The OT stunt lightsaber blades research thread
- Thread starter vadermania
- Start date
Mouse Vader
Sr Member
I’m gonna sketch up some pics, I’m trying to picture what Brandon was explaining to use about the “collars”
Once I get home tom (depending if my damn internet is working today...) I’m going to sketch up some pics, see if I understand you guys correctly
I posted some screencaps to my ESB Stunt thread
ESB Bladed Stunt Graflex Lightsaber "The Core!"
Dagobah utilized a long bladed graflex based stunt.
ESB Bladed Stunt Graflex Lightsaber "The Core!"
Dagobah utilized a long bladed graflex based stunt.
gonk27
Sr Member
In that thread James Kenobi posted the following, then someone asked about the auction text that went with it...
I'm in Dallas also.
I have no idea about the blades, but I suspect they were partially hollow to allow the mounting. I have no idea where you would get them, I guess they were made specifically for LFL back in the day.
Here is the photo from the prop auction catalog:
I've just dug out the catalogue from this auction and the text for these two lots reads:
188
Star Wars/The Empire Strikes Back
A rare prop 'Light Sabre' weapon, comprising a cylindrical silver-painted metal torch casing with ridged handle of black painted plastic, a dowelling rod covered with reflective tape applied to one end, the base stamped Manufactured by Graflex - made for Mark Hamill as Luke Skywalker for the fight sequences in the 1977 and 1980 films Star Wars and The Empire Strikes Back.
Few versions of this 'Light Sabre' are thought to exist as many of them were damaged during filming due to the brittleness of the rod.
£3,000 - £4,000
193
Return Of The Jedi
A rare prop 'Light Sabre' weapon, comprising a turned and milled aluminium rod with detailed profiles and imitation controls - 11in (27.9cm) long - made for Mark Hamill as Luke Skywalker in the 1983 Lucasfilm Return Of The Jedi.
£2,000 - £3,000
Mouse Vader
Sr Member
I noticed this piece of bending while looking for something else. Very flexible blades in ROTJ so has bearing on what they were made of.
(loop starts when blade is at it's highest ends on bounce back from rail).
Bottom pic is conservative on how much deflection is going on but we're getting close to 90 deg.
This just before he starts wood chopping at DV & the blade flying off.
(loop starts when blade is at it's highest ends on bounce back from rail).
Bottom pic is conservative on how much deflection is going on but we're getting close to 90 deg.
This just before he starts wood chopping at DV & the blade flying off.
Wow, yea, here are some other moments of pretty intense bending.
At least for this part of ROTJ it looks like they had clacking flexible material, it does sound like metal after the blade flies loose, making me think old graphite material
it does barely look like there is a tang in this blade that flies out
At least for this part of ROTJ it looks like they had clacking flexible material, it does sound like metal after the blade flies loose, making me think old graphite material
it does barely look like there is a tang in this blade that flies out
Mouse Vader
Sr Member
Using those two consecutive frames I have isolated the detached blade, rotated it & overlaid it on the preceding frame, using the arrowed distinguishing feature to line up the two images. The red line is approx. where the face of the emitter is & the white line is where the end of the (detached) blade reaches. This indicates that there is, indeed, some portion of the blade extending into the emitter & pos. as far as the neck.
I hope that makes sense to you if you examine my gif.
Bear in mind these are very blurry images so we can't be sure what that inserted part might be - for instance it could be some sleeve in the hilt that the blade is attached to that has come out with it or it may be a tang on the blade as suggested. This only tells us that the unit that flies off is longer than the exposed blade is situ.
Mouse Vader
Sr Member
Another one. DV this time.
Man, I've seen Pvc flex like this but way more. Doing a lot of thinking on this one.
I finally joined the camp of successful (ish) reflective wrap. With wrinkles of course. This is a graphite golf club with a double collar (inner and outer) but the outer collar is too long. Just an experiment but it worked!
That adhesive is a fighter, this was the third time I wrapped thus golf club. Basically I cut a trapezoid of the right length and trimmed it after wrapping too, as to not get too much glue at the edge
I finally joined the camp of successful (ish) reflective wrap. With wrinkles of course. This is a graphite golf club with a double collar (inner and outer) but the outer collar is too long. Just an experiment but it worked!
That adhesive is a fighter, this was the third time I wrapped thus golf club. Basically I cut a trapezoid of the right length and trimmed it after wrapping too, as to not get too much glue at the edge
Mouse Vader
Sr Member
Something that you might bear in mind with these stills of flexing is that what we can see in photographs isn't what we necessarily see with the naked eye - correct me if have the wrong end of the stick with the above quote.
Also I'm not aware of what you know or don't about what follows but I am aware others read this stuff but don't comment & they may not know any of it.
For instance there is this still from forged in fire.
I can't find a motion clip but I did watch that episode & this flexing just doesn't register at full speed. The human eye works about 24 fps which is why movie camera's go at that speed, so what you see is all at 1/24 th sec exposure - if something moves then moves back faster than 1/24 second it will appear stationary. (strobing is a form of this)
It's the basis for a lot of what stage magicians do - literally the hand is faster than the eye. It's also why so much of this flexing that we're pointing out seems so 'extreme' it normally happens so quickly that we actually don't / can't see it.
edit; another good eg is archers paradox & the 'snaking' of arrows in flight, too fast to see under normal conditions.
These blades, to me, look & sound GRP/Carbon fiber. The stills we have give us the opportunity to test blade candidates to see if they look/sound/bend the same. Unfortunately testing takes time & or money & often only serves to eliminate stuff rather than confirm.
I have been thinking about the possibility that the, apparently inevitable, wrinkles contribute to the 'wobbliness' we see in rotary saber blades. eg of this is in birth of the light saber OB1's blade from 3.05.
I'm still working on making a motorised saber to test out stuff like this.
Hold on, I skimmed that listing because I've seen the ESB Stunt (that disappeared and doesn't share the same details as BTS photos) before and am at a roadblock mentally over it... The Luke ROTJ saber is a metal one?! Looks like the one that Lucasfilm owns. I'm wondering if anyone knows if LFL bought it back or there's another hero out there. Or if it's really resin and they got it wrong.
Very good points, you're right. Looking at the footage, the flexing is at most a single frame. Very quick. They are also hitting eachothers sticks rather hard, pushing and even scraping the floor
I remember a shot from ESB where Luke's blade shattered on Vader's helmet in the Dagobah Cave. Is this a comparable swing? Does that mean they were different materials?
Mouse Vader
Sr Member
The Degobah cave head whack doesn't look, to me, anywhere near as hard as what Mark H is putting in on that hand rail, even on a frame by frame basis.
In both cases the point of failure is at the hilt / blade joint, which is where most stress is generated.
In ROTJ something that is inside the hilt (blade stud or hilt stud) exits too, in the Degodah scene it looks like the blade actually breaks at the base. As far as I've come across so far these are the only two blade breaks documented & because they are different failures don't give us a clue if they are the same stuff or not.
I'll keep an eye out for ESB bendies & post them here if found.
I tried to scale the ROTJ blades in these shots using Mark H's hilt but came up with 62" so I think my scale base was a bit off, just not enough clarity to gauge the hilt length.
Incidentally re. magicians, a quick calculation for how fast you need to throw a small object to span 12 " (hand to hand) to make it become 'invisible':
To make 12" in 1/25 sec = 17 mph. To make it in 1/50 sec = 34 mph.
(12 x 25 = "/sec x 60 = "/min x 60 = "/hr divide by 63360 (" in a mile) = speed in mph over 12")
For just about everyone that's implausibly slow & add in the implausibility of someone spending hours practicing to do just that -
it's where the magic is.
In both cases the point of failure is at the hilt / blade joint, which is where most stress is generated.
In ROTJ something that is inside the hilt (blade stud or hilt stud) exits too, in the Degodah scene it looks like the blade actually breaks at the base. As far as I've come across so far these are the only two blade breaks documented & because they are different failures don't give us a clue if they are the same stuff or not.
I'll keep an eye out for ESB bendies & post them here if found.
I tried to scale the ROTJ blades in these shots using Mark H's hilt but came up with 62" so I think my scale base was a bit off, just not enough clarity to gauge the hilt length.
Incidentally re. magicians, a quick calculation for how fast you need to throw a small object to span 12 " (hand to hand) to make it become 'invisible':
To make 12" in 1/25 sec = 17 mph. To make it in 1/50 sec = 34 mph.
(12 x 25 = "/sec x 60 = "/min x 60 = "/hr divide by 63360 (" in a mile) = speed in mph over 12")
For just about everyone that's implausibly slow & add in the implausibility of someone spending hours practicing to do just that -
it's where the magic is.
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