Movies - TV
Emilia Clarke’s Legs Were A CGI ‘Nightmare’ For The Game Of Thrones Team
By JOE ROBERTS
In a series as epic and effects-laden as HBO's “Game of Thrones,” one would anticipate VFX artists encountering challenges with rendering exotic beasts or grand landscapes.
However, the toughest trial for artists on the show was depicting Daenerys, or Emilia Clarke, evolving into a dragon-flying queen rather than focusing on the dragons themselves.
In a Vulture interview, Derek Spears, Pixomondo VFX supervisor, discussed the difficulty of aligning dragons with Clarke while filming due to their inorganic compatibility.
He shared, “They move, and when they move, they flex, and their muscles move too. So we had the dragon flying and the muscles moving — but Dany's legs didn't react to any of it.”
Spears further clarified, stating, “We ended up replacing her legs on so many of the shots just to get it to follow the trap muscles on the back of the dragon. It was a nightmare.”
The biggest issue was Clarke's knees, which would slide across the dragon, detracting from the effect. Spears said that detail “was probably half the labor” in the shots.