Coronation Street turns to virtual production

A key scene in Coronation Street has been shot in Manchester’s RecodeXR Studio’s virtual production stage. The scene is a tense rooftop stand-off between two characters that takes place against a night-time Manchester backdrop.

The decision to capture the footage in a Volume stage is being described as a “trailblazing move” by the Coronation Street team, which was driven by a desire to push the visual boundaries of the long-running soap.

Virtual production extends the creative options of the production team and has additional sustainability benefits too, allowing multiple scenes with different backgrounds/virtual locations to be captured without the production team having to physically travel to each location.

As well as reducing travel to location shoots, production teams benefit from consistent lighting and avoid night shoots. 

VFX house Carbon Digital co-founded Recode XR Studio in 2021 with investment from Creative UK’s Creative Growth Finance fund. 

Tim Evans, head of investment at Creative UK, said: “It’s a privilege to be part of RecodeXR’s story. When Carbon Digital first approached us about a loan to help expand the studio’s capabilities, we knew it would be a game-changer for the company. On visiting the studio and seeing its potential, you realise what a truly immersive experience it is for actors. It’s brilliant to see this amazing technology working hard for the northwest region. We can’t wait to watch this episode of Coronation Street and we look forward to following RecodeXR’s future development.” 

Sue McHugh, co-founder of Carbon Digital, added: “It was incredible to see the speed at which the Corrie team recognised the expanded creative possibilities that this virtual production technology enables. The investment we received from Creative UK made all the difference. Thanks to this injection of finance, we were able to launch the amazing capabilities of the RecodeXR studio to expand our offering. With RecodeXR, we can bring storylines to life that would previously have been impossible or restricted by budgets, weather and even laws of physics.”

Paul McHugh, co-founder of RecodeXR, said: “We were honoured to be entrusted to deliver this ground-breaking storyline piece for ‘super-soap week.’ It was undoubtedly the biggest technical challenge we’ve ever had, with some incredibly complex shots and the obvious sky-high expectation on production quality. We can’t wait to see what the public make of it.” 

Iain MacLeod, Coronation Street produce, added: “You can do things that you could never normally do in a location shoot. You can put real actors in what appears to be a very real danger without using stunt performers, you can have the camera behave in a way that it can’t do in the real world.” 

This episode of Coronation Street airs on ITV at 8pm on Friday 23 September.