By: Allison Xu

Behind the new film “The Sea Beast,” animators were extremely focused on the details of the regal monster, Red. This includes the skin, the eyes, the size, and the color pallete of the creature.

“The Sea Beast” is a new Netflix film. Masie, who was voiced by Zaris-Angel Hator, has escaped a cruel group to join the Inevitable, a group of monster hunters. There, she meets Jacob, voiced by Karl Urban.

Chris William, the director, and his team wanted Red’s skin textures to be simpler and more mammalian, than the other beasts shown in the film because they wanted the audience to form a deeper connection with Red.

“We wanted her skin to be beaten up because she’s been through many battles with the hunters,” said Woonyoung Jung, the movie’s art director.

Red’s eyes sit above ridges on the sides of her head. The placement of her eyes were in a part where Maisie and Jacob rested in front of one of Red’s eyes, and directed her where to swim.

“There had to be a place for them to stand, and the eye had to be a certain size,” says Matthias Lechner, the production designer.

Early on, the idea was for Red and the other sea monsters to be extremely large, but size is a challenge for animators.

“You could go Godzilla giant, but at some point it’s not relatable to humans anymore,” Lechner said. “So a lot of this movie was figuring out scales that are impressive as much as possible, but that still relate.”

The colors for Red had many considerations, which includes the shade. Jung says that if she boosted the saturation, Red looked too small, and that she looked like a toy. If Jung lowered the saturation, Red looked like a live-action creature. They decided to go with a red that was slightly more magenta.

A general rule is that the creatures and natural environments in the movie are colorful, while the human elements are much duller.

“It’s very held back, whereas the splash of colors in the wild is out of control and fun,” says Lechner.