George had decided to introduce the new villain (Boba Fett) in an animated comic book format in "The Star Wars Holiday Special" that was going to air on TV in December of 1978. Nelvana was selected to produce the completed animation based on our "A Cosmic Christmas", which George liked very much.
At that time, Heavy Metal (Magazine) was the graphic cutting edge for Science Fiction/Fantasy. The decision was made to go with a graphic style based on the artist Moebius (pseudonym for Jean Giraud) whose art was appearing in the French magazine Metal Hurlant (published in the United States under the title Heavy Metal).
Here are the model sheets for Boba Fett (by Frank Nissen, who designed the show), some of my rough first pass poses, and thumbnail sketches. It was a challenge to animate a performance with a character that had no facial features to work with. I had to use hand gestures, head tilts, and body language.
Following the artwork is the animated comic book that introduced Boba Fett. The entire show was animated in 6 to 8 weeks. When viewing this material, remember that in 1978 full animation industry-wide was pretty much dead except at Disney's.
You guys did a great job on the animated segment. It was the only good thing in the special (which George Lucas has stated that he will NEVER release...ever)
ReplyDeleteWe felt it was a cool project and gave it our best efforts. We were all very young and green back then.
ReplyDeleteFond memories indeed of this segment. John, I shoulda posed this question on one of the Rock and Rule posts, (a childhood favorite of mine -first the Marvel Super Special, then when I could finally watch the film on cable around '86) however being that we are in the context of Nelvana productions, I've always wanted to know who designed and animated the crude and satiric little cartoon-within-the-cartoon "The Uncle Mikey Show" in R&R? Many thanks for your efforts here.
ReplyDeleteHi, Kirk. "The Uncle Mikey Show" was designed and animated by Mike Merrill. This was actually ground-breaking as the design and attitude were light years ahead of the MTV styling that followed.
ReplyDeleteThanks for that credit, John. Yes, very prophetic, the crude Adult Swim esprit, exactly. Appreciate your work with Quadhole, and the whole production. Thanks for contributing your voice to blogosphere.
ReplyDeletehad to post this anonymously becuase for some reason I am being blocked via my google account.
Anonymous: I don't know why you are being blocked. Are you "Kirk"?
ReplyDeleteyeah, that's me. Strangest thing, sez I don't have permission. Oh well. Keep 'em comin!
ReplyDeleteHow many animators worked on this to get it done in that short of time? 6-8 weeks for 9 minutes of hand drawn cel animation is no easy task. Is this including the storyboard process and recording the actors voices as well?
ReplyDelete@djsteelo: The 6 to 8 weeks I'm referring to is just for the animation phase. The script and voice recording was provided by George Lucas (& company). Nelvana had a staff of 6 to 8 animators plus an equal number of assistants, all coming off of The Devil & Daniel Mouse. The studio had a complete staff of around 32 people (including painters, camera, etc.)
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