Daniel's eyes

[GulPlum]

Felicia Rickmann wrote:
> I have avoided the issue of Harry's eyes for too long and must now 
throw in
> my 5 pence worth then hold my peace.
> 
> I don't really think it's that important.

<snip>

I agree entirely. I think that HP fandom has made *far* too much out 
of that interview transcript. During the interview (the Real video of 
which is available on the BBC Newsround site), she is clearly puzzled 
by Lizo's question about the eyes and it takes a couple of 
supplementary questions (by which stage their *colour* is all but 
irrelevant) for her to say something like "wait and see" (I can't be 
bothered to check right now). 

JKR was consulted at every step of the casting of the first movie, 
she saw some of the raw footage and was then invited to a test 
screening two weeks before the premiere. As far as we know, she did 
not make a big deal about Dan's eyes at any time. At least, she 
didn't in public - she may have done so privately to Columbus and/or 
Heyman. 

In any event, both she and they constantly underlined their mutual 
trust, and they asked for her advice about every detail (Columbus is 
quoted as having phoned to ask her about the growth rate of Mandrakes 
for CoS, for Goodness' sake!). I would consider it RUDE (at the very 
least) of them not to have asked for her opinion about Harry's eye 
colour when it transpired that (the contacts having proved to be a 
bad idea) the CGI colouration would not be applied.

> Opinions on the computer/coloursation element (i.e. changing the
> colour of his eyes by nefarious means) differs greatly; either it 
> costs a mint or next to nothing depending on whom you believe.  

The process itself is not expensive as such. The issue is that it is 
very time-consuming to do it right (though as they say, "time is 
money"). Dan's eyes being behind glasses most of the time added to 
the difficulty in making his eyes look *realistically* green.

By way of comparison, Mrs Norris's red eyes looked unnatural (not 
only because of the colour), but then that was probably deliberate; 
even so, I would expect her few short scenes to have taken a couple 
of days to apply the colour. It would have been extremely important 
for Dan's to be realistically green, especially without making them 
look dead, and as (let's face it) his eyes were his biggest acting 
asset in the first movie, a quick job to colour them would have 
looked extremely nasty.