Part I: The Models

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KITBASHING AND FOUND HARDWARE

One of the revolutionary design principles that George Lucas brought to the first Star Wars film was the notion that his universe should look used and lived-in. Up until then, science fiction films tended to feature shiny polished chrome spaceships and the like – all improbably new and clean looking. Star Wars – oil stains, broken equipment, and junk – changed everything. Since 1977, science fiction has been about space trucks and garbage scows.

Tight finances assisted the implementation of this new vision. Not only was Star Wars made on a pretty limited budget, but the 1970s was a time of economic downturn in the UK, where most of the original trilogy’s live action was filmed. Scrap metal from wrecker’s yards and salvage from defunct aerospace firms was readily and cheaply available. Roger Christian, hired by Lucas to build and decorate his sets, is generally credited with coming up with the basic idea of going to scrapyards, buying piles of old airplane parts and the like, stripping the parts down to interesting-looking small modules, and then applying the bits over the set in a visually logical and believable fashion. Lucas dubbed these random parts "greeblies" (sometimes shortened to "greebles").

The practice was a real-world version of the “kitbashing” techniques used to build the spacecraft models. The Star Wars model makers in California bought roomfuls of plastic model kits – cars, planes, tanks – and used the tiny random plastic components as sub-elements to encrust the model spaceship surfaces. In the photo below model makers Paul Huston and David Grell attach greeblies to the surface of the 5 foot Millennium Falcon. Note the rows of kit boxes at the ready.

This modelling practice dates back to at least the pioneering model work on 2001: a Space Odyssey. Kitbashing works partly because it yields a convincingly busy texture, but also because the model components are based on real-world objects that were designed to serve real purposes. So when you look at a model covered with this stuff you get the sense that it must all do something, even if you don't know what it is. Greeblies serve another practical function – they break up the surface, making it easier to conceal joins. The Falcon and other models had to be openable to give the filmmakers access to the contents, and having the saucer halves filled with a ring of greeblies was very handy.

It's all quite different from the relatively simplistic geometric forms and whatnot used to adorn spaceships of the 50s and 60s. Consider the Star Trek set (1965) to the Empire Strikes Back set (1980) shown below.

A SIDE NOTE ON GREEBLIES

Greeblies are a funny thing. They’re basically a matter of expediency and convenience – grab some model kits, pick out some cool thingies, and slap ’em on your model in a place that visually makes sense. The Millennium Falcon also has a lot of small model decals applied all over for extra texture – many incorporating little in-jokes such as a miniscule decal reading DRIVE SAFELY (see below right). But greeblies and decals aren’t things that fit terribly well with planning or replicating. The surviving Star Wars blueprints have detailed instructions for the set craftspeople, but large areas are just rectangles marked GREEBLIES to be filled in later. The Millennium Falcon model for ANH was designed very hastily to deadline when the ship plans changed (see “The Original Falcon” below), and was mainly built on the fly without a lot of blueprints or plans.

The greebly issue caused problems when creating new versions of existing models to different scales. After all, that motorcycle engine part from that Tamiya model kit might be a convenient piece for your large spaceship, but no equivalent part is necessarily available for your smaller spaceship. So you either fake it and put something else in, or you spend a bunch of time scratchbuilding a replica approximation. Model makers working on the original trilogy followed both approaches when making smaller Falcons, with the continuity errors that inevitably result. Today, of course, the people working on sets for the new Star Wars sequels have been doing a lot of 3D modelling and printing, in addition to trawling auction sites and the like looking for old bits of junk, to reproduce model and prop details.

There’s now a whole geek subculture of greebly documentation. These are people who have bought crates of model kits known or believed to have been used by the Star Wars modelmakers, and have lovingly gone over Falcon model photographs, identifying each plastic part and where it came from. Whether this is a “get a life” situation or a “holy crap that’s super awesome and useful for my modelmaking accuracy!” situation is up to you!

Interestingly, the legacy continues. Visual effects supervisor John Knoll, in a fascinating presentation in 2016, remarked that he launched an initiative at ILM to produce accurate 3D models of a whole load of greebly components that his team could use to construct the virtual CGI models used in the new Star Wars movies. They may not have the boxes of styrene and sprues, but the idea has stepped into cyberspace!

THE FIVE FOOT HOLOTYPE

In the field of biology, the first documented example of a given organism is known as the “holotype” for the species. All subsequent organisms are compared to this holotype, even if a better-looking or more complete specimen is found later.

So arguably the “5 foot” model is the holotype for the Falcon. It was built by George Lucas’ California effects company Industrial Light and Magic (ILM) in 1976, is huge and incredibly detailed (as seen in the tiny detail to the right), was the first three-dimensional manifestation of the Millennium Falcon design, and is the only Falcon model in ANH. The studio set constructed on a British soundstage at Elstree was modelled after the 5 footer, as were the subsequent smaller models.

Of course, it's a bit more complicated than that, since the existing 5 foot Falcon model was modified during the filming of the ESB to reflect certain design changes – mainly the addition of the extra landing gear and the lights. But, details, details. The 5 foot model is shown below as Richard Edlund photographs the ANH Death Star docking sequence.

THE 32 INCHER

The 5 foot model was superdetailed and impressive in its scale. But it suffered from one significant drawback – it was big and heavy and difficult to move around. This wasn‘t a huge issue in the first film, which didn’t show the Falcon doing very much other than sort of flying about. There were a couple of tricky bits, such as the way it backs out of the Death Star hangar, spins midair, and rockets away. But in all, the Falcon’s motions in ANH are fairly limited – approaching the camera, banking, retreating from the camera. And this was mostly done with motion control – the model stood on a blue pole while the camera moved around it.

For ESB Lucas decided he wanted to see more action. He wanted a Falcon capable of fluid and dramatic acrobatics and complex motion, especially during the famous asteroid chase. Although camera motion relative to a static model was key to Star Wars’ revolutionary special effects, the Falcon now had to be able to spin and rotate.

Accordingly a second or “stunt” Falcon was built. This model was a little over half the size, at 32" in length. The shot to the right shows two ILMers (Ease Owyeung on the left; possibly Paul Huston on the right) adding greeblies to the 32" Millennium Falcon model. Note how its primary substructure is black plastic; something that affects the way inscribed damage marks appear on this version of the ship.

It was pretty nicely built and detailed, but the detail is not as fine as on the 5 foot model. For example, the six top-deck exhaust vents are solid rather than being covered with fine grilles. Additionally, a lot of specific and recognisable greeblies differ, especially on the sidewalls. Finally, the 32" cockpit cone is pointier and less stubby than the 5" model’s cone, and the 32" model is subtly more slender and more streamlined. The cockpit and mandible tip shapes are probably the most significant visual differences between the two models. Incidentally, Falcon aficionado Jaitea has produced a helpful page for distinguishing the two Falcons if you’re interested.

Since the 32" model appears on-screen almost entirely during fast-moving action sequences, where there’s a ton of motion blur anyway, these differences from the 5 foot model are rarely seen. But they‘re there if you freeze-frame a BluRay disc and examine the details. The shot below, for example, clearly shows that the 32" was used. The pointier cockpit, the grid-like engine casting greebly to the side of the cockpit, and the blobby spherical greebly to the lower right corner (this greebly doesn’t appear on any other version) are giveaways. It’s also missing the red and black arrow decals on the top of the cockpit. Of course.

The 32" version is probably the one most commonly used as a model for commercial products – toys, etc – and thus most familiar to the public. Though now that TFA has officially deemed the 5 foot Falcon the basis for its digital models and physical sets, this will probably change.

THE TINY FALCONS

Two additional teeny tiny Falcons were built for a couple of brief scenes in ESB. For the scene where the Falcon is shown clinging to the back side of the Star Destroyer bridge, a miniature version roughly 2" in size was made. This had mostly pencilled-on details and solid black windows. And for the shot where the Falcon is shown attached to the medical frigate, rather improbably via an exhaust fan, a 10" model was built. (this is a long shot of the scene, not the closeup in the picture above)

MODEL COCKPITS

The miniature cockpits, found in the 5 foot and 32" models, are both completely different from the physical shooting sets. In particular the 5 foot cockpit (shown here) has a front panel, dashboard console, seats, and backwall that don't look anything like the actual set. J. W. Rinzler in The Making of Star Wars suggests that this is because the cockpit was actually taken straight off the original linear Falcon design and slapped onto the new saucer design. A shame it was never updated to match the physical cockpit sets.The 5 foot model also has, funnily enough, three plainly visible LEDs – one red, one amber, and one green – sticking out from Chewie’s console. The reason they're there is because the two consoles had pale grey boxes resembling CRT-type display monitors on the top. However, the one on Han's side is still there, but the one on Chewie's side is now missing. This reveals the LEDs that were used to illuminate its interior.

The 32" model looks quite different – it lacks the strange and inaccurate white pipes and circular greeblies on the backwall. And it also features a pile of black pipes and busy greeblies below its front console. But it does have more cockpit lights, as seen in the shot above.

Interestingly, the surviving 32" model has a figurine of Han Solo in the pilot’s seat, but his face is painted with (now peeling) brown paint, suggesting that the figurine was retrofitted to represent Lando Calrissian in ROTJ; the last time the 32" Falcon was used to film a movie sequence.Finally, neither the 5 foot nor 32" models have any glazing in the windows. This is for technical reasons. The optical compositing procedure used by ILM in those days couldn’t handle reflections, which would have shown up as holes. (ie: stars and stuff would have shone through) Accordingly the models lacked glass or plastic windows, though the exterior sets obviously were glazed. The digital models, such as the one used in TFA, have glass.

THE ENGINES

The engines and the butt end of the Falcon weren’t ever seen in the initial releases of the Original Trilogy. The models just had a sheet of translucent white plastic around the back, and the ship produced a wall of bluish-white light when in flight. Rotoscoping was used to give the impression of streams of energy pouring out. The physical sets never really showed much of the back end of the spaceship.

For the Special Edition of Star Wars, Lucas and John Knoll’s team at ILM decided that the engines should consist of a grid of recessed square holes, through which the magic spaceship energy is emitted. The engines are an almost purple-red colour initially, then become more blue as the power increases, ultimately becoming more or less white. When Fine Molds of Japan produced their first 1:72 Falcon model they were given an “off state” Falcon engine design to build into their product.

THE NOTES

Introduction

Part II: the Sets (the next bit)

Part III: Final Notes

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