Planet of the Apes set design

"The spaceship was initially done as a sculptural model. From that, they tried to draft the set traditionally, but were unsuccessful because the geometry was so complex...there were so many pinnacles. They called me up and I was able to create a form•Z model of the physical model. form•Z allowed me to take section cuts at any point and produce construction drawings from them. Because of its complexity, the whole thing was built in 20 foot sections. It was enormous." "All the parts were constructed in LA and had to be taken to the Mojave Desert, where the scene was shot. There were seven truckloads worth of pinnacles alone. Each of the pinnacles were nearly 100 feet long. The final product ended up being equivalent to a 10-story building tilted at about 30 degrees. It was a real challenge because the footings had been placed in the sand nearly a month before the pinnacles were put in. There was absolutely no room for error. Due to form•Z's precision, the whole thing went together beautifully from the draftings."

"PLANET OF THE APES" © 2001 Twentieth Century Fox. All rights reserved.