{"id":23658,"date":"2020-07-20T17:19:08","date_gmt":"2020-07-20T17:19:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/propstore.com\/?p=23658"},"modified":"2020-08-24T09:44:33","modified_gmt":"2020-08-24T09:44:33","slug":"lightsabers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/propstore.com\/blog\/lightsabers\/","title":{"rendered":"Evolving the Lightsaber l Entertainment Memorabilia Live Auction – Los Angeles 2020"},"content":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s hard to think of a movie weapon more iconic or impressive than the lightsaber. With its unearthly glow and that mesmerizing hum, it represented the perfect blend of Star Wars\u2019 romantic fantasy and sci-fi elements: a sword, which could have been a samurai blade or King Arthur\u2019s Excalibur, whose blade glowed and crackled like a magically frozen laser blast. To quote Jedi Master Ben Kenobi (Alec Guinness), it was \u201cNot as clumsy or random as a blaster. An elegant weapon, for a more civilized age.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

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It is rather ironic then, that this amazing, elegant weapon \u2013 which George Lucas himself describes as \u201ca symbol for a simpler time, a time when honor ruled\u201d \u2013 started life as the flash attachment to an old 4×5 camera.<\/p>\n

Roger Christian, then a set decorator on Star Wars<\/em>, constructed Luke Skywalker\u2019s (Mark Hamill) first lightsaber (previously his father, Anakin\u2019s) by adding cabinet T-track to some Graflex flash gun handles he found in a photography shop in London\u2019s Great Marlborough Street. With the application of a few greebles and a clip, requested by Lucas so Luke could attach the weapon to his belt, the first-ever lightsaber handle was created.<\/p>\n

More challenging, however, was finding a way to make the fantastical creation\u2019s magnetically contained plasma work on screen. A physical blade was required, rather than something entirely animated, so the \u2018swordfight\u2019 scenes could be choreographed appropriately. \u201cWe need the real pole to tell us where the sword blade is,\u201d explained Lucas.<\/p>\n

The initial solution was to light the blade practically. Special production and mechanical effects supervisor John Stears came up with a rotating, three-sided wooden-dowel rod, which was coated with Scotchlite retroreflector material (typically used for road signs). When a lamp was placed next to the camera, the lightsaber would reflect back the lightsource with an intensity that made it look like it was generating its own glow. At least, that was the intention.<\/p>\n

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\u201cThe problem,\u201d said Hamill, \u201cwas that when you moved it out of a certain area it went from glowing and looking great to just a rotating pole.\u201d The blade was also, it turned out, impractically fragile, not able to take much of an impact before it snapped.<\/p>\n

The immediate visual solution was to rotoscope the glowing blade effect onto each lightsaber, a painstaking process undertaken on the first film by Korean animator Nelson Shin, who introduced the idea of the plasma-blades looking \u201ca little shaky\u201d, which somehow made them feel more of a realistic and tangible.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, genius sound designer Ben Burtt, inspired by Ralph McQuarrie\u2019s original concept art of Luke and Darth Vader battling with \u201clazer swords\u201d (as an early script draft described them), concocted the iconic lightsaber hum. His prime inspiration was the sound of an idling film projector. \u201cThe motors would sit there with this kind of magical, mysterious humming sound that I thought was musical in a way,\u201d said Burtt. Yet he needed another ingredient: a specific kind of buzz. This he discovered almost accidentally, while walking around his apartment with a broken mic cable, which had lost its shielding. As he moved past his television, the hum from its picture tube was picked up by the broken wire, creating a buzz. \u201cThat\u2019s a great buzz,\u201d Burtt thought, \u201cthat sounds dangerous.<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n

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While Burtt\u2019s buzz-and-hum would remain largely unmodified throughout the Star Wars <\/em>saga that followed, the lightsabers themselves went through numerous changes in fabrication. Unsurprisingly, the spinning reflective blades were dropped for The Empire Strikes Back<\/em>, replaced by a stronger carbon rod, which would be entirely rotoscoped in post-production. Despite still being fragile and needing constant replacement during fight scenes, this rod was used throughout Return of the Jedi<\/em>\u2019s shoot, too.<\/p>\n

Sixteen years later, when Lucas launched into his prequel trilogy with The Phantom Menace<\/em>, he knew he\u2019d need better, stronger blades. Now we were going to see the Jedi knights at the peak of their Force-wielding powers, so the lightsaber combat would be more frequent and, as Lucas put it, \u201cmore ferocious\u201d. Out went the carbon rod, and in came new blades of steel and aluminum.<\/p>\n

Yet these were frustratingly fragile, too. They bent and flexed, requiring constant replacement and, even more worryingly, had a tendency to send small fragments flying when struck during combat, requiring them to be coated in shrink wrap. It wasn\u2019t until third prequel Revenge of the Sith<\/em> that something truly durable was implemented, with aluminum and steel replaced by carbon fiber laminated with glass and plastic. Although now, of course, these blades could really hurt<\/em> if they hit you.<\/p>\n

For the most part, each lightsaber\u2019s glow continued to be a matter of rotoscoping, although this was digitally achieved from 1999 onwards. However, for the 21st<\/sup> Century sequel trilogy, proper light-up lightsaber props were introduced, to allow for some atmospheric in-camera lighting.<\/p>\n

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Lot 662. Obi-Wan Kenobi’s (Ewan McGregor) Dueling Lightsaber Hilt from STAR WARS: ATTACK OF THE CLONES (2002). Estim: $25k-35k<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

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The prequel trilogy also marked the first time a different era of lightsaber was seen on screen. In an age before Emperor Palpatine took power, and Jedi policed the galaxy, lightsabers were sleeker and more decorative in many ways. In Episode I, we got Darth Maul\u2019s (Ray Park) cool and deadly double-ended blade. Then there was Mace Windu (Samuel L. Jackson)\u2019s purple lightsaber, specially requested by the actor himself (Lucas reluctantly acquiesced) Aside from Maul and Windu\u2019s unique weapons, Obi-Wan Kenobi\u2019s initial saber had a more purposeful, machined design to it, while the evil Count Dooku\u2019s saber was the first on-screen saber with a curved hilt, adding more elegance to the weapon.<\/p>\n

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Starting above: Lot 664, Count Dooku’s (Christopher Lee) Dueling Lightsaber from STAR WARS: ATTACK OF THE CLONES (2002). Estim: $30k-50k, Lot 663, Mace Windu’s (Samuel L. Jackson) Dueling Lightsaber from STAR WARS: ATTACK OF THE CLONES (2002). Estim: $25k-35k<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

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It\u2019s fair to say that audiences have never grown bored of seeing lightsabers swoosh and clash on screen. In 2008, the lightsaber was voted the best-ever movie weapon, and it\u2019s hard to think of anything which has appeared since to beat it. And it just keeps on evolving. What started with Luke\u2019s lightsaber going from blue to green blades, conceived because Lucas realized it looked better against the azure Tatooine sky than Luke\u2019s original blue, has resulted in change that, more recently brought us Kylo Ren\u2019s (Adam Driver) impressive blade, with its crackling plasma quillions.<\/p>\n

Thanks to the animated Star Wars <\/em>series\u2019, lightsaber styles have only diversified, with the addition of the Inquisitors\u2019 circular spinning blades in Rebels<\/em>, and Ezra Bridger\u2019s blaster\/saber combo in the same series (we\u2019re sure Obi-wan wouldn\u2019t approve). Most exciting, however, has been the introduction of the \u201cdarksaber\u201d, a unique black-bladed weapon introduced in Clone Wars<\/em>, created by the galaxy\u2019s only Mandalorian Jedi, and given its live-action debut at the end of The Mandalorian <\/em>Season 1, in the hands of the nefarious Moff Gideon (Giancarlo Esposito).<\/p>\n

It seems certain that the lightsaber will keep evolving and changing into impressive new forms for many decades to come. Which isn\u2019t bad for an old camera-flash handle\u2026<\/p>\n

The lightsaber lots and 865 more lots of iconic props and costumes will\u00a0 be open for bidding in our Entertainment Memorabilia Live Auction – Los Angeles starting July 27th. Click the banner below to view our preview gallery and don’t forget to register for bidding.<\/p>\n

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Follow us on\u00a0Twitter<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Facebook<\/a>\u00a0to be the first to know about all current & upcoming Propstore Auctions and more!<\/p>\n

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It\u2019s hard to think of a movie weapon more iconic or impressive than the lightsaber. With its unearthly glow and that mesmerizing hum, it represented the perfect blend of Star Wars\u2019 romantic fantasy and sci-fi elements: a sword, which could have been a samurai blade or King Arthur\u2019s Excalibur, whose blade glowed and crackled like […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":230,"featured_media":23663,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23658","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-auction","category-star-wars"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/propstore.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23658"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/propstore.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/propstore.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/propstore.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/230"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/propstore.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23658"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/propstore.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23658\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23894,"href":"https:\/\/propstore.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23658\/revisions\/23894"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/propstore.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23663"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/propstore.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23658"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/propstore.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23658"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/propstore.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23658"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}