DivineHeresy
Sr Member
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"2001" style helmets in "War in Space", "Titan Find" and other TV and movies
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The Sunshine suit designs served the plot, inasmuch as their bulkiness/lack of manoevreability allowed the script-writer to introduce moments of tension (notably the fixing of the shields and Capa's escape from Icarus 2 after decompression and his near failiure to right himself after falling in the suit)
I thought the design was kind of cool, they could have just wrapped a standard pressure suit in gold foil and called it a day. The 'workshop on legs' design was interesting.
BTW, I think the Nostromo helmet designs from Alien have been liberally 'borrowed' from over the years, too.
I thought the design was kind of cool, they could have just wrapped a standard pressure suit in gold foil and called it a day. The 'workshop on legs' design was interesting.
BTW, I think the Nostromo helmet designs from Alien have been liberally 'borrowed' from over the years, too.
The IBM suits for the ad campain where to be exact replicas and are exact in basic details, in fact they where pain stakenly copied and pieces where even patterned off of surviving pieces to insure their accuracy.
But, at the last minute they (someone who didn't do their due diligence at the ad agency) realized they needed clearance from the Kubrick estate to use the 2001 suits, so these suits where changed. The chestpack was completely changed, the back pack had it's jets hacked off and side "scoops" lights and a padded panel where added to the helmet to make the suit "15%" different.
As for IBM and the film;
During the writing of the 2001 movie, IBM was a technical advisor in regards to advanced computers.
They were also THE computer company of the era and Kubrick and Clarke where using IBM this way. As was done with Pan Am and Bell telephone and Hilton hotels. This was not “product placement” as is common today. But was a way to tie in present day (1968) business icons with the future of 2001.When the treatment or script was completed IBM pulled out because the “IBM 9000” kills people. Kubrick and Clarke where supposedly quite upset by this, as IBM was synonymous with state of the art computers in the 1960’s and they felt they just lost “credibility” of their “Star actor” , the computer. I believe this is why the name plate for the HAL 9000 looks very close to the Honeywell logo of the late 60’s, a sort of Jab at IBM. This pull out was so late in production that the IBM logo was already on some items and did not get removed, as in the Moon bus on the control panel and the large black button on the suit control panel. The IBM on the suit panel can be clearly seen in the first spacewalk over the Discovery. I think this was the PTT for the 9000 computer. edit: see above photo
I have been told by Keir Dulleha and Gary Lockwood that the H.A.L. being one letter in front of IBM was a coincidence. But I find it hard to believe it was not thought of at the time.
This is why it was so surprising IBM wanted to use replicas of the 2001 suits for a worldwide ad campaign in 2001. The ad agency thought the blue color was another difference between their suit and the 2001 suits. No one told them there was an almost identical blue suit hanging in the pod bay. And of course they didn’t look.
BTW: the Discovery suits were the moon suits painted. They just painted the moon suit for the later scenes. Then painted them back for a pick up shot on the moon. (The survey team shot as the moon bus goes by) The chest & back packs changed and the panels on the backs of the helmet changed as well.
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johnnyappleseed
New Member
space suits with open cuffs really make me question a filmmakers resolve to convince somebody that the suit is indeed intended for space wear.
DivineHeresy
Sr Member
Not heard that before.
If they made the 6 (or so) suits for the moon sequence it wouldn't have been much more trouble to create a few more for the discovery scenes.
The moon suits are also missing some details you've already mentioned but some other details are missing aswell, the key-pad and other little things.
The (hood) head scoops serve what purpose?
I understand the ones with the lights, but just open scoops...? Oh, I know. They suck hydrogen and convert it to energy to power the suits life-support! :cool
Those crotch-straps look uncomfortable too...
...don't mind me, just rambling.
The scoops on the IBM helmets help them not look like the 2001 suits. :lol
That's fascinating info about IBM's involvement with the film. But I question whether the six silver Moon suits were just modified to make the four Discovery suits (Yellow, Blue, Green and Red). Actually there must have been a fifth suit somewhere, since there were five human crewmembers (three in hibernation)...
I think the story is just that Bowman's red suit was painted silver, since at the last minute Kubrick wanted to do an insert shot of the astronauts working on the lunar surface at Clavius while the Aries IB lands. You can tell that one of these guys has got the IBM keypad on the left sleeve, but none of the other Lunar type suits have this.
Lunar suits at TMA-1 have no sleeve keypad
That's fascinating info about IBM's involvement with the film. But I question whether the six silver Moon suits were just modified to make the four Discovery suits (Yellow, Blue, Green and Red). Actually there must have been a fifth suit somewhere, since there were five human crewmembers (three in hibernation)...
I think the story is just that Bowman's red suit was painted silver, since at the last minute Kubrick wanted to do an insert shot of the astronauts working on the lunar surface at Clavius while the Aries IB lands. You can tell that one of these guys has got the IBM keypad on the left sleeve, but none of the other Lunar type suits have this.
Lunar suits at TMA-1 have no sleeve keypad
I had first had look at a real suit (I believe the only remaining one) and in the area around the fittings you could see the suit was silver, then yellow, then red, then silver again. I have also talked with people who worked on the film and they also said suits where painted back and forth.
And yes, the scoops where just to make them look different.
And yes, the scoops where just to make them look different.
DivineHeresy
Sr Member
Very cool info guys.
Karl, do you have a better shot of that first image?
It could be the quality of the image but the buttons on the key-pad look blue instead of orange?
lmgill, thanks for that great info aswell. I've learnt something new today :thumbsup
Karl, do you have a better shot of that first image?
It could be the quality of the image but the buttons on the key-pad look blue instead of orange?
lmgill, thanks for that great info aswell. I've learnt something new today :thumbsup
The keypad buttons do look blue. However that shot is very blue saturated. The pic above was my best effort at cleanup. Here's what the raw screengrab looked like
One of McCall's promotional paintings for the film shows a similar scene of astronauts on the surface of the Moon near Clavius Base... those astronauts do not have the keypad.
One of McCall's promotional paintings for the film shows a similar scene of astronauts on the surface of the Moon near Clavius Base... those astronauts do not have the keypad.
DivineHeresy
Sr Member
Thanks Karl.
I wonder if they changed the colour of the buttons so it went with the red & yellow space suits? The orange would look better than the blue.
Or maybe it is just the saturation.
I wonder if they changed the colour of the buttons so it went with the red & yellow space suits? The orange would look better than the blue.
Or maybe it is just the saturation.
My belief is that when they filmed the Floyd-visiting-the-Monolith sequence, there were no keypads. When Kubrick moved on to filming the Discovery scenes, either some of the silver lunar suits were modified, or new suits were built. In any case, the Discovery spacesuits have sleeve keypads, which were all yellow-orange (even on the blue suit which hangs in the Pod Bay).
Then at the end of the shooting Kubrick needed silver suits again for the "astronauts on the surface near Clavius" scene, so at least Keir Dullea's red suit was painted silver (but it still had its arm keypad).
This suit has been exhibited, and it appears to now have BLUE keys. So I guess this was changed when the suit was repainted, or after filming at some point.
Pic from my files
I note that the "IBM" Is just written in Helvetica, it's not the distinctive IBM logo. So maybe the whole thing is fake, who knows. :lol
For "2010 the Year we Make Contact", a 2001-style suit was recreated for Keir Dullea to reprise Bowman. I consider this a replica because, like everything else in the sequel, it was recreated by analysis of film frames, and not by directly copying the original props.
I consider the other space suits seen in the sequel, the US and Soviet suits, to be horribly banal and boring, looking just like off the shelf 1980s Shuttle era space suits.
Then at the end of the shooting Kubrick needed silver suits again for the "astronauts on the surface near Clavius" scene, so at least Keir Dullea's red suit was painted silver (but it still had its arm keypad).
This suit has been exhibited, and it appears to now have BLUE keys. So I guess this was changed when the suit was repainted, or after filming at some point.
Pic from my files
I note that the "IBM" Is just written in Helvetica, it's not the distinctive IBM logo. So maybe the whole thing is fake, who knows. :lol
For "2010 the Year we Make Contact", a 2001-style suit was recreated for Keir Dullea to reprise Bowman. I consider this a replica because, like everything else in the sequel, it was recreated by analysis of film frames, and not by directly copying the original props.
I consider the other space suits seen in the sequel, the US and Soviet suits, to be horribly banal and boring, looking just like off the shelf 1980s Shuttle era space suits.
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The cinefex article says that they tested with a more conventional helmet design but it reflected sky, studio lights and the crew so they designed a faceplate which angled down to avoid reflecting the sky.
Then the article says:
"They looked a lot like the helmet faceplates in 2001 which gave [them] cause to wonder if Kubrick and Tony Masters went with this design for the same reasons"
DivineHeresy
Sr Member
Whoa, that is a great picture!
Thanks for sharing, Karl :thumbsup
If you've got any more you can share, I'd really appreciate it.
Thanks for sharing, Karl :thumbsup
If you've got any more you can share, I'd really appreciate it.
Larry Young
Master Member
DivineHeresy
Sr Member
I think I can make out "Fetch" "Set" "Exit"
Larry Young
Master Member
I think you're right! The bottom four yellow look like "A" "B" "C" and "ENTER" but I have no guess on the rest. The top silver looks like "KEY" -something, but Karl must know...
DivineHeresy
Sr Member
I think you're right! The bottom four yellow look like "A" "B" "C" and "ENTER" but I have no guess on the rest. The top silver looks like "KEY" -something, but Karl must know...
Yep, that's what I got aswell.
If Karl doesn't know, I doubt anyone else does, lol.
YenChih Lin
Master Member
For the RPF record: http://www.globaleffects.com/B_02_frameset.html
Global Effects did most of the movie Space Suits including Star Trek First Contact, but not the helmet (Why?!)
Global Effects did most of the movie Space Suits including Star Trek First Contact, but not the helmet (Why?!)
