So after a looooong loooooooooong wait, we finally got back the results of the ILM Art Department Challenge. I didn’t win one of the prizes, but I’m very proud and honored to have been one of the survivors who made it all the way to the final round (top 5.7%) of this challenge with such amazing artists!
Anywhoo, here are some of the pieces I put up for the contest:
Vader’s Lament – Keyframe from Round 1. This is the moment from Episode V right after Vader walks away from the Death Star bridge after Luke has rejected his offer to join him and rule the galaxy…I tried to convey his sadness by showing him with his head down in his meditation chamber after throwing down his helmet in frustration.
Stromtrooper Interrogation – Keyframe from round 1. This is a scene from Episode IV that was not shown: the scene where imperial stormtroopers invaded Luke’s home and interrogated and murdered Owen and Beru Lars. I made an effort to show the intensity of the moment with the intensity of the light on Owen’s face as well as the intensity of his stare.
Some thumbnails of various ideas I had for the Moment keyframe.
Sand Drill – Vehicle Design from Round 2. This scene depicts Jawas finding an abandoned and rusted drilling vehicle on Tattooine, from the same manufacturer as the Sandcrawler, their normal mobile home. They look up in awe and curiosity a they contemplate what to do with it. These vehicles were once used to drill in search of water underground prior to the development of the moisture farms on the planet.
A couple sketches of the vehicle itself and the final composition.
Hoth Landing – The other vehicle design from round 2. Darth Vader going out to meet Emperor Palpatine as he arrives on Hoth in his own exclusive Alpha-Class Imperial Shuttle shortly after the Empire successfully captured the rebel base on the icy planet. The bottom wings usually stick out beneath the ship when in flight, giving it somewhat of a stinging hornet silhouette, but here they are shown rotated around and outward as it prepares to land.
Design sketches. Early iterations/silhouettes were based on letters of the alphabet, like several Star Wars ships.
Composition sketches
Release The Wampas! – A keyframe from round 3. I read in the Ultimate Star Wars book that several wampas were held captive at the rebel base since they have been known to attack the base in small groups, sooooo…I figured what better time to release them to do just that (as a convenient diversion) than when the base has been taken over by imperial snowtroopers!
Release The Wampas! initial sketch
Unfortunately in this round my schedule didn’t do me any favors with the demanding requests, so some of my other submissions for the final round weren’t my favorites, but I have included them here for completion’s sake.
The Danji At the Rebel Base – Keyframe 2 from Round 3. Here we had to come up with a new race of warriors who have rescued C3PO ad R2D2 and returned them to a secret rebel base on a cavernous planet. The wheeled vehicle design was based on a ridged circular saw.
A Dramatic Meeting – Keyframe 3 from round 3. Here we had to redo the previous keyframe, only this time it was on a stark and volcanic planet.
Danji Princess – Character design for round 3. The idea was that this warrior princess was the leader of the Danji race that came to the aid of the rebel forces against the empire. The men in the background are just a crowd of men, I didn’t get to transform them into aliens like I wanted to, but you get the idea!
The Calm Before The Shootout: Keyframe from Round 3. Here I showed a bar scene in which a bounty hunter is talking to a lady bartender seconds before he gets into a blaster fight with some shady characters in the back corner.
Bounty hunter bar sketch
Gotta Keep Drawing! 