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In Space Everyone Can See Your Face: Difference between revisions
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A variation, seen in the few science-fiction media that make some attempt at scientific accuracy, is to avoid the lights, but also omit [[One-Way Visor|the highly reflective metallic coating applied to the visors of real spacesuits.]] (It should be noted, though, that the reflective visors on real spacesuits are often retracted when not looking the direction of the Sun; [http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/gallery/images/station/crew-14/hires/iss014e09795.jpg case in point].) Such scenes would often require contrived lighting. Then again, "[[Lighting Tropes|contrived lighting]]" has been a staple of filmmaking for ages.
[[Acceptable Breaks From Reality|Of course, the reason for this is that the makers want us to see the faces of the actors filling those helmets.]] A lot of body language and emotional cues are carried through facial expressions and reactions, so it helps the audience to be able to see the people in question while they [[Chewing the Scenery|chew the scenery]]. The same reasoning pops up in [[Faceless Goons]], where avoiding possible humanization is the goal.
Obviously, this is not a problem in literature, since there are no expensive actors or camera scenes involved at all.
This trope is probably related to the fact that pretty much all spacecraft are evenly illuminated from all sides, regardless of their distance from a star or the possibility of being shadowed by a planet or a bigger ship or whatever. Presumably they all have little lights attached to their outer hull for the same purpose as the helmet lights, though it isn't like there is any [[Stealth in Space]] anyway.
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== Anime and Manga ==
* [[Planetes]] - +95% averted. Spacesuits have faceplates with integrated [[HUD]]s, and are almost always lowered to protect against unfiltered sunlight and debris impacts. If you see a character's face in a spacesuit, it's a [[Closeup on Head]]. People raise their faceplates only to identify themselves to each other - or so they can see each other's faces during [[Rule of Drama|dramatic arguments]].
* ''[[Gundam]]'' plays this one straight pretty much all the time, though in one episode of ''[[Mobile Suit Gundam 00]]'', Setsuna turns his visor into a two-way mirror in order to hide his identity.
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* ''[[Battlestar Galactica]]''
** Justified in the original series - it was the emitters of a force field that kept the pilot's air in.
* It has cropped up a couple of times on ''[[Doctor Who]]''. In "The Impossible Planet" and "The Satan Pit", the Tenth Doctor spends much of his screen-time gallivanting around a pit-and-cave-system wearing a pressure suit and helmet. The helmet features four tiny lights which are pointed directly at the corners of the Doctor's mouth and eyes.
** also, "Silence in the Library" features helmets with blue lights shining into the face in the mouth area.
*** But those lights can be turned on and off at will so more likely the point was to let you hold a conversation while wearing in them.
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** The introduction to ''Super Metroid'' has Samus typing up the events of previous Metroid games. You can see her face on the computer monitor.
** Explained in ''[[Other M]]''. The visor has a device that switches it between transparent and opaque.
* Avoided in ''[[
* Mostly averted in ''[[Mass Effect]]''. The human characters (and the alien Liara, who wears human-style armor) add a largely opaque facemask to their helmets when in inhospitable conditions. However they all include a transparent eye slit, and the area visible through that is well lit, thus their functionality remains debatable. The aliens Garrus and Wrex have only one helmet design per armor, all of which are face-concealing. The alien Tali is always wearing an environment suit with a mostly-opaque visor, but if you look close you can see her eyes and a few lines of her face. The artist who designed the helmets for the game noted the difficulty in still having characters be expressive while they're basically wearing masks.
** The sequel keeps the same design for the most part, but also includes several alternative bonus armors with full face visors that play it straight.
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== Western Animation ==
* In ''[[Static Shock]]'', Gear's face mask, while hiding his identity, allows the viewer to see his face.
* ''[[Invader Zim]]'' had an air helmet that was a pink gooey bubble that turned invisible after forming around his head and pressurizing. It's also seen reappearing sporadically when damaged.
* In ''[[Star Trek: The Animated Series]]'', personal environmental force fields allow the crew to explore planets without Earth-like atmospheres while wearing nothing but a uniform. This was likely [[Limited Animation|so the animators wouldn't have to do much extra work on the characters]].
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[[Category:Speculative Fiction Tropes]]
[[Category:Space Does Not Work That Way]]
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