PropStore Auction - Original Black Pearl from Pirates of the Carribbean

[Duncanator]

I'm so excited to see this prop that I headed the restoration of going up for auction!
The captain's cabin off of the original Black Pearl from Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl.

When the ship was cut apart during production of the third film, this piece was rescued from the dumpster. It sat in storage while parts were gradually found to restore it. We had a great restoration team made up of former ILM model makers who built the model originally. The model was built at 1/6th scale, which makes a person about 6" tall. The entire ship was close to 30 feet long! Pretty big for a "miniature". Disney still has the Pearl that was made for the second film, which is the same scale as the first one.

Prop Store Auction

 

[Duncanator]

Here's a picture of the Pearl during production of the first film. As you can see, it's a big model.

 

[Duncanator]

A second model of the Black Pearl was made for the second Pirates film because the production wanted to use a redressed, real sailing ship for shots of the ship at sea - and the shape of the hull was slightly different from the original.

The first model ended up getting cut apart during the third film to be used upside down in a water tank for the "green flash" scene, where the characters return from the land of the dead.

This is what the captain's cabin looked like before restoration began.

It took years to gather the parts needed to restore it. One of the greatest finds was a box with all of the stern detail goo-gahs that had been removed for use on the second model, but ended up not being used because the shape of the new model stern was too narrow. We were able to match the details to their original location by the glue marks and paint markings.

 

[Duncanator]

Some other cool details were these paintings of room interiors behind the windows. The windows light up, so the paintings were there just in case the camera could see inside. They implied an interior that wasn't there!

 

[Tom]

Thank you for the pictures, restoration writeup, and movie history lesson!

Tom

 

[joberg]

Wow, love the size of that ship Duncanator! And beautiful work on that restoration part

 

[joez2391]

awesome restoration! I'd love to see more in progress pictures of the restoration and other hidden things you found in it

 

[division 6]

Awesome.

More pix if you have them.