Tommy writes:
There are few elements of popular culture created in the
last fifty years that are as iconic as the line of Star Wars action figures
released by Kenner in the late 70s and early 80s. They are a vital part of a lot of childhoods,
both during the original trilogy years and in the decades since. They’ve been featured in movies and
commercials countless times over the years, representing something deeper in popular culture. They’ve taken on a life of their own, becoming an icon that’s separate
from the films or even the characters themselves.
To my way of thinking, those toys were art. They told a story that was their own, growing
and changing as the years went on. They
were the actors and props used to enact whatever adventures and dramas a child
could dream. The toys were the product
of the talent and dedication of hundreds of artists, all working together to
create something which has been beloved by millions of people the world over. While many might dismiss their achievement as
being merely commercial design work and not representing true artistic vision, I am of
the opinion that the people behind the toys were very talented artists and craftspeople. They had skill and imagination which few could match. I don’t understand why anyone would ever hesitate
to call their creations “art,” especially the early stages of the production
process. It might not be art that
everyone appreciates, but that doesn’t make its artistic merit any less worthy of respect. The toys are as much art as the
films themselves, or Frank Lloyd Wright’s designs, or the Sistine Chapel, or
any of the other ten thousand works which were originally done as commercial
enterprises but which are now celebrated because they spoke to something deeper in us.
To me, the toys are small plastic works of art, presented to
children at $1.79 a pop. I believe the imagination of the artists who created them should be appreciated and remembered.
Since there seems to be a general confusion among many Star
Wars fans about how the vintage Star Wars action figures were created by those
artists however, I thought I’d offer a step-by-step analysis. I will try to break down the collecting and
engineering jargon into its simplest terms, because I’m assuming that most of
the people reading this will be doing so out of curiosity and not because they
have any real familiarity with the process or desire to understand every single
complexity. I am trying to write this as an easy to understand overview of the production process, rather than describing every last detail. As such, if I oversimplify something or miss an aspect of a particular stage, you'll have to forgive me.
Unlike the other online
and print resources which attempt to illustrate the stages of production however, I’m going to be able to do it using only one action figure for all of my
examples. My assistant will be everyone’s favorite character from the Star Wars saga: Kea Moll.
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| Kea Moll |
For the uninitiated, Kea Moll is a secondary character from
the first arc of the animated Droids TV show, which ran for one season in 1985. The show followed the adventures of C-3PO and
R2-D2 before the events of A New Hope (Episode IV), filling in the gap between
the prequel and original trilogies. Kea
essentially served as the show’s “Leia” character for 1/3 of its run; a Rebel
freedom fighter and pilot who befriends our protagonists. To be honest, she doesn’t do a whole lot
that’s especially noteworthy. She is
probably as strong a female character as you’re going to find in an ‘80s cartoon
show though, which is something, but doesn’t automatically make her a
celebrated icon of female empowerment in the Star Wars fan community. No matter how unimportant she may be to most people though, an incredible number of things related to her character were
saved. A true… Moll-titude of items (…sorry).
There are simply more surviving stages of the Kea Moll
action figure around than almost any other from the vintage era. For whatever reason, examples of just about every
stage of her production were saved and I was able to acquire them over the
course of the last 17 years. As such,
Kea Moll can guide us through each step and illustrate how Star Wars action figures
were (and for the most part still are) manufactured.
Now, since she’s an animated character rather than an actor
in one of the feature films, there are obviously going to be extra steps in her
production process that a Luke Skywalker figure, for example, wouldn’t have
gone through. But generally, those are
design considerations rather than a question of the process itself. The basic stages of production would be the
same whether we’re talking about Kea Moll, Boba Fett or the Rancor. Toy production is a pretty standard
enterprise, no matter the character or line. We’re just going to start our journey a little earlier in the process
than we would need to for a trilogy character played by an actor, since you
can’t make an action figure of a character if you don’t even know what the
character looks like.
NOTE: for the purposes of this article, I will for the most
part refer to the parties involved as “Kenner,” despite the fact that some of
the tasks were actually performed by outside vendors or contractors. This isn’t to downplay the contributions of
those artists or companies, it’s merely for clarity. I’m trying to keep this article as simple as
possible, and toy production is complicated enough without involving the names
of half a dozen different companies.
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| Kea Moll figure, MOC (in awful condition... don't judge me) |
Production Kea Moll Figure:
Since we are dealing with such an obscure character, perhaps
it would be best to first show the final toy in question so that you will be
able to recognize it as the production process goes along.
This is a vintage carded Droids Kea Moll figure, released by
Kenner in 1985 (yes, this particular
example is in *terrible* condition, but that’s beside the point.) This is the final product which we are trying
to reach. We are quite literally going
to see every step until we get to this point again, from almost the moment of Kea Moll’s
creation up until the point these action figures started lining shelves across
the world. When a stage of this
production process is missing, which very few of the important ones are, I will try to note where it
would be placed in the sequence and link to a picture/description of what the stage
entailed.
Now that you know who Kea is and what her final toy looked
like, we can start at the very beginning and show how we get to this
point. Some of this stuff has never been
seen publicly before.
The Birth of Kea Moll
Part I: Making the Character and Figure
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| Original Script to "The White Witch" |
Droids Script:
If you wish to make a Kea Moll action figure from scratch, you
must first create Kea Moll. As such,
Kea’s birth begins here, with this original production used copy of a script
from the Droids Star Wars cartoon show, written in 1984. This isn't a modern photocopy -- this is the
studio file copy of the final draft script, meaning it was the exact copy which
was kept by the studio in case they ever needed it for some reason.
It's "The White Witch," the first episode, in the
first arc, of the show’s only season. It
is also the first appearance of Kea Moll, which is what we’re concerned with at
the moment. This script is essentially
the first time her name appears in print in any kind of official capacity, so
this is basically where she is “born.” In
her first scene, her character is listed as "The Watcher," which is
pretty awesome and makes her sound far more exciting than she actually is. Since this is still a draft script and not the
final script however, the dialogue in this version is a little different in
some places. Kea is portrayed more as a
grease monkey than she is in the final cartoon, talking with Thall (our
protagonist and owner of the Droids) about his speeder using racing jargon and the like.
This draft of the script doesn’t specifically physically describe
her however, referring to her only as "a girl," "The Girl,"
or "a teenage girl.” Since
animation is a visual medium, this obviously presents a bit of a problem.
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| Copies of Early Nelvana Concept Art of Kea Moll |
Nelvana Character Designs:
Once the animation team decides a character is needed, the
character designer begins coming up with designs for her, in sketches very much
like these. These are modern copies of early
Nelvana sketches, originally drawn by one of their character designers. It was his/her job to just sketch random
characters and things needed for the production of the cartoon. The character designer typically draws a
number of different characters, letting their imagination run wild, until one
of their creations speaks to him/her and that becomes the official “look” for a
given character. The design can greatly
affect the character, which is why it’s sometimes done before the script is even
written or the story finalized.
You’ll notice that in this early art, Kea almost always has
one hand on her hip and one stretched out, gesturing to something. The character designer seems to have been
going for a casual street-smart self-confidence and familiarity with a
dangerous lifestyle. The character’s last
name is "Moll" after the prohibition era "gun moll," the
tough gun-toting girlfriend of a gangster. They named her ship “The Star Runner,” after
the Rum Runners of the prohibition era to fit in with this idea. I assume they tried to pose her in a
self-confident and slightly flirtatious way in this early art to get that idea
across. The character designer’s
decision to give Kea a certain confident swagger could also be why the dialogue
in the final cartoon was changed, downplaying her mechanic background and
making her more of a fighter. Thall Joben and
Jord Dusat do most of the mechanical stuff in the final cartoon, while Kea does most
of the fighting. She is one of the few
characters in the entire run of the series who can actually hit what she’s
shooting at, which given the accuracy of weapons in the Star Wars universe, is
quite an accomplishment.
Nelvana and Kenner were working together closely at the time,
since Kenner was planning a line of action figures based on the Droids cartoon. As any child of the ‘80s could tell you,
cartoons of the era were often little more than animated toy commercials and
that meant that the animation studio and the toy company needed to be on the
same page at all times. As such, Nelvana
sent Kenner copies of their early artwork for the series, so that the toy
company could begin their own preliminary work on Kea.
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| Kenner's Kea Concept Art |
Kenner's Concept Art:
This is a modern print from an original slide showing Kenner’s version of the
first Kea Moll concept art Nelvana sent to them. Kenner redrew Nelvana’s art, making it clearer and focused
solely on Kea, so that they could get a better sense of who the character was. At this point in her creation, Kea is a blonde
and dressed in a much more colorful outfit than she’d end up wearing.
Sadly, to the best of my knowledge, the original art seen in
this slide no longer exists.
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| Concept 1 Kea Moll Sculpt |
Original Concept 1 Kea Moll Painted Wax Sculpt:
Kenner took the early image of Kea Moll they
created and used it as reference to sculpt this non-poseable conceptual prototype
out of wax. This is the very first time
the character was ever realized in 3D. Since
this is based on the early concept art, she is sculpted in the exact same pose,
still a blonde and still in her colorful outfit.
Kenner seems to have literally been doing a 3D
representation of the concept art here. It's
an almost exact recreation. I don't know
what purpose they would have had for this, but I seriously doubt this wax
figure was ever intended to be used to create anything in this form, especially
since they almost immediately began work on a more refined sculpt for the
character.
I think they worked up this
rough little wax figure and painted it for some kind of meeting or
presentation, in order to show the
Droids characters as 3D toys.
When the meeting was over, they put it aside
and forgot about it.
Concept 2 Kea Moll Clay Rough:
As a followup to the Concept 1 Kea, Kenner immediately started work on a second. The first stage of the Concept 2 Kea would have been a clay rough, which can be thought of as a preliminary rough draft of the figure. The details on the figure are vague, for the most part, since all that matters is the general shape. The purpose of the clay rough is to make the sculptor's job easier once the sculpt reaches the wax stage, since the figure will already be in the right general shape and all he'll have to do is add in the details and refine things.
Once the clay rough is done, the sculptor makes a silicon mold of it and pours in the wax to produce an exact copy of his work in the new material. Very few clay roughs from the vintage era survive, but an example can be seen
here.
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| Concept 2 Kea Moll Wax Cast |
Concept 2 Kea Moll Wax Cast:
A
wax cast doesn't really serve a role in the production process, but
might have served a purpose to the sculptor. Oftentimes, the sculptor
would store excess wax in the silicon molds he had created, which also
helped to ensure that the mold kept its shape and didn't get distorted
over time. When the wax was needed, he'd pop it out and use it. Any
excess got poured back into the mold, and the process started over
again.
In this case, it appears that the sculptor was keeping
wax in the silicon mold made off the Concept 2 Kea clay rough. As such,
since this is a wax copy of the clay rough, this is our only look at what the earliest stage of the Concept 2 figure looked like. These little wax casts thus not only represent what the Concept 2 clay rough looked like, but also represents what the Concept 2 wax sculpt looked like before the sculptor
started refining it by hand in the next step. You can see the details are very general here, just giving hints at what the final figure will look like.
It
could also be that this wax casts represents an attempt by the sculptor
at getting a jump on the sculpt for the final figure, bypassing the concept figures altogether. He could use the
wax cast of the Concept 2 as reference or even in place of a clay
rough for the final figure, just to give a general shape which he could
further refine in the sculpt of the final toy. This would save him time, if it worked. There's no
real evidence that that's the case here, but it's possible.
Sadly, since it was most likely just for storing the wax, large sections of
this cast were melted down and recycled by the sculptor for use on other
projects.
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| Concept 2 Kea Moll Sculpt |
Original Wax Sculpt to Concept 2 Kea Moll:
This is the wax sculpt which resulted from the sculptor refining the detail on a wax cast identical to the ones seen in the last step. The sculptor made a mold of the clay rough, then poured this wax into it. He then refined the sculpt by hand, adding all the details. You can see it takes a considerable amount of work to make the wax cast of the clay rough into a presentable sculpt.
By this point, Kea has begun to look more like
an action figure rather than a little statue like she did in the Concept 1
version, although she is still non-poseable here. She's gotten curvier though and her hairstyle
has changed slightly. The Concept 1 Kea
was merely a 3D recreation of the concept art, but this revised sculpt is the
first time Kenner starts to do its own thing with the character and make her a
little more toy-like in appearance.
You can see some faint pencil marks, most notably on the
inside of her arm. These were put there
by the sculptor to show where the parting lines on the figure would be, as the
two halves of the mold come together.
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| Concept 2 Kea Moll Hardcopy |
Concept 2 Kea Moll Hardcopy:
This is the painted non-posable
hardcopy, made from the Concept 2 Kea wax sculpt. The hardcopy is exactly what it sounds like:
a hard copy of the wax sculpt. The
figure is cast in resin because Kenner needed to create a more durable copy of
the sculpt, so that they could use it for a variety of internal purposes like
design meetings and presentations, without risking harm to the fragile wax of
the original.
I know of nowhere this concept was used however and they
certainly didn’t create steel tooling with it, which is the main purpose of a
hardcopy. This is also the only hardcopy
of this figure that I know of, so whatever role it played, it was evidently a
small one. You can see remains of glue on its feet, so it was apparently used in some sort of photography or display.
It also seems to have been created very close in time to the Concept 1 Kea, since the alternate outfit is exactly the same and her hair is
still blonde on both. Judging from
Nelvana’s art, she wasn't blonde and wearing that style outfit for very long in
her development, so I think Kenner did the Concept 1 Kea and then immediately
did this second concept of her.
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| Conceptual Kea Moll Mock-up seen in Kenner Photography |
Photo Negative of Conceptual Mock-up Kea:
This internal Kenner photo negative (this is
a positive modern print of it) shows what would have been the first time Kea Moll was shown on
cardback. The mock-up was created using
a cardboard cutout of Kea inside the bubble, since the actual figure wasn't
ready yet.
This particular mock-up was created at some point after the Concept 2 Kea hadcopy was made, but before the actual final figure was sculpted. You can tell this because the cardboard
cutout of Kea has brown hair, while the Concept 1 and 2 Keas both have blonde
hair.
Interestingly though, Kenner simply reused Nelvana's
conceptual art for the images of the characters on this mock-up cardback. They
copied the early art sent to them by Nelvana and simply changed Kea's hair
color in the image. But otherwise, Kea,
Thall and Jord are lifted entirely from that early art.
The art for the Kea cardboard cutout used here actually
still exists as well and can be seen
here.
Nelvana's Final Character Designs:
While Kenner was busy taking the first steps in the creation of the Kea Moll action figure,
Nelvana was still working on the character themselves. Nelvana had previously sent Kenner conceptual
designs for Kea, but they were never meant to be her final look.
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| Original Art for Kea Moll Model Sheet |
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| Original Art for Kea Moll Model Sheet |
Original Pencils for the Kea Moll Character Animation Model Sheet:
These were the final design images
Nelvana sent to LFL to show them what they wanted the character to look like,
and one presumes, Kenner received a copy of them as well. Once approved by LFL, these images were copied
into a collage and sent to all the animators at Nelvana, becoming the basis for every time Kea
is shown in the cartoon. This allowed the
animators of the cartoon to keep her look consistent throughout the series -- a
difficult task considering the hundreds of thousands of individual animation cels
needed to produce the show. If they drew
something that didn't match the look shown here, it was deemed "off
model" and would be redrawn. As
such, these are, in a sense, the images of Kea Moll, from which all others are
based. Whatever Nelvana drew or Kenner
sculpted after this, it would need to match these drawings.
You can see the stamp from Lucasfilm, indicating that it was
approved by Lucas, as well as the signature of someone named "Ken." I don't believe that’s the artist, but rather
the director of the Droids series, Ken Stephenson, signing off on this version of
the character.
Once the model sheet is approved, Nelvana set about working
on the model cel.
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| Kea Moll Model Cel |
Original Kea Moll Model Cel:
This cel wasn't used
anywhere in the cartoon itself, because it was used everywhere in the cartoon. It's
using the model sheet pencils as a base, but instead of showing the animators
the correct way to draw Kea, the model cel is showing the ink and paint
department which colors to paint Kea and where. This helped to ensure that her look was
consistent throughout the series and that she didn't suddenly have different
color hair or clothes.
Blueprint/Color Specification Sheet:
At this point, Nelvana probably would have shared the model
sheet and model cel with Kenner so that Kenner would know exactly what Kea
looked like in the final cartoon.
Since
Nelvana’s work was drawn from an animation perspective though, Kenner would
have had to take that art and do their own turn-arounds of it from a sculpting
and engineering perspective, very much like this
Sy Snootles Color Specification Sheet.
The drawings/blueprints Kenner produced (which collectors sometimes call "Color Specification Sheets") would have had
to show the proposed figure from every angle, the scale of the figure, the colors used, and make
note of any engineering challenges or features which would need to be included.
Sadly, the color specification sheet of Kea Moll has never turned up.
It is at this stage that most of the figures based on trilogy characters would have begun, since it's the stage where reference photos become translated into a toy. Kea had to go through the character design process first, but an actor wouldn't need that, obviously. Internal LFL photographs of the actors and costumes would be sent to Kenner, and the turnarounds done from those.
Engineering Drawing/Technical Rendering:
During this time period, the accessory destined to be
included with the Kea Moll figure would also have been planned.
Since the weapon chosen for Kea was a
recycled Squidhead blaster from Kenner’s
Return of the Jedi line (replaced with
a grey Stormtrooper rifle in the Brazilian release of the Kea Moll figure), no
additional steps would be needed to produce her accessory.
Kenner already had the finished toy on hand,
so all they had to do was start producing them for Kea’s figure as well. If Kenner had chosen to create a unique
weapon for her however, they would need to design it and create a blueprint for
it at this time too, in order to ensure that it could fit into the figure’s
hand. The resulting plan would look like this
technical rendering for the of Klaatu Skiff Guard Weapon. Once the technical rendering was made, the
weapon would follow the same basic stages of production as the figure itself.
Figure Mock-up/Kit-bashed Figure:
Kenner would occasionally decide to create a preliminary
version of a figure or toy using existing parts which they modified.
Sometimes they recycled their own toys,
sometimes they’d use a competitor's, pieces of a model kit, whatever worked best to achieve the look
they wanted.
They'd repaint them, add
additional sculpted details, swap out parts, etc.
The only purpose of these Franken-figures
were as mock-ups to show what the completed figures might look like.
They were simply preliminary models, not
something ever intended to be final.
The
most famous example of this is probably the
kit-bashed Boba Fett action figure, which appeared in
a number of early materials.
In the case of Kea Moll, no such figure was needed, since
Kenner already had the conceptual versions of the figure and the cardboard
cutout of the concept art they used in the mock-up cardback. If they needed a model of the figure, they
already had several options and no additional mock-up figures were needed.
Original Kea Moll Wax Sculpt:
Now that Kenner received the final design for the character and
had planned out the accessory, they could begin sculpting the final action figure
itself. Unfortunately for them, in this
instance, the change from concept character to final design was drastic. No elements of their conceptual sculpt could
be recycled, although a wax cast of the Concept 2 Kea might have been used as a starting point for the sculptor. It theoretically could have been possible, but whether or not the sculptor tried to go in that direction is unknown. In either case, a new sculpt was created.
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| Original Wax Sculpt for the Kea Moll Action Figure |
These are the original wax sculpts for Kea Moll’s head and
arms. Each is sculpted by hand around a
plastic disk to make assembling the sculpt easier and to provide a base for the
wax.
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| Wax sculpt of Kea's left arm compared to production figure |
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| Wax sculpt of Kea's head compared to production figure |
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| Wax sculpt to Kea's right arm compared to production figure |
When you compare it to the
production figure, you can see the loss of detail and general distortion which
results from the molding and tooling processes. The production figure looks bloated and almost melted in comparison to
the fine detail of the sculpt. Think of
it like making a Xerox; the further you get from the original document, the
more detail you lose. The wax sculpt is
very clear, but by the time you get to the production figure (a copy of a copy), the figure
doesn’t look as sharp. In fact, the Kea
figure ends up being rather homely at the end of the process. But no matter how it ended up, every single Kea Moll figure ever released
is a copy of this sculpt.
Again, you can make out the pencil lines the sculptor added
to show where the parting lines on the figure would be. It
is important to plan that out, as it can have a profound effect on the final
figure. If planned incorrectly, it could
destroy the sculpt in the mold-making process or greatly increase the cost of
production. In this case, the sculptor has also added in
Kea’s eyes to make her face complete and give it character.
Sadly, the sculpts of Kea’s torso and legs do not appear to
have survived and this is all that remains of her sculpt today.
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| Hardcopy Kea Moll |
Kea Moll "Paintmaster" Hardcopy:
At this point in the creation of the figure, Kenner made a
hardcopy of the Kea sculpt.
Again, a hardcopy
is a hand-made resin copy of the original wax sculpt, created to
provide a harder figure which could be used as a step in tooling the final steel molds.
The hardcopy was created by making a silicon
mold of the sculpt and then pouring in a white/off-white resin material that Kenner used
on a lot of
Droids and
Power of the Force era prototypes.
Once removed from the mold, the new figure
would be a hard resin copy of the sculpt. The limbs and head of the figure are typically held in with pins and are removable.
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| Photosample Hardcopy Kea Moll, showing how limbs are removable |
The role of the hardcopy is rather technical, but to
simplify the process in your mind: imagine needing to use a machine to trace
every detail of a wax sculpt using an ice pick or needle. You wouldn’t be able to do it, because the
sharp point would destroy the delicate wax. It's too soft and can't be used for the job. As such, a copy of the sculpt in a harder and more durable
material was created, so that it could better stand up to that process.
Since hardcopies are copies of the sculpt, they are much
more detailed than the production figure, as they’re one step closer to the
original. They are also slightly larger,
due to the shinkage of the final plastics used on the production figure and the
general loss of size from the mold-making process. Generally, each generation (our Xerox copies analogy again) is going to be slightly smaller than the one before it. Hardcopies do not have copyrights or footholes, and
they aren’t made of plastic (they're made of resin). All of that
comes later in the process, once the final steel molds are created. Hardcopies are a product of the silicon mold made from the wax sculpt, and none of that was molded in yet.
This particular Kea Moll hardcopy is called a "paintmaster" because it's job concerned the paint details on the figure, rather than being created to help tool the steel molds (the "tooling master," which wouldn't have been painted). If you’ve ever looked on the back of a toy’s packaging and
thought to yourself, “Hey, that doesn’t look anything like my toy. It’s more detailed and beautifully painted,”
that’s because you’re almost certainly looking at a paintmaster hardcopy. Photography is one of their primary
purposes, since the pictures for the packaging were usually taken before the
final figures were ready, and the extra details/hand-painting made the paintmaster hardcopies look better
in pictures than a production toy would anyway.
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| Paint Chips, connected by a keychain |
Kea Moll Paint Chips:
To accompany the paintmaster hardcopy, Kenner also created these paint
chips (sometimes called “paint swatches”), in order to show vendors (the people
overseas who actually produce the toys for Kenner) the correct colors to use
when painting Kea. Much in the way the
model cel kept the colors on every animation cel depicting Kea consistent,
these paint swatches made sure every Kea action figure would be the same
colors.
The back of each swatch is marked "Kea,"
unsurprisingly. Sadly, the blue swatch,
showing the color for Kea’s eyes, was lost to time.
Mock-up Stage:
Once Kenner had a tangible and durable prototype of the
figure in hand, they often used it in a carded mock-up. A carded mock-up is a figure (a hardcopy, a
first shot or sometimes even a production figure), paired with a matching proof
card and presented as a stand-in for the final packaged toy. Typically, Kenner would hand-cut a plastic
bubble, stick a hardcopy or first shot in it and glue/tape it onto a
proof. This allowed them to get a real
sense of what the toy would look like once it hit the shelves. Mock-ups were also sometimes used in
photography and trade shows to announce the figure. Many of the carded figures seen in vintage
Kenner commercials were actually mock-ups, simply because that was all Kenner
had at the time, since the production versions weren’t finished yet.
No Kea mock-ups have ever been found, but you can get an idea what the step looks like
here.
Protomold:
At this point of the process, Kenner occasionally produced
a stage called a “
protomold” (sometimes incorrectly called an "Internal First Shot" by collectors). No Kea figures of this stage have ever been found, if they were made at all.
Essentially, the stage involves locally producing figures in low yield aluminum molds, rather than waiting for the overseas
vendors to send back the toys created in the final steel molds. These figures wouldn't have been used in the tooling process, like the hardcopy, but rather for photography and to simply have additional samples of the figure on hand. The details on a protomold are sometimes rougher than you'd see on a hardcopy or even the production figure. They're also sometimes smaller than the production figure and they lack footholes and copyright markings.
Tooling Aid:
The hardcopy is used
as a stage in the creation of the steel molds which make the production figures, but it does not create the
steel molds by itself. The hardcopy
is used to create the tooling aid, which creates the tooling (the final
steel production mold.) Unfortunately, collectors don't really know a lot about what those
tooling aids for the 3 3/4" figures looked like. Judging from other toy
lines though, the tooling aid would have been created using the hardcopy
and would have been a negative copy of the front and back of the
figure. So, imagine two blocks, one with an impression of the front
half of the figure and one with an impression of the back half of the
figure. The details of these tooling aid blocks would then be traced and tooled into the steel mold, copying them. Some pieces/parts may have used a different means or even produced molds in metals other than steel, but that's the basic idea behind this stage.
For collectors though, we usually just say
that the hardcopy creates the steel molds, simply because it's easier to
understand and isn't a question mark. Plus, most collectors don't care
about the stage anyway, since no tooling aids for the 3 3/4" figures have ever
shown up.
For the sake of completeness though, this is where the tooling aid would go in our rundown of the process.
Steel Mold:
While one Kea hardcopy was used as a paintmaster to guide
the painting process using the paint swatches, another Kea hardcopy was used as the tooling master, which creates the tooling aid, which makes the final steel molds. So, the steel mold is a
copy of the tooling aid, which is a negative copy of the tooling master
hardcopy, which is a resin copy of the original wax sculpt.
Wax Sculpt -> Tooling Master Hardcopy -> Tooling Aid -> Steel Mold
The steel molds are what actually produce all of the Kea Moll figures that Kenner wants to sell. Every figure sent to stores is a product of the steel molds.
For lack of a better analogy, think of the final steel molds
as a muffin pan.
You pour in the batter
(plastic) and out comes the muffin (figure).
Only in this case, the plastic/batter is shot into the mold under pressure, filling up the Kea Moll shaped cavity
created as the two halves of the mold/muffin pan close, and then the mold opens
again.
Tiny automatic pins in the mold
eject the toy pieces from the mold into a bin and the process repeats.
If you’ve ever looked on the back of a
plastic army man or model kit and saw round circles in the plastic, that’s the imprint of the ejector pin, which pushed the plastic piece from the mold while it was still soft. You can see an example of a steel mold
here.
Since the creation of an action figure is a large-scale
enterprise interested in quantity and speed, the steel molds would produce
several of each piece at a time, connected by plastic.
Again, if you think of how the pieces of a
model kit are all connected on single piece of plastic and you have to snap off
the pieces you want, that’s because they were all created in one mold.
The piece of plastic which remains from where the molten plastic was introduced to the mold and connects the
pieces, is called a sprue.
Vintage
Star Wars figures were manufactured much the same way, and you can see an awesome example
here. Sadly, no
examples of Kea Moll pieces with the sprues still attached have ever been found.
Bench Shot:
A “
bench shot” is a figure made at the mold-making facility, rather than being made at the overseas vendor which produced the production figures for Kenner. The mold-maker uses the tooling aid to create the steel mold, tests it out with whatever plastic he has on hand at the time, then sends the completed mold off to the factory. Those figures he produces as tests would be bench shots.
To be perfectly honest, I don't completely understand this stage and I don't know anyone who does. It's so obscure and so rarely seen that collectors don't know a whole lot about it. It's one of those stages where there are two or three pieces which are confirmed bench shots based on their provenance, and then others which are questions marks because the figures look almost exactly like first shots produced later by the vendor. Collectors come up with various theories on how to spot them and what the differences might be, but none of it is really definitive, so I won't speculate. For informational purposes
however, this is where the step would fall in the production process.
Since no Kea figures of this stage have ever been found though, the point is moot.
 |
| Kea Moll Pull-Test First Shots |
Kea Moll First Shots (Pull Tests):
Once the steel mold is created and sent to the vendor, those first figures out of it
are called first shots.
A first shot is
exactly what it sounds like: it’s the first time plastic is shot into the steel
mold by the vendor. Again to use the muffin analogy: they're the first muffin out of the oven, which the baker taste tests.
So, the process so far goes:
Wax Sculpt -> Hardcopy -> Tooling Aid -> Steel Molds -> First Shots
A first shot is created by
machine, using production quality plastic, in the final steel mold. It lacks the detail of the hardcopy, since it's one (technically two) generations later, and is a product of the final steel production mold, which means it is the same
size as the production figure. The first
shot also typically lacks copyright markings and (occasionally) the footholes on the bottom of
the figure’s feet, which were all added to the steel molds at a later time.
The two shown are shot in non-production colors, most
likely because that’s simply the color plastic the company had in the machine
that day. Since first shots were not
meant to be sold to the public, it really didn’t matter what color they were
shot in. They were simply tests of the
machine. The headless one is not
sonic-welded, meaning all its limbs are removable, and each has been marked and
numbered by an engineer at the factory. The second first shot is complete.
This variation of Kea Moll first shot is usually referred to
as a "pull-test," which means that Kenner tested the figure's construction by
seeing how much force it would take to rip off Kea's head and limbs. Since many of the pieces used to create an
action figure could present a choking hazard to children, it was important to
see if a child could easily remove and swallow them.
 |
| Partially Painted and Fully Painted Kea Moll First Shots |
Kea Moll First Shots:
Once Kea passed the pull test, the company was ready to start
doing other first shots, continuing to try out the steel mold.
As the figure nears completion, it comes
closer and closer to the final look.
The Kea figures still lack footholes and copyrights however. While most first shots have footholes, Kea is one of the exceptions and first shots of her can be found without them.
 |
| First Shot Kea Moll compared to production figure. Notice the lack of footholes on the first shot. |
 |
| First shot compared to production figure showing the lack of copyrights on the first shot |
The
first shot on the left in the top picture has an unpainted head because the company was still working
on the final paint apps for the figure, while the second is fully painted.
Painting the figures (both the first shots and the final production figures) was done using a process called "paint masking," which can be thought of as a stencil. Essentially, the figure was covered with a metal shield which exposed only the parts of the figure which had to be painted a particular color. For example, there was a paint mask for the blue of Kea's eyes, meaning the paint mask would cover every bit of the figure except where that blue paint needed to go. That color was airbrushed in by hand, only reaching the figure in the open spaces left in the mask, and then another paint mask was put over the figure, exposing only the areas which needed to be painted in a different color. In this way, each color was painted in turn, as determined by the color specification sheet and the paint chips included with the hardcopy. It's a labor intensive and expensive process, which is why action figures typically use as few colors of painted details as possible.
Once she reached this stage, engineers would
have examined Kea, making sure she met all specifications and that changes
weren't needed. They would send the figure back to Kenner for their approval as well, such as this
Barada Bagged Sample. In this case, no changes
appear to have been made following the first shot (aside from some slightly different paint masking on
her eyes) and full-scale production of the figure began.
Engineering Pilot:
Once the steel molds were altered to include copyrights and
(in this case) footholes, an "engineering pilot" would be produced. An engineering pilot (“EP”) would basically be
a production figures for all intents and purposes.
EPs can be thought of as being
peri-production rather than pre-production, being "at, or near, the time
of production." It's literally a
case where EPs are production toys, they're just the first figures produced out
of the altered steel molds once the copyrights and footholes were added. They're pre-production only in the sense that
they still serve a purpose to the manufacturer and aren't sent to stores. However, they're truly of production quality
and only pre-date the production toy by a very small amount of time. They are the last step, as the engineer checks
the altered mold for issues. Sometimes
they're signed, sometimes they're not. Sometimes
they're tested again for durability, sometimes they're not. It's just a general term for the first figures
off the line when the steel mold is changed, and without provenance, they are
almost always indistinguishable from production toys. A nice example of an engineering pilot can be seen
here.
No Kea Moll EP figures have ever been found. They could very well exist, but since they’d
look identical to the production figure, it’s almost impossible to know.
After the engineers sign off on the EP, full-scale
production of the Kea Moll figure would begin.
Figure Production Process in Review
 |
| Kea Moll figure pre-production run: concept pieces lead to the original sculpt, which creates the hardcopy,
which helps create the steel mold, which produces the first shots and the final figures sold in stores. |
So, to recap the process so far: the writer created Kea Moll,
the character designer drew some basic images of what she looked like, Kenner
got the conceptual art of Kea Moll from Nelvana and had one of their artists do
their own version of it, Kenner used that art as a guide to sculpt the Concept 1 Kea in wax,
did a clay rough of the Concept 2 Kea and made a silicon mold of it, made a
wax cast in the Concept 2 Kea mold in order to store extra wax/preserve the mold, refined a different wax from the mold into the Concept 2 Kea sculpt, created a painted hardcopy of the Concept 2 Kea, did a mock-up of the carded figure using a revised design of the character in order to show what she'd look like when she hit the stores,
received the final character design of Kea from Nelvana, decided what weapon
should be included with Kea, sculpted an entirely new version of the figure out
of wax, made a silicon mold of the wax sculpt to produce resin hardcopies of
the sculpt so they'd be more durable, created paint swatches/chips to clearly show which colors of paint
to use on the final figure, used the hardcopy to create the tooling aid, used the tooling aid to create the steel mold, used the
steel mold to produce first shots in non-production colors as pull tests to
see how much force it would take to rip off Kea's arms and legs, produced partially and fully painted first
shots in the steel mold as tests, added copyrights and footholes to the mold,
produced some engineering pilots to double-check that everything was correct,
and finally began full-scale production.
Everyone still following me?
Good, because that isn’t the end of this.
Having the Kea Moll action figure in hand didn’t solve
all of Kenner’s problems.
They would still
need something to put the figure in.
Part II: Package Design
 |
| Original Art for the Kea Moll Packaging |
Original Kea Moll Cardback Art:
This is the first step in the package design process, the original
artwork to the Kea Moll action figure cardback. It's done kind of like an animation cel, where
Kenner (or in this case one of its outside art suppliers) took a clear sheet of
animation acetate with the character lineart on it, and then put the colors
down on an art board beneath it. This makes the contrast and definition of the
piece very high, because all of the black lines are on a separate removable sheet.
Since Kea changed so drastically from original concept to
the production figure, we can date when the artist was painting this cardback. Kea appears as she does in the final
cartoon and figure, so this cardback was painted later than the Concept 2 Kea and
(obviously) the cardback mock-up. Which
means that Kenner was working on the figure at a considerably earlier date than
the cardback. Which is obvious when you
really think about it, since the figure takes more lead-in time and is a more
involved process than printing cardbacks. Still, this is probably one of the only times in the vintage line that
this scheduling is so apparent.
Kenner didn’t pull the layout for this art out of thin air
though, and both Kea’s pose and the hallway she's standing in were part of Nelvana
concept art. Most of the Droids
cardbacks were taken almost exactly from the earliest Nelvana art. Unfortunately, I've never actually found the
final conceptual image used as the basis for this cardback in Nelvana's art. I suspect there was one, based on sketches and
later conceptual uses of this hallway, but it's currently missing.
As a side-note: if you look carefully, the guy in the background standing
against the wall behind Kea has no head.
 |
| The Headless Alien ("Yargmot Vemy") on the production Kea Moll cardback |
I have no idea why he was painted that way, but there are no signs his
head was painted over. The character
also appears in conceptual art of the hallway (but not in the actual cartoon) which
means he was deliberately drawn without a head for some reason. The cardbacks to the Droids figures are weird
sometimes.
I once took a poll in the vintage community to give the headless guy an unofficial Expanded Universe-style complicated name, and the winner was: "Yargmot Vemy." So, there you go. His official unofficial name.
Incidentally, for the trilogy figures, the cardbacks are
photoart, rather than original art. Basically, photos of the character are heavily modified and airbrushed to create the look the artist wants. Then, they're used exactly like the artwork here would be. They serve the same purpose, they just have a different name and a different origin.
Layout Board/Mechanical:
The next step in the process is to create a mechanical of
the cardback. Black and white copies of
each component (art, logo, text, etc) are glued down onto an art board, planning
out where everything needs to go and what size it needs to be. This allows the printer to see how it’s all
going to fit together and what it will look like once the card goes to press.
To date, no mechanicals of the Kea Moll cardback have turned up.
 |
| Kea Moll cardback films, each showing where one color would go on the final packaging |
Kea Separation Sheets/Films:
Now that Kenner has received the final Kea cardback art from
their art supplier and used the mechanical to plan out how it should be
arranged, the next step is to turn the art into films, which help to create the
actual plates which would be used to print the final cardback. Each of these separation sheets represent one
of the colors used in the final image: cyan, magenta, yellow and black. So, for example, the black sheet shows only where black ink needs to go on the final cardback, and the yellow sheet shows only the yellow, etc. The 4-color printing process needs to lay down
each color in turn, producing the final image once the cardback went to press.
 |
| Kea Moll Cromalin |
Kea Moll Cromalin:
The film/separation sheets were used to create the "cromalin,"
which allow the printer to do color management and correction, in addition to simply
check that everything is as it should be on the cardback. In other words, the proofing of the cardback
was done at this stage. Cromalins are
one-sided and printed on slick photo-like paper. Each color on a cromalin is actually printed
separately on a clear sheet and then affixed together into one image, which
creates very vibrant colors. The process
is expensive though, so there are typically fewer cromalins of each character
than proofs. For Kea Moll, 3 cromalins
were created, which is a large number for a vintage figure. Typically, most vintage figures only required
one cromalin.
Since the primary purpose of the cromalin is to proof colors
and text, many of them are marked up with changes that are needed. In this example, you can see where the printer
has circled imperfections in the image, so that they can be corrected on the
films. This helps to ensure that the
image is perfect when the plates are created and the cardback sent to press.
 |
| Kea Moll Proof Card |
Kea Moll Proof Card:
This proof card is an early printing of the Kea Moll cardback,
done for internal purposes such as mock-ups and samples. It looks like an unused cardback, but it is not a product of the final printing plates and usually differs from the
production cards in a number of ways. Proof cards don't really serve a formal
purpose in the actual production process on their own, since the films had already been sent to Asia to create the plates used to print the production
cardbacks. Kenner just wanted some
examples of the Kea cardback and didn't want to wait for their overseas vendors
to send them.
Printing Plate:
At this point, the films would be used to create the actual
printing plates which churned out the production cardbacks themselves.
I’m not aware of any surviving printing plates for the
vintage cardbacks, sadly.
Production Cardback:
The final step would be to start printing out the cardbacks seen on the production toys.
So, to recap, the process for the cardback goes:
Original Artwork -> Mechanical -> Films -> Cromalin -> Proof Card -> Printing Plate -> Production Cardback
Although, technically it would jump from Films straight to Printing Plate, since the Cromalin is simply used to correct mistakes on the films and the Proof Card has no real role in the engineering side of the cardback at all. But collectors don't really think about it that way, because it's confusing and messes up the orderly linear progression of the stages of development.
Part III: Coin
The figure and packaging have now been designed, but while
all of that was going on, Kenner was also working on the pack-in they planned to
include with the Kea Moll toy. Kenner didn’t have
faith that the Kea Moll name could carry the Droids line on her own (the
fools), so they wanted to sweeten the deal for consumers by giving them
something extra for their money. Kenner
decided that the perfect way to do this would be by continuing their Power of
the Force coin promotion, and include a Droids coin in every package.
Interestingly, the original idea for the coin as a pack-in wasn’t
even Kenner’s, it was actually pitched to them by one of the mints who produced
the coins. The mint simply thought coins
would be a good idea and took the concept to Kenner to offer it to them.
 |
| Original art for Nelvana's model sheet of Kea Moll, which served as the basis of the Kea Moll coin |
Art/Renderings:
The Kea Moll coin began life with original art, showing what
the final coin would look like. Sometimes
done on vellum and sometimes simply a Photostat (like a Xerox) of the model
sheet of the character, the art would show the front and back of the coin, exactly
as it was planned to look.
Although the art for the Kea Moll coin itself no longer
exists, it was largely based off of Nelvana’s model sheet for the character, so
in a sense, this is the original art for the original art of the coin.
Original Sculpt:
The next step was to sculpt the coin at 6 times its
production size.
This allowed for a
great amount of detail to be included and would make sculpting it easier.
Typically, the sculpt would have been done
out of plaster (although sometimes other materials were used), with the details rising
above the surface just like on the production coin. An example of a coin sculpt can be seen
here.
This is the first (and only) major step of the Kea Moll
production process entirely missing from our rundown. Sadly, the sculpt for the coin has never
turned up and was almost certainly destroyed.
 |
| Stage 1 Hardcopy Coin |
Stage 1 Hardcopy Kea Moll Coin:
Kenner used two mints to produce their coins and each had
slightly different production processes. We will only be concerned with the mint that
produced the Kea Moll coin (a company called Osborne Coinage), which also
produced about half of the other characters’ coins as well.
In order to get the desired look for the final coin, Kenner
needed a negative copy of the sculpt (the details sit into it rather than being
3D) with a slightly domed shape to its surface. Getting to that point takes a couple of intermediate steps. It should be noted however, that only Osborne coins needed to have a domed shape, because that's the way they did things. The other mint (Worldwide Mint) had flat surfaces to their tooling masters.
The first step towards our goal is to create a negative copy of the
sculpt out of white epoxy and a green resin called “dynacast.” Also at the 6-to-1 scale (about 9” across), the
details on the Stage 1 hardcopy are set into the surface, rather than rising
above it like on the sculpt.
 |
| Kea Moll Softcopy ("Rubber") Coin |
Kea Moll Softcopy Coin (“Rubbers”):
The next step is to create a soft rubber copy of the Stage 1
hardcopy, only in the positive, meaning the image is 3D, just like the
production coin. The entire purpose of
the softcopy is to bridge the gap between the original sculpt (convex image where
the details rise above the surface) and the Stage 2 hardcopy (concave image
where the details sink below the surface). Additionally, there needed to be a slightly bulbous quality to the
surface, rather than being completely level. Since the softcopy was done in pliable silicon,
it could be bent without distorting the image and was perfect for the job.
 |
| Kea Moll Stage 2 Hardcopy Coin, the "Tooling Master" |
Kea Moll Stage 2 Hardcopy/Tooling Master Coin:
Since the softcopy could be bent inward slightly while it
was copied in resin and epoxy, the resulting Stage 2 hardcopy was slightly
domed outward.
 |
| Profile image of the Tooling Master, showing its slightly domed surface |
This was what they were
after the whole time: a negative image hard enough to survive the tooling process,
and possessing a domed surface.
Thus,
they were ready to use it as a tooling master to create the final steel die for
the coin.
The Stage 2 hardcopy tooling master has no text however, which would have to
be added to the production dies using an etching.
 |
| Kea Moll coin Text Master |
Kea Moll Coin Etching/Text Master:
The etching is done on a thin sheet of zinc,
with the image and text of the original coin rendering literally being burned into the surface of the zinc with acid and a
photosensitive material, at roughly 2.5 times the scale of the production coin.
The purpose of the etching plate is to essentially serve as
the sculpt of the text, so that the words appear clean and easy to read on the
final coin. The image of Kea on the
plate didn’t matter, which is why it differs slightly from the image on the
production coin. All that mattered was
the text. The image is almost certainly a copy of the original art for the coin though, so it's interesting to see.
Etching plates of the front and back of the coin would have
originally been created, but the back plate of Kea’s coin was recycled for use
on a different coin for the unproduced second series of Droids figures. Her back plate was altered and the original
text lost or obscured as a different character’s text was glued down over top
of it.
For informational purposes, it is this stage where the difference in techniques employed by the two mints which produced the coins becomes most apparent. Osborne (the mint which produced the Kea Moll coin) used these zinc etchings to add the text to the steel die, while Worldwide Mint (the other company), used a material called "Dycril." Dycrils are made using a photo-chemical process, where the art/redering is projected onto the material and the image is transferred because the light chemically changes the composition of the Dycril. Dycrils are larger than these zinc text masters and made of a different material (obviously). But Osborne never used Dycrils and Worldwide never used zinc text masters. They are two different companies, using different means to accomplish the same goal: adding text to the steel dies.
Since no Dycrils of Kea Moll's coin were ever made though, they don't concern us at the moment.
 |
| The original steel dies which produced the Kea Moll coins |
Kea Moll Coin Production Dies:
Once the mint had the tooling master for the image on the
coin and the etching plate for the text, they could combine them and cut those
details into the steel dies. The actual
process was done using a pantograph, a machine that traces details on something
using one stylus and replicates those details at a different scale onto
something else. All of the details of
the Stage 2 hardcopy coin and the text on the etching plate were traced and reproduced onto the
blank coin dies, creating the means to produce the final coins.
You might recognize that this process (sculpt leads to
hardcopy which leads to steel mold) is the same basic one used on the action
figure. The details of the action figure’s
hardcopy were traced by a pantograph to create the tooling aid, and thus the steel mold, in much the same
way the Stage 2 hardcopy coin was traced to create the steel dies. In fact, the Stage 2 hardcopy coin is the tooling aid stage, which went unseen in the 3 3/4" production process.
Although the process seems overly
complicated, it’s actually still the way a great number of everyday products
are created.
Since these dies are solid steel, there was really no risk
of them wearing out from stamping the soft aluminum of the production Kea Moll
coins. As such, these dies are the only
ones which were created to produce all the Kea Moll coins ever released in the
world. If you’ve ever seen or owned a
Kea Moll coin, it was created right there.
 |
| First Shot Kea Moll coin |
Kea Moll First Shot Coin:
The die strikes the coin blanks, and the aluminum is pressed
into the die cavity, recreating the image of Kea Moll in the positive. The resulting coin was then inspected to make
sure it conformed to the design specifications required. The first shot coins are silver, rather than
gold, because they haven’t gotten to that step yet. They’re simply tests.
Quality Control Sample:
At this point, the coin vendor would have sent back some
samples of the Kea Moll coin to Kenner, to get their approval on the coin.
Although no Kea Moll coin QC samples have ever shown
up, an awesome C-3PO example can be seen
here.
 |
| Production Kea Moll coin (from the collection of Yehuda Kleinman... because I forgot to take a pic of mine) |
Production Coin:
Finally, the coins were anodized so that they were gold in
color and the coin production process was finished. The coin mint would then start shipping the
finished coins to the vendor producing the action figures for Kenner, so that the coins could be
included in the packaging with the figure.
So, to recap the coin production process:
Rendering -> Original Plaster Sculpt -> Hardcopy 1 -> Softcopy -> Hardcopy 2 + Etching Plate or Dycril -> Steel Dies -> First Shot Coins and Production Coins (once anodized)
Part IV: Putting It All Together
 |
| Canadian Kea Moll Quality Control Sample |
Kea Moll Quality Control Sample:
The last step in the production process is for the vendor
(the factory in Asia actually manufacturing the toy) to send a sample of the
assembled and packaged figure back to Kenner for approval. The company would examine all aspects of the
figure, cardback and coin to decide whether or not it met their
specifications. If approved, production
would start. If it wasn’t approved, the
vendor would need to make the necessary changes. This would be a continuing process over the
course of the line, where the vendor would supply samples of their work every
so often to Kenner for inspection.
You’ll notice that this particular QC sample is on the
Canadian version of the Droids cardback rather than the domestic release we’ve
been following. It should be remembered
that the Canadian version went through its own package design process just like
the US version did however, adding to the incredible amount of work that went
into getting the Kea Moll figure to market. Ironically however, the same factory was producing the final carded figures for both the US and Canadian releases.
As far as I know, no QC samples from the US release of any
Droids figure have ever been found. The number
of QC samples of the Canadian release can be counted on one hand, but
surprisingly (or perhaps unsurprisingly after all we’ve seen by now) Kea Moll
was one of them.
Kenner could now begin shipping the finished Kea Moll action
figures to stores.
 |
| Production Kea Moll figure, still in terrible condition |
So, there you have it.
The production process in a nutshell, from the first time the
character’s name appears in print, to her first toys leaving the factory.
And so we're finally back where we started...
 |
| Kay Bee Toys 2 / $1.00 Discount |
...the discount bin. Because kids just didn't want to play with a Kea Moll figure.
All of that hard work. Thousands of man hours, utilizing the talents of hundreds of artists, in several countries. Stages done in wax, plaster, film, resin, silicon, clay, ink, paint, pencil, rubber, zinc, paper, acetate sheets, cardboard, plastic, and solid steel. Just for a .50 cent Kea Moll action figure that the entire world ignored.
Kind of puts it all into perspective, doesn't it? There's a Pixar movie in there somewhere.
Toys are complicated. And they're hard work. But I think they've become so ubiquitous in our society that we sometimes overlook that. We dismiss them. We forget about all the effort that went into creating them and instead imagine them somehow materializing fully-formed on store shelves. They are sometimes designed so well, we forget they are designed at all. And that's a shame, because I think they're art. And all art is worthy of respect. Even if it's of a character no one has ever heard of, and it only costs 50 cents.
 |
| Copy
of LFL's trademark to Kea Moll's name in regards to toys, which was filed
about a month and half after the coin tooling master was created. |
If you would like to learn more about how these
toys were created, I HIGHLY suggest picking up copies of (
Coining a Galaxy,
Gus and Duncan's Guide to Star Wars Prototypes,
and
A New Proof). If you are interested in the story of the interrelationship between the Star Wars films and the toys they spawned, I'd recommend Steve Sansweet's
From Concept to Screen to Collectible.
Additionally, you should also take a look at some of the
other online resources on the production process of vintage Star Wars toys:
If you decide to start collecting this type of thing, you
need to educate yourself first.
Learn
how the process worked and what the stages looked like, and spotting fakes will
be much easier.
If you don’t know, ask
someone who does.
There are any number
of trustworthy experts in this hobby who understand this stuff, and they will be more than
happy to give you advice if you ask them. Contact them on Facebook or one of the collecting forums if you have questions. You'll be glad you did. The time to spot fakes is
before you buy them.
Thanks goes to Ron Salvatore, for helping me by fact-checking this article and making suggestions for improvement. Collecting is always a learning process, and the day I know everything about this hobby, is the day I'd grow bored.
Yehuda Kleinman, for helping with the coin photo.
And to Steve Danley, who actually proofs and re-formats every SWCA blog entry, not just this one.
Special thanks goes to Kim Simmons, who was the photographer responsible for taking the vast majority of Kenner's Star Wars photos, including a couple seen in this article. He still sells prints of his work and you should definitely check out his site:
The Man Who Shot Luke Skywalker.
If you’d like to see a similar rundown of the production
process employed on the modern Star Wars line or the Micro Machines line, please feel
free to petition Hasbro to manufacture a modern Kea Moll figure. The same goes for movie props or how the Star
Wars: Rebels show is done. Kea can guide us through anything, I'm sure. Everyone
needs to write to the producers and demand more Kea Moll, in all aspects of the
Star Wars fandom. TV shows, movies, everything. The world needs Kea
Moll, now more than ever. I’m even
willing to be an expert consultant on the character, for her new appearances. Your move, Dave Filoni and J.J. Abrams. Your move.
Make your voices heard, fellow Moll-Rats.
Kea’s legend needs to live on. ;)
- Tommy
