Page 51 - Star Wars Insider - The Last Jedi 2018

CANTO BIGHT

GIDDY UP!

FORMING THE

FATHIERS

Large and fast, the fathiers were created using an ingenious
mixture of practical effects and computer-generated imagery.

22 /
AN EMOTIONAL
MOMENT
Recalling the moment he fi rst
witnessed a full-size, fi nished
fathier being brought to life by
puppeteers on set, writer/director
Rian Johnson exclaims: “I’ve never
experienced anything like it. They
took this robot covered with latex
and rubber and yak hair, and when
they worked their magic you could
stand three feet away from it, nose
to nose, and you’d swear it was a
living, breathing thing. It conveyed
real emotion.”

f all the creatures created for The CG skeleton, muscles, surrounding fat layer and
Last Jedi, the most striking are the sliding skin over the top, designed to convey the
fathiers. These horse-like, feline- incredible agility and weight of the creatures.
O featured animals (with a hint of lion When it came to putting the fathier sequence
and owl) stand almost 16 feet tall, and as such together, one of the most challenging aspects was
represented quite the challenge, not just in terms working out how to place actors on the back of
of the animatronics required for their distinctive a CG fathier and then composite both elements

movements, but the mechanization needed for back into real film plates, along with the rest of
their wonderfully expressive faces. the rampaging CG fathier herd. This complexity
The creation of the fathiers required close demanded that all three departments—visual
collaboration between creature designer Neal effects, creature effects and special effects—
Scanlan and his team and the team at ILM. Aaron work very closely together. ILM built a full-size,
McBride from ILM provided early concepts, from articulated body section with saddle, and mounted
which Scanlan and team built a full-sized maquette, it on a 6-axis motion base. This whole system was
covered with flocked body fur and hand-punched then programmed directly from ILM’s animation

mane, tail, belly and ankle hair. Once approved, scenes, including a Bolt robot camera system that
this design formed the basis of a head and shoulder afforded very dynamic camera movements within
22 / A fathier ‘performs‘ puppet featured in the stable reveal shots and formed the interactive lighting dome they built around the
an emotional scene.
the initial design for ILM’s CG fathier build. riding rig and actors. Taking such care to drive the

23 / The stables on Canto Each final CG fathier was covered with more practical fathier rig with approved CG animation
Bight provide shelter than 10 million hand-groomed hairs, dynamic meant that every practical bump, jump, lurch and
to the creatures. (See mane and tail and all covered with layers of CG skid felt by the actors directly matched the fi nal
opposite page) dirt particles. Internally, the fathiers contained a animation of the CG character in the shot. a

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