I) The First Movie (Episode IV)

   It all began in 1974.when George Lucas started writing a screenplay, first called STAR WARS, and later “Episode IV: A New Hope (Un Nouvel Espoir)
Lucas became the Writer/ Producer/ Director/ Editor, of an 11 million dollar budget film. He decided to begin with the fourth Episode of his saga, because of cinematographic limits at that time. In the 70s, special effects were not much developed yet, so he chose to start his first movie with the second trilogy. The shooting involved many problems. Technical issues, weather conditions …Some scenes on the desert planet Tatooine were filmed in Tunisia, under severe drought, followed by heavy rain falls, a rare phenomenon in that region.

   Furthermore quite some people saw no future for his production, casts and crew were also very skeptical, like Harrison Ford (Han Solo)who considered it “weird», or some cameramen, who because of the many costumes, said it would just be a “popcorn” movie. But the movie came out and revolutionized special effects, still true today. In 1976, George Lucas founded “Industrial Light & Magic a company specialized in SFX for movies. The Company obviously concentrated its work on Star Wars first.
   Special Effects were rudimentary
   People used miniature spaceships and a camera that was controlled by a technician who had to turn around them, whilst zooming on them so they look like real spaceships making true movements. This is how the last battle of the fourth episode was created. This proceed was called Dykstraflex in name of its inventor John Dykstra.

II) The Second Movie (Episode V)

   This time, the manager of the Fifth Episode isn’t George Lucas. In fact, the first movie made him earn a huge amount of dollars. G. Lucas gave this job to his old teacher of cinematography, Irvin Kershner. George Lucas, who was the storywriter of all his movies, financed and worked with his firm “Industrial Light and Magic” to film his movie, so he was independent of Hollywood.
The production of the firsts was very similar to that of the first movie, but with some new locations. Among the most known is the beginning on the Hoth ice planet where once again a new engine appeared to the spectator.

   Technology of the first film was also used for some other sequences, such as the heroes’ interstellar trip in space with their "Millenium Falcon", followed by Empire. Here, there wasn’t any change in the filming technology.
The first shots were turned during lasted 6 months and started on March 5th, 1979 in Norway, more precisely on Hardangerjøkulen. Conditions were almost identical to those of the story more precisely those of planet Hoth: It snowed a lot, there were some blizzards and temperatures fell below- 25°C, conditions were extremes as in the first filming of the fourth episode in the Tunisian desert. On top of that, they had to face technical difficulties, as a fire destroyed part of the filming equipment causing a budget increase by 6 million Dollars. In the end, the film will cost over33$ Millions

But the place wasn’t perfect for the last sequence on planet Hoth. As a matter of fact, here we have a battle between Empire with its AT-AT, a huge quadruped engine, and rebels and their Snowspeeder (small vessels) called "Battle of Hoth". The place had no setups that would fit with the story, so G. Lucas decided to film in his ILM studio. He used mountain paintings to create snowy sceneries. In front of this landscape were some AT-ATs, reduced from 22m to 6cm to create the impression of distant vehicles, and up to 50 cm for the closer vehicles, filmed just in front of the camera, behind painted decors. These huge machines moving like elephants, slowly and foot after foot, the specialists of special effects, with John Dykstra, used the "Stop-Motion", technology also called animation picture by picture, as in the 1st film. They used the same technique for Snowspeeder, except for some passages where they constructed a real size: 5,3m Snowspeeder, to film the set where the hero crashes, and then another one where the hero goes out of his ship, just before the AT-AT crashes it. In this episode appears a new character. A small wise green extraterrestrial named Yoda. The design, recognizable by all, was created by Stuart Freeborn, who had the great idea of using his own face, adding some characteristics of Albert Einstein, as some wrinkles, to give him this appearance of an old sage. The figure was enlivened by Frank Oz, as it is about the only puppet of the film.

III) The Third Movie (Episode VI)

   “Return of the Jedi” is the end of the second trilogy of the filmed saga. In fact, George Lucas has written many other stories but didn’t want to film them.

   This movie of 1983 is also the last Star Wars movie filmed before those of the first trilogy begun in 1997. In fact, the Star Wars saga has also the peculiarity that the 3 last episodes were written before the 3 first. G. Lucas had already imagined the stories but didn’t want to write or film them, because of SFX limits.This last episode has also been financed by George Lucas thanks to the success of the fifth episode, which allowed him once again to be completely independent of Hollywood, giving him much more freedom.For the filming, G. Lucas was more present than for the previous movie, supervising some of the filming, because of the lack of experience of the new director Richard Marquand. And the producer Howard Kazanjian whose also produced “Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark” directed by Steven Spielberg.

   Like for the other films, SFX was done by ILM. As it was a G. Lucas’ company, they succeeded in saving18 million dollars for special effects. Filming started on January 11th and was to be shot in several places depending on set. Some sets of the film on Tatooine were filmed this time in the Arizona Yuma desert , they also filmed two months in the Elstree Studio in England for most of the inside sets . They also used special effects, called Bluescreen, an effect where they shoot behind a blue screen that will be replaced by computer in a film setting.These were made in California in the ILM studios. Some sets for Endor’s Moon were filmed in Redwood’s National Park, in California. There is a set of a very quick chase with "Speeders", a kind of flying motorbike. In this one we can see the forest landscape moving at very high speed.

   Here, a certain Garrett Brown filmed by walking slowly,atabout 6 km/h in the forest, with a camera which recorded at one image per second. The film was then speeded up 24 times, creating 24 frames per second, which is the normal flow speed of a film. In moving faster by24 times, it gave the impression that the landscape march was not of 6 km / h, but of 144, so it didn’t show that the film had been speeded up. May 20th, 1982 was the end of the shooting, that's more than a month less than the filming of episode V. In fact, George Lucas asked to start the filming as early as possible so as to have more time to work on special effects. The film came out on May 25th, 1983 at a total cost of 32.5 millions $.

IV) The Fourth Movie (Episode I)

   In 1994,based on ideas George Lucas had in creating the 2nd trilogy, he wrote the story of episode I. After having written the
script, and chosen the cast,George Lucas then worked as film director, first time since A New Hope ". New things appeared in this movie : Computers were much more competitive than in the eighties, he used computer generated special effects, as the figure of JarJar Binks. Movements and voice were then given by Ahmed Best, by the computer graphic images (CGI)this time;the actor wears a blue suit, with small whitespotstied on the limbs. Blue color will be also replaced by the figure. This new system for Star wars, became a standard for a great number of action
films,and science fiction. Also many parts of space battles were computer made, the 1st Star Wars was the first movie which used computer generated special effects in large quantities.
   However,some old techniques such as that of models remained in use, but in smaller quantities: in fact they used at the same time the modern digital computer technology and those older systems. For example, they shot the model of a vessel, and then they touched it up and reproduced it in large numbers on the computer. So they restricted the number of models required.

   Battles of Lightsabers were also changed: In one of the final parts you have two Jedis, Qui-Gon Jinn and Obi-Wan Kenobi, confronted to the Sith Darth Maul, who is armed with a Lightsaber with Two Blades. This setting is taken from the art of oriental battle, like the Kenjutsu and Kendo.
   The shooting of the film began in England on June 26th, 1997. This time, the Leavesden studio was chosen for the indoor parts and Tunisia for the Tatooine parts. Filming lasted 4 months and ended on September 30th, 1997. The film came out on May 19th, 1999 at a total cost of 115 million dollars. The film was a big success; expenses for the making and the launching of the film were easily amortized: they estimated a 941 million dollar benefit, the 2nd film most successful film, after Titanic.

V) The Fifth Movie (Episode II)

   This episode is the next in which digital techniques were incorporated. High definition and very heatproof cameras were used for shooting in Tunisia. It is also the 1st Star Wars movie which has been recorded on a digital support and not on spools. Some cinemas had to change their screen projectors when the film came out on May 16th, 2002. This episode was the 2nd film after Vidocq (2001) to be entirely digitized. All of this was made under the orders of George Lucas, always manager-film director and author of the story as for the Episode I. Some characters, as Yoda, were entirely created by computer. Others were "digitized". On film it’s a figure created by computer, animated by the actors with the Bluescreen effect.

   The total cost went up to 120 million dollars, which made the Star Wars film the most expensive of the saga. The film had a great success: about 650 million dollars of benefit.

VI) The Sixth Movie (Episode III)

   The last film of the Star Wars legend, the last one of the 1st trilogy, came out on May 19th, 2005 between 2002 and 2003, George Lucas adapted a scenario for 3rd episode. Here the computer made pictures are even more advanced. In fact, a great deal of sets were computer made. Such as for example this extraordinary environment of the Mustafar volcanic planet, and some other planets with exotic environments George Lucas heard about the eruption of mountain Etna in Italy and decided to film the eruptions under various angles, as we see them in the film. The film also has that specificity that it was completely shot in the FoxStudio in Sydney, Australia. The shooting began on June 30th, 2003, with the exception of a scene, the last scene, which was filmed in 2000 during the shooting of episode II. They only used computer for generate sets, and some touched up pictures, notably Thai's films, and for some parts of planet Kashyyyk, they filmed around Pukhet in Thailand and added the characters by computer. All further, actions, and indoor shots took place in the Australian studio. This Star Wars is the film with the less outdoor shootings and the most special digital effects. The number of 2151 special effects will be a world record.
We shall also note the similarity of vehicles with those of episode IV, we find devices which will later become those of episode IV. Among the best known, we find X-Wing, not with 2 pairs of wings, but with 3. The aspect of the Destroyer got more andmore similar to that of episode IV.

   The film was a success: 850 millions of dollars.

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