Some of the facial features on the haggard evil birds were controlled by puppeteers, but whereas in the past they used the aforementioned bicycle chains and pulley systems, they were able now to 3D-print custom-fit handpieces and equipment to control more precise mechanisms. The Skeksis, meanwhile, were given remote-controlled eyes that moved back and forth. It's easy enough to recognize the lead Gelfling, the castle guard named Rian (voiced by Taron Egerton), and varying skin colors help as well, but when you've got a tribe with three very similar-looking sisters, it can get tricky. With a narrative that includes multiple members of each of the seven different Gelfling tribes, those little customizations were critical to differentiating, as well. That's largely because the rest of the face could be manipulated from afar puppeteers controlled Gelflings' ears and lower eyelids via remote control, adding some subtle extra signs of life, which help immensely on HD and 4K TVs. Whereas the original Gelflings required four puppeteers, this time around they were able to cut that number in half. The new Gelflings, like the originals, have jaws that are controlled by the hands of their puppeteer, which provided an important baseline most of the time the audience is watching the mouth of a puppet move, and making no obvious change in those mechanics buys a lot of leeway. "There's so much you could do, but, honestly, they'd be weird." "We make sure that we're not suddenly having every eyeball popping out, waggling around the jaws and teeth and tongues," Chapman says. And yet, because The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance was in part an exercise in nostalgia and a faithful recreation of the style of a bygone era, director Louis Leterrier and his team of puppeteers were careful not to overindulge in the new capabilities. The new Gelflings and Skeksis puppets were built with modern internal architecture, which offers the tools to manipulate the most minute aspects of puppets' faces. In a way, using more advanced, semi-robotic puppetry is a fitting tribute to the original Dark Crystal, the production of which saw Henson, Oz, and their team of artists and engineers pioneer early versions of the animatronics that are so dominant today. "We had to achieve the same effects but with the modern way of doing things, which is a lot of remote control, animatronics, and radio-controlled stuff." "They're full of old-school mechanics, which would be controlled by bicycle cables and triggers, so not so much animatronic, heavy stuff," Chapman tells SYFY WIRE. The Jim Henson Company had preserved some of the Gelflings and Skeksis puppets in its archives, but according to puppeteer Dave Chapman, the inner workings of puppets have changed so much over the past 40 years that the old creatures served more as reference and inspiration for the new versions than practical assistance. Their quest brought them to a castle occupied by the Skeksis, a frightening clan of human-sized muppet vultures who controlled the titular life-giving crystal. Set in the magical, Middle-earth-ish world of Thra, the original Dark Crystal followed the adventures of the last two remaining Gelflings, a once-thriving race of creatures who look like the offspring of Yoda and a beautiful elf (Wendy Froud, who designed the Gelflings with her husband Brian, also worked with Oz on the Jedi master puppet for Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back). These new realities presented both opportunities and challenges to the team working on the new series, The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance, which hits the streaming service on Friday. The technology used to both construct and control puppets has advanced by leaps and bounds since Jim Henson and Frank Oz made the original 1982 cult hit fantasy film, as have viewer expectations in the age of CGI. The new Netflix-produced prequel to The Dark Crystal promises a return to old-school puppet techniques, but there's some sleight of hand to that claim.
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