During the filming of the film, the number of the art crew reached more than 1,000 at one point, including technicians, carpenters, bricklayers, tailors, prop engineers, and even shipbuilding workers. After studying the script with director John Woo, Yip first started to design the sketches of the main scenes, because the focus of the film was on these battles, and then drew the renderings. At the same time, Ye Jintian and his team conducted a lot of historical data research to understand the architecture, clothing, warships, weapons, and props that may appear in the film during the Three Kingdoms period. That's because director John Woo's philosophy is to be as faithful to history as possible in detail.
Ye Jintian said, "The most difficult part of "Red Cliff" is to unify the overall style. The cultural relics that can be handed down from the Three Kingdoms period are rare. And our understanding of that period comes from the novel "Romance of the Three Kingdoms". The novel is to increase readability He has created many legendary stories. Director John Woo hopes to make a version that is more faithful to history and different from the novel. He focuses more on the role played by Zhou Lang in commanding the coalition to fight against Cao Cao. Therefore , his version is a romantic adaptation of the novel. The audience has never seen the ancient Chinese navy fighting, burning warships, and borrowing arrows from grass boats. So these scenes we are going to shoot are It looked familiar, and it was unprecedented to shoot on such a scale."
"We must rebuild these large-scale historical monuments one by one, and give them the rhythm of life. I consider it from two aspects. First, the scale should be large and the momentum should be large, like those representative ones. Like traditional Chinese painting, it needs to be grand. Second, everything must be detailed and accurate. So I spent a lot of time studying the existing cultural relics handed down from the Three Kingdoms period. With details, the designed things will come alive .And many details are unique to that era. Things in the Han Dynasty are dignified and grand, and the details are beautiful. So we pay special attention to its accuracy when designing these details."
"We consulted historians in all aspects, including architecture, military, law, weapons, and clothing; and we studied the different lifestyles of the nobles and ordinary people at that time. I also went to Japan specially to go to I asked a Japanese expert on the history of the Three Kingdoms. I learned some new knowledge about making armor and weapons there, which was very helpful to us."
""Red Cliff" tells the story of the three kingdoms of Wei, Shu and Wu before the Eastern Han Dynasty. At that time, the wars continued year after year, but in fact there was not much difference in the clothing of soldiers from different countries. This film is based on generals and military divisions. Lord, I made reference to the attire of the scholars at that time, and processed it strictly in accordance with the production process of modern suits. Therefore, the effect on the big screen looks luxurious and has the style of a gentleman. In fact, it is a combination of ancient intellectuals and aristocrats. characteristics."
"Iron armor did not become popular until the Jin Dynasty, so Cao Cao is the only one in the film wearing all-metal armor."
