INTRODUCTION:

 I have been a life long Star Wars fan with Darth Vader being my all time favorite fictional character in all of cinema history. To me his costume is the best costume design ever and that was made very apparent when John Mollo, costumer designer for Star Wars(1977), won the award for best costume design at the 1978 Oscars. The costume is very samurai inspired from the large flared helmet down to the layers of intertwined robes and hard armor. He was a force wielding warrior that drew heavy inspiration from the old Japanese samurai films. This inspiration also paved the way for future force users mostly known as Jedi. 

As a fan of Darth Vader I had set out to create the most accurate representation of Vader's costume I possibly can with in reason. I started in 2010 with the Return of the Jedi version and now recently I started working on the A New Hope version to keep on display and use the other for trooping. This blog is to detail the costume I put together for ANH version of Darth Vader.

The A New Hope iteration of Darth Vader's costume is vastly different to the other 4 versions seen on film. The budget for the film, roughly $10mil, was a large contributor to the final look of Vader's first on screen appearance. For a film with many more special effects shots planned then any other before it $10mil quickly became a very small figure. No one thought the project would amount to anything so funding was sparse for the film. An executive at 20th Century Fox believed in Lucas and was able to scrape up a few dollars for this space fantasy film. This small budget limited Vader to only one complete costume for the entire production of the film. As a result of heavily using this one costume it became worn and weathered and thats the look commonly associated with ANH Vader. The costumes that came after were cleaned up and polished to look shiney and mirrored. The ANH costume also saw more wear and tear as it was worn by Kermit Eller after production to help promote the release of the film. To this day very little of this costume is accounted for and still exists.

Darth Vader was in the script from the begining and largely remained the same. He was described as a tall black figure with flowing robes. Initially Vader only had a face mask since he had to leave his Star Destroyer to board the Rebel ship/Tantive IV. Concept artist Ralph McQuarrie showed some sketches to Lucas with Vader wearing a mask and Lucas fell in love and gave Vader a permanet mask. This is when Lucas decided to add a large flaring dome that was inspired from the Samurai helmets. Vader varies a lot from sketch to sketch and concept painting to concept painting but it was sculptor Brian Muir who brought to life the final iteration of Vader's helmet in clay. He based his clay sculpt off of one sketch given to him by John Mollo. Muir's sculpt was molded and casts were made for the film for towering 6'6 actor David Prowse to wear on set. The belt and chest box were made by the prop department while all the soft parts were outsourced. Costume company Bermans and Nathans was contracted to help create the costumes for the film. They made the gloves, cape, robe and cod piece. The suit however was sub contracted to Lewis Leathers.

 

THE HELMET:

The look of Vader is implanted into our pop culture. Anyone who can see will instantly recognize the large dome and triangle breathing vent weather or not they have seen Star Wars. 

Vader's helmet consists of a face mask and a large flaring dome, no reveal detail or neck brace exists on this helmet, that were both cast out of fiberglass. Fiberglass is glass sheets bonded together with a resin material. This method of casting allows the piece to retain sharp detail captured in the mold. Originally Muir sculpted a back section to the face but David Prowse found it to claustrophobic and it was instantly discarded. The number of casts made is debatable but I heard 3 or 4 were made. Only one was fully finished and used during production. Originally the helmet had a straight black paint job but screen tests quickly proved that to be problematic. As a last minute result the face had an alternating Gun Metal Grey added to it. It was rushed, sloppy and done with a brush and that helped create the weathered look. This left brush strokes on the gunmetal areas which also contributed to the final look. Since Muir hand sculpted the clay sculpture it came out very asymmetric. The left hand cheek curves down and up while the right hand just curves down and the bottom of the mouth vent slopes down to the left hand side.  

There are many replicas out there that range from fan sculpts to copies of the screen used to licensed pieces. My helmet is the Darth Jones or DJ for short. DJ is the owner of the cast my helmet was copied from. DJ's cast came from the ILM or commonly known as the Rick Baker molds. The Baker molds were made by make up effects artist Rick Baker(An American Werewolf in London)directly off the one and only screen used helmet in order for Lucasfilm to have copies for promotional touring. This makes my helmet twice removed or the second generation from the screen helmet. To date this is the closest fans have gotten to copying the original helmet. Mike Warren currently produces the DJ and you can find him on Instagram under m.warren.propshop. Be aware that being a lineage piece it is very expensive. Bellow you can see my copy of the DJ.

 

Other Lineage ANH helmets includes the TM and the SL(initials of the owners). The SL is Baker derived but no longer available to purchase first hand. It is important to note the SL has had detail altered to detect recasts thus not a direct copy of the original SL cast. The TM is a whole other beast. Its an actual production made helmet from ESB instead of being a cast from a mold off a screen used. It came from what is commonly known as the UK mold which did come off the original ANH helmet just like the Baker mold did. In a sense its still a cast from a mold of the original helmet if we look at it as a ANH. But as ESB we cant get any closer as the crew made it for the film along with the actual screen used ESB helmets. The dome being purely ESB most people only use the face as it really didn't change much from ANH to ESB. The TM isn't available and probably the most expensive lineage cast put there. 

Fan sculpted helmets include the Quasimodo and Darth Ugly which both are produced by Bookface on the forums and are still available. 

The cast that DJ owns was ever so slightly modified by him. This was before collecting and preservation was really a thing. He removed the glue drip going down the neck from the left hand tusks along with one small detail on the neck and nose. The rest of the cast was left as is and is reflected in the casts Mike produces. It introduced to me a lot of detail I was unaware of on Vader's helmet. Mike did however recreate the glue drip using reference from the TM which still retains that detail. 

Each mold and or cast has their own issues just like the DJ. There is no source that is 100 percent unaltered. If anyone claims they have an unaltered copy its not true. Along with the minor changes to the DJ the Baker mold has the undercut of the tusk tubes filled in for ease of casting. This was done when Rick Baker made the mold in 1977. This mold is the only true ANH native source fans have come across. The TM was found to have its tusks broken off and the tip of the tubes needed resculpted. Any other cast with lineage is a few more copies or generations down the line which causes them to lose detail. And some casts may have been inadvertently cleaned up due to lack of knowledge like the VP.

eFX collectibles did produce a licensed version of the ANH helmet with 3 different versions. The limited and Legend editions were made of fiberglass with the Legend edition being more accurate to the original prop and the limited being idealized. A precision crafted replica or PCR for short made of plastic was offered at a smaller price. eFX's version was also sourced from the Baker molds BUT their helmet was extensively cleaned up for mass production. A lot of detail was removed from all 3 versions with the PCR seeing the most alterations. It is a very nice representation of the ANH helmet for the masses as it retains all of the original geometry but it ultimately falls short of being accurate to the prop. 

THE ARMOR:

Vader's armor consists of a chest plate and two side shoulder pieces commonly referred to as shoulder bells. It is cast in fiberglass and painted in the same gloss black and brushed on gunmetal as the helmet. My armor is cast off the original set(I have no more information on the source of the armor) and is produced by Mike as well. It is the first available armor to date that does not have any warping on it at all.

CHEST BOX AND BELT:

These parts are the ones to differ the most among the other versions. The chest box is very plain with little detail. It consists of a base box, 2 side rods, red and green square buttons next to 3 coin slot shaped pieces and 4 rocker switches beneath them. Everything is resin expect for the rockers being made from wood. There are leather straps on the top and 2 sides that hold the box to the wearer. They are 1" in width and have 2 incised lines. The box is roughly 6 7/8" in height and width. It is however very asymmetric with the sides not being of exact equal length. 

I purchased my box from an Etsy seller, Devilmannsprop. It was 3D printed and he did the initial finishing work but the weathering was the typical silver rub on stuff that almost every Vader builder does. As I want total authenticity I wanted more out of the finish. The box was sent to Mike for a complete repaint. He does real weathering such as real scratches and paint chips that were matched to the Kermit Eller reference pictures taken right after production. In my opinion that looks so much better and improves the overall look of the costume.  

The belt boxes consists of 2 boxes with 6 diamond knurled knobs and underlying red washers facing towards the arms on each box with one red LED between the knobs and 2 Green LED lights and a flat mesh below the green lights. The boxes were project boxes that open via a top lid with 2 Philip screws on each side. 

The belt is 2.25" wide with incised lines on the top and bottom. The buckle has a flat black base with a silver D that has 5 thinly squared cut outs that progressively get shorter vertically towards another circle cut out on top of the D piece. The D is slightly angled down ward towards the left hand side. 

My belt rig came from Black Falcon FX.

THE SHIN GUARDS:

The shins were sculpted on David Prowse's life cast just like the helmet and armor was. As a result one came out longer then the other as David's shins were not of equal height. They have a center strip with 3 cubes on each side near the top and 2 u shape indents on both sides near the bottom. My shins were cast directly off an original pair. 

THE BODY SUIT:

The suit is made of 3 pieces the shirt with leather sleeves, a leather vest and leather pants. Each leather section has quilted lines running vertical and are approximately 1" apart. Many suit makers have the lines on the sleeves angle into the inner seam but its incorrect. Both the seams and quilted lines run parallel to each other. The vest is made in panels which resulted in two extra seams running down the front of the vest. They can be found right under the thin outer strip of the chest armor. 

My suit is from Custom Props.

THE GLOVES:

The gloves overall are the same as ESB and ROTJ except for the direction of the quilted lines on the gauntlet. They run perpendicular to the body suit instead of parallel. The fingers and underside are all one piece as they are joined at the index finger which means no seam on the outside of the index finger and are sewn together at the pinky. The Thumb is a separate insert. There are side panels added between the fingers to help shape better to the hand. The stitching is external and is whip stitched. A whip stitch is where the thread is wrapped around the edge of the material similar to a string of lights wrapped around a pole. 

My gloves were made by Fenix Props. 

THE CAPE AND ROBE:

Both the cape and robe are made out of a heavy coat wool which is a felt like material with no visible weave to the fabric. Any kind of Gabardine or twill is not correct for any of the OT Vaders. The cape is made up of 4 panels that comes to a half circle when laid flat together. It is lined with a shiney polyester fabric with leather at the collar and a corduroy strip ruining down the underside of the cape's front edge. There is a visible sewn line on the top side. The robe is a basic sleeveless robe that is worn over the chest armor. 

My cape and robe was made by Kelly Jo Boyd of Korbanth. 

THE COD PIECE:

The cod is the piece that covers the crotch area. It is a foam core with leather covering the outside of it. It has a depressed oval in the middle with a strip of leather lining around the area. The ANH cod is slightly different in shape to the ESB/ROTJ cod. 

My cod was made by CRPROPS on Etsy.

THE BOOTS:

The boots are simply knee high riding or military officer boots. Either or works as they are styled the same. They are a dull black and have no tread on the sole or any visible zipper of any kind. 

The original costume barely exists today. Only the face mask and gloves are accounted for. The belt and buckle were reused in ESB but their where abouts is unknown today. My replica and many other screen accurate replicas are really the only way to see the ANH costume as it was during production of the film.

You can see pictures of my Vader on Instagram @ohio_starwars_prop_and_costume.