Death on the Nile was another film with Kenneth Branagh, this time shot entirely at Longcross Studios.

The film opens with the First World War battle sequence, showing a young Hercule Poirot in the trenches. That gave us a very different type of work from the rest of the picture, with the Special Effects department creating the battlefield environment through explosions, smoke, atmosphere and the general destruction and movement needed to make the sequence feel convincing. It was a substantial opening to what otherwise became a much more controlled and elegant studio film.

The centrepiece of the production was the enormous full-size recreation of the steamer Karnak, which gave us plenty to work with from a Special Effects point of view. Much of our work was concentrated around the engine-room areas, creating steam, atmosphere and practical mechanical effects to help give the ship a sense of heat, movement and life.

A large part of the job was also supporting Haris Zambarloukos, Ken’s Director of Photography and somebody I have always particularly enjoyed working with. Haris is incredibly collaborative and very inventive with his lighting. He is always looking for practical ways to shape or manipulate light in-camera, and Special Effects often becomes part of that process.

For this film we created a number of reflection tanks, allowing Haris to use moving reflected light to bring the feeling of the Nile and the surrounding water into the sets. It is the sort of work that may not immediately register as a Special Effect when you watch the finished film, but it can make an enormous difference to the atmosphere and realism of a scene.

That collaboration between Camera and Special Effects is something I have always enjoyed. Rather than simply being asked to provide smoke, steam or mechanical effects, you become part of the visual problem-solving process — working together to find practical ways of achieving something distinctive on camera.

From the mud, smoke and explosions of the opening battlefield sequence to the steam-filled engine rooms and subtle moving reflections aboard the Karnak, Death on the Nile covered a surprisingly broad range of practical work and was another very enjoyable production with Ken..