As a game comes together, sometimes we're able to watch cutscenes that have been put together, concept art that's more developed. For that initial game, and for all the games, we do get concept art early on, because it takes years to shoot a game. It's definitely a combination, but a lot of it is mocap. Ĭraddock: Going into the production of Tomb Raider 2013, what materials were you able to reference before stepping into a recording booth? Did you have scripts, screenshots, concept artwork, anything like that?Ĭamilla Luddington: A lot of the game is motion-capture as opposed to voiceover. It was appealing to such a challenging role, and because I knew it was going to be a new take.

This is a Lara Croft that has self-doubt, and weaknesses, and experiences pain, and loss, and mourning. But also, it was very appealing to me as an actress that I was playing a character that wanted to make more human and more complicated. She's not the Tomb Raider yet, and I thought it was really fun that we got to tell an origin story. I was just so honored.Ĭraddock: Besides your interest in Lara while growing up, what interested you about Crystal Dynamics' and Eidos Montreal's take on Lara for this origin story?Ĭamilla Luddington: I liked that did go back to the beginning. To get to step into her boots and take on the role. Growing up, Lara, to me, was the only main videogame hero who was female, who I knew of. I think I got the call maybe two days after that, and was told it was Tomb Raider and Lara Croft. Which I knew was for motion-capture, but, again, I didn't know it was for Lara Croft and Tomb Raider. I got a call back and still not knowing if it was really for Tomb Raider, but it was really interesting, because it was me and two other girls audition, and they wanted to see the way we moved: the way we walked, the way we carried ourselves. I remember the audition was a video diary, which you saw Lara do some of those in the very first Tomb Raider. I remember reading the audition slides and thinking she did remind me of Lara Croft, so I went into the audition in shorts. How did you get that audition, and when did you realize you were actually trying out to play Lara Croft?Ĭamilla Luddington: I remember getting a call from my agent and being sent out on an audition, just like any audition, except the project name was originally called Krypted. (Image courtesy of Tara Bruno PR and Progressive Artists Agency.)Ĭraddock: I understand that when you went to the Tomb Raider audition, you didn't know what it was really for. For half an hour, the Tomb Raider actress and I talked landing the part of one of gaming’s biggest icons, what playing Lara Croft taught her over years of voice work and motion capture, and, in a surprising turn, how loss shaped both Luddington’s and this writer’s perspective on life.

Lara has to step up and lead her first adventure. Tomb Raider, aka “Tomb Raider 2013,” opens with Lara, her mentor, and her friends aboard the Endurance before a freak storm dashes the ship on the rocks of an island governed by supernatural forces. Crystal Dynamics and Eidos Montreal were orchestrating a reboot, and Camilla would play an untested and unproven Lara setting out on her maiden voyage-literally. Then she became Lara, and had to forget everything she knew. And had an affinity for rooting around in dark, dank crypts and caves. Before stepping into the boots and short shorts of Lara Croft for 2013’s Tomb Raider reboot, actress Camilla Luddington knew as much about gaming’s most famous female hero as fan.

Camilla luddington tomb raider