Wednesday, February 07, 2007

Corridor Concept work

Ok now I know this doesn't look much like a corridor yet, Hazel over at Sun Gate Films who's in charge of set decoration has started raiding shops like IKEA for objects to help dress the spacecraft interiors etc... She's sent me a selection of stills of things she's already bought in bulk, the aim being that I can recreate these objects in CG so when I'm doing my work I can incorporate these into the designs. Above is one of the objects that I've built which is a lid off a storage box 13 x 9 inches. I'm planning on adding these to the final corridor design and some of the other sets that are being built for the spaceship interior, they'll make great panel details.
The picture of the lid I've rendered for fun in Blue Plastic like the actual box but once on the set these will be all sprayed the uniform cream/light brown colour like my previous concept work.

IKEA
was used heavily by the set builders on Babylon 5 for set decoration, they do have some very interesting light fittings. Also on her travels Hazel has uncovered some boxes in storage near the Bavaria Film studios which she says has set dressing used on the 1985 film Enemy Mine directed by Wolfgang Peterson. I mentioned to her that Galaxy of Terror had what appeared to be some sort of food storage cartons on the walls of the spaceship, the orange detail at head height, from what I heard these were from McDonalds, they don't look too bad on the set, also these sets have a similar feel to those of the LV-426 Colony in Aliens, funnily Aliens director James Cameron was a Unit Director and FX man on Galaxy of Terror.

Wikipedia says: Most of the sets of the science fiction series Babylon 5 contained IKEA components. One reason for this was to reduce the cost of set construction; Babylon 5's producers were proud of always filming episodes on time and under budget.

13 comments:

Matt Turner said...

That doesn't look much like a corridor yet.

allen etter said...

Loved B5...never saw Galaxy of Terror. I did see a film once, and the name escapes me, but they used styrofoam packing pieces that were painted and aged for a corridor...what was that movie?

Andrew Glazebrook said...

Roland Emmerich's film 'Moon 44' used stuff like styrofoam packaging on the sets,they were sprayed grey and rubbed over in oil to give them a metallic look,they looked pretty cool in the movie !

Tim Bye said...

I don't know which impresses me more Andrew - your designs or your knowledge of all things sci-fi! Top stuff

allen etter said...

MOON 44 WITH Michael Paré...I just saw him when my kids were watching "Greatest American Hero" on DVD. But yeah, that was the movie I was thinking of. Good Brain!

allen etter said...

I just realized who the woman is in the picture. Erin Moran from Happy Days...so she wound up in space...always wondered what happened to her.

Machinistscott said...

I would like to offer my services as Chief machinist mate on the USS IKEA.
I admire your magic. But I think making partical board space worthy is even beyond your wizardry.

Andrew Glazebrook said...

Allen, Eri Moran's face explodes in this movie ! :)

Can we call you Scotty if we put you in charge as Chief Machinist ? :)

allen etter said...

Explodes? Why? Acne?

Andrew Glazebrook said...

:) No she gets attacked by these tentacle things,not sure why that makes her face explode though !

I. N. J. Culbard said...

Very punk. Great idea. Weren't a lot of the detail on ships in Star Wars the links from airfix kits and the like? Not forgetting of course that a model of R2D2 is stuck to the underside of the mothership in Close Encounters (was it that or ET?)

Andrew Glazebrook said...

Ian, The use of model kit parts for detailing started with the FX crew on Kubrick's 2001:A Space Odyssey, it was the crew on Star Wars who named this 'Greebling' the parts been known as Greebles and in some later cases Nurnies. The UK FX crew on films like Alien called the details 'Widgets'
A huge variety of kits from company's such as Tamiya,Monogram,Airfix,Revell were bought and the sprues stripped for their parts. A popular kit being the Airfix Saturn V rocket,parts which can be seen on most Star Wars ships as well as craft in films and shows like Space Academy,Space 1999,Battlestar Galactica,Alien,Outland etc...

R2-D2 can be seen in 'Close Encounters of the Third Kind',visible on the Mothership as it rises up behind Devil's Tower,though in the film he's actually upside down,here's a pic of him on the miniature
http://tinyurl.com/ywugaf
He also is hidden on the Pirate Ship Miniature in 'Goonies' and on the Roger Young Spaceship in 'Starship Troopers'

sammo said...

This is a really fascinating post! You definitely know your craft.