10

In The Last Jedi:

An “old friend” (Yoda) appears in spirit form on Ahch-To and has a conversation with Luke.

I'm guessing that this character was a puppet, however the eyes in particular looked strange which makes me wonder whether it was CGI after all, or possibly a mixture of the two.

Are there any sources (yet) that confirm which approach was used?

Improve this question
1

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
11

TL;DR: The character was a mixture of both - a puppet enhanced in post with CGI.

Lighting company Digital Sputnik, which specializes in practical lighting effects used on movie productions, commented on a recent tweet that they have now illuminated both Jesus

and Yoda.

Given that the company is fairly new, we can safely eliminate any of the older productions in which he appeared. This, along with a few other hints here & there, would seem to indicate that the character is indeed a practical puppet on-set.

In addition, Star Wars theorist Mike Zeroh claims to have heard from a source at Pinewood Studios that a special set was constructed to accomodate

the Yoda puppet speaking with Luke.

Update: Director Rian Johnson has now confirmed this during an interview with Uproxx...

Neal Scanlan and his team did a recreation of the Yoda puppet. It’s not only a puppet, it’s an exact replica of the Empire puppet. They found the original molds for it. They found the woman that painted the original eyes for Yoda. Then Frank came and worked with them for a few weeks to get the puppet right. He did a lot of testing and a lot of adjusting with the puppet creators. It was amazing to watch the process.

So the answer to your question would appear to be... a mixture of both.

Improve this answer

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .