I loved the interview.  Especially when Smaug called Benedict Cumberbatch "a hack" XD  And also when they showed Smaug, the dragon, dressed up in the motion capture equipment.

Last edited by sj4iy (December 14, 2014 11:24 pm)

It was brilliant!

I am huge fan of Steven Colbert and of his show (don't get me started on how much I will miss it when it
Is over tonight)!! 

And to see that segment with BC in all his dragon-y goodness was... well, just sublime.

My favourite line was the "That hack Cumberbatch" as well.  So much pin-pricking the pomposity of his own self-importance - hilariously delivered by BC!!

I saved the whole programme on my DVR just for that one line alone.

-Val

As I understand it, they do it through process called "motion capture".

There's a pretty thorough explanation of this on Wikipedia (sorry I can't give you a link - still trying to figure out how to do this on my iPad!!) if you want all the details, but short explanation is that it is a very complicated form of animation that is directly linked to an actual person's body to capture and reproduce their natural movements on film.

BC's participantion in the movie was so much more than just supplying a voice to the animated character.  When doing motion capture work an actor has to go through all the body movements that his character does but he does it with all sorts of equipment attached to his face and body without the direct interaction of any of the other non-animated actors in the scenes while he is delivering his lines. 

It can't be an easy task!

-Val

Last edited by Ah-chie (December 18, 2014 2:04 pm)

I know how they did it in the movie, but I thought the scene here was live. 

I just found this interview, how cool was it  I just wish I could hear/understand more of what Smaug was saying, it was a bit hard to hear his voice over all the laughing and cheering from the audience. I think he had a good opening line just after he burst into the studio, but I could only hear something like "... is in the house". I love how insulting he was, especially to Benedict Cumberbatch (love how he can take the mickey out of himself ). And later when he talks about the "Khaleesi rat-lizards from Game of Thrones". What was that bit about milkshakes?  (actually I googled that, it's a Daniel Day Lewis/There Will Be Blood reference apparently!).

Wish there were subtitles! I could definitely tell it was Benedict's voice though.

Edited to add another link, as the one at the top doesn't seem to work any more

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2cdt4m_stephen-colbert-interviews-smaug-benedict-cumberbatch_fun

Last edited by ukaunz (March 3, 2015 5:13 am)