Living History in the Star Wars Galaxy
applying the methods of progressive historic reenacting to the Galaxy Far, Far Away
The ‘Donovian Rainmen’ are a pretty deep cut, never appearing (as far as I know) on-screen in their film, but only in a DK reference book, a behind-the-scenes documentary (“A Twinkle Beyond Pluto”) on the Episode II DVD, and one frame of Dark Horse’s Republic #80.
However, they have always intrigued me, given their specific ‘occupational’ identity. Continue reading “Artifact ID: Donovian Rainmen”
This post is a follow up to my earlier musings on the trade-off between public recognizability and authenticity. After some careful consideration, I finally made some decisions that allow me to have my cake and eat it too, while also helping to better distinguish my Jedi persona as being based in the Imperial era.
Continue reading “Differentiating the Jedi persona”
As part of the research that yielded my Service Corps insignia patch, I came upon a detail that has led me to a dilemma.
In Part 2 of Daniel Wallace’s The Jedi Path, the various paths that a Jedi initiate may take are outlined: whether to go on to become a Padawan apprentice, to ‘wash out’ and join the Service Corps, or to leave the Order entirely and rejoin the ‘civilian’ galactic community.
In addition to the text, this is illustrated visually:
From this depiction, it appears that the Service Corps (center bottom) is differentiated by use of less layers of clothing (forgoing the tabards in favor of a tunic only?). My question is: How representative or stylized is this image?.…The token AgriCorps guy with the Mohawk also looks to be going with a simple tunic-only outfit.
The Jedi Path, as an in-universe textbook, is supposedly dated to 115 BBY… BUT, the comic series Act on Instinct—set during the Clone Wars—depicts a young AgriCorps member, Sanya, who does appear to wear tabards:
In fact, her outfit looks like a regular Prequel Jedi, just in navy blue, and with wrapped forearms. Additionally, this character would be about the same age as Silo, and so might be seen as the closest analogue to my persona?
However… Continue reading “Downsides to Research: Accuracy vs Recognition”
As I continue to refine my personas, further recent research has turned up what I believe represents true Sulon local style for my Rebel impression. Per the live-action cutscenes in Dark Forces 2: Jedi Knight, we know that a Henley style shirt was worn by both Kyle and Morgan Katarn!:
The hologram in question commemorates Kyle’s departure for the Imperial Academy, c. 4 BBY, and he also wears a roughly similar style nine years later in 5 ABY, possibly as a throwback or in recognition of his Sulon upbringing? Continue reading “Research Pays Off: the Sulon-style Henley”
What follows is a breakdown of the practical kit I eventually assembled for a Rebel ‘partizan’ persona, based on Sulon around 4-5 years ABY.
I. Soft Kit:
When starting to plan out what clothes a Rebel partisan on Sulon would wear, I didn’t have a lot of reference material to build from; the three Dark Forces novellas are each illustrated by three different artists with wildly different styles, and as typical Star Wars media, tend not to focus on the mundane minutiae of everyday citizens.
This gave me a certain amount of freedom, but I still wanted to keep things fairly conservative while starting out (a wise approach to take while reenacting in general!) Continue reading “Building the Sulon Rebel – 4: Soft kit”
What follows is an itemized breakdown of the kit I eventually put together for my AgriCorps ‘washout’ Jedi impression, based during the Dark Times.
The main thing I wanted to do with this persona was to help subtly differentiate it from the Jedi we’ve seen already and with whom we are most familiar. Continue reading “Building the Jedi Persona – 3: Soft Kit”
Now that you know what you want to do (as a reenactor or interpreter), who you’re going to portray (your persona), and (after careful research and/or use of the Galactic Style Guide) what you’re going to wear while doing it, the time has come to gear up and clothe your persona in appropriate ‘garb’. If you know how to sew, great! If not, it’s always a good time to learn! A simple websearch for ‘basic sewing stitches’ will yield plenty of tutorials. Even though we’re depicting a high-tech society, tailor droids break down now and then, so hand-sewing is fine too! (the first time I made my Jedi tunics, I opted to sew the main seams with a sewing machine, and then finish the seams by hand).
When it comes to making or buying elements of one’s kit, it always pays to remember The Designer’s Paradox:
In other words, getting something cheap and good takes time; fast and good costs money up-front, while cheap and fast will cost you in the long run.
Since there are plenty of how-to pages out there (costume tutorials abound on the internet), I will try to keep this short and sweet.
A quick primer on fabrics and their properties as they pertain to our purposes: Continue reading “Step 5 – Craft It!”
Living History in the Star Wars Galaxy 
