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Original Rebel
Alliance Helmets
X-Wing and Y-Wing Pilot |
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As with all the vac-formed helmets and armor made for Star
Wars (including
Stormtrooper, TIE's and DS Gunners), the Rebel X and Y
Wing Pilot helmets were produced by Andrew Ainsworth at Shepperton Design
Studios, near London. Fabricated during the unusually hot spring months of
1976, the X-Wing helmet mould was taken off a US APH-6B Pilot helmet, used
in the Vietnam war, which was provided to Ainsworth by Costume Designer
John Mollo. We have an in-depth review of a couple of
Original X/Y Wing Helmets form Star Wars - A New Hope, for more information
please follow the following link.
So the APH was used as the base with Ainsworth adding the
centre mohawk, front detailing and acrylic lens (which were amber on the
Hero's like Luke, Biggs and Wedge, but smoked grey for the stunts) Below a
sot of some completed X-Wing helmets sitting outside Shepperton Design
Studio's prior to filming. Once picked up by the Studio they were hand
painted by the Art department and screen-printed decals applied. |
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| Below a prototype design for the X-Wing
Fighter Pilots', this one auctioned at Christies in London in 2002 for just $4,136). The
initial design had the Rebel Pilots almost fully encased in a mouth piece
and visor until a decision was made to ditch the mouth section and raise the
visor so the actors faces could be seen. |
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| In total twenty rebel pilot helmets
were fabricated for ANH, with a good portion of them being made into Hero's,
requiring time-consuming paint and detailing by the Elstree Art Department
team. Though the amber visors look different from the smoke grey, they
are in fact the same design, with the amber visor attached higher into the
front of the helmet. Though the design suggests that they move, in actual
fact they were fixed firmly. |
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| A few of the Hero helmets also had
lined helmet interiors which included ear cups and mics, although most were
restricted to the traditional orange "maple leaf" style foam interior seen
on the Stormtrooper helmets. On the front you can see the mohawk
ridge, another vac-formed piece that was simply glued to the front section
to tidy the finished design up. The chin cups were just off-the-shelf Canoe
helmet cups from Ainsworth's other sporting business. |
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| There were at least TWO Luke "Hero"
helmets, as you can see the one he carries pre-flight (above) is different
to the one used during the Death Star attack (below). Its not clear where
either of these helmets are now, but the one Lucasfilm has in its archive is
not the ANH. The only caveat we'd add to that is that the X-Wing helmets
were altered for ESB and its likely that some of the existing ANH helmets
were adapted for the new film (much like like the TIE's/AT-AT's) - so its
possible it culd be the same helmet, albeit with some reworking and a
complete repaint for ESB or RotJ. |
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| Above and Below, a view of Luke's
different Hero helmets from ANH and ESB. |
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| If you notice on the photo above,
the yellow Mohawk lines run in the opposite direction so I'm not sure if
this is a different helmet or its just been flipped horizontally. |
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Here's a shot of a "Hero" Luke Lucasfilm has in its
archives. Photo courtesy Franz Bollo |
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| Although the detailing on some
helmets used decals, it look to me and Rich B that all of Luke's detailing
is hand painted, including the red phoenix logo's. Below another
screen-grab, this time Porkins. |
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| Below some shots of Wedge's helmet |
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| I don't think its ever been
confirmed who painted and weathered the hero helmets although I expect it
would have been the Elstree Art Department under John Mollo. |
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| Below, I've flipped this image to
its "correct" orientation since in the movie he's looking/flying to the right.
However as you can see when comparing this to the image above that we're
looking at the left side of the characters face and helmet. This is a common
"trick" in films where you literally flip the shot vertically if you suddenly realise you need a shot
of the character pointing the other way! |
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| and another close up of the
detailing, this time the right side of the helmet. |
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| Below, Biggs' helmet. These helmets
were all hand painted apart from a few decals like the circle/stripes on the
mohawk and the blue "Phoenix" logo seen on some rebel helmets. Not sure what the make of the
headset electronics were on the original helmets although its been suggested
they were a set of original USAF APH ear pads and Racal Mini-lite Headsets. |
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| Below, a nice Hi Def close-up of the
other helmet, lightened to show detail. |
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| Below another shot of one of the
Luke Hero helmets in the Lucasfilm archive. Note that when we say "Hero" it
refers to the fact that its been finished to a higher standard (such as the
detailing and weathering) and will be seen up-close on camera - although
clearly that's not surprising since its Luke's! |
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| ...and below a couple of shots from
Lucasfilm Exhibitions of a complete Luke Skywalker Rebel Pilot costume with
the same helmet as above. |
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| Below a nice shot of Luke's Blast
Shield helmet. This helmet was again fabricated by Andrew Ainsworth at SDS
and its simply a standard X-Wing helmet with an additional vac-formed ABS
visor fixed to the front. THe Art Department added some nice hand painted
detailing and weathering. Looks like they added some black lugs too. |
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In case you've missed it - check out the following
link for in-depth reviews of 2 Original Rebel Pilot Helmets......
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Return of the Jedi Y-Wing Pilot |
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| These shots hit the forums recently,
they were taken by an (unknown) photographer who visited the O2 arena in
London recently for the Star Wars concerts. So thanks go out to that
photographer for these great shots. As the title suggests its an original
Y-Wing pilot helmet from Return of the Jedi, and lower down the page we've
some shots of a non-screen-used but production made helmet that surfaced
recently. |
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| Above, this same helmet as seen in
Return of the Jedi - note that in the movie the image was flipped
horizontally so the pilots looking right. However I've flipped it back to
show what it looks like in real-life. Flipping images is usually something
done at the editing stage where they want want specific shots to edit
together better. Below, again more shots taken recently at the 02 Arena in
London. |
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| The detailing on this helmet is
really wonderful. It looks like they've used stencils/silk screens and built
up the layers in the paint work. It'd be interesting to see if anyone can
get an HD screen-grab of this helmet in the movie. |
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| Note the detailing around the face
opening which looks to be leather. The visor looks a lot like the ANH Visors
too so it'd be interesting to do a side by side comparison. |
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| Note that "Yamaha" button on the
ear-piece, I know they made a lot of different kinds of things but.... Below
just to complete the set a shot from the rear. |
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| ...and below a shot from Patrick H
who took a photo of the same helmet when the show toured Tulsa. |
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| Next up some photos of what appears
to be a production-made (but unfinished) RotJ Y-Wing helmet |
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| From what we can tell having
examined this it does appear to have all the tells we were expecting to find
- although we've never handled an original RotJ Y-Wing to directly compare
it against. However all the dimensions look to be correct and importantly,
it composition (including material) directly matches a number of other RotJ helmets - like the
Biker Scouts, which were all made at the same time by the same team - this
again reinforces its provenance. |
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| So its made in two separate halves,
which were then glued together, reinforced and filled. Following this it was
primed but presumably this was one of the "extra" helmets so didn't get the
full make-over. Its therefore unlikely that it would have been used on-set
but nonetheless is a really nice original production-made piece. |
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| Made of ABS its extremely light, but
still has a solid feel to it |
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| Below a shot from the rear where you
can see the crack forming in the filler where the two ABS hemispheres of the
helmet were glued together. |
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| Finally with the Y-Wing a comparison
photo below showing the Screen-Used and production made helmets. The photo
weren't taken at exactly the same angle but you can still see that
everything seems to line up as expected. The line that runs up the side to
the real looks a little thicker on the screen-used helmet but that could be
indicative of the strength of the vac-pull. |
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| So from having not seen anything of
RotJ Y-Wings over the years, two turn up at the same time! |
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Rebel Fleet Troopers |
| Next a couple of RoCKo's Hi-def
screen grabs of the RFT helmets. As with a number of the ANH helmets the
movie helmets were made by Andrew Ainsworth from a light grey ABS with an
acrylic smoked dark grey visor (probably the same as the TIE and Hero
Stormtrooper bubble lens material) |
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| A couple of dozen of these were
made but strangely hardly any have ever shown up in recent years suggesting
most were trashed after filming. |
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