With the latest installment in the Star Wars franchise, Star Wars: The Force Awakens, arriving in theaters on December 18th, we’re already starting to feel the early ripples of yet another tidal wave of Star Wars mania. While some marketing teams have been busy developing strategies for jumping on the Star Wars hype train the past six months, the age of YouTube and Kickstarter has afforded independent creators the opportunity to the exact same thing – and often, better.
More recently, French graphic designer Carlos Pardo has created what is sure to be a must-have for any engineering geek who grew up on a healthy dose of Star Wars: the blueprints of the Death Star II.
“I’m part of that generation who saw Star Wars on silver screen, I was a kid and didn’t imagined that this trilogy was going to significantly influence my creative universe and professional life,”explains Carlos, who has previously worked on projects in the video game, web and publishing industries for over 15 years.
Inspired by a previous project that involved the cartography of the roads network of France with a subway map stylization, Carlos saw an opportunity to create something similar for the schematics of a galactic battle station.
“Two years ago I released a design side project that was the cartography of the roads network of France with a subway map stylization, it was the first part of an ongoing series,” Carlis explains. “It was a long, complex and a very instructive challenge that fueled my taste for maps. During the process of documentation for that project, I stumbled across a lot of interesting schemes, conventions, blueprints, and started wondering about maps of iconic places or objects that influenced and defined me, as a creative. At one point I was looking back for Star Wars, specially the Death Star that always impressed me by it’s monolithic complexity… and I found almost nothing that could go on my workshop walls, only small 3D schemes and a few screen captures.”
The resulting A1-sized posters are set on 170-gram coated premium paper and are 4-color (CMYK) offset printed with a matte finish and UV protection. Each poster is numbered, signed and embossed with a seal of authenticity. Although he has since sold out of the first batch of posters – expected to be delivered during the week preceding the release of Star Wars: The Force Awakens – those interested can stay updated by heading over to the project’s Kickstarter page.
