The Dark Knight Capes and Cowls - New Batsuit Discussion Thread

[phil]

There is absolutely no way white lenses would work. It's so hard to show the emotion of Batman, this guy has no special powers I want to see what he's looking at.

 

[phil]

phil, the movie you're referring to is Pitch Black/Chronicles of Riddick:

I too, am for contacts. It provides just as much movement and shape as regular eyes do, but provide an otherwordly and bat-like quality to the character that would be a nice translation from the comics.

There's all this hoopla about "but you can't restrict Bale's emotions!", but I have yet to see people cite specific examples of where they see this magical emotional range that Bale provides solely through his eyes. Moreover, Batman is a man of very few emotions anyway, so I don't see what could possibly be hindered by removing his pupils.

Bingo well said, great posts that should put the debate to rest, do you have any shots of him in the light, those eyes were badass in that movie.

 

[magus]

phil, the movie you're referring to is Pitch Black/Chronicles of Riddick:

I too, am for contacts. It provides just as much movement and shape as regular eyes do, but provide an otherwordly and bat-like quality to the character that would be a nice translation from the comics.

There's all this hoopla about "but you can't restrict Bale's emotions!", but I have yet to see people cite specific examples of where they see this magical emotional range that Bale provides solely through his eyes. Moreover, Batman is a man of very few emotions anyway, so I don't see what could possibly be hindered by removing his pupils.

Covering just the pupils seems acceptable to me. It still allows looking, squinting, and any other expression while still being otherworldly. I can see the contact lenses striking fear into the hearts of criminals. I don't like the idea of lenses that cover the entire eye socket, however, unless they are going to animate them.

 

[phil]

Those eyes would scare the crap out of me at night if someone was coming at me.

 

[Mr. Earle]

pretty sure he just made the iris of his eyes white or paler and not do full on white eyes. They look pretty good though

Yeah i figured that out later.

The problem with contacts is that you still dont know where he is looking at because you erase the pupils. Just whitening the pupils a bit would surely make him look otherworldly, but then, what would be the point in that? The difference is minimal from what we have now.

Crook, that pic is awesome because his pupils glow in the dark, but i cant really judge the effect from two lights in a dark picture. We need a pic of him under normal light.

There's all this hoopla about "but you can't restrict Bale's emotions!", but I have yet to see people cite specific examples of where they see this magical emotional range that Bale provides solely through his eyes.

When ILM made those complicated eyelids and pupils instead of slapping on some lenses to make the Transformers more emotional and relateable, i think that eyes evoke emotion. There isnt a scene where Bale does it only with his eyes, but imagine how awkward he would look when he says "rest, gordon has crane" and pushes rachel back to the table.

We arent talking about the moving lenses of BTAS, we are talking about bland staring lenses.

 

[Crook]

Bingo well said, great posts that should put the debate to rest, do you have any shots of him in the light, those eyes were badass in that movie.

In most shots his eyes are more shiny/silver. For Bats, I'd prefer a more ghostly/blind white. This shot is kinda more like it, though the glowing effect is still there, which isn't what I'd want:

 

[Saint]

Something got lost in the transition from script to screen. The sonar lenses were supposed to help Batman see the "phantom/holographic floor" that the Riddler had projected over all those girders and that massive death drop for what it is. That's where the "This island is all one giant death trap" line came from. But then, I believe they became a sort of night vision lens after he destroys the power source, which was, I think, supposed to plunge the place into darkness.

Yes, that makes sense. Unfortunate that it got jumbled into a nonsensical nothingness in the actual film.

 

[magus]

In most shots his eyes are more shiny/silver. For Bats, I'd prefer a more ghostly/blind white. This shot is kinda more like it, though the glowing effect is still there, which isn't what I'd want:

I like that lost shot and I agree. But that is an entirely different case than lenses that cover the eye sockets of the cowl and do not move AT ALL. These lenses pictured would work just fine.

 

[phil]

Nice Crook, I think those eyes might take it just a step further than what I meant but still would work.
Here's that other manip further along (I forgot I did more work to it):

 

[Hole Shot]

There's all this hoopla about "but you can't restrict Bale's emotions!", but I have yet to see people cite specific examples of where they see this magical emotional range that Bale provides solely through his eyes.

Actually contacts wouldn't restrict that. The emotion that comes from they eyes doesn't come from the size of the pupil it's more from the position of the brows and other muscles surrounding the eyes. Sure, you're eyes can get red when your angry or sad, but again contacts wouldn't effect that and would probably be an awesome effect with the rest of the eye whited out.

 

[batman_1982]

phil, the movie you're referring to is Pitch Black/Chronicles of Riddick:

I too, am for contacts. It gives just as much movement and shape as regular eyes do, but provide an otherwordly and bat-like quality to the character that would be a nice translation from the comics.

There's all this hoopla about "but you can't restrict Bale's emotions!", but I have yet to see people cite specific examples of where they see this magical emotional range that Bale provides solely through his eyes. Moreover, Batman is a man of very few emotions anyway, so I don't see what could possibly be hindered by removing his pupils.

From the comments here, some would you have believe that the audience immediately becomes blind to what Batman might be expressing or feeling just because of this.

Now who thinks eye's like that wouldn't make for a cool scene in a batman movie? Imagine a scene taking place in a dark room, you hear batman's voice, and then the camera looks over to a dark corner in the room, and then you see batman's eyes glowing back at you.

 

[Saint]

Edit. Doublepost.

 

[Saint]

Yeah.... I'm not too sure about the lenses yet. It's good to know for absolute sure whether or not they're actually in the movie. They do look a little too round for my liking.

Actually somewhat similar to a manip I did a while back.

Any chance you could make the lenses gold and the body black? I'm interested to see how that would look.

 

[phil]

Now who thinks eye's like that wouldn't make for a cool scene in a batman movie? Imagine a scene taking place in a dark room, you hear batman's voice, and then the camera looks over to a dark corner in the room, and then you see batman's eyes glowing back at you.

That's exactly what should happen. That would look scary as hell.

 

[Mandalore464]

You are completely contorting it. Other people said lenses wouldn't work in the context that it would affect the individual dramatic scenes AND the entirety of the performance. You came in and said they would work. Then I pointed to those previous posters who talked about "performance" in the specific sense and you then tried to bring up the technicality that EVERYTHING in a movie is the performance, which ignores the scenarios the first posters addressed.

No this is not what happened. Not saying you're lying or "contorting" though, just that you misunderstood and I also did, probably. You showed up and replied to my message, saying that full-time lenses were unnecessary and they were just a nod to fans. I replied to you saying that I never said the contrary, just that they did not lessen an actor's ability to perform. You replied to me saying he was not performing while wearing them anyway, so I corrected you, cause this was an aberration (Although I know understand that you meant it as in "emoting" as well). But before that, I wrote a few lines to reply to what you had said about lenses affecting his ability to perform in a general way anyway (including "emotion" scenes of course, so I did take into account what others were saying. You can check for yourself, message number 7130 of this thread, on page 286.

Also, you can't talk about the lenses in ONLY the context of that scene (which you are doing if you can't see the correlation between other scenes and the lenses) and say they don't hamper is performance as there is likely to be very little to actually critique.

I'm afraid I may be misunderstanding this part of your message.

And you haven't put one forth to convince those of us posting in response to you.

Well, man, seriously it's not such a big deal, I'm not saying that anyone who doesn't have my opinion is a fool as it is what it is: an opinion. The only thing that ticked me off was receiving so many answers who did not actually reply to my post but to things I hadn't said.

If a film is completely dialogue driven then you would be right. Unfortunately, film is a visual medium and dialogue very rarely (or at least should rarely) be the source of exposition and emotion.

I agree that movies are meant to give something visual to audiences. My point was just that your voice is enough to convey an emotion, and that is true for radio, movie and real life as well.

But when it all comes down to it all you are arguing is that lenses would leave "just enough" modes of emoting to squeeze out a good performance

"just enough" implies that it's a bit on the down side. I'm just saying that it's enough, as in... It could very well be ann award-winning performance. It's not just "alright". It can be good if the actor's good. Again, it all comes down to the talent of the actor (and director). I'm not saying everyone can do it, nor am I saying that it's easy.

ignoring the fact that more ways of emoting could constitute a greater range of expression and a better performance, either in quality or variety.

But I agree with that completely. If you're saying that if an actor is in full control of his body, facial features, and that they are all exposed to us, it will be a) easier for the actor to convey emotions and b) easier for a lot of people to understand what he wants to convey, then I say yes.

Again, my point is not that eyes are irrelevant to a performance but just that they are not necessary, and again, many good performances show that. The fact that Ray Charles was blind does not mean that people watching Ray were expecting less emotions out of him. Just that he had to find other ways to convey those emotions to us than through his eyes. And he did it brilliantly, didn't he?

 

[Hole Shot]

I like this.

 

[Crook]

Actually contacts wouldn't restrict that. The emotion that comes from they eyes doesn't come from the size of the pupil it's more from the position of the brows and other muscles surrounding the eyes. Sure, you're eyes can get red when your angry or sad, but again contacts wouldn't effect that and would probably be an awesome effect with the rest of the eye whited out.

I don't recall saying contacts affected anything.

Now who thinks eye's like that wouldn't make for a cool scene in a batman movie? Imagine a scene taking place in a dark room, you hear batman's voice, and then the camera looks over to a dark corner in the room, and then you see batman's eyes glowing back at you.

I was also picturing a scene with a thug looking for Bats in a very dark room, and suddenly you see 2 glowing eyes open right behind him and you see Bats reveal himself preparing to pounce:

That would be all types of bad-ass right there.

 

[batman_1982]

That's exactly what should happen. That would look scary as hell.

Actually, since I've thinking about it a little more. An even better idea would have been to have something like that happen just before the lights go on in the interrogation scene between Batman, and the Joker! Also in Begins when Crane, and the two goons were going to burn the apartment. That would have been another good example of a scene that could have used them. Maybe when the guy was takin a leak, and he looked at the mirror, he could have caught a glimpse of batman's eye's glowing, just before he got taken out.

 

[phil]

Here's another shot of the wht contacts, I wish this was bigger.

 

[phil]

double post

 

[phil]

Actually, since I've thinking about it a little more. An even better idea would have been to have something like that happen just before the lights go on in the interrogation scene between Batman, and the Joker!

Why aren't you Nolan's right hand man?!

 

[Saint]

Any chance you could make the lenses gold and the body black? I'm interested to see how that would look.

Nevermind, I did it myself:

Don't really like it. I think gold lenses would be great for an all-black costume in the comics, but here it looks... Off. Might be better in context of an actual film with appropriate atmosphere and whatnot, but eh, white ones are better.

In any case, I maintain that lenses, if used at all, should be retractable--used for combat, biking, vision enhancement and perhaps for supernatural effect on occasion, but retracted at all other times.

 

[phil]

lol, good job anyway saint, that really looks gold

 

[Hole Shot]

I don't recall saying contacts affected anything.

I know and I was agreeing with you and the idea of contacts and going further into detail as to why I believe they wouldn't effect an actors peformance for anyone who might think otherwise. And that's coming from me a person who has been admamant in these batsuit threads about not covering his eyes.

Exchanging so much with BF is warping your mind you think everyone is challenging your opinion

 

[The Shape]

SECONDED!

Thank you, but I think many missed my post a few pages back.