10 years since we started TESBY

It is Ten years since we started Filming our first Star Wars spoof, The Empire Strikes Backyard!!! Little Luke was barely nine months old! Our resident Poet Laureate of the Yard recounts the story that was the making of TESBY. We dare you to understand….

Exactly ten years ago, on cardboard sets in a snooker room, they made…

STAR WARS Episode II THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACKYARD

It was a period of CGI: with wooden spaceships, filming on an air force base, they shot their first feature film made in the Star Wars fanfilm genre. During this battle they used CGIs, needed carefully to iron Backyard’s ultimate weapon, the GREEN SCREEN, and had bulky transformers with enough power to light up an entire film set. Posted on the outer rim of the country, and at weekends racing home aboard his Starlet, Darren wrote the sacred plans and had several people erect film sets in the snooker room.

It was a dark room for them to film in. Although the sets have now been destroyed, they backlit pieces of bubble wrap attached to the wooden base and positioned them across the snooker room. Creating the look of the Imperial Starfleet was a group of volunteers. Next door was established a kitchen for making tea and, in this remote ice world, some broth. Executive Bully Darren Scales, obsessed with following the storyboard, had them attach hundreds of remote props and made the best use of the space.

When Luke Scales had returned to his home town of Lincoln, after playing Luke and Leia, with friends and solo, his dad went through the rushes and the VFX with Chewie, the mutt. Luke was too little to know that the Set Designer had earnestly begun construction of a new computerised visual effect even more powerful than the first dreaded rotoscope. When completed, this ultimate model dispelled fear in the room, and a small bag of Revels struggled to restore nutrition in the snooker room.

Traffic had engulfed Melton Mowbray. They had gone to a trading estate with outlay for stage systems in the ute. Hoping to resolve the matter with a tirade of pyrotechnics, they set up enough explosions to make a small planet go ka-boom. Once the crew of the production had endlessly debated arming all this chain of effects, the Executive Bully pressed the trigger for two head-high lights to flash, then peace and fresh air in the snooker room to settle the smoke.

They got undressed in the adjoining chamber. Several thousand safety pins were employed to tack up the Levi’s and tunic. The prosthetics were created under the workmanship of the mysterious Behind the Mask. The queen’s costume was difficult for the limitless number of red, high lights. To maintain pieces of material in order, the second Amidala, the former being taboo, was adjusted by the talented seamstress, who took on the critical issue of creating an ARMHOLE FOR THE JACKET and in-stitched the overlocked hemline.

Phwoar! Sandra wasn’t grumbling about Darth Maul or the ruthless schedule. How do you edit a film, their first in DV, with not much time to spare? In a stunning movie, a fiendish amount of dirt lingers. Everyone mucked in, had swept up the rubbish then relished a Kit-Kat: chance for a proper tea. The edit was done right before the charity premiere, avoiding attempts for any return on invested capital from their valuable footage. Two red-eyed nights ended a desperate mission to enthrall the captive audience…