The Blood of My Blood director on planning under pressure, protecting his vision in the edit, and knowing which battles to pick.
Azhur Saleem directed the final three episodes of Outlander: Blood of My Blood’s first season and has since wrapped work on season two. Brought onto the prequel series by cinematographer Neville Kidd, with whom he’d worked on Anansi Boys, Azhur inherited a show that demanded sensitive handling of nudity alongside practical location challenges with Scotland’s rugged terrain and a compressed US schedule.
As the second season starts streaming this week, we speak with Azhur about his work on Season 1, from the discipline of planning before the camera rolls, to knowing when a single shot is worth fighting for.
Difficult terrain close to base is a production asset
Azhur points to Glasgow’s proximity to the Highlands as a practical advantage for a show like this: “What’s also great about being based in Glasgow, is that within 30 minutes of the studio you can be out in the Highlands or up a mountain which is so useful for a show like this. You have this wonderful backlot within reach that is so rich.”
He also notes that conditions which are difficult to shoot in don’t necessarily work against the image: “The weather also plays a massive part. Even in the depths of winter, it can be brutal to film out on location but it still looks so impressive and atmospheric.”
How Saleem planned the complex Great Hall sequence
In episode 8, lead character Ellen (played by Harriet Slater) is forced into a virginity test before her wedding, staged in front of the men of her family in the Great Hall — a scene Azhur had to shoot across a tight two-day schedule while covering numerous eye-lines around a 360-degree set.
“We shot that sequence over a very tight two days and there were so many eye-lines to cover all around the Great Hall as well as making sure we followed Ellen’s emotion in the centre of it. This required careful shot-listing and I made camera-plans of the entire sequence from start to finish so that we could be as efficient as possible when it came to lighting and coverage, whilst still making sure there was a visual progression to the shots.”
Rather than storyboarding it — his usual method for action sequences — Azhur built the plan from the Art Department’s floor plans, breaking the scene into individual beats that both he and the lighting/camera teams could work from:
“These sequences weren’t storyboarded... but the camera plans were much more useful. I would get the floor plans of each set from the Art Department and then feed that into an app called Shot Designer on iPad. This allowed me to break complex scenes down into individual beats. This plan wasn’t just for me, the lighting and camera teams could use them to anticipate precisely where they had to place key lights and flags to protect the numerous eye-lines in the 360-degree set.”
That level of prep, he says, is what let him hold the schedule on a scene with no room for improvisation: “There are scenes where you allow for flexibility and discovery but with a very complex, technical sequence like the virginity test, I find it’s so much better to trust your prep and stick to the plan rigorously. It’s the only way to make sure you don’t go over schedule.”
When the DOP brief is a single, evocative word
For the virginity test sequence, Azhur’s process with his DP was to hand over an emotional target rather than a technical brief, dividing the labour clearly between them: “I’m a director who's very involved with camera and framing. I set the camera, I pick the lens and I block the scene; my DP [Neville Kidd] creates the mood and lights the frame.”
That division is what let a single word do the work of a full lighting brief: “We talk a lot about emotion for each scene and I’ll have a one or two word description of what I want the audience to feel. I can then trust Neville to be able to translate that into lighting. For example, in episode 8, I wanted it to be about ‘humiliation’ which was the word I gave Neville and we created an overcast look for the whole virginity test, giving all the scenes a higher contrast and allowing the space to fall into shadow.”
The lighting then tracked the character's emotional arc as the scene resolved: “Only when she’s coming through that experience do we start to give the scene a sense of victory, even though her feelings towards her brothers has changed greatly by this point.”
Storyboarding the 360-degree shot in episode 10's bothy scene
Episode 10 contains a major intimate scene involving full nudity — the first time Azhur had directed nudity of that kind, despite having worked with intimacy coordinators before. The scene was set in a bothy (a small hut), which gave him a circular set to design around:
“We have an intimate scene in episode 10 that is a big emotional climax... The scene was set in a bothy (like a small hut) which meant we were working with a circular set — because of this I knew that I wanted to build the sequence around a shot that circles 360 degrees around the actors for the climax of the scene. Using that as the jumping off point, we storyboarded the entire thing.”
He treated the planning process like an action sequence, breaking it down shot by shot and communicating the plan to the actors in advance so nothing was left to be discovered on the day:
“Directors UK’s Directing Nudity and Simulated Sex guide was a great starting point for me in how to approach creating a safe environment, and working with the intimacy coordinator along the way helped us all find the best process... Keeping the actors informed about our choices made them all the more comfortable when it came to rehearsal, we all had a clear idea of where the camera would be and what each shot would be framed for and also how long it would last. In a way, it became much like an action sequence where we broke it down shot by shot.”
Using sound cues on set to protect the edit you want
Moving from UK productions to a US show meant a much shorter edit window: “In the UK you get weeks of editing, but with the US system you have five days of editing per episode.”
Rather than treating the edit as the place to find the scene, Azhur used the shoot itself to lock decisions in, building in sound choices specifically so a later editor couldn’t unpick the pacing he'd already set:
“Knowing I only had five days, my focus was less on finding the scene in the edit and more on rapidly executing my pre-planned rhythm. I made sure every cut was intentional, and I used sound design ideas like the squeak of a chair to lock in the pacing and emotional subtext, making it harder for a later editor to fundamentally alter the rhythm.”
Trading a shot to save the one you really want
During a two-day action sequence, one visual gag kept getting dropped from the schedule; a sword bursting through a stunt dummy dressed as the actor, rigged with a blood bag, with slow reset times between takes:
“There was one shot that I really wanted to make sure we got during an action sequence. It was a fun gag of a sword coming out the back of someone. We had a dummy dressed in the costume of the actor and inside was a blood bag that would burst as the sword went through the body. It was a time-consuming gag to get right and the reset times weren’t exactly quick.”
Rather than pushing back outright when the producer wanted to cut it, Azhur negotiated a trade and delivered fast enough to make the case for himself:
“The producer was pushing to leave it, but I knew it would add a little visual flourish to the scene. I had to meet them halfway and offer to drop another shot that we had at the end of the day if I managed to get this shot done within the first 30 minutes. I think it was important that I heard her concerns and didn’t bulldoze past them. It was then down to me and the team to make it happen and we got exactly what I needed in three takes. The shot was so visceral that it even made it into the main title sequence!”
On being invited back for Season 2
Azhur was invited back to direct five episodes of Season 2, including the first episode which allows the series to pick up where it left off: “There’s a real continuity across the visuals, the shooting style and the performances that helps bridge the gap between seasons, and it’s useful for the actors too, who get to maintain that relationship with me as we kick off the story.”
Working in this way also meant the production on Season 2 could start in full stride, Azhur shares: “Coming back on Day 1, it felt like we already had a shorthand. Those first couple of days were technically complex, and having the actors’ trust meant we could move fast and get what we needed.”
Why the director is the one place every decision has to pass through
Asked directly why the director’s role matters, even on an established franchise, working within a writers’ room and under a showrunner, Azhur’s answer:
“Every creative decision that ends up on screen passes through the director, and it’s their responsibility to synthesise the work of all the departments into a coherent, singular vision. Even in television, where you are serving an established vision, the director is the person responsible for how that vision gets realised on the day. You are the eyes of the audience, deciding how the story is told moment to moment, shot by shot. No one else can make those decisions for you, and ultimately no one else carries that responsibility.”
All episodes of Outlander: Blood of my Blood Season 1 are available to stream on MGM+
Season 2 begins streaming on Friday 18 September