southampton for their exhibition); there's one left in my shed/studio - Stephen has one in his house; David has three in his office reception area (a big office!) - so you tend to get a bit blase. And then it dawned on me - it looked rather familiar! Yes it was radio-controlled "Onya" - soon to be repainted (the online voting came out in favour of the "Black Dalek look") being manoeuvred up and down Lewes High Street by the redoubtable Ian Watts from Robot Wars Team "Big Brother". Check out his website!!!! (also on the links page) Anyway - here's a quick shot taken by a passer-by (Steve Edwards from Sussex).
The looks from the kids and adults alike were incredible - the reaction seemed to show that if the BBC were to bring the daleks back (as they were - not updated or "improved" in some revamp) in Dr Who they'd have a winner on their hands. Kids loved it - only one cried when the gas-powered gun went off - I think the noise frightened more than anything!!! - and even then we checked later to see he was all right!
14 November 2002
New daleks anger DAVROSIn an amazing development it seems that the new dalek operators recruited during the recent Devious filming (9th-10th Nov 2002) have incurred the wrath of the more seasoned cast members. An un-named greying operator with dodgy knees told Devious-News that his future prospects for this type of work was being put in jeopardy by their enthusiasm and ability. Apparently he'd passed his thoughts on to his local Dalek And Various Robot Operators Society representative at his last branch meeting and they were considering whether to go on strike - leaving Devious only with a contingent of green-goddess-style daleks - i.e. in tasteless green with useless guns.A spokesperson from D.A.V.R.O.S. said "we get this sort of thing all the time; sad faded actors wanting to be daleks because they think they've got all the right moves, but in reality the new intake are far better at the job". D.A.V.R.O.S. are, as expected, not particularly good at representing their members and are not intending to join any intergalactic trades union groupings in the near future.
Pictured above are some of the new operators... - Laura Clarke of Sussex is sitting in the base, whilst her brother Ashley holds Auriga's gun, with two of our honoured guests behind in the green room.11 November 2002
Marathon Filming Session & Meridian TVA spooky moment this - I was working in my shed/studio on the sets last Friday evening (or was it Thursday - the days are a blur) and I thought I'd turn off the radio & switch to the TV. I turned it on and looked away, continuing what I was doing - and then I heard "ex-ter-min-ate" loud and clear across the room. It did take me by surprise and for a moment I almost confused reality and fiction - what with a dalek only feet from me at the time it was an odd moment! Turned out I saw the last few moments of a ITV1-Meridian news item featuring the exhibition in Southampton where 2 of the Devious Daleks are currently spending a few weeks away on their 'olidays! So, did anyone catch it on video? - I must say I only saw the ending!
The last few days of last week from Wednesday onwards - were spent in preparation for our longest spell of filming in a long while! Two days worth in the corridor sets! Three daleks (with operators drawn from a new team of five (!?!?!)); a few welcome guests in attendance, and very hard work for all those involved. We'd like to take this opportunity to thank all of you for the work put in - without the help it couldn't have been achieved.
There will be some more pictures and an article as soon as we have any energy...
- Ashley
07 November 2002
Daleks Millaising aroundThe Millais Gallery's exhibition by Roy Brown is now in full swing and there's now a web page giving more details and some interesting photos (if you like daleks, that is!). Click here for details. Here's one photo from the page (used without permission, so please someone exterminate me if I am not entitled to do so!). Now, isn't that Chico at the end of the row on the left?????
04 November 2002
Black v Silver ???With the radio-remote-controlled dalek being required for a scene this weekend (hopefully) we have to make the final decision by Friday what colour scheme the leader dalek will be. Until now in the script it's been the "Black Dalek" but it's been renamed "Dalek Supreme" whilst we consider the final colours.
It looks so good all in super-bright metallic silver we've not wanted to colour it with a black dome (or use a spare one painted black so we can keep the silver one) and blue balls but we feel to stay in keeping with the 1960's "Power" and "Evil" era daleks as these are meant to be, then it should be painted up accordingly. It's all fiction anyway so why should we care what colour - if we think the all-over silver looks better then we should keep it, and stuff the continuity.
Here it is at present, in all it's brightness. If it goes black dome and blue balls we will still keep the extra-bright silver (the other daleks are silver-grey in comparison).
We'd be interested in your opinions - unless they are of the "I don't give a monkey's" variety.
Any emails we receive at chiefdalek@doctorwho-devious.com we will read and consider.
You'll see the final decision in the first pics from the next filming test shots.
31 October 2002
Devious Daleks making an Exhibition of themselvesLast night (30th) saw 2 of the Devious Daleks packed off to an exhibition in Southampton at the Millais Gallery. Artist Roy Brown has spent the last 6 months preparing for an exhibition featuring 15 daleks. Centred in a room with the Declaration of Human Rights etched in glass in displays around the walls, and suitably lit to bring back the menace so lacking in recent media outings the daleks are set to make quite an impressive artistic and political point in the run up to Christmas.
No pictures are available yet, although I have seen the exhibition guide book and publicity and it all looks rather impressive. Roy has tracked down many of the country's dalek builders and asked to borrow their finest work for this show, and it is an honour for Ashley's creations to be part of the exhibit. "Friend of Devious" Andy from Liverpool - he of the excellent remote-control daleks, cybermen and "Numan" robots has lent a couple and it was a conversation with him which led to the Devious props being added at a late stage to the exhibition. Sadly too late for their builder to make the photos, which is probably no bad thing at all - there's plenty of home-grown publicity on the Devious site itself! We are promised a weblink and we have supplied a few construction photos, and a specially-signed piece of dalek memorabilia has also been lent.
It's only a pity that the two daleks supplied were practically the two oldest (i.e. Chico and Harpo) and have had to have some repair work and emergency painting done - mind you they need that for the Feb/Mar '03 filming session anyway! - we couldn't free up the new ones as they're needed for our next filming session at the start of November. Here's one of them (above) with Ashley at the Comic Relief filming.
We at Devious wish Roy well with his work - it was a pleasure to meet him and his partner Jo when they came to collect the props.
30 October 2002
New Filming DateWith any luck we're filming again the second weekend in November. Wish us luck - we need it! Having tackled the script again last night and made the usual last-minute changes we're half hopeful and half apprehensive about the next batch of filming. The next session will see the exits of cast members Chaldar (Ashley) and Aturo (Arthur), and a lot of filming for The Covellitor (Stephen). Fresh from his week starring in a local production of Copacabana (see picture below) we are hoping that Stephen (not actually pictured below in case you thought one of them was him!) won't be quoting from Mr Manilow's epic during his Devious scenes.
29 October 2002
A bit of a cock-up...on the news front...
Muchos apologies - for some reason best known to our server - or our own machine - or whatever - the whole site slipped back into some sort of time disturbance such that the site appeared to all in the outside world to be nearly three weeks out of date. Now it's entirely possible that our "time weapon" storyline has leaked out into reality and affected the web too. Quite frankly when you've been making this film as long as we have you'd be prepared to believe anything.
It seems that the mailing list was also affected - so if you had signed up since the 3rd of October there's a chance we may not have your details. Fear not, the intrepid Ashley X will do his best to track down from the emails the various people who rashly said 'yes' to receiving intermittent, sparce news about this 'happening' project!
28 October 2002
Sliding Doors......don't slide very well if you have to push them along. Ashley's been working on the sliding door props before the next shoot, since there were major movement problems last time.He's also trying to construct the gruesome new piece of kit to be attached to one of the daleks - this will be used for one of the death scenes to be filmed in a few weeks time.
There's also a bit of work going on tarting up the final three daleks - although they're not needed until February 2003 it's been decided to get them prettied up now to save time later. This will mean more time can be spent on the final sets and lighting. It is also hoped that a piece of set walling can be constructed to blend the new corridor sets with the door unit used in the interrogation room filming some years back - we have to somehow convince people that the changes in design between one part of the complex and another are intentional - and not just convenient!
14 October 2002
The Curse of DeviousAfter an gap of several years "Curse of Fatal Death" cast members Julia Sawalha and Stephen Cranford were reunited on the location for the forthcoming series of Jonathan Creek IV.
The meeting took place by the sandwiches tent in the rain on Sunday 13th October, and the conversation went something like this...Stephen: Hello Julia. Last time we worked together you were with Rowan Atkinson and I was a dalekJulia: Oh yes (laughs) crumbs that was ages ago!Stephen: Yes it was , wasn't it. How have you been keeping?Julia: Very well thanksStephen: See you laterJulia: Oh, by the way, I have been following the progress of the Devious on the web site. It's looking good. Remember to keep me updated with it's progress. Here's my personal email address so you can keep in touch.One of the above lines of dialogue is not true. There may be a competition to decide which one, but it's probably a bit obvious isn't it... Yes, that's right, Julia is unlikely to use the word "crumbs"When the new series of Jonathan Creek is on, look out for the duo. Julia stars alongside the principle, Alan Davies. Stephen plays a policeman background artiste who crosses from screen left to right in one particular scene. It's dark and I'm dressed in black. We'll no doubt provide the timecode position of my appearance once it's been transmitted, so you can record and freezeframe it.- Stephen13 October 2002
Goodness Me! It's the TardisWell after a few days of woodwork and painting, the battered old TARDIS is fully restored and ready for another few years service.With a total of 7 coats of paint over the years, the final finish is looking suitably battered now, so very little deliberate weathering was necessary.
The first picture shows the new roof, complete with it's new paint job.The other two show the TARDIS from two angles. Note the new roof has a much stronger light guard. This time it's made of 15mm ply and is square, rather than round like the original one. When being moved the original proved far too fragile, and it's trip to Newcastle recently finally finished it off.
In the end, I elected to mix the Celestial Blue paint with some black to dull the colour down a bit. A crisp even colour looked too wierd, having been used to the weathered look for so long. The two colours were only very gently mixed together, so that there is a slight mottled effect to the final coat. After a while I may still dull down the paintwork a bit with some grey and dirt paint.
I'm still tempted to paint the window frames white and obtain a St John Ambulance badge for the door - a la Hartnell.. Maybe one day?- Stephen06 October 2002
the Tardis lives on...I spent the day repairing and restoring the elderly TARDIS roof and floor panels. I have taken a few piccies, 2 are attached.
I have also brought a tin of paint (coinincidentally called Celestial Blue) and will administer it's 7th coat of paint during the week. That's how many times I have painted the F***ing thing in the past 13 years!!!
- Stephen01 October 2002
Moving Dalek Footage on WebsiteWell - not a lot but a bit of fun really. David from the team had found an unused remnant from the test edits and has converted it to be web-ready and we've stuck it on the site! Now it's 1.9MB and will take time to load so don't get your hopes up but we thought "why not" and so here it is. You'll see a couple of the blighters trundling down the corridor set - and that's it. No effects no nuffink. So be warned if you have a slow connection - you'll need to save target as. In time of course we'll put some more interesting clips on the site but for now it's furthe rproof that we haven't dies off or have given up on the project - yet! Give it a few days mind...!!!!
See the "filming" part of the site for this particular gem!
27 September 2002
test edits
Well - on Wednesday we did some test edits of the footage - playing around with brightness contrast and some other delightful combinations to make the footage look someway towards what we had in mind - i.e. hide the construction of the corridor!!! You can see some of the early results on the "opening doors" page under the "filming". Mind you, by the time we've finished we'll probably change the look again!12 September 2002
More pics from the filming weekendThere's a new section on the website called "filming" which contains a short article and some photos from the filming from last weekend.
When we get some stills from the actual footage - they'll be added too - but for now there's some shots from a digital camera to keep you all happy!
10 September 2002
First Pic from Corridor Filming WeekendHere's the first pic from the set of 60 stills taken on the Sunday 8th Sep 2002 from our latest filming. Daleks (Gummo and Alfred !!!) awaiting another scene in the complex/science station. The corridor lighting was stark and contrasty, and this shot emphasises that look we were after. The photo was posed with the two casings whilst the poor tired operators took a breather! More photos as soon as we can!
09 September 2002
Shock-horror ! - Whole Day Filming!GASP - finally we've done some more filming !!! Sets were put up on Saturday 7th and 12 hours of solid filming (along with hours either side to prepare and strike the sets) were completed on the Sunday (yesterday as I write this). The Doctor, Bradley and some daleks were in action in the complex. Six tapes of footage (2-3 digital cameras in use), and with 100 feet worth of corridor it looked impressive - well we thought so at the time! Judge for yourself in the next week or two as hopefully we'll put some stills from the day on the site - hopefully in a new section! Our biggest sets so far and the biggest challenge for an amateur group such as us - at least we've got going again as promised! The next batch of filming (with this new set) is intended for mid October with a break until January/Feb whereupon we hope to film the big control room set (once it is suitably sci-fi furnished). The break is to allow us to construct the next sets and to view and test-edit, although hopefully we have a happy event (due 23rd November coincidentally) with the impending birth of David and Bilga's new baby.
30 August 2002
the joy of painting
Oh to spend a day off from work armed with a paint-brush and roller! Whilst many look forward to a day off work to do a bit of d-i-y when you're set-building it can get a bit tiresome! The new corridor set has twenty two supports each needing painting. There are four door arch assemblies each needing three coats of paint (undercoat/primer, then gloss and then the final colour). There are three pairs of doors each with the same 3 coats of paint. Still, it all has to be done as these set elements hope to be in use in the next few weeks if all goes to plan. Suffice to say there'll be some pictures if all goes well. This brief news item has been typed with silver fingers and the distinct aroma of white spirit.16 August 2002
website updatea few new pics scattered through the site - see the Images - COFD section - more will follow...
Also a link to the BBC Southern Counties Radio's Charity Challenge where you'll spot a few Devious people!
09 August 2002
daleks on the move again
In what must rank as the smallest bits of news in a while - but then what do you report when you're waiting to film due to availability of actors and sets (!!!) - the daleks were on the move again last week. In a bizarre swap (well it must have seemed bizarre to any passers-by who witnessed the movements) dalek "Chico" (yes we've named them after Marx brothers as per BBC originals) came back to base for some repairs (including a new Ashley-patented head mechanism) whilst "Alfred" and "Karl" (named after the less well-known Marx brothers - the employment bloke and the popular communist) were delivered to the place where we'll hopefully be filming the first corridor scenes. These two are entirely new props and match the radio-controlled model "Onya" (the even less well-known brother, whose name is heard at athletics meetings at the start of each race). They have 6-inch wheels and will travel over most surfaces without a problem. They only require the lighting mechanism kit to be ready for menacing the Doctor, Bradley, Chaldar, Aturo and the Covellitor in the near future.25 July 2002
the first step in universal domination...... is of course taking over a garage. It seems that Ian Watts, our Big Brother Robot Wars colleague has solved the problem of storage for Devious's black dalek (the currently-bright-silver-all-over radio-powered one) by conveniently buying his neighbours house. "Onya" (the worst-named Marx brother of all) now has his (/her - we're not sure on this) own garage. Heaven help you if you want to park your car in there!
Meanwhile, door painting continues apace, and the nation's stocks of silver, red and white will be heavily depleted by the weekend if all goes well. We're still hoping for August filming, in case you ask!
12 July 2002
no news is good news- or so they say ! Well, hopefully that's the case. As you may know I'm a bit superstitious and so I don't want to report on things until they've happened, so I suppose I can say with confidence that a lot of the corridor sets have been completed. The unique design is hopefully a lights and mirrors job, so the construction methods should be reasonably confusing. The trick, as with all sets, is the lighting. We hope to get an atmospheric quality about these scenes, and we think it may be possible. When we get to use them in some shooting (provisionally August) we'll put some shots on the site. The sliding doors are coming on nicely too. Again, no pictures, so here's a nice one of Stephen, David and I (Ashley) taken at the successful Dimensions On Tyne convention last year.
Our Tardis can be seen behind! Incidentally, Stephen is rebuilding the tardis roof and base due to years of decay - I think he kept hearing the cloister bell each time he moved the prop into his shed at home!
15 May 2002
corridor lighting testA section of corridor was set up yesterday evening (a) to see what it looked like lighting-wise, and more importantly (b) to see if it would fall down again.
Thankfully (b) was all right, although careful lighting will be required to ensure it looks half decent in the production. As we have got rather a lot of corridor-running to do (in the true cliche-ridden tradition of Dr Who) we knew that corridor sets could get expensive if we weren't careful. So providing people don't lean on the walls or daleks don't run into them we may get away with it!
There'll be some pics from the test as soon as I've had a chance to grab them into the right pc and pushed them to the web.
08 May 2002
new website launchToday sees the launch of the new Devious website - it will be linked to www.doctorwho-devious.com in due course...
At present there's only half the intended content - at least we'll be able to add stuff as we go on to keep you all interested while we gamely try to get this blinkin' epic finished! For example there'll be a "faq" section and more news items will be added retrospectively to reflect our history...
Please bear with us as we try to get this thing going - as we've always said we don't bother much with the site as it does rather tempt fate a bit - we'd rather report on things completed rather than surmising, as we do tend to miss our own extremely elastic deadlines.
But then we only do this (a) for fun, and (b) occasionally. And (a) isn't always the case, as you'd think if you'd just cut the 75th wall roundel or painted the 200th dalek hemisphere!
16 April 2002
New Daleks nearing completionThe final members of the dalek "fleet" are nearing completion in the shed/workshop AT LAST!!! Numbers seven and eight are complete except for working lights and an internal seat for no 7. New lights will be fitted to the rest of them anyway, so there's not a big problem there. Whilst the new ones were being built, Ashley took the time to improve some of the poorer features of the older props - namely the eyepieces and improvements to the gunsticks. The shot below show them waiting rather menacingly in the darkness of the shed - reminiscent of the "Power of the Daleks" Troughton....
16 February 2002
Radio-powered Dalek at Brighton Modelworld 2002The weekend of the 15th-17th of February 2002 saw the radio-controlled dalek make an appearance at the acclaimed ModelWorld show at the Brighton Centre. Moving amongst the crowds it caused quite a stir over the three day event...
Radio control work has been achieved by Ian Watts from the successful Robot Wars Team "Big Brother", (with some help from Ashley from Devious Team!) - this weekend it has been using a new motor controller wigh a better turn of speed and better control!
