Imagine if you were to view, say, Bumblebee with some sort of "X-ray" whilst in vehicle mode.

Would you expect to see recogniseable robot parts or would you imagine the parts to be completely transformed into car-parts even on the inside?

I've always imagined the Bay-aesthetic to be latter.

 

well if you think back to the first movie mikayla only saw real carparts under the hood and tou only see real interior inside them so i would also lean twards the latter

 

i would expect to see robot parts, but after they showed bees engine in movie 1 i think he would just look like a car. which i think i kind of stupid.

theyre disguised as cars, they arnt actually cars. i always kind of thought that they had some kind of mini engines at each wheel or something, and the rest is just folded up robot. it explained how they could drive in space and underwater. they ran on energon and didnt need oxygen to burn it. besides the engine a vehicle is alot of space. in the trunk (i think you americans say "trunk") and passenger compartment there is really nothing, so where are their parts supposed to go if bee has a working engine and a normal trunk?

 

THey form the whole car.

 

Their matter can transform into different materials and forms.

 

I would expect to see some robot parts, but I would expect most robot parts to turn into vehicle parts.

 

This is where CG cheating comes in. Take Bumblebee for example. His CG model actually takes up the interior of the car. So there's actually no space for passengers. All of that gets magically hollowed out in the movie though, to allow the actors to get inside. Also, if you study Bumblebee's robot mode CG model, there is absolutely no sign of an interior. I can excuse the dashboard and floor disappearing. But where in the hell did the entire back seat, and 2 front seats go?

Another example would be Optimus. Look at any real tractor truck of that type. They have huge hollows and gaps all over the place. They're big all right, but they're not crammed full of mechanical stuff. Optimus's robot parts would very much have to consume that space in alt mode. If you study his transformation, the engine compartment and cabin (+sleeper) mostly yield his torso and arms. There's hardly any room for anything else to fit. A real truck's rear axle area is extremely bare, consisting of little more than the rear chassis, the axles, shocks, wheels, and trailer hitch. The chassis alone is too thin to yield Optimus's legs; and what little is left of that part of the truck sure as hell couldn't yield the rest of his legs.