“The last shot was the most difficult and the most satisfying—it’s an 11/2 second take that required split-second timing to coordinate the actors, hundreds of feet away, with the model.” (to make it appear very large) and the actors playing the explorers would be xchundreds of feet from the camera (to appear much smaller than the model) and both would have to be held in focus. If the model were too small it would have to be placed too close to the camera and be outside of the range of focus. (On the other hand, the larger the rocket, the longer it would take to build—the more time, effort and money it would require and so on. Muren thought the shot could be done with a two-foot model. ‘The basic form was turned on a lathe from dense styrofoam, When the foam matched the pattern, a negative mold was cast in sections. ‘The positive was cast with auto body putty, slush molded. The casting ‘was then assembled and followed by ‘many hours of sanding to achieve a perfectly smooth and even surface ‘The slightest flaw in the surface of the model would destroy the illusion that the foreground miniature ‘Above: Mike Matney adjusts foreground rocks that were bullt by Tom Scherman ‘and Milce Minor. perspective shot sought to create. | carved out the door opening Finally the model was painted land inserted a piece of girder from 2 with fiberglass resin, sprayed with _toy that looked right for the struc: ‘gray primer and allowed to dry. tural members of the rocket Just in “After a few hours," says Scherman, side the door frame. Since the door “(sprayed it with a candy apple ‘was supposed to be open for the silver base and then with spray shot, | thought it would be nice if ‘aluminum paint. | did it on a alt: you could see just alittle bit of the ‘and-half basis so the rocket didn’t interior structure, shine or glitter too much but still “The portholes are clear plastic had that dull aluminum look doll’ eyes. | drilled a small hole into. ‘The fins were simply cut out of the body where the porthole was balsa wood and glued into position. supposed to go, painted the inside The ladder rungs are ordinary black and then epoxied the clear staples, "I very carefully measured _plestic eye over it. The portholes how far apart the rungs should be have just a little glint to them and and laid out a pattern in tape on the you can just see in. rocket. Then, with a very fine drill, I “The next problem was to find a made a tiny hole through the resin and into the styrofoam, being very ‘careful not to crack the resin, and drilling, of course, two holes for ‘each staple, up and down the body of the rocket. Then I pulled off the tape and pressed in each staple by hhand until it was within about 1/8 Inch of the surface. Below: The completed fore- ‘ground ministure showing allgn- ‘ent of camera miniature rock.