Concept art from Rogue One: A Star Wars Story reveals new information

By now, we’ve all seen Rogue One in theaters, and recently, the film’s concept artist and costume designers held a Q&A in London and revealed new, previously unknown information about the Star Wars story….

Speaking at an event for Gosh Comics in London, concept artists and costume designers for Rogue One: A Star Wars Story opened up to Star Wars fans during a Q&A to promote the release of the all-new book from Lucasfilm and author Josh Kushins — The Art of Rogue One. Here’s a brief description:

"In the same format and style as Abrams’ The Art of Star Wars: The Force Awakens, the book gives readers unprecedented access to hundreds of concept paintings, sketches, storyboards, matte paintings, and character, costume, and vehicle designs."

The artists and designers revealed many new details about Rogue One, which until now, had been kept a secret. And, thanks to Star Wars Hyperdrive on Tumblr, we have the details of the event.

Image Credit: Lucasfilm

Saw Gerrera was originally supposed to be on another planet. There was an icy planet shown, with designs for Snowtroopers. Saw was also reportedly on a jungle-like planet, which was shown as well.

Image Credit: Lucasfilm

The team wanted to use CRAB-ATs (transport vehicles resembling crabs) on Scarif, however, at the last minute decided to go with the familiar looking AT-ACT. There was some concern with going overboard on the designs for Rogue One, so the team dialed it back, deciding not to load the film too many new designs.

Image Credit: Lucasfilm

The Ring of Kafrene, where Cassian Andor (Diego Luna) met with his underworld contact, was inspired by the movie Bladerunner.

Image Credit: Lucasfilm

The team leaned heavily on the work of Ralph McQuarrie and Star Wars storyboard designer Joe Johnston. The did this because those two are credited with creating the “language” of Star Wars by using each other as a sounding board for ideas.

Image Credit: Lucasfilm

The citadel tower on Scarif was a project the team worked on for two months and then changed it completely, redesigning it in just two hours.

Image Credit: Lucasfilm

There wasn’t enough money in the budget for a tank, but the team didn’t want but didn’t want to use CGI, so they designed the Imperial hover tank around an older, real-world tank.

Image Credit: Lucasfilm

While director Gareth Edwards was busy shooting the final Darth Vader scene — the one where he rips into a small battalion of Rebel soldiers — the team was upstairs working on additional sketches for the film.

Some other neat little tidbits of information:

Apparently, there are no 45-degree angles in Star Wars.
Most of the artists and design team are already working on the Han Solo standalone Star Wars film.
Some members of the team were extras in Rogue One: A Star Wars Story.
Most of the artists and designers also worked on Star Wars: The Force Awakens and Star Wars: The Last Jedi.

Again, you can read the entire list of reveals from the Q&A, by visiting Star Wars Hyperdrive on Tumblr.

More from Dork Side of the Force

I love seeing all these concept art designs for Rogue One. They offer an inside look into a fantastic film, and I can’t wait until the Blu-Ray/DVD release in just a couple of months, where hopefully we will see even more behind the scenes work from the production team for the film.

Home/Rogue One: A Star Wars Story