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An Interview with Chris Bouchard, Tim Ogdon and Robin Anson
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By Vaughan Dyche
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Excuse the pun, but zombie movies have had a bit of a rebirth of late. Despite the many high-profile productions from America, a lot of credit has to go to Britain for its many 21st century interpretations of the re-animated corpse genre. All around the United Kingdom, the air has been awash with the sound of the undead as they shamble (at varying speeds) across open farmland, various suburban housing estates and even the centre of London. But now the dead have arisen in the historic city of York thanks to Human Residue, the promising looking horror thriller from Rickety Shack Films which follows the plight of seven young volunteers who are thrown into a desperate struggle for their lives in a post apocalyptic world. TFA was lucky enough to have a chinwag with some of Human Residue's main players, namely that of director Chris Bouchard, producer Tim Ogdon and SFX creator Robin Anson.
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Could you tell us a little about the film including more about its story and influences?
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 Tim Ogdon - The film's story and concept is firmly placed in the suspense thriller genre that you would find on the horror shelves in your local Blockbuster. Major inspirations that we looked to for the project were slow, tension building and character orientated films such as Ridley Scott's original Alien and Neil Marshall's The Descent. These films lent as much time to character development as they did to their horror sequences, it was this effect that we were looking to achieve with Human Residue. I think we definitely have more in common with those films than we do with more classic Romero zombie films. We were definitely quite conscious of the fact that the word 'zombie' brings with it a lot of connotations and i think we have tried to move away from that but without alienating the hard core zombie fans (those guys are hard core and i personally cant wait to see what they think of some of our set pieces.) I also think horror fans will be able to see other strong inspirations in our work, Cube, 28 Days Later and even Jurassic Park all make quite clear contributions .
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How much preparation went into pre-production?
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Tim Ogdon - I joined the project in the November of 2005. At this point only Chris Bouchard (dir), Mike Ritchie (prod/codir), Bernadette Martinez (prod) and Rachael Blyth (Actress) were attached to the film and we instantly set about prepping the story and script until around March 2006 when we really started working on the budget and the casting of the film. Mike and Chris worked on the budget where as I organised the (never ending!) casting sessions. Don’t get me wrong though, it hasn't all been smooth sailing - there were teething problems and i think at times the unique organisation and style of our project both benefited and hindered our work. Everything had to be ready for the July shoot and we had a ridiculous amount of logistical organisation to do. It was quite scary.
Chris Bouchard - We spent a lot of pre-production time trying to raise money for the film (oh and write the script, find actors, crew, equipment, shoot concept trailers, test scenes) but in the end we got to the shoot and still had only a couple of grand in the bank. Not enough for all the effects and sets we wanted! We really had to rethink our approach to everything to figure out how we could shoot the film for so little cash. It was frustrating but we carried on. We invented some marvellous new methods of getting special effects on a micro-budget. And cut our costs until the biggest expense was just feeding the cast and crew. The cast and crew were brilliant, and so passionate about the film that they all agreed to collaborate with us as unpaid volunteers. As a non-profit film, we’re going to release it for free download, so nobody gets paid, it’s all just for the experience. Having that made some things a lot easier to do. Using the theory that all you need to tell a story is a camera and an actor (ok and a few buckets of blood!) we kept on at it until we succeeded. The buckets of blood had to be created using supermarket ingredients, and half eaten corpses came cheap as the crew would take turns to volunteer to be covered in sticky goo and shiver in the cold for a few hours (yes – I had to take my turn too)! Only half way through the shoot did we get a lottery grant which enabled the set to be built and more ambitious effects/locations to be shot later on. But yeah now I wish we’d done even more pre-production. It was too much work for only a couple of producers so in future I intend to shoot in short bursts giving even more time to properly pre-produce each scene. There’s never enough time.
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What kind of atmosphere were you shooting for?
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Chris Bouchard - The atmosphere was the most important thing I wanted to get right. I’m a big Ridley Scott fan, I love the way he creates worlds and we’re trying to do the same. I just love the idea of this surreal post apocalyptic world filled with mystery and horror and throwing our characters into the thick of it. So the atmosphere is dark, bleak and very mysterious. The music and cinematography will play a big part, as will the feeling of emptiness… There’s nobody left alive. We’re also really pushing what can be done on such a tiny budget. Even with digital technology now it’s possible to make your shots look really professional, stylish and with dead-real acting that creates an addictively immersive atmosphere.
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What will genre fans love about your film?
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 Tim Ogdon - I know a lot about horror (its my life obsession) and i know there are going to be a lot of elements in this film that people can relate to. There's the obvious zombie/creature element, but we have managed to obtain the suspense of more character driven narratives like I discussed earlier. One thing that we wanted this film to be was British, we're flying the flag here guys! This isn’t a copycat American feature, we have taken our inspirations and made it our own. We want British horror fans to connect to the film in the way they did with 28 Days Later and be proud of our work. I also think that elements of Wes Craven (surreal dream imagery), John Carpenter (the old school tempo) and even Cronenberg (we have our body horror here) will all be noticeable to genre fans who we hope will enjoy watching it as much as we did making it.
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How were special FX and makeup employed within the film?
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Chris Bouchard - There’s a mixture of CGI and good old fashioned gore effects. Our blood mixing team were highly skilled, as was our blood throwing department. It’s incredible how hard it is to hit an actor in the face when throwing a cup of blood! Initially we had to cut a lot of exploding head effects because the materials were too expensive, however we’re now going back to shoot a few really grizzly sequences in time for the final cut. The visual effects in post include lots of smoke effects for the post apocalyptic landscape, interactive CGI computer screens and plenty of creature touch-up such as painting the eyes white frame by frame. Visual effects artists from around the world including Jaison Duell Wilson and Steve Hayes have lent their huge talents to the fantastic special effects! It all helps make the world more real.
Robin Anson - The initial SFX & Make-up were done on a shoestring budget of around £100 pounds, which is crazy to say the film was going to be shot on HD! Had the producers been able to spend more money on the physical effects things would have looked even better. All the effects in the film are pretty much Make-up. Lighting, shading & colouring, with some latex & fake blood thrown in. Each full body zombie Make-up took around 3 hours to complete. It was done in 3 stages:
1. Cover the (half naked) actor in latex to create a wrinkled texture.
2. Use a make-up colour palette to give the look of decay, bone structure, etc.
3. Cover in fake blood ready for camera.
Initially the producers couldn't afford materials needed to produce prosthetic pieces needed for some of the more ambitious effects, eg. Stomachs imploding/exploding, decapitated heads, remains of torsos, etc... So  alot of the more sophisticated Special FX either went wrong or had to be scrapped. Alot of the FX had to be made up on the spot working out of the Make-up kit, eg when 1 zombie gets it's eye gouged out by some syringes. Some gelatin appliances were made on the spot to create the effect. On top of the Make-up for the creatures, the lead actress Rachael Blyth had to have some tattoos concealed with make-up daily. This was a pretty big Make-up & FX film to take on and I worked pretty much alone most of the shoot, with assistants on a couple days of the shoot.
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What's your present production status and release plans?
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Tim Ogdon - The film is about 70% complete. Were going to go back in a few weeks and shoot some more horror sequences, the film will of course be available for free through our website (www.residue-movie.com) but keep checking the site cause were launching a new trailer and an overhauled site in a few weeks! so keep looking!
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