Page 59 - Star Wars Insider #175

GRAPHIC DISPLAYS

01

Cuba told J.W.
Rinzler, as quoted
in 2007’s The
Making of Star
Wars. “Coming
up on the Death
Star, fl ying
toward the surface, entering the
trench, going straight down the
trench, and dropping the bomb
at the end into the target.”
Cuba had three crucial
references on which to base
his animation: an early Ralph
McQuarrie matte painting of
the Death Star; photos of ILM’s
Death Star 40-foot-long trench
model, supplied by Ben Burtt as
02
it came together; and physical
pieces from that same model.
Most usefully, McQuarrie’s hemisphere came too late in 01 General trench model consisted of six
Dodonna
painting showed the station the schedule to commission pieces, and for each piece
briefs the
in its full, spherical glory, but new computer graphics. Rebellion on Cuba placed a photo on a data
notably located its superlaser Yavin 4. tablet, using a light pen and
dish on the equator line. This IN THE TRENCHES keyboard functions to plot
02 The effects
led to a discrepancy between Cuba set about building his may have its X, Y, and Z coordinates.
Cuba’s animation and the Death trench animation by ‘tracing’ been in their This created a 3D wireframe
infancy, but
Star model seen in the fi lm, the photographs given to they remain model—viewable on a
as the decision to move the him by Ben Burtt into a PDP ground- cathode-ray monitor—that
breaking.
dish to the station’s northern 11/45 minicomputer. The ILM Cuba could rotate.

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