Conceiving a Decor, from the Chef décorateur to the Production Designer - Text 4
Trauner studied painting, and his models, “drawings of imagination,”[8] are similar to sketches for paintings, with significant colours serving as vectors of sensations. Trauner explains: “Architecture is structure, and what we [set painters] show is the surface, the light. In my drawings, there are always colours which give an impression of harmony, which we try to maintain.”[9] In fact production designers have a decisive role in defining a film’s aesthetic.
Despite the years separating them, and according to recently published volumes,[10] production designers working today follow the same steps for conceiving decors as their predecessors: reading and scrutinizing the script, documentation, drawings to set the ambience, perspectival drawings. In the wake of technological change, however, new tools now offer new possibilities.
