It's a difficult question to answer as rubber moulds and such fourth don't provide a solid answer and people can only hazard a guess as to why things are the way they are from distorted eyebrows, necks, flanges etc.....
That is partly why even authentic castings are not always correct. Some have great detail but miss other aspects which is most likely from some form of clean up, previous repair. Sometimes deliberate or not knowing better.
I've seen various moulds done by different people over the years and they aren't always exact to the original template. Take a dome for example. The dome cap on one castings from a mould may be wide and loose the shape and definition where as the flanges are perfect. Sometimes on another mould the flanges are warped and the dome cap is perfect. It all depends on many factors from the techniques used, the materials used, how much material is used and so on. I've seen excessive silicone used to make a lasting mould only for it to cause dips and warps and the weight can distort the shape. There should be a simple answer as if it's done right it's fairly easy but more often than not things go wrong. The other issue is the generation of the castings, the quality of the material that should provide minimal shrinkage, good time management and various additional factors for the castings afterwards are also a factor.
Like you mention storage could be an issue but the silicone mould is pretty robust as for shrinkage it isn't overly excessive it has a small part to play but not to the degree the anomalies show.
This is just another authentic casting that suffers from imperfections like the majority out there. Whether that is from the shape of a certain feature, clean up or additional issues.

The Rick Baker mold was made of a thin rubber rather than silicone, but it could have possibly moved a bit in the jacket. There is good reason to believe (as suggested to me by a friend who knows more about molding than I do) that the mold might have been in long term storage with a casting in it which may have helped to keep its shape. Perhaps the SL ANH was such a helmet given the material it is made out of, but I would still need to have that confirmed.

If there was a problem with the mold at the time the master eFX was pulled, then we'd see the dents in all the Legend helmets. Do we? If not, then perhaps it is just a production line issue in terms of how it was yanked out of the China production mold.

It's probably in the master then (or in one of the eFX moulds), as I know of four eFX domes with this issue.

well i guess anything is possible then.

Actually that is part of the reason I wanted to get two eFX helmets, and that way I could compare them directly against each other in terms of anything such as that, that might look different than what I would expect.

I guess we're all waiting for the Limited to ship...

ive been thinking. and im sure some of you have thought of this and have stated this as well.

but it very well could have been the person who made the master pattern for the helmet. maybe they didn't do it thoroughly enough to capture all of the detail? or didn't take their time to make sure all of the aspects of the original helmet/mold were captured? maybe they rushed through the process becasue they were on a time line and needed it to get done asap?
what is clear, is something did happen. in some way shape or form.

Now, on the other hand. it may not even be the RB molds. how do we know this for sure? just becasue efx says so? they aren't even sure them selves. because on the eFX website they state, "Our master pattern was cast from vintage molds" in the Lucas film archives "which are believed" to have been made by none other than Rick Baker from the screen used Vader helmet back in 1977."

they dont say, "our master patter was cast from vintage molds in the Lucas film archives which have been made by none other than Rick Baker from the screen used Vader helmet back in 1977"..they only say that they are "believed" to be. that says to me they dont know for sure. sounds like they are assuming that it is just becasue it was in the Lucas archives and it was an ANH helmet. wouldn't there be someone to be able to let them know for sure or be able to identify that it was the RB mold for certain? i would think that there would be.
maybe their whole description of the helmet and promotion is just one huge sales pitch to make everyone believe it came form the RB molds that were made from the screen used helmet. to make everyone believe that what they were going to receive was a copy of the actual helmet that was used in the original film ANH.
becasue if the legend was derived directly from the rick backer molds (as they want everyone to "believe") they would have said so. but they didn't..they used the term "which are believed". this is indicating that there is some uncertainty on the identification of the molds. yes? no? maybe?

there were 3 helmets that were made for the film. maybe its possible RB made molds from one of those other helmets? maybe he made molds from all three? and the Legend is a copy of one or even a combination of those helmets. if that's the case then the legend would have derived from the RB molds.
but maybe it was someone else who made the molds? do we know for certain that RB was the one and only person who made molds from the helmets that were made for the film? or from the screen used helmet for that matter?
maybe these are the reasons why there are some differences on the legend's compared to the original screen used helmet? becasue it sounds to me that eFX isn't sure themselves who made the molds. they only "believe" that they are the RB molds..or is it they want to "believe" that they are?

now im not saying that the molds aren't RB's becasue i dont know for certain. they very well could be. but it's eFX's own statements that make me question the validity of the molds that the legend helmet derived from. not to mention the differences it has compared to the original.

im just trying to find or come up with an explanation (like all of us) why there are differences between the original and the Legend.

one thing is certain though. we will never know..

I'm not sure. Wasn't the picture posted of the mold confirmed to be the Baker mold? That line of text hasn't changed since the beginning where they just found the mold... I'm sure there's been some confirmation since then and they just didn't change that original line.

There is no way that the eFX links back to anything but the screen used helmet - it is doubtful that the other spare ANH casts were molded in any way, shape or form. There is another molding of that original screen used helmet - the mold that was later used to create the ESB/RotJ helmets.

I think they did everything humanly possible to verify the history of the mold, and I can't see what they would gain by not being truthful about what they used. There was never a doubt regarding the face mask and the differences are easily explained with cleaning up the cast. The dome was somewhat in question, however, I don't think that's the case anymore. The differences can easily be explained as cleaning up the cast.

I guess the battered look of the original would have sent more people screaming at eFX about selling crappy unfinished stuff for loads of money. I take it that was the reasoning behind any kind of cleanup performed.

I would be very interested in what kind of market research --if any-- has been done that would justify the whole "this is too crappy to sell to the public" line. It isn't much of a stretch to think that the public at large would not want something with the kind of surface defects that we are talking about (this is more than borne out by my experiences with people who are not prop enthusiasts). But, is this just a gigantic assumption on the part of the companies that are trying to reinforce "perceived value" of their product (and how much of this is us just guessing that is what they are thinking)? And how far would a thimble full of education be along side explaining why it looks the way it does.

Especially when the specific product we are talking about was conceived to be marketed to that exact and narrow demographic--the Legend Edition at least (which in my opinion doesn't seem to be significantly different from the Limited). This was going to be struck in an edition of 250 pieces aimed directly at people who want all of the scratches, dents, paint runs with advertising copy that emphasized just how amazingly wonky this thing was going to be in all of its glorious, grimy detail. Sales proved that there were loads more than 250 people willing to shell out large coin to own just that. I think whether or not they delivered what was promised can remain a matter of opinion.

The pendulum swings back and forth for me. One time I look at it and like it quite a bit and the next I'm not so enthused. This morning I noticed a warp along the side of the right cheek (looking at the face) that should not be there. The overall softness of the piece is a big turn-off for me too. And I don't think this is an issue of there being too much paint. No one has stripped one down yet so we don't know for certain what lies underneath but I doubt it is much different from what we see coming through.

No I don't think it was rushed or neglected in any way, just that they took the master pull and either cleaned it up or cleaned up the 2nd generation masters that would produce the Legend and Limited versions. After all, the whole basis for each version is a certain degree of cleanup, which was stated by eFX up front. They do not deny there was a limited amount of cleanup.



Well, they are being conservative at least insofar as saying the molds were believed to have been made by him, probably because they do not have word from him directly and probably because they do not have a written record of who made the mold. But, the mold itself has been known about for a long time thanks to our own Darth Jones who used to work for ILM, has a casting from that mold, and has seen the mold in person. There are actually tells on castings that come from that specific mold so it is possible to determine if a casting comes from it assuming that it wasn't cleaned up too much. And the molds are vintage in that they are, so I am told, perhaps the oldest molds in the LFL archives.



Well I don't know who they found out from specifically, but clearly they would have had word of the molds' possible existence from discussion of the concept of an ANH helmet with Jez and myself years back. Back then I knew that they had a helmet, but not the mask. So they were trying to source a mask and apparently then at that time didn't know about the RB mold.



It is from the RB mold, well at least the mask is most certainly. The helmet is open to debate. But it probably is and they have no reason to be dishonest about that. The term "which are believed" refers only to who made it, not the source mold itself.



No, because the helmet RB molded was the original ANH helmet using in filming, and also any casting from the RB mold (the SL ANH and DJ ANH included, along with a third and different RB pull) shows nearly every hallmark of the original screen helmet, down to the paint details. There's no mystery helmet source, so that any difference in the eFX helmet would be a result of work done by eFX.



Well he was the one who made that particular mold likely for the purpose of making additional helmet copies for LFL (tour helmets) or their licensees at that time, since their only source presumably was the original ANH helmet itself. It is important to note that the RB mold was not used for making later helmets seen in ESB or ROTJ (except perhaps the funeral pyre ANH helmet seen in ROTJ).




Well we know from people who worked for LFL what the RB mold is. Whether RB made it or not is open to debate but from everyone that has some direct knowledge of the mold itself, RB was the one suggested as the maker and I believe this has been confirmed. And the molds are LFL molds, not RB's molds.

There seems to be a serious interest on the part of LFL for prop replicas not to be exact to the original and so then to be passed off in auction as an original prop. Based on all the replicas we've seen from MR and eFX, or even DP or Rubies, there is nothing to indicate otherwise. The key question is whether it is an intention to make the product look more "finished" and without flaws that could be mistaken as such and the item asked to be returned for a refund or exchange (no company wants to deal with that possibility), or whether there is an intention to make some kind of change to a replica so that it could not be passed off as an original. There is no practical reason from a production standpoint to make a replica cleaner, at least that I can think of. So it would seem reasonable that either the company wants a more finished looking product, or they are bound by LFL to make some kind of change. Does that answer why the eFX Legend is cleaned up more than at least some of us think it should be? Not really. It could also be that the mold itself was not able to provide that kind of detail. But I have a feeling that it should be able to if it had been preserved professionally for so long.

From what I know, the photo is confirmed to be of the RB mask mold. That being said, it would also be nice to see a photo of the RB helmet mold. I'm almost certain that eFX has a photo of that as well.

Exactly, and what is interesting is that since this specific point has been made people who have had direct involvement with LFL replica projects (eg Steve Dymszo, Bryan Ono, and even the controversial Jim Latta) have said that this is not the case that LFL actually wants them to get it right. Now they are either expressing an opinion truncated by some sort of non-disclosure agreement, which would be understandable, or LFL really isn't trying to alter anything (or perhaps our definition of "alter" differs). Which, if that is the case, leads us to the secondary question:



Me neither. So why haven't any of the licensed replica companies managed to get it right? Dunno, so it's just a topic we kick around for the fun of it.

that's what i was saying.. it must have been in the contract with Lucas film that the prop couldn't be exactly like the original. that would explain everything. that would expalint the hiding of detail and the dome.
and that goes for every other company out there that is producing or has produced a licensed replica.

becasue if you think about it..if they did have an exact copy of the original prop being sold to the masses. then the original wouldn't be so original...lol because there would be hundreds of copies of it out here.

it has to be one or two things...it was in the licensing agreement that they had to alter it in some way..or that something happened to the molds due to their age and how or where they were stored.
at least that's what seems to be the most logical explanation i can think of.

Ah, thank you, that does cut down the time span I was looking in to (up to the Richard Prior Show/Corbis shoot) - regarding stuff such as what possible time the screen suit was shipped out of the studio (UK side) and what side of the pond the RB/other molds were made and whether the suit came back to the UK for promos.

Basic history stuff I should probably read up on lol.