during the third season, was filmed in downtown Senoia. Other exceptions include the Kingdom, which is filmed at the former military base Fort McPherson, now converted to studios for Tyler Perry. The series was shot on 16 mm film up until the end of the tenth season before it transitioned to digital for the series' final 30 episodes. The change was due to the COVID-19 pandemic with there being fewer "touch points" with digital than film. David Tattersall was the director of photography for the pilot episode with David Boyd as the director of photography on the remainder of the episodes. Production design is done by Greg Melton and Alex Hajdu. The effects team includes veteran special effects makeup designers Greg Nicotero and Toby Sells, special effects coordinator Darrell Pritchett, and visual effects supervisors Sam Nicholson and Jason Sperling. Greg Nicotero also served as the primary director for the series, directing 35 episodes up until 2021. Marketing The Walking Dead debuted during the same week in 120 countries. As part of an expansive campaign to advertise and heighten anticipation for the premiere, AMC and Fox International Channels coordinated a worldwide zombie invasion event on October 26, 2010. The stunt involved invading 26 major cities within a 24-hour period, starting with Taipei and Hong Kong, and ending in Los Angeles for the U.S. premiere. The series's official website released, just prior to the San Diego Comic-Con in 2010, a motion comic based on Issue No. 1 of the original comic and voiced by Phil LaMarr. The site also posted a making-of documentary primarily about the first episode, as well as a number of other behind-the-scenes videos and interviews. In the documentary, comic series creator and television series executive producer Robert Kirkman, as well as artist Charlie Adlard, say they are pleased with how faithful the series is to the comic and remark on the similarities between the actors and the comic's original character drawings. Action figures of characters from the series were created for release in November 2011 and have continued throughout the years with eight line-ups. The figures, which are manufactured by McFarlane Toys, are designed to resemble the actors on the series. Figures created to resemble the characters as drawn in the comic book were released in September 2011. In December 2020, it was announced by AMC that Chris Hardwick would host a special for the show featuring the