Blast from the past: some early Parks sabers

[jedi573]

Hey all,

I was going through storage and came across some happy memories. Some of us have been in the lightsaber prop game for a while. I remember the arguments about MPP vs Heiland, T-track conjecture, and of course back when we surmised the Ben Kenobi must have had motorcycle parts on it.

If I recall, I got these around ‘97 and ‘98, getting the “Graflex” first. I made the Luke ROTJ into a stunt back in the day.

We couldn’t have imagined the discoveries that would follow, nor the quality of fan manufacturing. The stuff guys here put out these days is just insane. Still, kudos to Jeff Parks and the roads he blazed way back a long time ago. I even found some old print ads I had.

Enjoy and I hope others will share their old school props.

 

[teecrooz]

Andy, is it really you! Love those sabers and ads. Still on the hunt for a few of them.

 

[jedi573]

Sure is, buddy! I don’t post much but I am around. Nice pair.

 

[Lichtbringer]

Maybe not accurate, but i really like some of the design elements.

 

[thd9791]

Augh I love the old advertisement for them! Yeah I came around about 6 or 7 years after this and they got more complicated around that time. Some nice designs here..

 

[Sluis Van Shipyards]

I remember seeing those in magazines from around that time. I still think that Shadow one is pretty cool! I just wish we could be lightsaber replicas for $120!

 

[Psab keel]

I remember seeing those ads in the Sci-Fi magazines back at Barnes and Noble in the mid to late 1990's. I was blown away with the idea of a machined metal hilt and a more realistic blade than the telescopic Hasbro POTF toys. I wanted one so bad, but it was way out of my budget being a broke young teenager. I was still making hilts out of wood, plastic, rubber parts. I had yet to make them out of sink tubes at that point, though that would happen a few years later.

Thanks for sharing these! This brings back a lot of fun memories. There's still a part of me that would love to own different sabers to show off the evolution of the tech over the decades. I know these were for the EL tech, but when Parks release his Phase blades a little over a decade ago, I thought those looked pretty slick!

 

[Benjo]

I saw these hilts in december 2000 when I had my first access to the internet. My very first job was to write "lightsaber" in the search bar , I was such a prop freak at the time and these hilts pop out. I got crazy and I remember trying to gather mechanical parts in my parent's garage to build something similar.
I also had the same shock when I first saw the "Icons" replicas in the late 90s, seriously wondering if these stuffs were really working.

Thank you for sharing these pictures. Now replicas are almost identical to the real stuffs but and I love to remember these days when lightsabers was e few reference pictures and a lot of creativity and interpretations.

 

[Halliwax]

You’re not kidding! Brings back Star Wars insider memories

 

[Tan Djarka]

Wow, those are just awesome(ly bad). I've actually found a few of those spring clips used for Graflex ears, and plan on making an "old school" hardware saber like that at some point in the future.

 

[BudaFett]

I love the names! "Mean Guy"!

 

[James Kenobi 1138]

 

[Boba Flint]

Ah Jeff. He loved using hex bolts on his sabers.