 The effects for all the APF series from Supercar to UFO were directed by Derek Meddings , who later worked on the James Bond and Superman films . Knowing that Thunderbirds would be the " biggest project [ APF ] had worked on " , Meddings found himself struggling to manage his workload with the single filming unit that had produced all the effects for Stingray . He therefore established a second unit under <unk> Brian <unk> , and a third exclusively for filming airborne sequences . This expansion increased the number of APF crews and stages to five each . A typical episode contained around 100 effects shots ; Meddings ' team completed up to 18 per day . 
