AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON: James Spader Talks Motion Capture Work as ULTRON



Marvel Studios and motion capture, also known as mo-cap, are becoming more and more synonymous as the studio makes tons of cash with its films. Hulk, the Chitauri, Rocket Raccoon, Groot and now Ultron are just a few of their characters in need of actors in a mo-cap suit to bring Marvel's heroes and villains to life on the big screen.

Actor James Spader is the next to experience this form of performance acting as he donned a mo-cap suit and facial dots to become the villainous Ultron, in Avengers: Age of Ultron. Spader discussed this experience to Total Film:

"When you first meet Ultron, his physicality is very different to what he evolves to. It was in the script but we arrived at the metamorphosis of him on the set. In practice, in rehearsals... we were able to create the physicality of the character on the motion-capture stage. They would dot me up and I was wearing a helmet that had two cameras on my face, and they could live stream it to a monitor so we could try different things. Then I'd go and shoot the scene with the other actors and they're recording all of it, including my voice. 9 times out of 10 they were not using ADR (additional dialogue recording) after the fact. 
"If you wanted to add something, or change something, you had the opportunity to do that. I just loved it."

Spader is not the only actor in Avengers: Age of Ultron who is doing mo-cap work. Mark Ruffalo is mo-capping as Hulk and stunt actors are in mo-cap for Ultron's army of robots. Plus, legendary mo-cap acting pioneer Andy Serkis is helping to guide the mo-cap performances while ironically not donning his own mo-cap suit in the sequel.

Avengers: Age of Ultron releases in theaters on May 1, 2015.



To read more about Avengers: Age of Ultron, click right here.


[Quotes transcribed by CBM.]