Bruce Boxleitner wore my Replica Tron helmet!

[CB2001]

That makes sense to me. I think the best way to recreate the circuitry effect in today digital editors is to shoot via green screen, with the blue chromakey on the circuitry, then patch the footage in so that you have background composite, circuitry composite and then remove the flesh tones or tone them down a bit.

BTW, CB, I saw you as R.J. I shouted out your name but I was too far away to run up and say Hi. Great costume, BTW!

I think the green screening thing has been done by various people on YouTube doing their own fan films/parodies. That'd be a good solution for low budget/fan films, but to utilize this on a bigger scale, again you have the same problem with trying to evenly light the green screen portions to make it work. Not to mention is that most viewers would notice the effect of the glowing and how cheesy it would come off as because if you can't evenly light it, you'd end up with certain sections of green bleeding into sections that aren't suppose to have them.

In fact, the reason why green screen/blue screen works so well is because the subject is drastically separated from the screen not just by distance, but by the lighting. If you look at raw footage from a deleted scene from a movie where you have actors in front of a green screen, you'd noticed the difference of the distance between the subject and how the green screen seems to glow like it was its own light source and how the actors are lit in a way that would separate them from the green screen's glow. Trying to do something like that on a small scale, you end up with a similar problem with what you have with reflective tape.

Doing the actual suits glowing and being their own light sources is the best option for a motion picture like TRON: Legacy, as you don't have to use post production to actually make it work which would take out hours of post production work. Anyone who works in special effects, or in filmmaking in general, will tell you: it's always better to do it on set and on the day of instead of doing it in post. It'd work best in still photography like the reflective tape, but not so much with moving cameras and lighting setups like that seen in film (Sorry, my filmmaking side talking here).

I'm sorry I didn't hear you, MrSinistar. It was rather noisy in the convention, as I'm sure you can agree. If I had heard you, I totally would have stopped and said hello. And thanks for the compliment.

 

[Davlin]

@ CB2001 : Thank you for your explanation. It was very clear, no problem.

Well, maybe the technical side was right for Legaçy, but not on the art side : The EL stuff got to simplify A LOT the whole "circuitry" on them, and then it lost the Tron touch, as far as I am concerned. The reflective material, as shown on the pics, allowed that... Pity. :/

 

[CB2001]

@ CB2001 : Thank you for your explanation. It was very clear, no problem.

Well, maybe the technical side was right for Legaçy, but not on the art side : The EL stuff got to simplify A LOT the whole "circuitry" on them, and then it lost the Tron touch, as far as I am concerned. The reflective material, as shown on the pics, allowed that... Pity. :/

You're welcome Davlin.

Well, the EL light actually was not just technically right for T:L but on an artistic level it was too. A good example is the scene with Sam and Quorra in the hallway after Flynn shoots down Sam's proposal to make a run for the portal (prior to her getting the EOLC sector disc and giving it to Sam). In that scene, the light from the suits actually lit the actors faces for that scene. The director purposefully chose to have the suits actually light up not just for the fact that its easier to do it on the set and on the day of (and saving hours, if not days, in post-production for just one scene), but as he said himself, he actually wanted the light to interact with the actors and the environment around them for certain scenes, such as the at one I just mentioned. Another scene I can think of where it is artistically used is the the Digital Pit scene with the Sirens. Before you see Gem, you see her silhouette and the light coming from her suit, making her stand out well before she comes into clear view.

Well, I know the main concern is that the EL wiring allowed for the suit's design to become simplified, as you've stated, but honestly, it actually reflects well on the evolution of technology if you think about it in that context. I mean, look at a cell phone. Remember the big-brick cellular phone? Inside that, they had a lot of technology that had its limitations wedged right into the casing as a tight fit. Now, look at cellphones now. Not only is it a cell phone, some of them also have a camera built into because the technology was streamlined and even better processing power. So, the simplifying of the circuit design of the suit actually works in T:L because it reflects the changing of technology (and it also helps at showing the difference in the styles between TRON and TRON: Legacy), possibly even showing the difference between the Encom 511 server of the original TRON and Flynn's Grid in the recent film, where the Encom 511 had circuitry suits because it was a corporate system that had a basic appearance on the inside and the appearance of the circuitry suits were programs in their most basic appearance, while Flynn's Grid was meant to be a complex system in which programs of all kinds can exist freely, thus a not-so-circuitry heavy design to the clothing.

Of course, that's just my opinion. Everyone has their own opinions and interpretations, even me with my technical knowledge in film.

 

[nickytea]

Not to burst anyone's bubble, but the practical suit lighting in Legacy had to be digitally enhanced in just about every shot.

 

[CB2001]

Not to burst anyone's bubble, but the practical suit lighting in Legacy had to be digitally enhanced in just about every shot.

But it was still practical, as it shows in the making-of.

 

[nickytea]

But it was still practical, as it shows in the making-of.

The effect of which is only reaped in situations when the actors are standing inches from each other. It would have the same resulting effect if they had only used them in shots where those circumstances were met, with key-colored gridlines on the suits used for any of the other shots, and imagine how much more flexible the suits could have been ...

 

[Davlin]

Okay, this is turning into an argument. Let's chill down a bit.

I'm both agreeing and disagreeing with you, CB2001. Yes, technology tends to simplify itself during its refining, but still, a thing is designed by its appearance. In the first film, they were "programs" because one could see the circuitry on them. In the second movie, the circuitry was gone, and the actual light stripes on them does not reflect that. In the upcoming tv series, they put back some subtle circuitry around the stripes and bam !, there you got your Tron feel all over again ( that and the fact that the lightcycles can turn at 90° angles again ).
Same thing in Tron 2.0, where Jet's suit reflect the technological sense without losing the "program" feeling.

In Legaçy, yes, they wanted to have self-emitting suits, to avoid rotoscoping and getting themselves some nice light reflections. BUT they ended having to touch-up each scene anyway, and the visual did lost in quality IMHO. So...

( there was a screenshot of Sam and Quorra in the corridor that have been photoshopped to add more circuitry, and the effect was spot-on. Unfortunately, I can't find this picture back. Sorry. )

 

[CB2001]

Okay, this is turning into an argument. Let's chill down a bit.

I'm both agreeing and disagreeing with you, CB2001. Yes, technology tends to simplify itself during its refining, but still, a thing is designed by its appearance. In the first film, they were "programs" because one could see the circuitry on them. In the second movie, the circuitry was gone, and the actual light stripes on them does not reflect that. In the upcoming tv series, they put back some subtle circuitry around the stripes and bam !, there you got your Tron feel all over again ( that and the fact that the lightcycles can turn at 90° angles again ).
Same thing in Tron 2.0, where Jet's suit reflect the technological sense without losing the "program" feeling.

In Legaçy, yes, they wanted to have self-emitting suits, to avoid rotoscoping and getting themselves some nice light reflections. BUT they ended having to touch-up each scene anyway, and the visual did lost in quality IMHO. So...

( there was a screenshot of Sam and Quorra in the corridor that have been photoshopped to add more circuitry, and the effect was spot-on. Unfortunately, I can't find this picture back. Sorry. )

You may want to reconsider using Jet Bradley's outfit (or any outfit from TRON 2.0) as an example for two reasons:
1. they don't have circuitry patterns like the original TRON did, only glow patterns.
Jet (User)

Mercury (Program)

The original TRON suit:

As you can see, the original suits had more of a circuitry pattern, where as in TRON 2.0, they are completely absent.

2. It's a video game, not a film. You see, you can get away with the glowing of the suits in the video game because it's a game and the suits are able to glow to do the lighting effect systems in the game. Not to mention, it isn't based in a real world example. Even the "most realistic games" have dramatic lighting for the sole purpose of artistic style (for example, Left 4 Dead originally was going to have a real world lighting set up during the initial creation, but then the makers of the game changed their minds and added more of a "cinematic" feel to the game (they talk about the "film appearance" here).

The overall point is that the film's style, even the glowing suits, is the choice of the director and at the mercy of the technology available at the time. The reason why the characters had circuit patterns on their suits in the original film was because Lisberger was trying to convey that TRON, Yori, Sark and any other characters in-system were programs (because that was the first time any type of story had been told, with computer programs as characters, so their outfits have more circuit design ton convey that). When it came to T:L, it had been years since we saw the original TRON, so we know that the moment that Sam Flynn enters the Grid, everyone he's most likely to encounter are programs unless stated otherwise, so the original circuit design wasn't needed, but the "TRON lines" remained intact and became more practical.

But overall, you're side of the discussion is more for nostalgic purposes than practical filmmaking purposes. I understand that a lot of the fans of the original film disliked T:L's style because there is a lack in the evolution of the in-system style (not just in the costume design, but in the overall in-system world and items themselves) between the two films. But, that was the choice of the director of T:L to attempt to not only have suits that have practical lighting, but to have the system appear differently from the original. Different system, different style, different rules.

Of course, what do I know? I could very well be 100% wrong. I think we should just get back to the original topic, which was of Bruce Boxlietner wearing MrSinistar's TRON helmet."

 

[Davlin]

You may be right on the "nostalgic" side. Let's stop this here and indeed go back to MrSinistar's topic.

 

[MrSinistar]

I leave this topic a couple of days and this is what happens?! :lol

Yeah, we had a discussion just like this on the Tron-Sector forums and it basically boiled down to the "nostalgia" factor. Aestheticly, I perfer Tron and Tron 2.0 but Legacy is still really awesome as a minimalist design. Tron: Uprising is going to have a little bit more circuitry designs in the costumes, if I recall correctly.

But yeah, who's excited for Uprising? I'm personally very stoked about it, especially considering the fact that Steven Lisberger originally envisioned Tron to be a full-length animated feature.

 

[CB2001]

But yeah, who's excited for Uprising? I'm personally very stoked about it, especially considering the fact that Steven Lisberger originally envisioned Tron to be a full-length animated feature.

I'm totally up for it.