Michael Shannon felt ‘ridiculous’ shooting Man of Steel

Michael Shannon felt "ridiculous" shooting ‘Man of Steel’ in a motion capture suit.

The actor stars as Kryptonian General Zod in the upcoming Superman reboot and he admits he initially struggled with the amount of CGI (computer-generated imagery) required in the filming process, which included his entire costume being added after shooting had wrapped.

He said: "Literally the first short I did, I was supposed to be coming out of a spaceship, which was basically some wooden stairs they’d built and painted neon green. I walked down them in my unitard, acting like I’m General Zod.

"After the take I walked over to the monitor and Zack [Snyder, the director] was sitting there, and I watched it back and smirked.

"Zack said, ‘What’s wrong?’, and I said, ‘That’s one of the most ridiculous things I’ve ever seen in my life.’ "

However, Zack was able to convince Michael of how grand and "badass" the final shot would look once the effects were added – although it didn’t ease Shannon’s initial apprehension.

He added to The Guardian newspaper: "Zack’s like, ‘Yeah, but two years from now, it’s gonna be one of the most badass things you’ve ever seen in your life.’ And it is. But it takes a lot of faith, because the first day you’re there and you wanna go home and cry, because you just think no-one’s ever gonna take this seriously."

‘Man of Steel’ also stars Henry Cavill as the DC Comics superhero, Russell Crowe as Jor-El and Amy Adams as Lois Lane and hits cinemas this week.