Client: The Walt Disney Company | Time: 2008 – 2009 | Credit: Vehicle Concept Designer
Tron Legacy is a 2010 science-fiction feature film, directed by Joe Kosinski, and starring Jeff Bridges. Daniel was tasked with the design of over 10 different vehicles, and is credited as Vehicle Concept Designer.
He was contacted in 2008 by the director to work on this much anticipated sequel to the 1982 cult movie TRON.
This would become Daniel’s first experience on a US feature film production. After all necessary permits to work in the US were organized by Disney, and after the Art Director’s Guild approved his necessary membership, he immediately relocated from Berlin, Germany, to Los Angeles, where he joined the design team under guidance of both the director, and the production designer Darren Gilford. The team—a mix of leading designers with backgrounds in creature design, fashion design, architecture, set design and transportation design—worked for over 2 years on a look that would make Tron Legacy an icon in the sci-fi movie world.
The Hero Light Cycle was already conceptualized by the time Daniel joined the group, which gave him a defined starting point to proportioning and surfacing this beloved vehicle. The Light Runner and Light Jets were designed by Daniel from a scratch, and saw his involvement up to the final set builds, which were used in the film. The classic Light Cycle, originally created by industrial design authority Syd Mead in the 80s, was updated by Daniel to match the film’s contemporary language.
Daniel appears briefly in the film in the End of Line Club scene.