Following Sylvia Anderson’s talk, Alan Shubrook took to the
stage to present his slide show dealing with the series special effects.
He was nursing a very bad throat and was in mortal danger of
losing his voice but, in true heroic style he soldiered on.
He talked about how Derek Meddings and later on, Mike Trim
came up with the designs for the fantastic vehicles, and what materials were used
to create the buildings.
The slide show was full of behind the scenes photos, with Alan describing the scenes.
He shared the secrets of how the special effects technicians
got over all the niggling problems they were always coming across.
One problem was that when the rock face was lowered on Tracy Island it left a gap which Thunderbird 2 would get stuck on.
A second shot had to be filmed from a new angle and the gap
filled with card so the Thunderbird could smoothly run out of its hanger.
Another fact was that the water tank used in the studio was
so big it had to be constructed and sealed in two halves, and took half a day to
fill!
Following the lecture, Alan signed autographs. He’d prepared
a nice glossy special anniversary souvenir brochure packed full of info about
the making of Thunderbirds, using lots of behind the scenes photos.
One photo in the brochure did catch my attention showing
lighting cameraman, Harry Oakes taking a light reading against a fibreglass model
of an Orbit lolly ice, used for one of the Lyons Maid commercials.
As Alan points out, little if anything has been written
about how these commercials were made.
Alan goes on to say, that these were filmed at weekends
meaning you didn’t get a break, although there was something quite surreal about
launching a lolly on a Saturday morning on the Slough Trading Estate.
