Darth Vader versus papercutting

Chances are I'm going to upset people with the following statement, but I'm not a Star Wars fan. In fact, I've never been able to watch one of the movies in it's entirety. Still, one has to admire the special effects displayed in the movies, especially those from the old days. But what has all this got to do with papercutting?

Well, last saturday Star Wars IV - A New Hope was programmed to be aired on national television, and I decided to have another go at watching the movie. Still not thrilled with the story nor the actors, it suddenly struck me that the whole light saber effects must have been quite a feat back in 1977!

I decided to check Wikipedia for some more information on how these special effects for the light sabers were made ("with the acting and the groupies and the Vwing, Vwing, Vwiiiiing")...

While browsing for information, I found that there were quite a few effects that required manual cutting of movie strips, for which an X-Acto knife was used. Unfortunately, I never heard of such a knife, so I started to look up some more information about this neat little tool.

... and that's how I found out about the art of papercutting - in particular a website with papercutting art by Joe Bagley. I might not like Luke Skywalker, nor Darth Vader, but I must admit that I have a very deep admiration for anyone who is able to create such wonderful pieces of art! The attention to detail is just astonishing...

Now that's a special effect!