By Nathan Davis.

Imagining the frogs are little X-Wings can only help.

A monkey is outfitted with a cane and a mask and measured. The simian was also briefly considered for walking shots of Minch-Yoda that would have been impossible to execute with a puppet.

Vanity Fair has a collection of shots from the new Making of Empire book.

I remember seeing low-res versions of these (or something very similar) a while ago that were more awesome idea than awesome but these finished products are pretty cool:

Check out the Ninja Star: Wars set at Spoke.

What if the Rebel Alliance had used Powerpoint during the Death Star briefing?

Amusing as the image is the article does make a fair point: if your presentation is you reading out the words on your slides I don’t need both you and the slide, I’m quite capable of reading.

A great piece about the creation of Chewbacca (it turns out it’s a little more than George’s dog, Indiana):

Chewbacca, the character, also started his life in the rough draft (May 1974) as a kind of barbarian alien prince on the jungle planet of Yavin:

…The eight foot Chewbacca, who resembles a huge, grey bushbaby with fierce baboon-like fang…

The article has great background on the development of Chewie’s appearance and story arc (or lack of unless you subscribe to an alternative interpretation) along with great concept art and costume images.

I think my favourite image is this one of Ralph McQuarrie’s where a Storm Trooper is wielding a lightsaber:

Also for anyone who’s interested: the original Jabba/Han scene from A New Hope with Jabba as a human gangster with an Irish lilt.

(via Kottke)