Watch How ‘Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles’ Created Its Half-Shelled Heroes

When our first look at the new 'Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles' was revealed way back when, fan reaction was, well, pretty underwhelming if not completely off-the-rocker angry that their favorite heroes in a half-shell were made to look like a mad scientist's laboratory experiment gone amuck. Nonetheless, the process in which these characters were created through motion capture is pretty stellar.

ILM's VFX supervisor Pablo Helman decided it'd be better to base the new turtles on human actors and utilize motion capture to do so. Wired got an inside look at this process and it's pretty much as cinephiles would expect.

As with such performances as Gollum in 'The Hobbit' films and Caesar in the 'Planet of the Apes' prequels, actors Alan Ritchson (Raphael), Noel Fisher (Michelangelo), Pete Ploszek (Leonardo, though Johnny Knoxville voiced the character) and Jeremy Howard (Donatello) all wore those tight motion-capture suits in a confined studio and on location, as high-definition cameras recorded their movements through various markers. These digital skeletons were then passed along to animators who created the final on-screen product.

Whether you j'adored the Turtles' new look or hated it with a fiery fury, the movie magic behind it is worth a look. 

Learn more about 'TMNT' from our interviews below.