The Making of Harry Potter



This week I went to the Making of Harry Potter which is on the actual lots where the films were shot out in Leavesden which is just outside of Watford. And it was amazing! I went with Twisted Alchemy so was in good company! There was so much to see that below is just a small portion of the things we saw....

The first set you enter is the Great Hall with Dumblore (well his costume) and many other characters at the front. No sorting hat mind, that was in Dumbledore's Office on a top shelf.

This is the Gryffindor Common Room with Hermonie and Harry's costumes.

With the infamous Christmas jumpers looking on

Dumbledore's Office. The attention to detail was incredible

As you can see there were lots of people there and sometimes it was a little bit of a scrum to see everything but all in all it wasn't too bad.

As already mentioned the attention to detail was incredible. Above are two of the portraits which cover Hogwarts. The left (I think) is made up and many were portraits of directors, producers etc painted in an old style and the right is a copy of the portrait of Mary I which can be seen in the National Portrait Gallery

The Death Eater masks were a little scary

Here is a sample of the letters Hogwarts initially send to Harry under the Stairs when he was old enough to go to Hogwarts. Some were printed, some were hand written (those to be in shot) and they then had to make a light weight version that the flying owls could actually carry!

Above relates to Quidditch which is a game I still don't really understand

Half way round there is chance for some refreshements and a sit down. Of course we had to have some Butter Beer which is essentially cream soda with a froth which had a mind of it's own and you had to slurp it quickly otherwise it would spill over the side of the glass. It was really nice but did make you feel a little sick afterwards, a bit like when you ate too many sweets as a kid. Glad I tried it though. And no, there is no alcholic content

Here is one of the giant Chess pieces. Unfortunately the background was awful for photos which was a real shame.

Here is the NightBus which looked deceptively narrow - and it did look as if it would fall over any minute. The problem with a cut and shut I suppose!

The prosthetics and special effects were phenomenal. Here is the giant that Harry and Ron had to fight in the girls loo in the first film (I think), or was it the second.... an early one anyway!

It may surprise you to know that Robbie Coltrane isn't 7ft in real life (I know - who knew!) and so many of the shots were of a very large rugby player wearing this mechanised head. Incredible.

One of the bankers from Gringotts.

And Dobby the House Elf

And this shows the insides and outside of Prof Lupin's head when he is a werewolf.

If you like Harry (or as most people who were there love, though I got a few stares when I confessed I haven'nt seen all the films, read the books mind!) this is well worth a trip. There was just so much to see I've not even scratched the surface! A few more photos also on my Flickr pages