Adam Savage and Fon Davis Talk About Working on Star Wars!

hey everybody adam savage in  fond davis's cave we're at faunco   in la how are you my friend i'm good um fawn  and i worked on a lot of movies together back   in the day and a couple of them were the star  wars prequels episodes i worked on episodes one   and two you worked on one two and three one two  and three and then the the special editions right   that was before that right yeah oh wow i think  that's how george tested the waters to see if   the world was ready for more star wars did you  get to work on that star destroyer restoration   yes this this conning tower of the star destroyer  went to the smithsonian right it was known as the   whole thing it was the eight foot star destroyer  from uh empire strikes back and it was mounted   on a steel pylon that attached to the internal  armature of the craft which is how you mount them   when you shoot them and they loaded it into the  semi truck uh they got it there and then on the   way back just the vibration of the semi truck  and the starstruck was just on this one pylon   this is before they started shipping things  like this with the respect that they deserved   and the uh yeah the vibration everything  drove the pylon through the ship and the ship   ended up on so when they when it got to  island the star destroyer was on the ground   and the pylon and the armature was just up on  its stick with pieces littered throughout the   the truck i thought pictures of you guys were all  working on it it was a lot of rest like and we   were very faithful to the original uh orientation  of all the parts so it was like building a   three-dimensional puzzle any of the gribbles or  the pieces that fell off we will we oh right you   had to hold them on and see if the glue where it  cracked would match the same shape as the part   we did that for we had just bags and bags little  ziploc bags of parts we had to glue back on   that's after we repaired the whole top after  the structure was done and we had to re redo   all the fiber optics there's i think it's over  a half a mile of fiber optics in there in that   model for every little blinky light you see is  everything a window is a fiber optic yeah okay so   we were planning to shoot this video and we still  will talk about these maquette models and this   and model making in general but i'm actually  really curious because i hadn't it hadn't occurred   to me but as you were putting that together that  star destroyer was built in the 80s right yes   so what about its construction surprised you were  there any things that weren't being done anymore   by our generation that you learned from looking  at the inheritance you know it's interesting there   was a lot more acrylic structure than i was i was  thinking there would be because that's something   that we had definitely phased out yeah for later  built we would use plywood even plywood for the   interior and then styrene for the exterior  paint in the butt well it's it's brittle yeah   you know so uh also i mean we built to be fair  everything that we built for the prequels we   knew was going to end up in an exhibit somewhere  because they had already been doing exhibits for   star wars props right so everything we built we  built as if it were going to a museum exhibit   right we're finishing every last bit of it  and back then steve and lauren and those guys   they're just getting their destiny just got  to get it into the stage right yeah so it's   a completely different standard so yeah so a  lot of the older models aren't aren't built   full of finish and they're not built to last  yeah we used to joke at colossal pictures   if your model fell apart on the way out of the  stage after the shoot you built the perfect model   that was jamie's axiom about mythbusters we built  it to work for the day we're experimenting and if   it falls to pieces we've done exactly the right he  worked at colossal so he probably got that there   um that's right i have seen behind the  scenes pictures with big sheets of acrylic   in the star destroyer and in the  millennium falcon yeah before they   that's fascinating yeah okay so let's talk  about about maquettes because uh this is a   lot of the kind of work that we would do that  was some of the most fun work like i like to   point out to people who think that working in  special effects is a dream job like every other   job that is still 90 drudgery and tedium and  it's exhausting and a lot of terror yeah right   of being on set while everyone's staring  at your model that doesn't work yes   um but every now and then if you do the tedious  stuff with enough assiduous dedication you get   a chance to do something really fun yeah and  this is an example of one thing i did where   uh early on in the production process for  episode two brian grenan our supervisor said   uh they'd like to see a maquette of  the predecessor to the t16 skyhopper   so i chose to make this the t11 skyhopper and i  followed many of the form factors i added these   more curvy engineer cells that's vacuformed i  added this curved engine cowling in the back   and apparently it was one of the first meetings  of maquettes for episode two and george soton goes   well the only reason we made the t16 look like  it did is because we only had plywood and no time   and so brian brought this back to me and he's like  george didn't like anything about this i guess   just keep it and i'm hoping that no one's gonna  get pissed off that i still have it if you do   i guess call me um but this is like this is this  is this is classic ilm model making styrene basic   construction greebly's on the underside can can  you talk about what it was like to go up into the   loft for getting griebly's oh it's like a kid in  a candy store definitely well first of all you i   mean you you when you went up in the loft you knew  that some of that stuff had been around since at   least empire strikes back right right and so this  is this is a lot of model kits for detailing yeah   detailing yeah just office passed off models from  previous shows which is always really amazing too   but they had yeah we had our go-to's we definitely  had our go-to kits that were there and uh every   last truck part every catalog every plastic part  all the evergreen in the catalog yeah it was it   was it was amazing there were star wars ships lots  of star wars model toys because they were based   off castings that had been designed in-house so we  just used that stuff as well yeah so yeah i just   i remember going up with a with a tray and just  going through the models and then you'd like have   a pair of nippers and you'd like and you'd end  up with this little palette of sort of detailing   and then you'd sit there with your model and you'd  be like oh i think this one might go doop there   and now i'm looking at this i was just asking fawn  is like is that an eagle lander is that one of the   earl kits from 1999 or wait they didn't make the  1999 kids crazies you think you would never forget   yeah that stuff when you're doing it and then one  day you forget it's totally totally it's not what   you'd expect i still like pick up a hasagawa model  and i can tell that it's hasagawa just by the   quality of the cast yes the quality of the molding  the same thing with tamiya yeah that's true mad   respect for them yes and it's and i i've always  really admired the art of griebling i think it's   it's undervalued in the world of model making  because it's not just grabbing random parts and   putting them on explain why because it's got to  serve it's got to look like it serves a purpose   and then there's also a lot and we learned all  this at ilm on the fly yeah and and every show had   its aesthetics and it wasn't like no one really  wrote any of this stuff down there that's right we   would we would talk about it at lunch there was a  game i'm gonna sidetrack a little there was a game   where we would write on a piece of paper just uh  three shapes and we would hold it up and everyone   in the lunchroom would have a guess whether it  was star wars or star trek so and everyone in   that room was really good at nailing that just  that but everything had an aesthetic and it   included the gribbles you know so and you didn't  want to overdo grebels you'll notice that like   there's always a a smart use of open space and  then a cluster of grebels and then maybe another   cluster of grebel's connected with a pipe or two  but this is the very star wars aesthetic because   that what you just described doesn't happen  in star trek in star trek you might have five   things that are all the same all lined up next  to each other it's it's a utopia five unbroken   things but in star wars there'd always be the  fourth one is missing and there's a rust streak   yep that's the star wars is we haven't gotten  around to fixing that part yet star trek is we   worked it all out a long time ago it would always  be that one pipe that went off to just a box um i think you and i both had a similar moment  which was uh we've shared a mentor in mitch   romanowski yes um who was an amazing unbelievable  model problem solver just incredible and mitch ran   the shop at nightmare before christmas you worked  on that show but when mitch first got up to ilm   one of the first things he said to me is we're  working at a desk together and mitch goes dude   we're at ilm do you know what that means  and i said what he goes it means we're   wizards because every news story about islam or  the wizards up in san rafael california but then   after we'd been working a bit on star wars and  then a little galaxy quest then back on star   wars mitch came to both you and i at some point  and was like dudes can you walk me through the   star wars star trek thing again and we're like oh  sit down boss we'll fill you in on the whole thing   those are proud moments for sure mitch also  had this uncanny ability to get so much   done without ever looking like he was  working i never remember rushing at all crazy   because yeah he was never in a hurry he never  walked quickly he always had a coffee mug with   him yeah and somehow he would always hit all his  targets which a lot of model makers couldn't no it   was very very uh difficult work and i still don't  to this day i have no idea how he got it done   there was a thing at ilm where if you  weren't gonna hit your mark though   it wasn't like someone was gonna tell  you it's like most often you're super   you just noticed someone else would be sitting  next to you and they'd be like hey i'm here to   help you for the day and you'll be like okay  and then you think i guess i'm not hitting my   marks that's how i work yep you didn't get  yelled at you just got a little more help   yeah i got yelled at after the fact right like  it took a little longer than it should have when   i when at the end of the t2 set because i went  over oh right t3 yeah at the end of that set yeah   brian told me you took a little bit long to take  care of us in that one they started they started   tracking things closer so we can get those  numbers real time later yeah that made it   a lot easier but yeah before that we were  just guessing i think we spent this much   um will you talk about these two beautiful so  these these okay so this is kind of funny this   this actually dips into my childhood because  steve golly was one of the original ilm model   makers on star wars and i think he's the only one  that has his own uh trading card of just him on it   building a star destroyer and this is the original  orange series from the 70s so i've got that card i   worked with him at james the giant peach before  i got to isle i didn't realize he was on that   yeah and uh so i i of course totally nerded out on  him and had a lot of fun talking about this stuff   and he loved sharing it because i don't know if  he was around steve was super good about checking   in and remembered everything yeah like he would  tell you oh yeah i found that to agree with you   so uh one of the the biggest debates among model  makers uh when i was making uh the the tie fighter   model kits was what color is it because in the  original movie they overexposed the film and they   looked white or a very light gray yeah and then an  empire strikes back they were kind of a blue gray   and everyone thought that they actually changed  the color of the tie fighter from one movie to the   next but it was just the way they shot them they  were still exactly the same color wow and then so   the next question was what color is that you know  and then steve actually told me which paint and i   immediately had to build a tie fighter so i could  paint it with the color that he told me about   now speaking of steve and paint i think we should  cover one thing that steve was unbelievable at   which was walking into a room you were  painting a model in and touching the wet part   yes god this guy steve is the nicest guy in the  world but you walk in go hey hey that model looks   really oh buddy i'm really sorry i just put a  huge thumbprint right there and you'd be like what   i don't know how he always somehow had this  he had to touch your model where the pain was   he'll be happy to know i've been following  in his footsteps in recent years yes uh dude thanks for uh thanks for covering a  little memory lane with me yeah absolutely it was   a pleasure thanks you guys we are uh this is adam  and fawn from fond's cave funko see you next time

Channel: Adam Savage’s Tested

Views: 145,463

Keywords: tested, skyhopper star wars, adam savage, adam savage tested, adam savage ilm, adam savage star wars props, fon davis star wars, adam savage star wars models, ilm, industrial light and magic, adam savage special effects, fon davis, fon davis ilm, star wars special effects, star wars special effects behind the scenes, star wars special effects crew, how were star wars special effects made, adam savage model, fon h davis, adam savage fon davis

Id: kcjCJkXw-NM

Length: 12min 50sec (770 seconds)

Published: Thu Jul 01 2021