Star Wars Episode I: Production Notes

For more than twenty years, George Lucas has been known as a pioneer in the visual effects arena. The original Star Wars trilogy had a major impact on the way visual effects were created, as well as on the post-production process and on motion picture presentation.

In order to realize his visual effects ideas for Star Wars, Lucas created the effects house, Industrial Light & Magic, which introduced computer technology to the film industry and revolutionized special effects. ILM, which began as what Lucas calls a "commando unit" of 45 and now numbers more than 1,000 employees, has subsequently been honored with 14 Academy Awards for Best Visual Effects and 14 Scientific and Technical Achievement Awards for its breakthrough work in special effects on more than 120 films.

That tradition of breakthrough effects work continues in Episode I, which builds upon ILM's groundbreaking digital work in Terminator 2: Judgement Day, Jurassic Park, Forrest Gump and Twister. In Episode I, the digital technology plays a more prominent role than in any film in history.

For this "digital backlot," ILM was challenged to realize worlds of extraordinary fantasy while maintaining a realistic look and accommodating live-action footage of the actors. Not only the fantasy backgrounds, but many of the sets, vehicles and even characters are computer-generated. In fact, 95 percent of the frames in the film, encompassing nearly 2,000 shots, employ digital work -- more than tripling the greatest number of CG shots ever generated for a motion picture.

Despite the daunting task that Lucas laid out before ILM, he never doubted the company was up to the challenge. "After working with them for over two decades," he says, "I knew they could do it."

Episode I's ILM team, which included 250 computer artists, worked for two years on this digital universe. The visual effects tasks of the film were so immense that not one but three of ILM's best supervisors were called upon to share the load, each taking primary responsibility for one or more main action sequences as well as specific effect types that occur throughout the films, such as glowing lightsaber blades. Oscar- winner Dennis Muren, a veteran of the original pioneering Star Wars effects work, supervised the film's huge ground battle effects and the underwater sequences. John Knoll, an original author of the widely used Photoshop program, oversaw the spaceship and Podrace sequences, and Scott Squiers supervised the creation of the exciting Theed City sequences, as well as lightsaber effects. Together these effects wizards literally created entire worlds in the ILM computers -- an achievement that brings wonder to the screen, but left the actors often standing on empty stages of "blue screen" which would later be replaced by digital backgrounds.

Acting among a world of blue screen and CG elements was a key challenge to the actors, who often found their entire environments up to their imaginations, with only their costumes or an occasional stand-in to help them visualize the universe that would eventually surround them on film. Surprisingly, none of the actors had had any previous experience working against blue screens; but all seemed not only to cope with the process, but embrace it. Says Liam Neeson, who compares the experience to being on stage, "You have to use your imagination. We approached it all in a very intuitive way. For my part, I wanted to make sure I looked like I believed everything was real."

The digital realm also extended into the creation of some of Episode I's characters, including a familiar figure from Return of the Jedi and Star Wars Special Edition -- Jabba the Hutt. Among the more than 60 new CG creations, overseen by animation supervisor, Rob Coleman, Jar Jar Binks; Sebulba, the Podrace champion challenged by Anakin; and Watto, a gruff-speaking creature for whom Anakin toils in servitude. Each CG creature gives its own vivid performance through its expressive face and distinctive body language, created by the film's effects magicians. Even their clothes ripple and move like those of their flesh-and-blood counterparts.

It may have been a digital world, but it was also necessary that more traditional methods worked harmoniously with the envelope-pushing effects. Model making, supervised by Steve Gawley at the ILM model shop, continued to play a strong role in the Star Wars universe, working in conjunction with the CG material.

The digital work plays a key role in the creation of Episode I's exotic and disparate worlds, three of which serve as the story's principal locales. The desert planet Tatooine, already familiar to fans of the original trilogy, is home to many alien species that travel through its remote spaceports. This frontier world lies beyond the civilizing influences of the galactic republic, leaving Tatooine a rugged planet ruled by gangsters, where black market trade and gambling drive the economy, and where slaves are owned by the rich.

Naboo is a peaceful, idyllic paradise of green landscapes and few cities, found both above and below the water. This provincial world is the scene of the conflict that ignites the entire chain of events that sets the Star Wars saga in motion. Coruscant is a world-city where urban sprawl has covered the entire planet in colossal skyscrapers, and it is the center of the Star Wars universe. Here, the Jedi make their headquarters in the mighty Jedi Temple, and from here the Galactic Senate rules the Republic.