A couple of days ago I got a great opportunity to tour the Lord of the Rings filming sites in the Wellington region through www.movietours.co.nz . We had a very spunky tour guide who was very knowledgeable and very passionate about LOTR. On the van ride between sites she has a video screen where she could show behind the scenes clips about the making of the films and the construction of the sets. Here’s the recap of the various places we saw according to my memory of the tour! I’ll leave some stuff out so that you’ll be inclined to come visit and see them for yourself!
MInas Tirith and Helm’s Deep
Helm’s Deep from the 2nd film and MInas Tirith from the 3rd film are both filmed and built at this rock quarry right next to the main highway. Peter Jackson liked this location because of the large amounts of rock that he could use as a backdrop instead of building it all instead. He arranged to lease the quarry for a year and they built several massive structures in which to do the film. When building the Minas Tirith set (which is supposed to have multiple levels) they designed it to be shot from dozens of different angles giving the appearance of being in different locations. All the set is made out of styrofoam or polystyerene and supported with steel rebar cables. Artists then had to chisel away the styrofoam giving it the rock-like quality. I’d say they did some very impressive work!
Aragorn Washed Ashore
Along the Hutt River in Upper Hutt where my homestay is, you can find the place where Aragorn was washed ashore after being thrown off a cliff in the 2nd film. Fascinatingly enough, while Aragorn is floating in the river, it was filmed at a very crystal blue river in the south island that flows left to right. When Aragorn gets washed up, its at the river above which flows right to left. Somehow after watching LOTR dozens of times I never noticed! In the picture on the right I am simulating Aragorn and Josh is simulating the horse that comes to his rescue. Finally I got my Aragorn moment after all these years!
Isengard
At a local park in Upper Hutt, Peter Jackson decided to film Isengard. The tower is CGI but everything else is live. At the picture on the left, they built a tree with a hinge at the base to film orcs tearing down the tree. For four nights in a row it rained in Upper Hutt which to the benefit of the film created a really nice muddy scene. Interestingly enough they shot the same tree being pulled over hundreds of times from different angles and used it throughout all 3 films. You may also be able to pick out a dark line in the center of the photo. That is where they laid out a stone path for Gandalf to ride his horse up to Orthanc tower. The picture on the right shows the large tree to the right which can be seen next to shots of the Orthanc tower. Finally, the photo on the bottom shows Nick and I simulating a conversation between Gandalf and Sarumon in the gardens of Isengard.
Rivendell
Rivendell is one of the most incredible places all throughout the films and I was really excited to visit. Most if the city is CGI but they did build some of the sets in the woods of a large state park. Funny enough, even though they filmed during New Zealand autumn, most of the trees are evergreens so they had to ship multicolored yellow and red leaves in to the scene. Also, the set design team recorded the location of every plant so that when they dug up the forest, they could put the plants right back where they should be after filming. One spot at the large tree above is where Legolas did his character photo shoot for posters. You can see Jared simulating that photoshoot. The other photo shows part of the valley in which they overlaid some CGI for the city of Rivendell.
Orc Chant
The chanting from the end of this clip https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Afw8e-abVa8 was recorded at a massive cricket match in Wellington. With 10,000+ people in the stands, Peter Jackson wanted the depth and range of voices that could not be created with just a few people in the studio. So, he ran out into the middle of the field during a pause to explain the chant and get the crowd to do it. It worked! Unfortunately they couldn’t get more than a few seconds worth because people started screwing around, especially when they were trying to record some foot stomping and such. However, they got what they needed and it made the orcs sound ferociously epic.
This was probably one of the longest posts you’ll see from me but I hope it was worth it. The tour was well worth the money, especially for a Lord of the Rings nut like me and further exposed me to some great sights around Wellington.
Reflections of an Urbanist 