Like so many of us, Doug Chiang grew up loving Star Wars, but his path would lead to him having a huge impact on the series he adored. Thanks to his time at ILM -- where he contributed to many films throughout the 1990s -- Chiang eventually got to work for George Lucas directly on both The Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones as design director, and he then returned to the franchise for The Force Awakens. On Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, Chiang had his most crucial role yet, as one of the film's production designers, working to seamlessly blend in new elements into the iconic world introduced in the original Star Wars movie in 1977.
With Rogue One hitting Blu-ray this coming Tuesday, on the heels of its digital HD release this past week, I spoke to Chiang about his work on the film. Chiang discussed what it was like diving into such a specific and important part of Star Wars history and how the film helped bridge the gap between the prequels and the original trilogy from a design perspective.
IGN: At this point you've been around the block with Star Wars a few times, and you've dealt with the crazy anticipation for the prequels and then the anticipation for The Force Awakens, but was there something particularly special -- yet also daunting -- about doing a movie that was so immersed in the original film's specific world?
Doug Chiang: For sure, and that's one of the primary reasons why I really want to be more involved in Rogue One than any of the other films, was because it actually was going to be a film that touches one of my favorite films, which was Episode IV, and it actually was one of the first times where I could actually contribute designs that would be classic era designs. When I first saw Episode IV when I was 15, [afterwards] I drew nothing but classic era designs. And then, I really thought when George hired me to design the prequels, that I would be doing classic era designs. And when he said that, no, we were going to go earlier in the timeline, that completely threw me for a loop, but it was actually great because I got to understand his thinking - his foundation of what makes a Star Wars design. And so for Rogue One, it was actually a combination of all that, where I got the big history lesson of how to design for Star Wars, but then it gave me the opportunity to actually design something that would fit into one of my favorite films.
IGN: I imagine it must have been an interesting balancing act, because you want to be creative and yet make it fit in perfectly with that pre-existing movie.
Chiang: Yes. But the great thing is, we knew that at least eighty percent of the designs had to seamlessly fit with Episode IV. And our thinking was okay, let's design that eighty percent as if these were designs and sets and such that George built in 1977, but he never shot on it. And we were gonna shoot on them for ourselves. But then there was that extra twenty percent, and we thought, okay, well, we have a prologue sequence which is actually closer to Episode III. Maybe we can actually use that to kind of help bridge Episode III with Episode IV, with that new twenty percent. And it was really a fun, challenging experience, because Krennic's shuttle resulted from that, along with some of the new Stormtroopers. And it's a really fun exploration because, ultimately, the design history for Star Wars is very connected. There is an evolution that you can connect the dots from one film to the other. And our film was really gonna bridge the two aesthetics - the romantic designs of I, II, and III, with the more practical, functional designs of IV, V, and VI. And so we were able to touch both.
IGN: Was there an element that you were particularly excited about working on?
Chiang: Yeah, quite a bit of it. I mean a lot of it was, we were going to be on the classic Star Destroyer set, we were gonna be on the Blockade Runner. And so those things kind of gave me goosebumps, because they were things that I had seen in Episode IV, and we were gonna expand that a little bit more. So those were great. The Yavin hangar was another one where we saw pieces of that in Episode IV, and we thought, okay, well, what happens if George had turned the camera around the other way? And we were gonna see the other part of the Yavin hangar and really expand that out. And that was a really fun exploration because we were very careful of designing things that opened up the world while at the same time being very respectful for what we're seeing, so nothing contradicts anything that had been established in Episode IV. And so all those classic era designs were really, really enjoyable to design because, you know, we had a strong foundation, but yet we could open it up more.
The new designs that we hadn't seen, things like Dantooine base, which ultimately got cut from the film, were true inspirations from early Ralph McQuarrie drawings, where he had designed early versions of other rebel bases. It was a really wonderful way of tapping into that and trying to bring more to the Star Wars visual vocabulary while expanding on it, while being very respectful for it. And so it's a real fine, delicate line.
IGN: You mentioned Krennic's ship, and you had a few notable new vehicle designs, like the U-Wing.
Chiang: I think the vehicles are probably one of the most challenging [elements], because we were gonna have classic X-Wings of course, and TIE fighters, but then we also knew, well, maybe we can have license to have something new, because Gareth [Edwards] wanted a new vehicle - what eventually became the U-wing. And he described it as the Huey helicopter version of the X-Wing. But yet it's earlier technology, so it's obsolete, it's decommissioned after Rogue One. And so then the design task became, well, how do you design something that dovetails seamlessly with the X-Wing, but yet fulfills the story requirement of being a troop carrier - and yet bridges a little bit of the design aesthetics of Episode III? And so it's a really fun design challenge for me, because it's the one design that I think effectively kind of hits all those notes and checks all those boxes. And yet it was also one of the hardest designs to do because it had to hit all those requirements.
IGN: You can't go back in time and work on the original trilogy, but having worked on the prequels and The Force Awakens and now doing Rogue One, does it make you feel like, well, "I kind of got to work in all of three eras of Star Wars!"
Chiang: Yeah, absolutely. It's funny you say that... I didn't think about it that way, but it's really true, because I've finally had a chance to work on classic designs. And I have to say, Rogue One was really a great treat because seeing the classic X-Wings in a dog fight, but in a new background, a new context, gave me goosebumps from a fan's point of view. I'm totally a fan and it was all those things, all those emotions that I had while I was 15, but now updated. And the fact that we have that layered upon with something else, that little bit of freshness... I think really, for me, Rogue One is a culmination of 40 years of design inspiration since I saw Episode IV.
IGN: When it comes to bridging the gap from the prequels, there was the prisoner transport vehicle Jyn is in, which a lot of people noted is a re-purposed tank from the prequels. Was there stuff like that where you guys were thinking about that connective tissue in a film set around 20 years after Episode III?
Chiang: Yes, exactly. And those tanks from the prequels was actually an early Joe Johnston drawing that was never used - that was going to be a tank on Hoth. And so we actually went back to the DNA of the classic era trilogy and updated the designs for our film.
IGN: You mentioned getting to use some of Joe's work or stuff that McQuarrie did that didn't get incorporated originally, like Vader's castle, and getting to put a spin on it. And I know that's happened for you too, where some of the designs you did on the prequels didn't get used, but then The Clone Wars or Rebels might dust them off and put them in. Is that gratifying for you, because of course you do so many designs and it's not all gonna make it in the movie, but then one day it can still pop up?
Chiang: Yes, and it's interesting because we do so much homework and design development for these films, and we really figured out comprehensively what these worlds are, in terms of designing many versions of vehicles. Many times when we start designing, we only get a framework of the stories. We don't quite know how the narrative is going to inform the designs. We design the world as real as possible, as immersive as possible, and then the directors will come in and cherry pick the one or two elements they want to put in their films. And so there's a lot of good designs that all still feels very Star Wars, all could be in a Star Wars movie, but are never used. And so it's always a real good treat, especially as these films expand and new media takes on the expansion of the Star Wars universe, that these designs then start to show up. Because at the end, all that homework we do fits. And all the early designs that Ralph did that never made it into the films, we're now updating and adapting for our new films.
IGN: You're coming up with the designs, and of course I'm sure you discuss some of the basic functionality, but then you get something like Pablo Hidalgo's book, the Visual Dictionary, and it gets into sort of the minutiae of the functionality of these things, and what each little element might be. Is that kind of amusing for you, when you're like, "Oh, okay, I guess that's what that is!" on a ship you designed?
Chiang: Absolutely. In some ways we get yelled at a lot of times too. [Laughs] It's like, "Why did you design this, because it doesn't make any sense?" And then they have to figure it out. But yeah, that's the funny thing about Star Wars design, is that we're trying to create a very immersive universe that feels very authentic, but it's also another galaxy, with different rules. And I always think of the Snowspeeder from Empire Strikes Back. I mean that's literally wings on the cockpit - because it's so small, you can't even tell where the engines are. And yet it actually works. And if you were trying to layer it with too much logic of reality, like our modern jet fighters with the cockpit and then eighty percent of it is all functional engines and wings and fuel tanks, it doesn't look that special. And so, part of the thinking is that when we're designing for Star Wars, we're trying to come up with very iconic designs, distilling it down to the absolute minimum requirements that's needed to create something that's very memorable. And when you do that, sometimes logic kind of falls aside.
The saving grace is that this is another galaxy, there's new technology, so maybe the fuel tanks are really small. Maybe the engines are really small but they're very powerful. You know, whatever levitates these things, maybe it's tiny and you don't have to explain it. And so that's the fun of designing this, is that we're conscious of reality, but we're not bound by it in some ways, because this is, after all, you know, cinema. I mean, it's all made up. But there's a big component that's part of my job, which is, granted that we're designing things as fanciful designs, but I feel very strongly that they have to be grounded in reality of some kind. I have to be able to explain this and make sense of it, and as long as I can do that, then the design is validated.
IGN: You put something like Vader's castle in the movie, and it's only there for a few minutes, but the fact is that not only will there be other stories that probably expand upon that castle, and the background of it, but for fans it instantly becomes a huge point of discussion. Is that also part of the fun, mixed with the pressure, of working on Star Wars?
Chiang: Yeah, and that's where a lot of the designs we do, I'm glad that fans will kind of discover the real purpose behind it. Because when we design something like Vader's castle, which was inspired by an early Ralph McQuarrie sketch, we really think out everything in terms of, "Why is he there? Where is he? What's underneath? What's the supporting structure? What is the history of the thing?" And then ultimately in the film, you don't get any of that. None of this is conveyed, because it's not important to the narrative.
But all that layering of information is there, and all the logic is there, and I think the audience can feel that it makes sense and it feels very real. But if you were to go in there, I could explain to you exactly what all the functions are, how the rooms connect. And it's cool to create things that, now that all that information has been designed, that can be carried on and expanded further in other films, or new medias, or other experiences. But it's all there, and I think that's one of the distinguishing factors about designing for Star Wars, is that we do a lot of homework. So things aren't designed just to look pretty. There is a strong foundation, and all that layering of information is there to be told if someone wants to know.
Rogue One: A Star Wars Story is now available on Digital HD and Disney Movies Anywhere and will be released on Blu-ray, DVD and On-Demand on Tuesday, April 4th.
Eric Goldman is Executive Editor of IGN TV. You can follow him on Twitter at @TheEricGoldman, IGN at ericgoldman-ign and Facebook at http://ift.tt/LQFqjj.
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