John Dykstra - Episode 110

70s Trek: Star Trek in the 1970s

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5+ y ago 31:35

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When it comes to special effects professionals from the 1970s, two names came to mind: Douglas Trumbull and John Dykstra.

When Doug Trumbull was brought in to do the effects on Star Trek The Motion Picture, he was given carte blanche to get them produced on time. To do this, he recruited a team of some of the best visual effects people in the world.

That included his friend, John Dykstra. He served as the supervisor of visual effects on projects like the original Battlestar Galactica and Star Wars. In 1979 he jumped in to help create over 500 visual effects for The Motion Picture.

But the workload ahead of them was considerable: They needed to create more special effects than those in Star Wars and Close Encounters of the Third Kind...combined!

Of course for Dykstra to work on The Motion Picture, he had to have a pretty significant background.

Silent Running

Back in 1971, Trumbull was recruiting recent college grads to work with him on the film Silent Running. This was to save money due to the film’s low budget. Dykstra’s job was to film the movie's models.

In 1975, George Lucas tried to get Doug Trumbull to work on his new film, Star Wars. ButTrumbull was already working on Close Encounters of the Third Kind. So he recommended Dykstra.

While working on that film, Dykstra developed a new computer controlled camera system for the visual effects, the first of its kind, ever!

However, Lucas saw Dykstra's development work as tinkering, and not focusing on the shots he needed produced for his movie. When Lucas finished principle photography, he dismissed Dykstra.

Battlestar Galactica

From there, Dykstra was hired to do the visual effects for the three-hour premiere for Battlestar Galactica. While the effects are impressive and ground-breaking, 20th Century Fox filed suit against Universal, claiming that Battlestar was plagiarized from Star Wars. They argued that the TV show had similar design style and visual effects.

The suit was eventually settled out of court.

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#Theater #Arts #Cinema #Bob Turner #Kelly Casto #1970s #Startrek