Herne Hill VFX supervisor Ben King describes how his studio delivered almost 200 visual effects shots, all grounded in a 1970s cinematic style, including extensive layering of practical and digital fire, along with a jackal-inspired demon, in Arkasha Stevenson’s chilling prequel to the classic 1976 film.
Just like a vengeful spirit that is hard to exorcise, horror franchises continue to resurrect new incarnations, even after 33-year installment gaps. Such is the case with the iconic The Omen franchise, which we last saw onscreen in 1991’s Omen IV: The Awakening, and 2024’s The First Omen. But in this case, the latest film, from 20th Century Studios, serves as a prequel to the entire franchise that launched with Richard Donner’s 1976 classic. Joining forces with filmmaker Arkasha Stevenson is Herne Hill Media, which has excelled in creature designs for Guillermo del Toro’s Cabinet of Curiosities and The Deliverance.
In the middle of this Hellish visual fray is Ben King, Herne Hill VFX supervisor, who maintains he is not impacted by the genre when designing, creating and executing visual effects. “Our process is the same every time, but obviously style comes into play. Ultimately, you’re trying to find a rhythm with the filmmaker because you’re helping them to realize their vision. However, we are looking at genre motifs to follow. You can go bigger with horror, which is always fun!”
Blood and gore were not something that Stevenson shied away from depicting. “There was one scene in particular where the shock value set the tone for the whole film,” states King. “We never got a note that said, ‘Too big or scary.’ The main notes were trying to keep it grounded. The director didn’t want anyone to notice the visual effects.”
The prequel deftly balances between franchise homage and its own new, distinct story. “The director did a nice job of sticking with the feel of the original The Omen but also bringing a new take to it,” King shares. “There is relying a lot on body horror and the themes are different in this one.”
Enjoy the VFX Breakdown Reel and then read more about the film's visual effects:
Regarding his team’s VFX work, King goes on to note, “Every project has one or two things that are unique challenges. In this case we had to design the main creature in the film. There was an original design that was done when it was to be more a prosthetic build. The direction came to be much more animalistic with the design. Also, there are so many shots of fire that were all so hero, and the expectation of realism was so high on this one.”
Every plate had practical fire. “For the sequence where Sister Anjelica hangs herself, there was a dummy that was hung and set on fire,” explains King. “The task was augmentation and extending the fire. We did that with CG fire, which was the base for everything, but then layered on different elements of fire that were shot. Most of the elements we had in our elements library. We threw every bit of fire that we could get our hands on that fit with the look. It was a huge combination of techniques to get them to layer.” Timing, color and interactive light were important components for the fire to be believable. “We had a bunch of fire that was slow-motion, which is actually something I hadn’t done at that level before,” King continues. “It was shot on the Phantom camera so we had to match that slow-motion feel; that was a challenge to try to simulate. Thankfully we had some elements that were shot which we were able to layer in there as well. Color is a huge challenge because fire under various lighting scenarios and exposure levels looks different and the lighting contribution of that fire was difficult.”
The creature ultimately required a radical redesign, using a jackal as its primary animal inspiration. “The original creature was a prosthetic costume, so we scanned that and built a full asset off of that design,” remarks King. “We went through the whole photogrammetry process, rebuilding and matching. The creature build was finished and then at some point the creative direction changed. There were a few things that we were able to take but ultimately, we started from first principles. One of our character artists Nikita Lebedev did a beautiful sculpt in ZBrush that fleshed out the anatomy and added detail for the look as well as the fur grooming. It was an iterative process. The big feature of the creature is that the director wanted this large prominent spinal deformity, like a hump. It is supposed to be scary but pathetic. One of the things that changed when we began our animation tests is that hump became too big and made the creature look too muscular because it had too much mass.”
Wounds had to be augmented, like a large one found on the back of a character’s head. “Originally, there was a practical element that was shot,” states King. “It was a beautiful prosthetic. They loved the feel of it, but the director wanted to feel negative space cutout of our actor’s head. It’s a similar process to a creature build where we do a digital sculpt and look development process on that. We do a close track of that moved onto our actor’s head in 3D space and then our standard lighting integration pipeline.” Not much discussion was had on the color of the blood because of the prosthetic. “We built into the prosthetics and had conversations about the amount of blood, how deep was the wound, and what does the brain matter look like? There was lots of surgical reference we were given for what does the veining inside of the brain looks like. We had tons of specific references for stuff like that.” Describing the crazy the scope and types of material available online, King adds, “You get desensitized looking at some jarring reference, especially on a project like this.”
The First Omen takes place in 1971 in Rome. “Not only was it set in the 1970s but also some of the filmmaking processes paid homage to how films were made at that time,” notes King. “That’s one of the reasons why the director wanted the visual effects to feel so invisible. They wouldn’t have had digital visual effects back in the 1970s when they made the original The Omen. Practical prosthetics were built wherever possible. For the car models we sourced that as close to period accurate as possible.” Lens aberrations had to be recreated to match into the practical photography. “A huge effort was made on the filmmakers’ side to make it feel like a film that was shot in the 1970s. We tried to match into those optical qualities in our composites as much as we could. Matching the subtle lens artefacts that you would get.”
Herne Hill Media was responsible for almost 200 visual effects shots. “The biggest challenge was the variety of work. We had crowd and fire simulations, creature design, and set extensions. The sequence that I’m most proud of is the final one with our jackal-type creature on fire; that’s when you get to see our work in all its glory!”
Trevor Hogg is a freelance video editor and writer best known for composing in-depth filmmaker and movie profiles for VFX Voice, Animation Magazine, and British Cinematographer.
