50 Star Wars Behind the Scenes Photos From the Start of the Epic Saga

George Lucas looking particularly awesome as he stands with young star Mark Hamill in the desert, working on a film neither could have realized would be one of the best and most beloved of all time.

The actors who played Han Solo, C-3PO, Princess Leia and Chewbacca share a laugh in one of many Star Wars behind the scenes images released to promote the film in 1977.

In the original Star Wars, Han Solo shoots Greedo first. Little did Greedo (Paul Blake) or writer-director George Lucas know that two decades after the original film’s release, Lucas would tweak it so that Greedo shot first.

He still dies though. Sorry Greedo.

If only there was an Ewok around, he could play a great drum solo. Please note that this terrific joke only makes sense if you’ve seen Return of the Jedi.

Obi-Wan Kenobi (Alec Guinness) claims that you’ll never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy than the Mos Eisley spaceport, but honestly, some of the regulars there are super nice.

George Lucas, right, with Alec Guinness, the only member of the cast who was a bona fide screen icon before the release of Star Wars, given that he’d already won an Oscar for Best Actor in 1957’s The Bridge on the River Kwai and was one of the biggest stars of the 1950s and 1960s.

He received a Best Supporting Actor nomination for his role in Star Wars. The film was nominated for 12 Oscars in all, including for Best Picture and Best Director for Lucas, and won eight.

The incredible Star Wars crew helps Anthony Daniels look his best as C-3PO.

Ford, who appeared in Lucas’ film American Graffiti and his friend Francis Ford Coppola’s The Conversation, famously scored the part of Han Solo while helping audition other actors for the film.

To this day we have no idea how Star Wars pulled off the floating landspeeder. Are those guys in the back holding it up? We don’t see any wires or anything. Is it The Force?

Let’s take a moment to appreciate the genius miniature work on the Star Wars vehicles, including the Jawas’ sandcrawler. Well before the age of CGI, the film managed to make it and countless other vehicles look lived-in, imposing, and unquestionable real.

The artist above is the great Lorne Peterson, who deservedly won an Oscar a few years after Star Wars for Best Visual Effects for his work on 1984’s Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.

John Williams leads the London Symphony Orchestra in performing his Oscar-winning score for the film, with Mark Hamill’s image providing inspiration.

Keeping Anthony Daniels as comfortable as possible in a stifling costume during filming in Death Valley, which stood in for Luke’s planet of Tatooine, was a very real concern. Star Wars also shot many Tatooine scenes in Tunisia.

The award scene was an even grander affair than we realized.

The dress code? Denim.

Knowing this is David Prowse in a costume doesn’t make him less imposing — or make Darth Vader less effective. He may be the greatest screen villain of them all. The voice of James Earl Jones only added to his considerable gravitas.

Speaking of imposing. Consider the bravery of X-Wing and Tie Fighter pilots: If they need to bail out, they have nowhere to go. Respect.

Sure, facing the Empire is brave. But so is checking a Wookie’s teeth.

That’s Chewbacca star Peter Mayhew and the brilliant makeup artist Stuart Freeborn, whose other contributions to cinema included designing the apes in the 2001 “Dawn of Man” sequence and designing Yoda in the first Star Wars sequel, The Empire Strikes Back.

The Sandcrawler wasn’t just a miniature, as this picture illustrates.

From left to right, Kenny Baker as R2D2, Mark Hamill as Luke Skywalker, George Lucas as the greatest Jedi master of all, and Anthony Daniels as C-3PO.

That when young actors Mark Hamill and Harrison Ford donned these white suits, they had no idea if they were making something cool, or a total dud.

Neither could have guessed that it would be one of the most acclaimed, successful and beloved pictures of all time.

Apologies for a Star Wars behind the scenes image we kind of wish we’d never seen. There’s only one more like this, we promise.

David Prowse as Vader, Peter Cushing as Moff Tarkin, and Mark Hamill very much out of costume.

Prior to Star Wars’ release, Cushing may have been the most recognizable actor in the cast after Alec Guinness, given Cushing’s many performances as Sherlock Holmes and his roles in many Hammer films, including as Baron Frankenstein and Dr. Van Helsing.

We wonder if Prowse and Hamill had any idea about the relationship between their characters at the time of this photo.

But it’s very cool that Daniels’ mask could just hang like that.

She was 19 when she made Star Wars but we never doubted she was intergalactic royalty. And good with a blaster, too.

Also, Carrie Fisher’s Star Wars memoir, The Princess Diarist, is essential reading for anyone who loves Star Wars behind the scenes stories.

Where does an eight-foot-tall Wookie sit? Anywhere he wants to.

Peter Mayhew takes a moment in one of our favorite Star Wars behind the scenes photos.

Shooting the breeze, and eventually each other.

You can tell this is a Star Wars behind the scenes image because something kind of crucial is missing from the Greedo costume.

Again, not all those cool vehicles were miniatures. Much of the Millenium Falcon was actual size.

See what we mean?

But then again…

Miniatures have their place, don’t they? Every spaceship in Star Wars looks absolutely fantastic, even after all these decades.

Helping a couple of wild and crazy guys look great before their big night out at the cantina.

Just another Star Wars behind the scenes image we kind of wish we’d never seen.

George Lucas with a stripped down version of one of his countless incredibly lovable creations.

What a genius this man is. It’s hard to think of a filmmaker whose brought more joy into our lives.

David Prowse was a bodybuilder, strongman and weightlifter as well as an actor, which contributed to Vader’s dramatic bearing.

A rare Star Wars behind the scenes look at David Prowse and Alec Guinness rehearsing for the inevitable:

The lightsaber battle between Darth Vader and Obi-Wan Kenobi that would turn out to be only the first of many classic lightsaber duels in the Star Wars Saga.

Wait, we’re allowed to take our shirts off? This is one of our favorite Star Wars behind the scenes images because it captures both the very hard work involved in making the film, and the very human approach to doing it. That’s so Star Wars.

Peter Diamond as one of the Sand People, among the most misunderstood of all beings in the galaxy. (They finally got to tell their side of the story decades after their first appearance in Disney+’s The Book of Boba Fett.)

Diamond also played a Stormtrooper in the film.

Mark Hamill cracks a smile as the hero of the rebellion, Luke Skywalker, in the film’s final scene.

We love this guy.

Harrison Ford, right, makes a face in an outtake from what would become one of the most famous publicity images of Star Wars.

He looks a lot more serious in the final version.

The Death Star in miniature.

On film, of course, it looks gigantic.

Harrison Ford, Mark Hamill and Carrie Fisher take a drive that isn’t quite lightspeed.

So that’s how he always looks so great.

It’s one of our favorite Star Wars behind the scenes images because now we feel like a Sith lord every time we use a lint brush.

And say how much we love Star Wars.

20th Century Fox

Of all the original Star Wars behind the scenes images released to promote the film, you’d be surprised at how many of them feature Greedo.

Hey, we like him as much as anyone, the whole trying to shoot Han thing aside.

Richard Edlund, abive, has has won four Oscars for Best Visual Effects, including for Star Wars.

In the treacherous trenches of the Death Star. It’s like shooting womp rats back in Beggar’s Canyon.

Dennis Muren was the second visual effects cameraman on the film. He has since worked on films including Terminator 2, Jurassic Park, Mission Impossible and — coming full circle — Star Wars: The Force Awakens.

He has won nine Oscars, the first of which was for Best Visual Effects for the sequel The Empire Strikes Back.

Carrie Fisher and Mark Hamill shoot one of the most exciting scenes on the Death Star set.

He has won nine Oscars, the first of which was for Best Visual Effects for the sequel The Empire Strikes Back.

Even Moff Tarkin has a boss, it turns out. And it isn’t the Emperor.

George Lucas rallies the stormtroopers.

Sorry, we forgot for a second that this is just an actor playing Moff Tarkin.

Move along.

You might also like this list of the Top Films of 1977 to see where Star Wars ranked, or this list of Extremely Minor Star Wars Characters.

All Star Wars behind the scenes photos from 20th Century Fox’s original publicity campaign for the film.