Servant — Behind the flames
The Servant series finale brought the show to a dramatic and visually stunning close. This blog takes a behind-the-scenes dive at how The Garage used the Bolt in tangent with the MRMC Tracker App to deliver a 360° fiery sequence that combined fluid handheld motion with frame-accurate motion control.
The Servant series finale brought the show to a dramatic and visually stunning close. This blog takes a behind-the-scenes dive at how The Garage used the Bolt in tangent with the MRMC Tracker App to deliver a 360° fiery sequence that combined fluid handheld motion with frame-accurate motion control.
Making of the 'Servant' Series Finale
The series finale of Servant demanded a climactic and visually stunning moment to bring its story to a dramatic close. The show’s producers turned to The Garage, known for their ability to produce creative and visually stunning scenes using motion control, to expertly deliver the breathtaking sequence.
SPOILER ALERT: If you haven’t seen the series finale and want to avoid spoilers, now is the time to stop reading. Additionally, please note that the final video of the sequence described is graphic, so proceed with caution.
The sequence in question features a woman dancing alone in an attic as flames consume the room around her. For safety and technical reasons, the production split the scene into two parts:
- The A-side: Filmed on the attic set, with the actress performing under carefully controlled lighting that simulated fire.
- The B-side: A replica of the attic set, built outdoors and specifically designed to be burned under controlled conditions.
To heighten the intimacy and dynamism of the A-side, a SnorriCam was used, mounting the camera close to the actress’s face to capture her performance against the fiery background. The challenge was then replicating that precise, dramatic camera movement on the B-side for the burning set. To solve this problem, The Garage used the Bolt Cinebot in tandem with the MRMC Tracker App.
Working alongside VFX Supervisor Ed Mendez and his team at Powerhouse, and motion control legend Julian Hermannsen, the team captured the exact movements from the A-side using an iPhone running the MRMC Tracker App to the SnorriCam alongside the Red V-Raptor camera. The Tracker App recorded the camera’s movements in 3D at 60fps, mimicking the fluidity of handheld motion while preserving critical positional data. This data was then imported into Flair, which allowed the movements to be precisely replicated by the Bolt on the B-side.
Recreating the move on the Bolt required running the shot in multiple sections, including repositioning the Cinebot 180º midway through. This approach ensured that the robot and camera were safely out of view in certain angles, allowing those elements to be composited out in post-production. It also gave the team the ability to carefully control the burn sequence on the B-side, maximising safety while capturing every detail of the flames.
The MRMC Tracker App was instrumental in translating the human touch of handheld camera movements into the precision of robotic control. By recording the 3D positional data, it enabled the creation of a motion path that could be refined and executed with pixel-perfect accuracy in Flair. This level of precision ensured that the final composite of the A-side and B-side shots would blend seamlessly, making the scene appear as though it was captured in a single, uninterrupted take.
The result was nothing short of spectacular. The heat from the flames on set may have been intense, but the thrill of seeing the perfectly aligned shots come together made it all worthwhile.