Height comparison...

[Winyaél Greenleaf]

http://www.warofthering.net/pp321/data/3012/56heightcompare2-med.jpg http://www.warofthering.net/pp321/data/3012/56Heightcompare1-med.jpg

Here's a reference on the comparisons of heights of the actual actor and the character he's portraying. I think it'll give us a rough idea on the height alterations (scaling, forced perspective etc...) made on each character.

[Saruman]

There is also a picture in 'The Art of the Fellowship of the Ring', which compares the heights of hobbits, dwarves, moria goblins, orcs, uruk hai, men, elves, ringwraiths and trolls, for costume and animation reference. Where did you find the picture you have posted?:)

[Frodo's Love]

That's a nice pic indeed! And even if I know how they forced the different heights with forced perspective, doubles and such, I'm still amazed when I see the results.

[Winyaél Greenleaf]

Well, my friend scanned the pics off somewhere and gave 'em to me lol That was a pretty long while ago, I just happened to see the pics lying around while tidying my room today lol

I think it's a good thing that in real life, John Rhys-Davies is a head taller than the hobbit actors, cuz they wouldn't have to do stuff like the blue-screen effect and all when filming scenes where both Gimli and the hobbits are present in, since Gimli is supposed to be one head taller than the hobbits too lol. This is what I heard from the FotR extended DVD ;)

[Frodo's Love]

I remember that, too. It's a good thing that they didn't have to force the heights in scenes with Gimli and the hobbits. I still find it stunning, even after seeing the processes on the DVD.

It's quite interesting btw to see that Aragorn and Legolas are supposed to be taller than Viggo and Orlando...

[Hobbit]

Hehe, quite interesting to see I'm as tall as Dom Monaghan (I hope I'm not to tall to be a hobbit. I always thought I was really small :( )

But you're right it's cool to see that Viggo and Orli are supposed to be taller to play their roles. They sure did a great job to make them seem bigger then...

[Lady Ashley]

:o

This is wierd...I just looked at these pics at LOTR Costumes this every morning!!! That is WAY to wierd.

But yes, I agree, it was a good thing JRD was taller than the Hobbits. And yes, Legolas and Aragorn are supposed to be very tall. Ary was taller than Boromir, though not as broad.

[Frodo's Love]

Originally posted by Hobbit
Hehe, quite interesting to see I'm as tall as Dom Monaghan (I hope I'm not to tall to be a hobbit. I always thought I was really small :( ) I'm exactly as "tall" as Billy and Elijah...lol
So we both could be perfect hobbits. ;) lol

[Winyaél Greenleaf]

lol well I suppose what ever height you are, the special effects crew will be able to scale your height to the correct hobbit height lol

[Frodo's Love]

...or the height of an elf...;) lol

[Hobbit]

That's cool. I was afraid I would have to change my name to a big folk name lol

I didn't knew Legsy had to be taller then Boz lol
I always though that Boromir and Aragorn were the longest members of the fellowship (before I saw this) :huh:

[Frodo's Love]

A while ago there was a thread about an "elf- and a hobbit name generator". That was quite funny. (My hobbit name is Ivy Chubb-Baggins, btw. lol) ;) So I've got my hobbit name already ;)
J. Rhys- Davies was the tallest of them all... you'd never believe that when you see him playing Gimli...lol

[Winyaél Greenleaf]

Originally posted by Hobbit
That's cool. I was afraid I would have to change my name to a big folk name lol

I didn't knew Legsy had to be taller then Boz lol
I always though that Boromir and Aragorn were the longest members of the fellowship (before I saw this) :huh:

I thought so too. According to the books, Boromir and Aragorn were the 'chunkier' ones lol They were supposed to be the tallest.

[Kenzie]

yhea thats what i recall being the big bulky type

[Ludibunda]

WG - thanks, this is too cool! Never saw it before. Don't come across something I want to print very often - You GOT ME!

[Winyaél Greenleaf]

lol You're welcome. veryhappy
This height comparison chart is an interesting bit of information.

[Kenzie]

it still surprises me to see how short the hobbits were ... every time i look at it lol

[Hobbit]

I always thought Hobbit were smaller: like one meter in lenght.
At some parts in the movie they look quite long standing next to Aragorn or Boromir, but since it's an enormous job to make difference in lenght I didn't mind..

[Kenzie]

yhea some of those people were rally small!! lol

[YayBoromir!]

This is interesting - thanks Win! You sure can find some cool stuff around these days... :thumbs: I didn't have a clue who would be the tallest before seeing this!

[Kenzie]

yhea lol ..... imagine if they didn't have stund doubles and lijah sam, billy anddom were really that small!! :o lol

[Frodo's Love]

That would have meant there would have been much less efforts for the crew, Kenz. ;) lol j/k

[Hobbit]

Yeah, and the acting would be less difficult for the actors aswell (no blue screen and such)

[Kenzie]

yep ... a lot less money!! hehe ... but i wouldn't want anyone eles to play the hobbits other than the actors that did so i cannot complain!!

[Hobbit]

But the actors played only little of the role of their character...
Scale doubles and stunt men played the hobbits for a big part of the movie
Whenever the hobbits needed clearly in view though and they needed to say something to a big person the crew and actors used either tricks with positioning (of the camara) or blue screen..
So it was quiete some work to make them look as big as discribed at Wins pic...

[Beleriel]

But does anyone agree with me when I say at times I think they had the Hobbits too small?

In the caves at Henneth Anun for example. On that blue screen shot, they really do look TOO small!

I mean... Frodo (actual size) stands at shoulder length to me. But there are times when they are literally only half size to the men.

Did anyone else see this? or is it just me?

[Hobbit]

I actually though they looked too big in some shots.
In the Hobbit it is said that the biggest Hobbit ever (next to Merry and Pippin after they had the draught of the ents) was about a meter long and was just big enough to ride a horse.
But if you look to the scene where Bilbo hugs Gandalf, you see that Bilbo reached to Gandalf shoulder while according to Win's pic Gandalf is supposed to be 1,80 meters tall, so Bilbo was way too big
According to Tolkien Hobbits are less then one meter tall and they are supposed to be only half the size of men

[Beleriel]

Tolkien gives the average height of a Hobbit as 3'6" and Frodo was slightly taller and thinner than most.

No way were they less than 3' tall!

[Winyaél Greenleaf]

Originally posted by YayBoromir!
This is interesting - thanks Win! You sure can find some cool stuff around these days... :thumbs: I didn't have a clue who would be the tallest before seeing this!

lol You're welcome lol But according to the book, I'm sure it was supposed to be Aragorn and Boromir being the tallest in the fellowship :huh:

Oh and i think the hobbits can't be that short, as Bel says. I remember reading somewhere that the height of hobbits can range from about 3 feet 4 to 3 feet 6 and the tallest hobbits are about 4 feet... something along that line...
Also, the piccy shows the hobbits to be about 1.2 meters tall, which is definitely more than 3 feet. ;)

[Hobbit]

But this is for the movie and I think PJ wanted the Hobbits a bit taller then normal (otherwise they would have to do more bluescreen becouse most screentricks won't work)
I'm almost certain they aren't supposed to be much taller then 1 meter in lenght (sorry I don't no how many feet that is supposed to be :huh: )
And besides even if they are actually 1,2 meter instead of 1 meter then still Bilbo looked way too big in the scene when he hugged Gandalf: you won't tell me that Gandalf's head is 60 centimeters long!!!!!!!!

[Kenzie]

yes bilbo did look rather big in that scene.... but i'm sure it was hard to get porportions right... so i don't mind all that much

[Hobbit]

Yeah I agree...
Even the scala doubles were too tall for actual Hobbits so it's almost impossible to get it right.... so it doesn't really matter ;)

[Bonos-Girl]

and when frodo is in rivendell he stands next to the railings and they come up to his waist...but surely for and elf-y place they should be alot higher...they'll only be knee-height to an elf....

[Winyaél Greenleaf]

yup, the proportion does keep changing. At times when it was the scale doubles doing the acting, the hobbits looked real small. And when the actors were acting, the hobbits suddenly seemed a tad taller and bigger. But I guess these little mistakes cannot be helped. After all, the crew has so much to look out for and its really difficult to use forced perspective, scale doubles etc and yet make sure the size of the hobbits remain exactly the same for every single scene. ;)

[Hobbit]

BG, I believe PJ said that the Room Frodo was in at Rivendell was Bilbo's special room which wasbuilt on Hobbitschale... that's why the ral reached to Frodo's chest...

And Win, you're right... it's impossible to make the Hobbits look as small as they should every scene, so the result was actually quite good ;)

[YayBoromir!]

The only scene I really noticed a large change of proportion was in the scene where they are running towards Lothlorien - the hobbits are clearly not the actors and look a lot smaller than in previous shots. It must have been so hard to keep everything in proportion!

[Bonos-Girl]

ahh..ok...that makes more sense, thanks hobbit! lol

[Frodo's Love]

Yayster, that's what caught my attention also. The hobbits are clearly the scale doubles there. And the way they moved was slightly different from the way of moving of the actors. I saw it also, when Gandalf accompanied Frodo and Sam in the beginning, when they were about to leave the Shire. There is one shot in the woods, where we see Gandalf and the two hobbits from afar. The hobbits look so much smaller than in other scenes there, and I thought it was to be seen that they used the scale doubles then.
But it surely must have been more than a great effort to put everything into the right scales. And they did a wonderful job with that nevertheless...

[Hobbit]

Yes, since the scale doubles are quite small people they take smaller steps comparred to Gandalf, Aragorn, Boromir etc. but when the Hobbitactors run they take quite big steps.
I don't mind when they look allot smaller then men and elves for in the book they were abut half the size of men.
But of course it aint possible to shrink the actors to half the size of normal men or to the size of the scale doubles so there was no way they could solve the problem
They did everything in their power to make the difference as small as possible and the result was quite good in my opinion.

[Winyaél Greenleaf]

You're right. The scale doubles seem to look as if they are scurrying about while the actors take larger strides.

[Melian]

It was interesting to listen to the actor commentary on the extended FotR. The scene where Boromir is fighting with Frodo over the ring, they said that there was no scale tricks used. The scene still works with no obvious faults. I don't know why it works, but it does. I think that we beleive that hobbits are under 4 feet tall, so that is what we see.;) ;)

[Winyaél Greenleaf]

Maybe it's cuz the cameras were mainly focusing on their upper bodies during the scuffle.

[Melian]

I suppose it didn't look out of place because Sean is a lot bigger guy than Elijah is in real life. And like you said, they only shot their upper bodies.

[Winyaél Greenleaf]

oh and while we're talking about scale doubles, we mus'nt forget about the big rigs who have contributed to the height differentiation too.

[Frodo's Love]

Oh yes, there was one very tall man at Amon Hen who doubled Aragorn in the boat... what was his name again? "Big Paul" he was called, I believe. Standing next to him (he is taller than two metres- sorry, don't know the inches :blush: ), the actors really looked like cute little hobbits. ;)

And the "machinery" they used for the Bree people to make them seem much more tall... it must have been quite difficult to get used to it...lol