Gem (TRON: Legacy)

I remember when the original TRON came out in 1982. Looking back on it I realize just how elementary the effects were but at the time we were amazed by the image quality and the entire concept of the story. It is funny how at the time we all talked about how phenomenal everything was, but by a just a few decades later when the sequel came out people had already reached the point of an expectation of visual perfection, spending more time talking about the small flaws in the imagery. It is mind boggling how much things change in less than 30 years.

Several of the characters did stand out, including Gem, a Siren who worked in the armory underneath the Arena, providing armor and the Identity Disc to Sam Flynn when he arrives.

We shot this pic of Gem on a bench on the campus of Kansas State University, located in a tunnel on ground level of one of the buildings. On this particular day it was several degrees cooler than we would have liked, and the wind blew especially hard through that tunnel as we were trying to shoot. It was strong enough that I had to shoot with no modifier on the speed lights, and Chelsey went above and beyond to deal with both the wind and the cold as we shot.

To get the general look of the inspiration frame from the movie I had to bounce the light off the floor and concrete bench she was laying on to get the soft up-light which was then modified in post.

With the large subtle gradient I was originally having a lot of trouble with banding and had a little success eliminating it by switching over to 16 bit RGB and adding a bit of noise to that layer in Photoshop by using the Camera Raw Filter. I have never used that approach before but it ended up being really simple and effective.

Even though it is a pretty simple shot I am pleased with the results we got, Chelsey did a great job with the costume, hair and makeup like always and I think the overall look ended up being pretty convincing.

Gem: Chelsey Curently Cosplay