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Timewatch

The BBC's flagship history series, from Gladiators to Genghis Khan, Bog bodies to Bloody Omaha, find out more in Timewatch.

Researcher Georgina Leslie's diary of the making of the Timewatch programme Bloody Omaha.

23 July 

One of the most fun parts of filming is for the computer graphics (CGI) sequences. Timewatch has its own team dedicated to CGI (Neil Wilson, Steve Flynn and Colin Thornton) who have come out to Normandy with a car laden with Rangers’ uniforms and fake plastic guns. They are here for two days to film some basic drama reconstruction sequences that will form the basis of their D-Day landing scene. In order to catch low tide when the beach is at its widest, we head for the beach at dawn whereupon the three boys spent several exhausting hours dress up in the uniforms and run up and down the sand, as I operate the Z1 camera. They carefully plan it so that each run is in a different part of the frame. That way, when they are back in the office, they can layer these frames up in the computer until it looks like there are hundreds of men landing on the beach – rather than just three. Later they will drop in beach obstacles and landing crafts, based on images they have gathered from books – and also small explosions, filmed separately again. As well as the beach landing scene, they have to film a sequence of cliff climbing at Pointe du Hoc – to illustrate what Ike and his fellow Rangers had to do on D-Day. We find a small 10ft sand dune which the boys clamber up head-on into the camera. I help hold up the green screen making sure it fills the frame behind the boys. The green screen means that when it comes to the edit, they can drop in a different background – in this case, the sea and Pointe du Hoc cliff-line.

About the author

Timewatch is the world's longest-running history series, having started in 1981, and is the BBC's flagship history series. Here, members of the production team share the highs, and lows, during the production process as they make some of the next series of programmes.

Blogging about

Timewatch

The BBC's flagship history series, from Gladiators to Genghis Khan, Bog bodies to Bloody Omaha, find out more in Timewatch.

Researcher Georgina Leslie's diary of the making of the Timewatch programme Bloody Omaha.

19 July

Having finished off our filming in the States with historians Joe and Adrian, we have now come to Normandy – and to Omaha beach itself – to film. Having heard the Rangers’ stories first hand, it is particularly chilling to stand on this beach and think what happened here. But it is very difficult to equate this beautiful stretch of golden sand, today bathed in glorious sunshine, with the horror of what happened here 63 years ago. We spend an afternoon filming at the American cemetery, the white crosses go on and on, as far as the eye can see – 9,387 Americans are buried here with another 1,557 names commemorated on a wall of remembrance. Again it’s really hard to get your head around; these sorts of numbers, how young so many of these men were. The cemetery’s position perched right on the bluffs above Omaha beach itself also makes it particularly poignant. We find the crosses for Ray’s friends – Joe Biddle, Ed Sowa and Joe Rafferty.

20 July

Today we take Simon to Maisy to meet Gary and see around the site for the first time. We film a new part of the site being dug up and it is a nice moment when we uncover a German ammunition store that has lain buried for more than 60 years. Simon is impressed by the site, it is large – complete with four concrete gun emplacements and two gun pits, an array of underground tunnels and rooms, and two miles of trenches which Gary has redug along their original lines. The site is very well preserved so it gives you a good sense of what it would have been like to be a German soldier here waiting for the invasion. Simon is yet to be convinced however that this battery has a direct bearing on the Omaha story in terms of contributing to the slaughter there, partly because the actual landing area of Omaha beach is too far away for the range of these guns. But we all find it exciting to see a genuine piece of forgotten history coming out the ground and it certainly serves to drive home how strong the defences were along this stretch of the Normandy coast and what a hard task the allies faced.

About the author

Timewatch is the world's longest-running history series, having started in 1981, and is the BBC's flagship history series. Here, members of the production team share the highs, and lows, during the production process as they make some of the next series of programmes.

Blogging about

Timewatch

The BBC's flagship history series, from Gladiators to Genghis Khan, Bog bodies to Bloody Omaha, find out more in Timewatch.

Researcher Georgina Leslie's diary on the making of the Timewatch programme Bloody Omaha.

9 July

We are in Washington to interviews our veterans. Frank Kennard and Jack Burke are lively story tellers – and when it comes to Ray, he gives a very frank, candid and emotional interview indeed. He talks about the men from his platoon that were killed and it is incredibly moving especially as afterwards we sit down together to look through a line-up photo of A company from 1942, and he picks out each of these men for me. Perhaps the most moving part of the interview is when he tells us about the moment he was wounded. He says that all he could think was he felt bad just lying there, that he was letting let his mates down – “I hadn’t done anything” – he is close to tears. I feel deeply privileged to be here in this room with this man, hearing his story first hand.