Star Wars Storyboards: The Original Trilogy

I'd say author/editor J.W. Rinzler deserves an MVP award for his current contributions to Star Wars fandom. He's hit another home run for the team with this OT Storyboards book. I loved his "Making of" books, and this is a perfect companion piece for them. It just keeps getting better. This book is not just a collection of various storyboard art. For the first time (I believe), Rinzler uses the original storyboard art to re-tell the stories of the three original movies (A New Hope, Empire Strikes Back, Return of the Jedi) in their original theatrical release form. Text is sparse in this book. Beyond the foreward and introduction, it's all artwork with brief captions. If there is a drawback to this book, it's that not all scenes are included--probably to keep the page count and price manageable. One glaring omission is the Cantina scene. Given how choppy the Kenobi/"Walrus Man" battle was, I'd like to see how it was portrayed in storyboards. If there is one treasured advantage to this book, it's that we see more drawings based on early designs that didn't appear in the movie. For example, the original Millennium Falcon was the Blockade Runner ship from Ep4's first scene. The cockpit was reused for the MF's "hamburger" design so the BR got a "hammerhead" cockpit. In these boards we see the original MF design escaping from Mos Eisley and being captured by the Death Star. That kind of stuff pleases me to no end! SPOILER ALERT! You won't believe what Alderaan originally looked like! It looks pretty familiar! It appears that Rinzler kept his choices as close to the finished movies as possible. That means that pretty much none of the cut scenes are included. For example, the scene of Luke and Biggs early in Ep 4 isn't here. Nor are any of the 1990's Special Edition scenes included. I did find one board from the sandstorm scene in Jedi, and there might be a few other rare instances, but overall the cut material is left out. I very much hope a future edition gets the "Special Edition" treatment with all that added. ***Side note for those who don't know what storyboards are.*** Storyboards are drawings of each shot for a movie. Every shot in a movie is pre-planned. Directors hire artists to sketch out what a particular shot will look like, meaning who is in the shot, how close they are to the camera, what action is taken (such as a spaceship's movement across the screen), and important background elements. Sometimes storyboard artists are asked to redraw a shot many times, depending on how many times the director changes his/her mind! Keep in mind, storyboards are sketches. They are not conceptual art involving detailed paintings. These are just production sketches that are placed on a big wall so the director can see the flow of the movie. And since directors often use a team of storyboard artists, the quality and style can vary greatly. They also vary in medium: some in pencil, some in ink, some in grey wash tones, and a very few in color. PLEASE DO NOT EXPECT FULLY RENDERED PIECES OF ARTWORK! Directors do not need storyboards that are finished pieces, so it is wasteful to pay for anything more than a sketch that shows the bare essentials for the shot. The beauty in this project is to experience the movies in their raw, imagined form. It's not just a revisit to the visuals or the story. It's a journey into the mind of Lucas and his assistants as they create the greatest sci-fi epic of all time.

Seeing that there's already Star Wars Storyboards: The Prequel Trilogy , it's probably not surprising to expect a second book to complete the set. Star Wars Storyboards: The Original Trilogy is as thick as the earlier book at 352 pages. It's hardcover and the paper quality is nice. The storyboards featured are split between Episodes IV, V and VI, with 82, 112 and 142 pages devoted to each respectively. These storyboards are of course way older than those from the Prequel Trilogy book. Some of the storyboard artists include Joe Johnston, Ralph McQuarrie, Nilo Rodis-Jamero, Roy Carnon and more. There are 15 artists total. You can see different drawing styles, and medium such as in pencil, ink, markers and even watercolours. Not every sequence in the film are included of course. In this book are mostly those that require visual effects, or action scenes, or the more complex sequences. It's cool to study the composition and story flow, and the handling of space and perspective is impressive. The art is fantastic. Many of the storyboards are drawn quite detailed. You can actually make out the designs for the mask that rebels and stormtroopers are wearing. Same goes for the many spaceships and robots. It's interesting looking at the storyboards for these three old films. Even though the technology supposedly outdated by today's film or sci-fi standards, it doesn't feel that way because of the suggestive nature of art. The text only comes in the form of short captions describing the scenes on each page. This is a great artbook that goes well together with the Prequel Trilogy book. Highly recommended to those who love Star Wars and storyboards. (See more pictures of the book on my blog. Just visit my Amazon profile for the link.)

I've been a Star Wars fanatic since the first film blew my socks off in 1977. This book is a wonderful trip down memory lane and reminder of what the original release looked like before George made his digital "enhancements" in the 1990s. As a filmmaker myself, this is a treasure trove of insight into the relationship between the storyboard and the finished shot. For me this is a rather exciting book!

A great book for all Star Wars fans and especially for fans of the original trilogy. Divided into three sections corresponding to each of the films, the book contains a lot of original storyboards drawn by different artists during the production of the three films. Storyboards range from early concepts for the story and for the character and ship design (the most abundant in the section for the original 1977 Star Wars film for obvious reasons), going through tests of concepts for the story and scenes to be filmed, and finally, well-defined and detailed storyboards to guide the filming and special effects teams during actual filming. The images are accompanied by brief but very interesting annotations that explain the context and sense of those, and shed light on how the process of creation of these films worked. As for the quality of the book, it is well bound and printed with well-defined sharp images. Very recomendable!

I pre-ordered this book nearly a year ago when little information was available, and when this big, beautiful hardback arrived today, it blew me away. Much better than I expected. So used to seeing the same tired storyboards over and over for the three films. The introduction, foreward and commentaries on individual boards by the artists make this book more than just something to glance at. I'm looking forward to comparing it, page by page in some cases, to my Star Wars: Frames, to see the actual transition from board to frame.I've only had this book a few hours and already feel it will hold up to multiple viewings for many years to come. If you are interested in how the original trilogy movies were made, I would say this is a significant book, second only to Rinzler's series on THE MAKING OF STAR WARS, EMPIRE and JEDI. This storyboard book makes a great companion to those books as well as FRAMES. One of many nice surprises in this book was finding boards drawn for THE STAR WARS, an early draft of the movie (when Alderaan was a floating city, for example). Really didn't know what to expect when I ordered this. So pleased that I did.

I have always loved to see how filmmakers expressed and worked out their ideas on paper beforehand. To me this is a very essential procedure and an excellent creative management tool. Star Wars introduced me to the concepts of storyboards and pre production art and I have enjoyed seeing the progression of ideas and how the films were visually developed. This book delivers! Several of the images I had seen before in the various "Art Of . . " books, and I had expected seeing some of the same material here, but this delves deep into the archives and pulls out images about Ideas I never knew were being discussed, making this book something like a time travel device. If you are into Star Wars, you should have this on your shelf. If you are into the pre-production art of films you should have this book. If you are a student of film, you too should have this book because the art of storyboarding is valuable to the filmmakers ability to communicate. This is a great way to see how film looks are developed. I highly recommend this book.

The storyboards are great an all, but the real treat of this book is the commentary by the artists. As it is, it makes a great overview of the pre-viz process that went into the films... i'd prefer a COMPLETE version with all of the storyboards, as this is mostly a "best of" or digest version with only selected scenes.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book in how it discussed the story boards of the original trilogy. George Lucas would give some story treatments to the artists and they would try to put his ideas into a visual format to help build models, sets, creatures, etc. Awesome work! Some boards show different elements that didn't make it into the movie or George Lucas changed his mind or a set wasn't feasible as far as costs. It also shows how the story early on changed into the movies we received. Highly recommended. I tracked down the Prequel Trilogy version of this book.

Ótimo

Very interesting

Libro en gran formato y tapa dura con una gran y detallada selección de ilustraciones de la trilogía original. Para poder incluir tantas ilustraciones se ha omitido la información técnica de los storyboards en la mayoría de ellos, si bien es una excelente pieza que muestra el trabajo de grandes ilustradores, e incluso explica el por qué de los cambios de dibujantes a lo largo de los storyboards de las tres películas. El papel es de buena calidad y las impresiones son en color a pesar de que muchos de los dibujos son originalmente en tonos grises. Muy buen libro. Una compra más que acertada.

I'm really happy I purchased this. I love the look of alot of the drawings/art. Although this is a 'story boards' book, alot of the artwork is great that I admired (alongside some basic drawings that are there to instruct and serve the production). There are some commentaries that I found interesting also. A fun read.

Devo ammettere che inizialmente avevo molti dubbi sull'acquistare o meno questa storyboard.... Qualcuno potrebbe pensare che alla fine sono solo "disegni". Devo dire peró che appena è arrivato mi sono ricreduto. Il libro è stupendo. Partendo dal formato importante di ben 24x31 cm ( più grande di un A4) copertina rigida, stampa di ottima qualità , ottima grammatura della carta e per chi se lo chiedesse non tutte le board ( "disegni") sono a colori, ma molte sono in bianco e nero, molte a tre quattro colori e solo alcune sono a "colori" ( come quella in copertina per intenderci. Per quanto riguarda i contenuti: Il libro è suddiviso in tre parti, una per ogni film. Oltre alle board che ripercorrono il film ( anche se in realtà è il film che segue queste board) sono presenti anche piccoli aneddoti di chi ha lavorato con Lucas e al film e in particolare ai disegni, vari commenti da parte di vari personaggi ed alcuni anche esplicativi ( come quello ad esempio che spiega il perchè viene realizzata una storyboard. Quest' opera di ben 348 pag. consente di immergersi contemporaneamente nel magico mondo di star wars e in quello di chi deve dar vita alla sceneggiatura con inevitabili divergenze di visione e problematiche varie. La cosa che più mi è piaciuta è vedere l'evoluzione "grafica" dei vari personaggi ( ad esempio Darth Vader il cui "volto" era inizialmente leggermente diverso) . Inoltre l'incipit del libro ( rigorosamente in inglese) che recita: "Per la prima volta, Lucas Film ha aperto i sui archivi per mostrare il meglio delle storyboards della trilogia originale.... Dai primi concept alle scene eliminate " promette che all'interno ci sono anche scene che poi sono state tagliate nel film ( che fin'ora non ho trovato, ma ho visionato poche pagine rispetto alle 348 pag totali, per cui aggiorneró quando lo avró finito). In definitiva posso dire che questa raccolta rappresenta una " delizia " per i fan della saga ( credo a parer mio che sia anche più significativa della storyboard della nuova trilogia)... Libro arrivato in perfette condizioni anche se non tanto velocemente ( preso su prenotazione con uscita il 13 maggio, é arrivato solo oggi, ma fa niente) Per quanto riguarda il prezzo sulla copertina è riportato: £25 - $40 , il prezzo Amazon si aggira sui 24€ , anche su questo Amazon imbattibile. Che dirvi.... Che la Forza sia con voi!!!