what informs a directors choice for the color of spandex used to film scenes with CGI?

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Just saw some behind the scenes footage of how CGI is done in movies like planet of the apes (actors in spandex suits & other little technology on the suits— presumably to identify spots with joints/limbs?) and in this specific case, the actors were wearing deep blue spandex suits.

I imagine this particular color selection had to do with shooting the scene in a forest— green suits would be more difficult to distinguish against a background with green foliage— but are there any other variables that are considered? I was just wondering why they would choose blue over, say, hot pink— I imagine some of the plants might have blue undertones and I would think that hot pink would also stand out and make it easier to add CGI. Are there any colors that are off limits, or don’t do the job as well (obviously dark/non-neon colors would be difficult to work with, but what about highlighter yellow or tangerine, or bright magenta?)?

Additionally any fun facts/video resources about film production would be cool & much appreciated! I just learned about the “pink haze” in copies of sailor moon apparently resulting from the degradation of the cyan & yellow inks and I find that super interesting, so I’d love any filmmaking facts along those lines. Thanks in advance!

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7 Answers

Anonymous 0 Comments

Like others have said, chroma keying will usually be the answer to the color chosen for body suits. However you mentioned POTA specifically. In those movies they use a suit that has a tracking pattern on the fabric. this is used to track the motion of the body and limbs to be retargeted to the digital character. Those are not ‘keyed’ (chroma keyed) out. the actors are digitally painted out of the frame. After the actor’s motion is retargeted to the digital character, the digital character is then composited on top of the painted background.

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