Now that the Force Awakened, there are great-looking Star Wars Posters everywhere you turn. And yet – how many of them remind you of classic Sci-Fi novels?
Both the old and the new Star Wars posters look amazing, and will fit perfectly the space above your Sci-Fi bookshelf.
Let’s begin with the Star Wars original trilogy movie posters. Tom Jung designed the very first of all Star Wars posters.
These are the best Start Wars Posters you should consider
The designer has a significant experience behind him – before this masterpiece, he was an art director at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, where he created many roadshow movie posters such as the ones for Dr. Zhivago.
Lucasfilms Ltd hired him in 1977 to create a movie poster for ‘Good over Evil’ – the most impressive part of this ‘space opera’ poster is the unintentionally made cross by Luke and Vader’s lightsaber.
Next to his Star Wars art poster, you will also adore the small logo that mimics the crawling opening narration of this film.
Empire Strikes Back by Roger Kastel
Here’s a beautiful and old Star Wars poster. Book illustrator Roger Kastel made this incredibly theatrical Empire Strikes Back poster. The famous Star Wars posters artist is also the illustrator of Bantam Books’ Jaws cover, a work of art that was later used for the same movie adaptation. The original Jaws poster he created is missing at the moment.
Kastel’s motivation for creating such an amazing Empire Strikes Back poster was Gone With The Wind – he recreated the epic hug for Princess Leia and Han Solo, and also added Luke riding his tauntaun.
Star Wars in Hungary by Tibor Helényi
This is probably the most beautiful Hungarian Star Wars poster. Hungary got to see Star Wars only in 1980, even if the movie was released in the US three years before that. Hungarian artist Tibor Helenyi created his own poster version of the saga using striking blues, reds, and oranges; and a number of unique features fans wouldn’t really classify as ‘canon’.
For instance, there’s the mouth on Darth Vader’s helmet (that’s originally not there), and it looks like a vintage Cadillac grill. On the left side, we can also see a scaly, alien-looking lizard with a flailing tongue, and a strong blast that destroys the Death Star.
As you remember, no such creatures were present in the Star Wars movie, but Helenyi had something else in mind – he showed us that aliens could blend just fine within the world Lucas created. In a way, he added value to the original poster.
Another theory that explains these creatures is that Lucas’ original idea of Han Solo was a lizard, but he yet took a more conventional route picking Harrison Ford to play it as a human.Call it ‘added value’! Or perhaps it’s a reference to how Lucas originally envisioned Han Solo as a lizard creature, before going the more conventional route of casting Harrison Ford to play the character as a human.
Empire Strikes Back… in Poland! By Miroslaw Lakomski
We also recommend this unique Star Wars vintage poster. Polish artist Lakomski’s approach to the movie was more direct and conventional. He used vivid color circles that recall Saul Bass and Piet Mondrian, and created an Empire Strikes Back poster with the iconic Yoda and AT-AT walkers.
Yet, if you take a closer look at Yoda you will see that he rendered most facial features in black and white. He also added an off-centered gaze into the horizon, and a neutral expression.
If you’re into poster art, you will notice immediately what Lakomski was after – his idea was to recreate Jim Fitzpatrick’s 1968 Che Guevara poster, and he did that pretty successfully. At the same time, he didn’t deviate much from the classic poses of this heroic sage.
Basically, you can either treat this poster as a faithful-to-the-original work of art, or pick up the secret message calling for new rebellion. According to many critics, the Polish artist brought the American film figure and hero of the global socialist revolution together to suggest aligning with US’s capitalist culture.
Empire Strikes Back…in Hungary By Tibor Helényi
Here’s another great work of Tibor Helényi – an Empire Strikes Back poster where, as you can notice, there are no alien-like lizards. The artists confirmed once again that foreign Star Wars posters deserve just as much attention as the original, US-made ones.
What Helenyi offers us this time is a confrontation between the Imperial Star Destroyer and Vader, and we can immediately notice how incredibly detailed and stylish they both are.
This is also another of the artist’s famous attempts to sneak-peak into the future of the sage – Alongside Vader, there is an army of mechanized and brave henchmen, which envisioned at the time how the Knights of Ren should look. Pretty cool, isn’t it?
The diagonal and very dynamic composition was completed with Goth AT-AT’s sudden lurching within the frame, which was a clear attempt to classify it as an unstoppable force.
Doing so, Helenyi once again anticipated an important development – Cam Kennedy’s aesthetic brooding in the 1993 Dark Empire graphic, where the author predicted Emperor Palpatine’s resurrection and Luke’s interest in the Jedi.
Return of the Jedi – Hungary by Tibor Helényi
Okay, including weird lizard creatures that don’t actually appear in the movie was not Helenyi’s best choice for this poster, but you must admit he did an amazing work forming one of Vader’s eyes with the second Death Star form.
Helényi’s contribution to poster art is simply unique, and thereof worth the interest of anyone exploring graphic design works.
You can also check his Ben Hur poster where he used Dali’s Hallucinogenic Toreador to depict Christ’s crucifixion and the epic chariot race. Another of his much appreciated works is the Kagemusha poster, where he replaced feudal Japan with jousters from medieval Europe.
Star Wars Fever by Lynx Art
Nowadays, the Star Wars fever is more present than ever, and it is not too late to become a fan. A relatively new and very high-quality Star Wars landscape poster you can consider is this action scene of Luke and Yoda created by Lynx Art.
The masterpiece depicts the memorable Dagobah scene between Luke and Yoda, perhaps the best moment in the sage so far.
A Long Time Ago by Tom Jung
Tom Jung’s career took a different path in 1977, as he joined the marketing community to work on the creation of promotional materials. His new assignment was ‘Good vs. Evil’, and he handled it right up to his standards.
While we can’t disapprove the quality of his work, we can argue it resembles Frank Conan’s Star Wars posters, and that’s mainly because of the strong presence of fantasy art. Obviously, Jung used a different space element, but the spirit remained the same.
Introductory Background to Star Wars by Tom Jung
What a great black and white Star Wars poster to have at home! We’re transferred to year 3000, and we’ve already met all alien kinds in the universe. A single force is controlling the billions of suns and planets, and that’s really awesome to see!
This poster is both an artistic masterpiece of Star Wars retro art, and an excellent work of marketing. It aims to explain this unique genre mash-up to audiences of all generations.
Star Wars with Light by The Brothers Hildebrandt
Let us introduce this very cool Star Wars poster! Brothers Hildebrandt created a very similar poster to the one of Jung, and that was because Lucasfilms didn’t approve how dark it was. The brothers were given a seemingly impossible task – to create a more pleasant version within only 36 hours!
The Boss Poster by Tom Chantrell
Here comes the Boss poster. The task was handled by Tom Chantrell, and he was asked to address the issue of featuring generic characters. OK, maybe not effectively generic!
The bottom line was to present the actors behind the roles, as once people met their heroes there was nothing that could remind them of the sage as well as they did. Our opinion is that anonymous characters would sell the movie just as well – before it hit our screens, Star Wars was a concept and a comic book, and there’s nothing bad with remembering that.
Struzan’s Intro by Drew Struzan and Charles White III
With this extended release poster Struzan was first introduced to Star Wars marketing. It was used to announce the temporary re-release of Star Wars on 15 August 1979.
We could see it again in April 1981 and in August 1982, which led to a surprisingly strong theater presence. In fact, this was the reason why so many great artists started working on marketing posters for Star Wars.
Tom Jung’s version of The Empire Strikes Back
Tom Jung got another task – to prepare an Empire Strikes Back poster together with Roger Kastel. As you can see above, it was a very good decision.
Return of The Jedi by Josh Kirby
Despite of Jung’s and Kastel’s amazing work, Lucasfilms decided on a completely different turn of events for Return of the Jedi. This time, they hired Josh Kirby, the illustrator who designed the cover for Pratchett’s Discworld book.
If we go deeper inside the list of all-time Star Wars illustrators, we will find many popular and extremely talented artists.
Revenge of The Jedi by Drew Struzan
Here’s another amazing and extended-release work of Struzan and Charles White III. You may or may not recognize Charles White III, but his contribution to the illustration world is just unparalleled – the guy created the posters for Harry Potter, Blade Runner, Indiana Jones, Back to the Future, Big Trouble in Little Chine, Goonies, Hook, and many other iconic movies.
At the same time, his unique two-color approach to designing Star Wars posters made him one of the best artists to ever work on the sage.
Concept Art Drew Struzan
How did this amazing piece come to be? How did they even get there? What’s on their minds?
Indeed, everybody likes concept art sketches.
The Special Editions by Drew Struzan
We are proud to present you the Special Editions! These amazing and contentious posters remind us of what Star Wars is all about – anger leading to hate, hate leading to fear, and fear leading to the dark side! At the same time, their artistic value is amazing.
Each of these posters uses a well defined color palette. They’re solid and bold, and can be observed completely independent from each other, or as a meaningful unit. On a single piece of paper, they bring together all key characteristics of this movie, and that makes them irreplaceable.
You can consider getting each of these posters individually, or arranging them in a different way. As they’re positioned now, however, they’re balancing the light and the dark side with perfect coloring; and the line up on the middle posters really seems to be exploding. Pretty fantastic, if you ask us!
Original and creative posters by Drew Struzan
Struzan worked with Lucasfilms for quite a while, and produced the posters of Episodes I, II, and III. Perhaps the most memorable among them is this poster for Phantom Menace, where you can see the eyes of Darth Maul on top of the piece. This accentuates in the best possible way his meaning for this movie.
Struzan remained faithful to his style even for episodes II and III – we can see the balance of force clearly depicted with opposing colors (teal and orange) .
Episode II Sketchwork by Drew Struzan
When creating a poster for this amazing saga, an artist must (more than anything else) highlight the importance of the main characters. This sketch composition by Drew Struzan does it amazingly well.
The Force Awakens by Bryan Morton
Despite of the very successful theatrical posters for The Force Awakens, Struzan decided to stay true to his role, and fans were ultimately frustrated by it. Pretty much the same dissatisfaction was caused by the poster above (Bryan Morton).
And yet, that doesn’t change the fact that art is subjective, and some of us do like the visual cues on heroes and villains we are about to see. At the same time, the colors on this poster are lovely, and may as well be the best palette to ever be applied on a Star Wars poster.
Plus, if you take a closer look on this poster you will see that Morton kept many of the Star Wars traditions alive. His colors are opposing, and his images depict the heroes in a very realistic way. You can also see the droids, the light sabers, the space battles, and, of course, the Death Star! Best of all, this poster is not as dark as most Star Wars works tend to be.
Here’s another hint Morton provided, and which you may not be aware of – Rey and Finn stand on different sides of the poster? Does that reveal their fate in Episode VIII? May be!
Rogue One
This poster can be considered a breakthrough in Star Wars art, as it only adopts some of the trends typical for the sage. It shifted tones so that the palette won’t be diametrically opposed, but it kept Vader’s and Death Star’s superimposed faces and the looming.
Fan-made Star Wars posters
Ending thoughts on the Star Wars Posters
Did you find your favorite original Star Wars poster? We hope to have presented the most creative ideas and the stories behind them, so that even those of you who aren’t into Sci-Fi got inspired to get one!
If you enjoyed reading this article about the Star Wars Posters, you should read these as well:
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The post The Best Star Wars Posters: Originals and fan-made ones appeared first on Design your way.
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