Behind the Scenes of Star Wars: The Original Trilogy ILM Special Effects Makers. 

ZeikJT thank you

This needs to be the top comment seriously! Or even the video description...

Thanks

Thank you ♥️

REDUCED LIST 49:56

Is not 50 years later, is actually 43 later, but yeah i got your point.

@@diganmelaraxd6981 ...."almost"

That's definitely not true

Oops sorry I ment that is totally true

@@diganmelaraxd6981 Why are people like you so fucking pedantic? It was filmed in early 76, thats literally almost 50 years later. Its how words, and years work. Holy shit...

Ian Riddle it's not dying at all though.

DaveGilmour Can you cite examples?

Im talking about the old school practical effects back in the when there was no CGI to clean things up

practical effects (fortunately) are not dead yet; you can still see them in the Bond films these days. and you can even get a BA in miniature effects: www.herts.ac.uk/courses/model-design-model-effects

"Battle of the Küchenrolle" is a new practical effects gem.

Yeah, the problem with modern CGI is also, that they overexaggurate everything (millions of ships, millions of lasers etc etc) so the power in the image of the original Star Wars laid in its SIMPLICITY and how notoriously elaborate well everything was made, in greatest detail. Of course the computer controlled robotics they used for precise accurate model ship movement were what made it what it was. So many seem to completely forget the effects team ILM work. This was what made Star Wars. Not story or actors or anything else. Its breakthrough power was in the milestone breakthrough visual effects.

He also took a lot of inspiration from Gerry Anderson shows. Which did a lot to pioneer that lived in futuristic look.

Adding a time stamp for myself: 7:43

The WW2 guns were just cheap props.

When my son was little I got him a little 50cc dirt bike for Christmas. It was used and had a big scuff on the side. It bothered him and I said “It’s like an X-Wing, that just means it’s seen some action!” And then he was okay with it! 😄

Yeah the problem with CGI is 1.Physical realism 2.Movement total failure 3.Texture failure 4.Unrealistic "video game" feeling in believability (and yes I saw the original Star Wars in movie theatres)

@R. M I would definitely make movie with no CGI, only practical stuff and stop motion, if i were given the chance

@@fearglitchdragonvodsandoth2973 same I would be in your project. It could be utilized so well to these day but movie makers dont have balls anymore and they go through the easy route. That's why we also have lots of shitty cgis these days as there are pretty mediocore editors working on movies who did shitty edits in their schools after another. Still gotta give it for LOTR movies making cgi look almost photorealistic. it holds so well to this day I think still the big troll in the dungeons is a real :D but that scene itself took over 3 months to render if I remember correctly. These days movies are made in seconds and as fast as possible. Fucking money and capitalism destroyed this great industry too.

The Mandalorian uses practical props

@@patrii9100 Lol I was just going to point that out. I absolutely love the Mandolorian due to that.

It comes down to lighting and the renderer.

I died. 😂💀

ksir lol

Yes. I’m just rewatching this now thinking all these scenes still look real to me even after knowing what is what. Of course I was a child when a I first saw these movies, but still, the effects are done with such precision there isn’t anything that really distracts from following the story. You don’t have a separate moment while watching where your brain says, “oh that’s cgi”. Somehow with the stop motion you can tell, but it doesn’t distract.

ksir You don't realize that it's CG when it's good. So a lot of the Empire's effects are better than the bad CGI

Amen Brother! Also Return of the Jedi's effects are amazing... I think that was a peak, they never got better than ROTJ, and other movies around that time, like Aliens... the effects are perfect, CGI only look fake and shitty in comparison... CGI can enhance effects I think, but should never BE the effect.

ksir have u seen empire strikes back? Lmao. Don’t be silly bro. We all love empire deeply, but we have also all seen avatar.

Lucky!!!

too bad Disney had to buy it, and CGI came into existence

That's a really nice anecdote. Thanks for sharing.

That’s rad! My aunt used to work at the research library at Skywalker Ranch near the San Francisco Bay Area! She was really smart and put in her retirement IMMEDIATELY upon Disney buying Lucas out. It’s my idea of a fun job since I’m a huge bibliophile and book collector/reader and my heroes have been the Beat Generation writers since I was 15. (I was born in ‘81, ages after Kerouac and the Beat Generation took off! Lol!) My aunt’s job would’ve been my dream job! But then for some it would’ve probably been a lot more fun to have been a cop because you’re not in an office all day lol. I guess it all depends on one’s temperament. Anyway, that’s a really awesome story! :)

Also, my aunt moved with my uncle into my grandma’s house that was in trust and all paid off right after her retirement. She TOTALLY hit the jackpot because of that timing with Disney! :D

It belongs in a museum!

It is in a museum.

Managed to get a piece from the first Death Star, which if people know was made of foam, and managed to get a brass ethcing piece with a pattern on it from the unfinished side of the II Death Star, and a piece of fur from the wampa, and a piece of the sarlacc pit, and last but not least a piece from one of the AT-AT Walkers, either from the small models, or medium size models or from the large scale models.

@@GHOST91991 HOW!!!

On ebay, been very fortunate to go on when these items have been listed. some from UK some from America@@owyman

@Green Tree - I enjoyed more than the last eight films. 😉

I enjoy a visit to the dentist more than the last film

LMAO @ you guys! I started to feel like some kind of a*hole when i couldn't say i liked the new films. I think i resolved that they wouldn't get any better and picked maybe 2 in the last 20+ years that i could go a little easier on..

Episode VII was so bad I didn't even watch VIII and IX.

@@gabormiklay9209 Truly a wise decision

Logan Stroganoff I am!

@Logan Stroganoff cgi always looks like a playstation game. Sometimes I think it gets worse. Jurassic Park back then was fucking great and nowadays it just doesnt look right.

MaLoDe1975 Bad CG does. Good CG will always look more realistic than models. There’s a misconception that computers do all the work, when that isn’t true. There are hundreds of talented artists behind CGI.

@Logan Stroganoff he has more than 80 likes so f u and your stupid fake cgi 😂

I was going to say, these guys deserve as much respect as those who do VERY IMPRESSIVE CGI. This artform is just pretty well dead is all. Sad. But way she goes. Props to Episode 8 for not using a CGI Yoda, & Mandalorian for multiple puppets & costumes.

Yeah they received Oscars

Imagine if they still relied on all that instead of CGI. They are so lazy now AI does all the work

@@brandonkelbe that's not how cgi works lmao

@@brandonkelbe you realize there are CGi artists right?

That's because they were recomposited in the special editions. Project 4k aged worse in that department while Harmy kinda cheats by using Blu-ray clips

have you seen droids

This is the way.

My thoughts exactly as I was watching it...

Same animators I think

I love that style so much

What company?

Nice ad

What’s BTS?

@@nlawson2004 Behind The Scenes

Brian Peeples Thanks.

@@nlawson2004 a Kpop group

@@skeletonentertainment4201 I am their biggest fan ( I mean in the weight) :D

Yeah exactly. CGI movement is what is fucked up. Even if texture resolution realism is photorealistic, without accurate realistic physical movement, it will look like a video game.

Agree. But also the big first person pov tracking show as they first enter the trench. 2 sublime shots.

Indeed. I'd rather be impressed by people than computers.

@@ryanlehning556 because you don't think CGI is made by people? modelling, texturing, animating, lighting and rendering these 3D models takes just as much talent as making physical models...

@@ryanlehning556 Lol, you think they just type "spaceship" at a prompt and bam, an awesome looking spaceship appears? Computer artists use digital modeling tools to model, detail, texture, render, etc. and it takes just as much effort, if not more so, than building physical models.

@@daxramdac7194 yeah see? thats boring.

CGI looks fake AF.

Optiv112 to say that all of them are lost is an exaggeration. There are plenty of untouched scenes.

Look up Harmy's Despecialized Editions and for the first movie, the Silver Screen Edition.

Cr4z3d It's a shame that Lucas had to cram every frame with some dumb CGI creature in the foreground. Because some of the changes were good, like the view fromm the windows in cloud city or exchanging cardboard cutouts for real people in crowd shots... if only he'd stuck to that. But as it is you can't watch the special editions. Han shot first!

A crime!

Well... I just watched "All Changes Made to Star Wars: A New Hope (Comparison Video)" , and my impression is that very little was removed, a good part of what was added makes perfect sense and adds to the movie (like the CGI Jabba that was supposed to be included in the first place) and most of the anger about Lucas' edits is talk by people who don't realize that most of their disappointment comes from no longer watching the film with the eyes of a twelve year old.

*Before the dark times, before Disney*

@@MarCuseus Disney, the destroyer of everything good with it's billion dollars nut sacks!

The dark times were the prequels, at least Disney is actually using practical effects

@@AmusedWalrus **FACEPALM** they used a crap load of practical effects for the prequels

90% of the sets and alien creatures were CGI in the prequels, eeven the fucking ships were CGI. All you have to do is watch the making of the prequels, the sequels are at least using practical effects for most things.

I'm with you on this one....HIGH 5

Yeah because you're not a kid anymore.

@Jon Boy It's even better i think...

wespozo 1-3 suck. Suck bad.

Well, yes. Nothing you see as an adult can replace your childhood.

A whole lot of effort still goes into cgi

What I find interesting is how close some of the other models came to be in the film, like how ugly was that first star destroyer. The film nearly ended up looking like space balls thank god it didn't.

it's funny when you realize this old technique gives much better results than the synthesis of today. Our eyes are too used to spot things made by a computer, but real objects look way more realistic.

But did you know every film since 1977 Has included more practical effects? all the naboo star fighters when they explode are physical objects. Most things in ep 1 where physical like the naboo city. Its just how its blended and made to look futuristic that makes it so CGI. Episode 3 takes the physical props to a whole new level.

Practical effects laced with CGI will look like CGI, not practical.

Bullshit. Plenty of models look fake. It all depends on how they are lit and shot.

@@TryptychUK Especially in Jurassic Park 3 when you see the Spinosaurus tear out the airplane. It's so stiff it looks like something from Jurassic Park ride.

Incorrect. How is a 3 foot model lpok like a real thing?

models can and do look fake unless done well

@@DrWhom nope because they are actually there.

Proof that George is always hungry 🍔

Yesssssss....

With a pickle - for the cockpit I heard.

You don’t win friends with salad 🤷‍♂️

"Make the Star Destroyers like pizza slices."

I had often heard that the escape pod sequence was the first ILM shot.

I agree....HIGH 5

The first act and last act of The Wrath of Khan was completely changed due to a script leak. Spock was supposed to die in the first act. This was all due to theft on set.

actually they did. FOR SOME REASON they released the RETURN OF THE JEDI comic before the movie came out and I couldn't help myself. it was disappointing. the only difference in the comic is that they didn't show VADER'S face. they showed Luke covering his eyes as it was supposedly too gruesome.

People used to spoil movies without a shred of hesitation. I remember being quite alone finding spoilers to be something bad.

Spoilers absolutely existed, you could even read the novelisation if the first one before it came out

Despite all this there was still "security" figure packs of Jedi Figures in 1983 "blacked out" the ewoks as was MPC Models catalog showing NO Jabba The scene in the comic was intentional as Lucas wanted people to SEE the film (though we had VHS Beta that would not happen for a few months You Tube Internet?) And Disney Owning Star Wars back in 1983????????????????????????????????????

Yeah you do

billygowhoop Its much more difficult to have a consistently profitable job in front of the camera.

Ryan A yeah but a lot of times one movie can set you for life

@@mem1701movies Only very rarely does that happen. There's millions of actors, a career path famous for being synonymous with desperate starving artists, but only a handful of people lucky enough to make it big. For every Harrison Ford, there's 10,000 actors that just make enough to keep on keeping on, but those aren't the actors we talk about. Most actors play the bartender, or the librarian from Season 1 Episode 3, or soldier #5. That's just how this industry works. Best wishes stranger!

Joe Lonsdale skill, patience and talent! Three things the up and coming generations just don’t have very much of anymore. Honestly it is very sad that younger people just do not have as much pride and dedication to their craft. Kinda sad. 😔

bla bla i bet you weren't even born in 77

Deipatrous he is probably a teenager who likes to pretend to be a cinephile 😂

@@DrWhom I wasnt born in 1977 I was born in 1996 and grew up with prequels but I can say still that OT is the best and reason Star Wars is so loved. You have to be certain kind of person to appreciate this kind of art over just crappy CGIs of prequels. Sequels have the best cgi Star Wars movies have ever had (but People are too vocal about other issues to appreciate that fact the whole chase scene on Jakku through the stardestroyer was fully CGI and awesome CGI to be honest.) Not to say every Star Wars movie from the first ones to the sequels suffer from bad writing and cringe worth lines I am still glad something started the Star Wars and thanks to -77 never forget, even though lived then I did not :3

Loo imagine if star wars was from the concept

@@SSaNNEE100 You try doing the CGI for phantom menace with a 1997 computer.

I think, very critically thinking, and with extensive movie history (I saw original Star Wars in theatres) that the only movie that managed to portray CGI and present it believably and well, was the first Jurassic Park. Why? I think it was because they put tremendous work and effort, in making it look as good as only possible with the awkward limitations CGI has (especially movement) by extensive background work of how huge animals move etc. It was not just playing around with vectors, they really put effort in mimicking the best way possible. It still had a glimpse of movement failure problems (for example how stupid the dinosaurs tails are "kept up" over the ground and their running movements etc. but I think as I saw it in movies it was rather well done, quite believable. What do you think?

@@semirecumbentoneYT There is some process that traditional chemical film movies did to reintegrate the cgi that hid the cgi 'plastic' look and gave it a slightly grainy, fuzzier feel... This is why Episode I cgi blends better than EP2 & EP3 (which had gone totally to digital cameras ) and late 90's movies like Starship Trooper had fx that aged so well.

The AT-ST in ROTJ used go-motion armatures. The programming of those first go-motion systems was incredibly difficult and time consuming. Some (very brave) stop motion animators introduced their own form of blur and imperfection into the animation by carefully moving or nudging the models during exposure, but of course that goes only so far.

​ @Nature Stuf We usually reintroduced an appropriate amount of film grain or video noise when we composited CG elements over photographic (life action) plates. That and the correct amount of motion blur helped a lot. The final re-print to chemical film also "softened" the CG elements a bit.

Why do you think there aren't any creative or enthusiastic people in VFX studios nowadays? Because there totally are people like that. But you seem to think that no effort or creativity is put into VFX anymore.

​@@bigmike9947 i dont think so, but only described this decade of filmmakers and their steps into a new world! even i said so, don`t mean today are not, correct?

Very few of the effects in Star Wars would have been possible if not for the groundbreaking work done by Ray Harryhausen in the 1950s and 1960s. Ray perfected the stop action modeling process, called Dynamation, that was used all the way up until Jurassic Park was made in 1993. I find his special effects in the 1963 movie Jason and the Argonauts still amazing today.

I mean that’s just untrue on so many levels...

m.ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-bY2YRESf9eQ.html

This is so untrue. It takes so much time and work to do CGi, if not more than this sometimes. Kitbashing existing pieces together (which is almost every Star Wars prop ever to exist) in real life is a lot simpler than modeling those pieces, texturing them, iterating and then compositing them . It's a lot more reusable to do the CGi as well.

this is true, CGI will always look fake

Trust the force.

I know, it introduces us to Boba Fett

thanks

It was when the baby Wookie was watching a video... it was the VERY FIRST TIME that anyone saw the Boba Fett character...

I love how disney and the media keep telling people that the new movies are so great and such hits, when everyone loudly disagrees.

Nester Ness it’s actually ridiculous you’re right 😂

@@geet77777 The bad opening for Galaxy's Edge should've been a red flag to Disney's executives, telling them that they need to make their versions to the standard of the original trilogy & not the subpar-to-terrible prequels (ironically, most of Disney's output concerning _Star Wars_ has largely been prequels save _Rouge One_ & _Rise of Skywalker_ [see the _Solo_ standalone film & the Disney Plus+ series on Boba & Jenga Fett's bounty hunter race]).

Merchant Ivory It's ROGUE ONE not Rouge One!!

Fuck disney!

ROUGE ONE. The behind scenes documentary about the make-up team for Star Wars. 😂

What are you talking about? The Last Jedi has many problems, but the visual effects are not one of them. They are easily the best part of the film and are actually some pretty incredible work by the artists.

​@@bossinator_gaming7382 Your just ignorant and have no idea what film making piratical effects are

New Bladerunner is alright. And there's also Dune coming from the same guy, which I have high hopes for.

What in the god damn fuck are you talking about? There is so much care put into VFX nowadays, so much skill and effort, just because it's made digitally doesn't mean it doesn't take skill or effort. Movies still take years to make, just like these ones, you just have your head too far up your nostalgic ass to see it.

The final design is basically a large Rocky Mountain bighorn sheep.

Back in 1980, "snow lizard" was what I had heard before I found out they were tauntauns. Perhaps the term was used in the earliest publicity material. They are built like a theropod dinosaur, but with a sheep like head and wool instead of a toothy snout and scales/feathers. They are also portrayed as warm blooded 6 years before Bakker proposed dinosaurs were warm-blooded.

@@paulcoddington664 but bakker was not the first he just did a lot of self promotion via the popular press

@@DrWhom D'oh! It was presented oversimplified back in the day. Should have done more background reading on the topic. Thanks for that!

Also the interior of the ATST looks like the interior of a Tiger with all the padded sections on the wall and ceiling

Yep, back when I had good eyes and steady hands I built many Sci Fi models. Before the star destroyer came out as a plastic kit, I built one out of balsa wood and lit it with fiber optics. That was a long time ago!

I also had the Cylon Raider model from BSG. In retrospect, I think the standard TIE fighter looks the best.

I still have the X-Wing model perched on top of my bookcase with my other models of WWII aircraft. I would've loved Vader's TIE Fighter model but it wasn't available in my area. A friend of mine asked me to assemble and paint the TIE Interceptor for him when Jedi came out and it was okay but smaller than Vader's TIE Fighter. I was surprised at the molded detail in that small model.

Well, yes and no. I agree that it makes sense to have a crew member inside a ball turret to aim the guns... on WW2-era Earth before modern electronics and computers... But... this is a galaxy far, far away where things like faster-than-light travel is a given. You'd think they'd have all kinds of remotely controlled and aimed weapons. I'm not complaining, part of the charm of Star Wars is that oddball "WW2 in Space" vibe that doesn't make much sense when you truly think about it. That universe is filled with unimaginable technology. Space, speed, distance, gravity... all are easily manipulated... Do you know where your enemies are located? Well, punch in a few coordinates into the hyperspace computer and you can be on top of them in short order... But once you get there... well, you need to fly down a narrow trench to within a few meters before firing that unguided projectile into the exhaust port.

Carrie Fisher will always be my princess!

Anthony Enos those model ships are just awe inspiring ... such a shame everything is CGi nowadays

thank you

Which one?

I don't Kno why people complain about the the last movie, I thought it was great.

@@KL-oi2yo You have the right to like it but millions of people hate it with a passion!

TFA and TLJ are not Star Wars. It’s an insane film dressed in the skin and carcass of a once great series’s. True fans realise this.

@@rooroo8767 are u saying that episode 1 2 and 3 are a great series. They are bad movies in my opinion. Hard to watch and hard to follow

K L yeah I agree. They’re not the best. But they built on the lore, stayed true to characters, impeccable fight scenes and had a love for the cannon. Great - no, not entirely. At least they didn’t take a steaming pile of shit on Jedi, impose PC and modern politics into them. It was fantasy. Not this tripe we have now. I did like Kylo Ren as a character to a degree but the rest are dismal. It’s just not starwars any more dude. It’s a beautiful looking pile of shit.