Revised Galactica.TV 2009 interview: Marcel Damen & David Stipes

Part 1 of 2009 interview. The original online Galactica.TV website postings appear to be lost. This article was recreated from transcriptions generated during the original interview between David Stipes and Marcel Damen. Minor editing was done for info corrections, clarity, and updates. Galactica.TV questions in boldface type are by Marcel Damen.

You started creating your own visual effects for movies at a young age. What brought this about? What movie made such an impression on you to get you involved in this field?

That’s pretty straightforward, King Kong and The Son of Kong. When I was in the third or fourth grade, the films were shown on television. I was amazed. I didn’t know what was going on exactly, but I knew something was. So I asked my mom, “How did they get King Kong to do all this stuff?” and she said, “Oh, David, it’s a trained chimpanzee.” Well, of course, they didn’t look or move like chimpanzees, and I thought, “That’s not right.” So even though I was very young, I knew something was going on, and it wasn’t what my mom said.

So it fascinated me. When I was about eleven, I discovered Famous Monsters of Filmland, Forrest J Ackerman’s magazine. Forry wrote about Willis O’Brien, King Kong, The 7th Voyage of Sinbad, and Ray Harryhausen. I thought, “Wow! This is terrific.”

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Battle of Galactica rare matte shot

Battlestar Galactica was so popular during the late 1970s that Universal Studios created a special Galactica themed “ride” or event as part of their back-lot tram tours. It was named “The Battle of Galactica” and opened in 1979 and ran to1992. 

Courtesy of Dale Long. http://byyourcommand.net

While the ride was being designed and constructed, Universal wanted to generate excitement and buzz about their new attraction. A promo / publicity film was to be shot and shown to generate excitement and attract people to the show. The major drawback was that nothing was finished enough to be photographed or to show off. Read the rest of this entry »

Night of the Creeps on DVD finally.

Finally, after years of waiting, “Night of the Creeps” has made it to DVD release. The 1986 horror / sci fi film, written and directed by Fred Dekker, has been a somewhat hidden away cult classic. My son, Nathan, and I found it at Wal-Mart for about $15.00. It has the cemetery ending Dekker originally planned for the film.

DVD cover art.

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Ogg and the Pink Baby Dinosaur

This is a frame from the first commercial I was paid to work on; my first professional job in 1969 at Cascade Pictures. This is from a Kellogg’s Cocoa Krispies cereal commercial featuring a caveman named Ogg. (His wife was “Kell” … for Kell-Oggs.)  These characters were used until about 1975.  (see link below)

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“The Magic Treasure”

“The Magic Treasure” is one of those obscure little films that few have heard about and even less has seen. It was conceived in about 1969-70 by David Allen as a stop motion production of “The Selfish Giant” by Oscar Wilde. Through 1970 and 1971 dialog was recorded, sets and puppets were constructed and production began shooting in October, 1971. Part way through production a cartoon version of “the Selfish Giant” was released.

David Allen with puppets of the Giant and the villagers.

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