The Empire Strikes Back - Wampa Attack - New Stop Motion Shots - Edit

A collaboration by Filmmakers/Visual Effects Artists: Joe Schultz and Jim Davidson to create new stop motion footage and edit it into the "The Empire Strikes Back," fleshing out the "Wampa Attack" sequence and matching traditional stop motion animation techniques and esthetics used by ILM in the late 1970's, while taking advantage of digital technology available today.

Joe Schultz (Schultzstudio) – Compositing, Visual Effects, Matte Paintings, Editing.  (imdb.com/name/nm3939793)

Jim Davidson (Fantamation Studio) - Stop Motion Animator, Stop Motion Puppets, & Miniature Set Construction (imdb.com/name/nm0203372)

Vimeo links:

The Empire Strikes Back – Wampa Attack – Full Sequence https://vimeo.com/56644189

The Empire Strikes Back – Wampa Attack – Shot #3A https://vimeo.com/56671343

The Empire Strikes Back – Wampa Attack – Shot #9A https://vimeo.com/56671684

The Empire Strikes Back – Wampa Attack – Shot #10A https://vimeo.com/56671836

It reminds me of Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer :)

Man, thats crazy! I just like that these two professionals did this! Does anyone know why? Was it just for fun?

Hey Everyone. Thanks for all of the comments.

Interesting question...Why we did this?  

We really wanted to see these shots, so figured we'd do it ourselves as an experiment...to see what the two of us could do in our garages.

We firmly believe that old school/practical and todays digital can and do play well together.

The original Tauntaun shots were go-motion.  We could have done this in CGI, but it would have stood out and not be the same.  Part of the character/charm we feel was in the technique used. We used digital as well where it would be efficient and maintain that look. 

We also wanted to pay tribute to our mentors, and honor their work.  We made a conscious effort NOT to replace their original work...just ADD a few shots we thought perhaps they would have done at the time.

We are glad the work is appreciated.  It was fun for us to go back and play in ILM's sandbox...sort of.

SilverWook said:

One has to wonder why ILM didn't do a go motion Wampa to get the long shots that didn't work with the suit on location. Just not enough time to meet the release date?

It would be nice to see go motion revived in some fashion. Dragonslayer is the movie Peter Jackson has to surpass to make Smaug truly memorable in my book. ;)

A go-motion wampa would have been the way to go...they certainly could have done it.

I've never seen or heard of any plans to use a go-motion wampa.  I think that they just had the Wampa Costume for interaction with the actors perhaps for that discarded scene...and a Tauntaun Stop Motion Puppet already built for the running shots, and then they put the 'Attack' scene together using a few live action closeups.  As you mentioned they tried to do the dragging shot with the costume.  I'm sure budget and release date had to do with it and they didn't have a Wampa Puppet to use.  

Now Dragonslayer is at the top of my list as well.  I'm sure Smaug will be amazing but bet it won't have the same impact ;)

Well, in a sense it is used in films completely done in that style, such as Wallace & Gromit.  But to see it incorporated into live movies again would be wonderful.  It's sad to see such an art go the way of the dinosaur.

(That last line is a very subtle joke--so subtle that I better explain it.  Jurassic Park was originally going to use go motion, and would have been the last or second to last to do so; then Spielberg realized that CGI had developed enough that they revamped their special effects.  So yeah, bad joke.)