Do the early Star Wars model ships have too many greeblies?

B

batguy

Master Member
I get it, they built the original SW models with greeblies to help the models look bigger and for the "used space" look that Lucas wanted. But even so, it seems really overdone in some cases.

The X-wings are pretty decent.

But, the Star Destroyers?
The TIE fighters?
The entire surface of the Death Star?
Shouldn't the Empire look more like they have their ***** together than the local smugglers' hot rods? At least a little bit?



I'm debating starting a 5ft Millennium Falcon build. The whole project seems a whole lot more fun if I don't try for perfect accurate details and get a little more creative in the interpretation . . . I wonder if the ship might actually look MORE realistic if the greeblies were toned down a bit compared to the actual ILM props.

I'm picturing something that isn't quite so "busy" looking on every single inch of the exterior. The existing detail on the greeblies is good, I just want more/larger areas without any greeblies at all.

Also, maybe a little more variation on the color/surface finishes of the model. The ILM stuff looks like they began every paint/weathering job by dunking the finished model in a tank of flat gray paint. NASA's stuff has never really looked like that.


--------
 
I understand where you're coming from. I don't quite agree, but sure, I get it, and a Falcon without greeblies would be . . . interesting to see, to say the least.

Although it is also true that you can't look to compare things from Star Wars, or most sci-fi for that matter, to real world space travel. It's made to be a good story before a realistic one.

- Master Tej -
 
Going to do my best here, but may get carried away so sorry.

1. The X-wing was one of the most advanced tactical snub fighters ever built at the time of "A New Hope" requiring months of construction to produce a single craft. Because of it's multi-role function, It had to be clean and easily serviceable depending on it's mission. The standard TIE was akin to a gutted 4-cylinder RX-7 and the X-wing was more of a fully loaded Mazda CX-9 with a V8 to boot.

2. The Death Star was not solely designed as a single gun platform. It was also a veritable skunk works of projects. While a majority of the structure was laid out vertically in levels, the outside was laid out like the surface of a small planetoid, taking advantage of the objects naturally occurring gravity. In fact a lot of the Death Stars inner volume did without artificial gravity as well, as it was extremely energy costly for it's size. (star wars projects artificial gravity as a field similar to star treks shields, with larger fields needing exponentially more energy). Additionally, the outer surface of the DS was only focused on point defense, as few ships were ever expected to make it past the main weapon. This meant an over abundance of medium to high grade Turbo-Lasers which ironically still didn't help when they were ultimately attacked by snub-craft. Because of all the smaller weaponry, larger facilities would have been hard to service, and so many replaceable and redundant components were built in.

3. Tie Fighters suffered from the same problem as any other imperial ship. Efficient, serviceable, and mass-produced. Why put aesthetic effort into something with a one year shelf life, when you can cut 30-40% of the cost and just replace it for cheaper when it busts?

4. Star destroyers suffer from the same as TIE fighters. All the point defense weaponry is mostly to blame. Like the DS, there is no need to cover anything in space so all the hardware was laid bare.

The Falcon was a unique case in SW. It looked considerably better when it was new, but it's rather old and beat up at the time of "A New Hope". Solo was not well off as a smuggler and had to make a lot of repairs on the fly, which is why things look half baked and a lot of access ports are missing. He also made a bunch of illegal mods to the falcon that were essentially bolted on the body.

All of this is really backed by two aspects of the star wars universe. Particle shields and space itself. You don't need sleek designs in space because aerodynamics are irrelevant in space. And radiation damage is mute to them as they have particle and radiation shielding. If you pay attention to the prequels, those ships lent themselves to a more refined design, but energy shields were also less prevalent. There was also considerably more funding for there construction. The empire ran flat on cash shortly after the clone wars ended and that's why it took 20 years to build the first DS.


As far as a falcon build, you could probably re-imagine the concept and make a "fresh off the line" version, or look up concepts of the remodeled version from the NJO books, where has has it re-armored and done in anodized black. Most of all though, remember that the falcon was a cargo transport first and foremost. I have never seen an Oil tanker look like a luxury yacht, and i wouldn't expect that out of the falcon(YT-1300), however maybe it's little brother(YT-2400) could pull it off.
 
Hey batguy, I'm currently building a 1/72 model based on SteveStarkiller's measurements of Ralph McQuarrie's Concept Millennium falcon.....Heres a couple of images that Steve created:
rmq001.jpg

rmq002.jpg


The thread here

J
 
SEBRET said:
Going to do my best here, but may get carried away so sorry.

1. The X-wing was one of the most advanced tactical snub fighters ever built at the time of "A New Hope" requiring months of construction to produce a single craft. Because of it's multi-role function, It had to be clean and easily serviceable depending on it's mission. The standard TIE was akin to a gutted 4-cylinder RX-7 and the X-wing was more of a fully loaded Mazda CX-9 with a V8 to boot.

2. The Death Star was not solely designed as a single gun platform. It was also a veritable skunk works of projects. While a majority of the structure was laid out vertically in levels, the outside was laid out like the surface of a small planetoid, taking advantage of the objects naturally occurring gravity. In fact a lot of the Death Stars inner volume did without artificial gravity as well, as it was extremely energy costly for it's size. (star wars projects artificial gravity as a field similar to star treks shields, with larger fields needing exponentially more energy). Additionally, the outer surface of the DS was only focused on point defense, as few ships were ever expected to make it past the main weapon. This meant an over abundance of medium to high grade Turbo-Lasers which ironically still didn't help when they were ultimately attacked by snub-craft. Because of all the smaller weaponry, larger facilities would have been hard to service, and so many replaceable and redundant components were built in.

3. Tie Fighters suffered from the same problem as any other imperial ship. Efficient, serviceable, and mass-produced. Why put aesthetic effort into something with a one year shelf life, when you can cut 30-40% of the cost and just replace it for cheaper when it busts?

4. Star destroyers suffer from the same as TIE fighters. All the point defense weaponry is mostly to blame. Like the DS, there is no need to cover anything in space so all the hardware was laid bare.

The Falcon was a unique case in SW. It looked considerably better when it was new, but it's rather old and beat up at the time of "A New Hope". Solo was not well off as a smuggler and had to make a lot of repairs on the fly, which is why things look half baked and a lot of access ports are missing. He also made a bunch of illegal mods to the falcon that were essentially bolted on the body.

All of this is really backed by two aspects of the star wars universe. Particle shields and space itself. You don't need sleek designs in space because aerodynamics are irrelevant in space. And radiation damage is mute to them as they have particle and radiation shielding. If you pay attention to the prequels, those ships lent themselves to a more refined design, but energy shields were also less prevalent. There was also considerably more funding for there construction. The empire ran flat on cash shortly after the clone wars ended and that's why it took 20 years to build the first DS.


As far as a falcon build, you could probably re-imagine the concept and make a "fresh off the line" version, or look up concepts of the remodeled version from the NJO books, where has has it re-armored and done in anodized black. Most of all though, remember that the falcon was a cargo transport first and foremost. I have never seen an Oil tanker look like a luxury yacht, and i wouldn't expect that out of the falcon(YT-1300), however maybe it's little brother(YT-2400) could pull it off.
Click to expand...

Although that's all genuinely interesting information, I think the original poster was talking about the models as models, not as actual in-universe spacecraft.
All that information which explains the appearance of the models is retrofitted, made up to explain why the props looked the way they did.
 
I won't Deny that the info is post production, but It's still better conversation then "they just threw a bunch of crap on it to make it look spacey and I don't like that". Opinions are always valid, so I offered what i could as a counter opinion.
 
SEBRET said:
I won't Deny that the info is post production, but It's still better conversation then "they just threw a bunch of crap on it to make it look spacey and I don't like that". Opinions are always valid, so I offered what i could as a counter opinion.
Click to expand...

Even though thats exactly what they did.
 
Exactly... although I think that they put a "tiny" amount of thought to it - like this looks like it has a function here... At least that's what I do when I "greeblie" something :D

I think its actually a bit of genius really using real world "machinery" as greeblies since our minds are used to seeing those forms and shapes and adds to the "reality" of the perception.

Jedi Dade
 
That's what I'm saying. We agree that they junk built their ships, but I'm taking to a slightly modified point. If we are going solely on the view of model building, then I could still agree with their designs. Look at the ISS for instance. If you put it to scale with a ISD, you would have about the same technical part/spattering per square meter. Given that the design was pumped out in the 70s, I would say that's a fairly decent guess into the future. I do still agree that it could be toned down at certain points, which I feel they did do in the prequels and some of the comic art, but the day they start another retcon and release the new and improved OT blue rays with "NEW SLEEK SHIPS" is the day I pick up a weapon.

Sorry if I seem stubborn, as I tossed aside objectivity due to the nature of the thread.
 
SEBRET said:
Going to do my best here, but may get carried away so sorry.

1. The X-wing was one of the most advanced tactical snub fighters ever built at the time of "A New Hope" requiring months of construction to produce a single craft. Because of it's multi-role function, It had to be clean and easily serviceable depending on it's mission. The standard TIE was akin to a gutted 4-cylinder RX-7 and the X-wing was more of a fully loaded Mazda CX-9 with a V8 to boot.

2. The Death Star was not solely designed as a single gun platform. It was also a veritable skunk works of projects. While a majority of the structure was laid out vertically in levels, the outside was laid out like the surface of a small planetoid, taking advantage of the objects naturally occurring gravity. In fact a lot of the Death Stars inner volume did without artificial gravity as well, as it was extremely energy costly for it's size. (star wars projects artificial gravity as a field similar to star treks shields, with larger fields needing exponentially more energy). Additionally, the outer surface of the DS was only focused on point defense, as few ships were ever expected to make it past the main weapon. This meant an over abundance of medium to high grade Turbo-Lasers which ironically still didn't help when they were ultimately attacked by snub-craft. Because of all the smaller weaponry, larger facilities would have been hard to service, and so many replaceable and redundant components were built in.

3. Tie Fighters suffered from the same problem as any other imperial ship. Efficient, serviceable, and mass-produced. Why put aesthetic effort into something with a one year shelf life, when you can cut 30-40% of the cost and just replace it for cheaper when it busts?

4. Star destroyers suffer from the same as TIE fighters. All the point defense weaponry is mostly to blame. Like the DS, there is no need to cover anything in space so all the hardware was laid bare.

The Falcon was a unique case in SW. It looked considerably better when it was new, but it's rather old and beat up at the time of "A New Hope". Solo was not well off as a smuggler and had to make a lot of repairs on the fly, which is why things look half baked and a lot of access ports are missing. He also made a bunch of illegal mods to the falcon that were essentially bolted on the body.

All of this is really backed by two aspects of the star wars universe. Particle shields and space itself. You don't need sleek designs in space because aerodynamics are irrelevant in space. And radiation damage is mute to them as they have particle and radiation shielding. If you pay attention to the prequels, those ships lent themselves to a more refined design, but energy shields were also less prevalent. There was also considerably more funding for there construction. The empire ran flat on cash shortly after the clone wars ended and that's why it took 20 years to build the first DS.


As far as a falcon build, you could probably re-imagine the concept and make a "fresh off the line" version, or look up concepts of the remodeled version from the NJO books, where has has it re-armored and done in anodized black. Most of all though, remember that the falcon was a cargo transport first and foremost. I have never seen an Oil tanker look like a luxury yacht, and i wouldn't expect that out of the falcon(YT-1300), however maybe it's little brother(YT-2400) could pull it off.
Click to expand...

Before I begin, I would like to apologize. First, to Batguy, because I'm about to derail your thread a little more. Then, to SERBET, as my disagreement with you doesn't indicate a lack of respect for your opinions.

To begin with, the discrepancy between the X-Wing and TIE Fighter in terms of overall capabilities really wasn't that large at all. Take away the X-Wing's shields, and it is actually a less capable snub fighter, because the TIE Fighter is slightly faster. Now, I do recognize that the X-Wing also has a hyperdrive and onboard astromech (in most cases), to name just two additional technologies is possesses. However, the two really aren't that far apart, with the X-Wing only set above in snubfighting from shields.

Artificial gravity generators need energy in exponential amounts according to what they're supporting? I'm not disputing that, I've just never heard or read that.

The Empire was flat on cash? This I will flatly dispute. After the Clone Wars, the Empire's value rose, as the war was over, the CIS gone, and the economy regulated by the government for prosperity. Now, this newfound wealth went pretty much completely towards the military, and that's why people suffered under the Empire, but it was not flat out of cash. The DS1 took so long to build because of any number of things: bureaucratic foulups, sabotage, frequently moving the project, lack of motivation by the Emperor to get it done, etc. Cash was not an issue.

- Master Tej -
 
The smaller scale the ships, the more greeblies per inch. X-wings and TIEs are pretty simple. The Falcon is supposed to be a modified hot rod, not stock. Star destroyers and the death star are huge machines that rely on not looking like a sleek jewel in order to look the part when glimpsed on screen in the story. Often the ships have to be judged as real or not in a matter of seconds. It's calculated by eyeball by the modelers and designers. That's pretty much all there is to it.
 
Back to the thread's original intent -

I wasn't intending to smooth-out the greeblies as much as you guys may have taken me to mean. I was thinking of a more subtle difference from the real ILM props.


Look at this shot of the 5-foot Falcon:
Do you really imagine an actual spacecraft looking THAT junked up?

30062009_006.jpg

I don't. I can see a fair amount of exposed stuff but it's the sheer lack of any smooth areas that get me. Think about it - the area of ship portrayed in that pic above would be 50-70+ feet across in full scale. You could probably park a small car on two of those big round vents.

Even the hull plating doesn't have straight lines but rather indentations and stuff all over the perimeter shape.



It wouldn't be Star Wars if they looked too smooth. But the mechanically-inclined areas of my brain reject the idea that it should look quite that crowded. I think there would be areas of a lot of stuff but other areas with much less.

And I think some of the greeblies are shaped a bit funny. I would just expect a little more rhyme/reason/patterns to the stuff. The ILM props have so many oddly-angled struts and braces, pipes connecting things that appear completely unrelated, etc. I would think it would be a few more larger items & pipes, and the tiny stuff clustered around/on the larger stuff more. Not quite so many tiny things sticking out alone by themselves. Etc.


--------
 
Last edited:
I always figured those struts in the back were to help angle the thrust deflectors and those piston like things were to move the flaps

Also unlike NASA stuff, many of these smaller craft fly in atmospheres of various planets or sit on the ground exposed to weather on those planets . Stuff like the Star Destroyer does not, so you won;t see a lot of that excessive weathering.

Lorne made a comment in the book how they made a concerted effort to make sure there was justification for those greeblies and that they looked functional. A big knock he had on earlier stuff like the vehicles from 2001 was that the greeblies there looked more random

- - - Updated - - -

Also stuff like the Y-wings were once a sleeker design and had all the exposed engine parts covered up by plating, but due to the need for fast fixes and constant maintenance, they just left off the fancy plating
 
the funny part is your complaining about all the greeblies. then the prequels come out and all the ships are very smooth and modern and everyone else complains theres no details and they look boring.

to me its just a movie a bunch of guys glued parts on a model to make it look cool. and it does look cool. for what it is A MODEL.
 
I'm not complaining that there are greeblies, just that they don't look the way I would imagine a real mechanical thing looking. It's a better job than most earlier Sci-fi but not how I picture technology eventually developing. I just think some of the stuff looks crowded for the sake of being crowded.

And the surfaces . . . so much flat light gray. I don't crave bright colors or anything (not for the OT era anyway) but even most industrial machinery tends to have more color variations, glossy/flat, some shiny-looking unpainted metal areas, etc. I get that the stuff is supposed to show atmospheric weathering, but even so.

Flat light gray can be the primary color but I would expect more individual components to be a bit different. ILM did some of that but I guess I picture more of it. They did some good random spots of rust-red hull plating on the Falcon for example. But I'm thinking more about the individual greeblies too.

I'm picturing subtle changes from the ILM props, not big obvious stuff that a kid in the toy store notices right off.
 
Last edited:
You know I have always wanted to build a 5 ft. Millennium Falcon, but I'm a poor man. That is why the 3 models I have + the scratch-build I have going, along with my current sculpture are stalled out. I hope to have the money to finish these projects by mid-summer, but who knows if I will. But if I ever DO build a Falcon, it'll be a three ft. model because The 5-footer is just too much, in terms of cost. I wouldn't spend $10,000. on a model if I was a millionaire. And I am far from that. And the 1/72 scale (at 18 inches long) is a bit small for my taste... I like a good-size model. The benefit of making my own Falcon, especially a 3 ft. Falcon is, again, cost. It wouldn't be studio scale, but slightly larger, forcing me to scratch-build all the little greeblies... I don't have to tell you how much money I'll save doing it all on my own instead of forking out ridiculous amounts of cash for models I don't want, anyway. But enough about me! I think you have a very good idea, and I agree with you that they could have used a lot less greeblies than they did. As far as your creativity goes, this is a modeling forum, not a proctologist's convention. Do what you want, do it your way and do it proud! :) I can't wait to see what you come up with. :)
 
batguy said:
And the surfaces . . . so much flat light gray. I don't crave bright colors or anything (not for the OT era anyway) but even most industrial machinery tends to have more color variations, glossy/flat, some shiny-looking unpainted metal areas, etc. I get that the stuff is supposed to show atmospheric weathering, but even so.

Flat light gray can be the primary color but I would expect more individual components to be a bit different. ILM did some of that but I guess I picture more of it. They did some good random spots of rust-red hull plating on the Falcon for example. But I'm thinking more about the individual greeblies too.

I'm picturing subtle changes from the ILM props, not big obvious stuff that a kid in the toy store notices right off.
Click to expand...

Well, I think the reason for the light flat gray coloring is primarily the practical aspect of filming the models on blue screen. Having a glossy paintjob tends to lead to a lot of problems with what's known as chromakey bleeding (which is where the color of the screen is reflected on the surface of the model, thus leading to problems trying to key out the color for compositing. This issue still exists, even with green screen). I think they had that issue with the first three Star Trek movies, which I think is the reason why the Enterprise was blown up in the third film, and the Enterprise after the fourth movie doesn't have the same problem. Plus, I think by using flat grays, whites and even black coloring for vehicles, it helps separate them from the blue screen when you light them so to also avoid bleeding issues.

I also believe chromakey bleeding was the reason why none of the ANH vehicles had drastically different coloring as well (but I could be wrong on that regard).
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

Analyzer
Star Wars Micro-Galaxy aka Jazwares
2
Replies
33
Views
2,652
jkno
jkno
G
U.S.S. Endeavor, NCC-1716
2
Replies
25
Views
1,625
Gregatron
G
Avanaut
A Revell Mandalorian N-1 Starfighter Custom
2
Replies
36
Views
2,371
Avanaut
Avanaut
RBJ
Disney Era Star Wars props
Replies
7
Views
1,522
Apollo
Apollo
Nascence
My Star Trek TOS PHASER II Pistol Model Replicas_Purchased Builds
Replies
1
Views
728
Nascence
Nascence
Back
Top