Ender’s Game Blog: Production Designer Duo

In the aftermath of production on Ender’s Game we tend to look back at the process that got us (yes, production crew, cast and us, the fans) to this point. That is what the new update on the Ender’s Game blog is all about.

Ben Procter and Sean Haworth — our amazing Production Designer duo — were tasked with bringing a difficult piece of Science Fiction to life… and they were more than up to the challenge.

Together, they created a unique blend of technology and humanity that made the ENDER’S GAME sets eventually seem like home.

As a duo, they played to their strengths, mixing a strong Illustration and Visual Effects Art Direction background (Ben), with the application of a physical set build and Art Directing (Sean).  It turned into a symbiotic “divide and conquer”, and the results speak volumes.

When asked about the Formic worlds both Ben and Sean’s replies are given with such excitement that “Even in a short conversation, their excitement for the project is tangible.  And it certainly helps that they were already fans of the novel.”

Ben describes his interest in the two cultures of Human and Formics:

“We tried to imbue the spaces and vehicles with a gritty, engineered realism that would help sell the seriousness of the training our hero kids are going through. The visual style of the Formics, on the other hand, needed to be both exotic and beautiful to represent a society not deserving of extinction.”

They were already fans when working on the film. Ben “read the founding short-story at age twelve, and has been a fan ever since.” As for Sean, he read the book later in his twenties deftly remembering the “science and technology” but as well as the horror of human elements behind the story.

“I was torn between wanting to be Ender but never having to be faced with that kind of a future,” he said.

I think we all had that feeling at one time.

Sadly, for the time being this update is the last for the blog as tweeted by Roberto Orci.

So, as the Ender’s Game Blog ends the post “Farewell… for now.”