Saturday 10 December 2016

ILM BEHIND THE SCENES: A DIFFERENT KIND OF CHESS!


Soon-to-be stop-motion and monster creation legends Phil Tippett and Jon Berg are hard at work in bringing the Millennium Falcon's quirky and diverse holo chess board characters to life, in a beloved scene from the original STAR WARS. Though it was short in duration when enjoyed on screen, the labour intensive sequence required much concentration to film, a bit difficult for the persevering duo to achieve when behind them at the Van Nuys warehouse, the ILM crew were having a loud, zany and likely very rowdy Wrap Party for completion of their effects work. At one memorable point during their work at ILM, the duo even got to hear the internal tannoy announcement that the company had officially reached the $1 million spending mark of their effects budget, which brought a huge and hilarious cheer from the incumbent team!

Here's a selection of great behind the scenes images of concepts (art by Tippett), selected models and filming. and selected models.










A scene stop-motion'ed for distant adding onto a wide shot within the Falcon hold.

Planning the sequence and establishing the dimensions.

One of the final classic shots.



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