“Dark Crystal” Animatronic Creator John Nolan Heads to Jurassic World 3
Yesterday, Jurassic World 3 director Colin Trevorrow announced some big news about the animatronics that will be featured in the upcoming movie. Talking with the Empire Film Podcast about his involvement in Battle at Big Rock, Trevorrow reported that John Nolan and his studio had been tapped to lead the production of the animatronic dinosaurs in Jurassic World 3.
While you may not immediately recognize the name John Nolan, you probably have seen his work. Most recently Nolan and his studio put together the breathtaking animatronics used in the Netflix series “The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance.” If you have not watched the new series yet, do yourself a favor and check it out. It won’t take long to understand why we are excited about this new hire for Jurassic World 3. Nolan also worked on animatronics for numerous commercials, some films, and is well known for his work on the “Spy in the Wild” nature series.
(Note: the majority of non-animatronic puppetry work on Dark Crystal was done by Jim Henson’s Creature Shop.)
It was previously reported that Neal Scanlan, who did the animatronics on Jurassic World Fallen Kingdom, would be returning to do the sixth Jurassic Park film. However, Neal choose to depart the project due to other opportunities causing scheduling conflicts.
Trevorrow seems to be equally excited about the news. In the interview with Empire Film, he announced that work has already begun on the animatronics for the third film. Colin enthusiastically shared the following:
“We’ve got everyone [at Pinewood Studios] carving dinosaurs out of clay.
If any of you have seen the Dark Crystal on Netflix, John Nolan who did all of the animatronics for the Dark Crystal is doing the animatronics on Jurassic World 3. He’s starting to actually build things, and we’re going to his workshop and seeing the things he’s doing with eyes and joint movement. He’s really innovating in a really exciting way.”
Animatronic by John Rosengrant @LegacyEffects #BattleAtBigRock pic.twitter.com/9CLfoatUpY
— Colin Trevorrow (@colintrevorrow) September 17, 2019
The veteran Jurassic director is no stranger to animatronics, having used them in Jurassic World and Battle at Big Rock. Trevorrow tweeted out a picture of the full scale Allosaurus rig used for Battle and it is an impressive machine. While the Allo was ultimately replaced/augmented with CGI for the finished project (similar to some of the Indoraptor shots in Fallen Kingdom), it is still impressive to see the resources Universal was willing to put into this eight minute short film. We hope the trend continues for the rest of the franchise – though allowing animatronics to live in their own light, without CG makeup would be fantastic.
The Allosaurus was done by Stan Winston Studios and Jurassic Park alumni John Rosengrant, and the team at Legacy Effects who also worked on the first Jurassic World. The team there is built from Winston and Jurassic Park veterans, and were a perfect fit for a Jurassic outting like ‘Big Rock’.
What do you think about John Nolan joining the franchise? Do you think he skillful work on Dark Crystal will translate well into full scale dinosaur animatronics? Let us know your thoughts below!
Source: The Empire Film Podcast
