Cantwell, “Star Wars” spacecraft designer, dies
Colin Cantwell, an animator, conceptual artist and computer expert who played significant production roles in seminal science fiction films such as “2001: A Space Odyssey, “Star Wars” and “WarGames,” died May 21 at his home in Colorado Springs. He was 90.
His partner, Sierra Dall, said the cause was dementia.
Cantwell’s work on several influential movies reached its peak with “Star Wars,” George Lucas’ hugely successful space opera. To impress Lucas, Cantwell built two elaborate steampunk-like spacecraft models from parts he had culled from dozens of hobbyist’s kits. He got the job before Lucas had found a studio.
Cantwell produced the original designs for spacecraft familiar to fans of “Star Wars”: the X-wing, the Rebel Alliance’s starfighter; the TIE fighter, part of the Galactic Empire’s imperial fleet; the wedge-shaped Imperial Star Destroyer; the cockpit for the Millennium Falcon; and the Death Star, the Empire’s enormous battle station, with a weapon capable of destroying a planet.
“Colin’s imagination and creativity were apparent from the get-go,” Lucas said in a tribute on a Lucasfilm “Star Wars” website, adding, “His artistry helped me build out the visual foundation for so many ships that are instantly recognizable today.”
Describing the design of the X-wing, Cantwell said in an interview on Reddit in 2016: “It had to be ultracool and different from all the other associations with aircraft, etc. In other words, it had to be alien and fit in with the rest of the story.” He got the original concept, he said, from “a dart being thrown at a target in a British pub.”
His original design of the Death Star did not include the equatorial trench. But as he created the model, he realized that it would be easier to include it. And it turned out to be critical to the design: In the film, the trench contains a thermal exhaust port that proves to be the source of the Death Star’s destruction.
Gene Kozicki, a visual effects historian and archivist, said Cantwell was most likely the first person Lucas hired to design the spaceships. “George had some rough shapes in mind for the ships that would make you know these are the good guys and these are the bad guys, but the details were left to Colin to work out,” he said in a phone interview. “All his designs evolved; it was all a group effort, but Colin was the godfather of the models.”
In an interview with the Original Prop Blog in 2014, Cantwell described his interplay with Lucas.
“He would say, ‘Oh, I
want an Imperial battle cruiser,’ and I’d say, ‘ What scenes do you want to shoot with it and how big is it?’ ” Cantwell said. “He said, ‘Really big,’ and I’d say, ‘Is it bigger than Burbank?’ ”
Colin James Cantwell was born April 3, 1932, in San Francisco. He studied animation at the University of California-los Angeles, where he received a bachelor’s degree in applied arts in 1957. A love of architec
ture led him to create building designs that he personally showed to Frank Lloyd Wright, who was impressed enough that Cantwell was invited to study at Wright’s school of architecture in Arizona. Cantwell was accepted, but when Wright died in 1959, he decided not to proceed.
“Colin had no interest in working with any other architect,” Dall said in a phone interview, “so that ended his architectural career.”
In the 1960s, Cantwell was a contract worker for NASA’S Jet Propulsion Laboratory, developing programs to educate the public about early space missions, and for Graphic Films in Los Angeles, which made live-action and animated films for NASA, the Air Force and industry clients. Douglas Trumbull, who died this year, had worked at Graphic Films before being hired by director Stanley Kubrick for “2001.”
Trumbull became a special photographic effects supervisor on “2001,” and Cantwell joined the crew from Graphic Films in 1967, during the last six months of its production.
Cantwell also worked on “Close Encounters of the Third Kind,” “Buck Rogers in the 25th Century” and “Wargames.”
He also worked as a computer consultant for Hewlett-packard, where he helped develop the first color display systems for desktop computers.