Stargate’s Production Designer returns to explore his archive of artwork and share more anecdotes from his time with the franchise.

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TRANSCRIPT
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David Read:
Welcome to Episode 394 of Dial the Gate: the Stargate Oral History Project. My name is David Read. I am privileged to welcome back someone whose work I’ve admired for many years, and if you are watching this, you are well aware. James C.D. Robbins, production designer on Stargate Universe, he was an art director on Stargate SG-1 and Atlantis as well. This is a livestream. If you have questions for James and you’re in the YouTube chat, put a question mark at the beginning of your comment like I’m demonstrating right now: “What did you think of this thing?” And submit questions to him that way through me, and I will be getting them on the back end here. If you have more than one, you are welcome to submit that as well for this episode. We’re not only allowing one question per person this time, because there is a lot to ask this guy. And I am thrilled to have him back. James C.D. Robbins, production designer. And you’re missing a pineapple kind of drink or something there, sir. How are you doing?

James C.D. Robbins:
I am well. I wish this was an actual physical background but it’s merely a little thing that ships with Zoom. It’s where I’d rather be.

David Read:
I am thrilled to have you. What’s been going on, before we get to the elephant in the room that Stargate’s back, what have you been working on? What have you been preoccupying yourself with? What’s been happening?

James C.D. Robbins:
Film in Canada has been a little bit handicapped of late, potential tariffs and other things. A few years back it was strikes and what have you, and it’s just been a sort of … We went from, I think in 2020 we had 72 productions shooting at one time, to the point where I recall once we actually had to push a week on a new movie that was starting because there were no trucks available at all. Period.

David Read:
What?

James C.D. Robbins:
And now we’ve gone from that 72 number down to, I think there are 16 productions shooting at the moment. There may be other indies things but that’s a significant drop. So, there’s a lot of people looking for work, and there’s a lot of people finding other work. And I have large hiatuses between jobs now, so I’m getting back to what I do, which is paint … I’m a painter, that’s where I started. I went to England and did my fine art training in London. And spent four years there. Any time I’ve been down in between films I try and go back to my art and stay creative.

David Read:
Have you ever been in a position, I’m genuinely curious, where … Because you make this your bread and butter, this is your day-to-day, where this thing stopped being something that you love and became something that, “You know what? I’m really resenting this part of myself right now, creatively speaking.” Have you ever been close to wanting to just stop doing this thing? Or has it always been a positive influence in your life, creating content, whether you’re doing it with your favorite medium, which is, I believe, charcoal, or Photoshop?

James C.D. Robbins:
There’s a few questions in there.

David Read:
Yeah, sorry.

James C.D. Robbins:
No, that’s fine. That’s fine. Let me think how to best put that together. Film is what I know. It has been my world since I graduated from college. I started working at a TV station in Ontario, in Toronto, and then I worked at a TV station in Winnipeg, and then I came up here and devoted myself to actual film work and worked my way up to becoming a production designer. That said, my art is always where I go. It comes with me by default. So, when I do not have productions that I’m working on, I go back to my own artwork. And yes, charcoal is part of it, but I’m an oil painter. And I try and bring my art to whatever I can do. When I’m on smaller movies, there’s many occasions when I’ve actually done oil paintings for productions and retained ownership of those. I try and do it so I do the paintings in my own time, so that at the end of the day, they still belong to me and I rent them or loan them out to a production. Some productions are more open to that than others, but I’ve never really had any complaints. And it allows me to flex artistically, basically. I could go out and take a photo and have it printed onto canvas. But if you’re in with camera up close, you can see brushstrokes. There’s a difference between an actual painting and a digital copy of a painting printed on canvas. So, I thought, “If I can do whatever little things I can do to lend credibility to the environment or the scene, it’s worth it.” And there’s been a few that have been very specifically oriented around portraiture. I did two different portraits for a movie. What was it? Three Bed, Two Bath, One Ghost, and it was a period piece. And it all centered around this portrait that was done of this young girl back in the 1920s, and then the portrait changed when she finally stopped being a ghost, and saw the light and went through to wherever she had to go, and then the portrait changed to her and her beloved. So, it was an integral story point in that particular movie. So, whenever I can do that, I will do that, but the rest of the time, I love wildlife art. I spent many summers as a kid at a game farm that no longer exists here in British Columbia, but I lived on the game farm doing wildlife drawing and painting every summer, so two months out of every year for four years running. And I was up close and personal with the animals and in the cages with some of them. I actually bottle-fed a lion cub for two months, that remembered me the next year when I came back.

David Read:
My God.

James C.D. Robbins:
That was pretty amazing. It really was. I got to go in the cage with this thing at a year old, and it remembered my voice. And the guy who ran the game farm, Ed Lacey, says, “Well, do you want to go in and visit?” “What? I can do that?” ‘Cause this thing’s huge now.

David Read:
Apex predator, man.

James C.D. Robbins:
But I was like Mom. This thing came in and it knocked me on my back and was licking my neck with this sandpaper tongue and the whole bit, and had to pull him off so he’d let me stand up again. And then he ran around like a fricking little kitten with the scooties. Just like jumping all over the place. He was so excited. There’s been some very memorable moments that I’ve had. And then wildlife. When I was a kid, I was doing pen and ink drawings of cougars and lions and all the standard stuff.

David Read:
Wow.

James C.D. Robbins:
But once I got into film, that was bred in me. ‘Cause you graduate from college with all the ideas that, “Oh, I’m gonna be the world’s next best painter,” and then you gotta earn a living. So, television has done that for me since 1982, I guess? I started working.

David Read:
Man.

James C.D. Robbins:
I know. Way, way back for sure.

David Read:
Takes me back, man. I was not born. No, I’m kidding.

James C.D. Robbins:
I was gonna say.

David Read:
’82 you said?

James C.D. Robbins:
Let’s see. I graduated in ’82. I’d actually done summer jobs at CFTO-TV in Toronto in ’81, and then in ’82 I started full time, and then we had a recession, and then I wound up bartending for about a year and a half, and then moved to Winnipeg, got back into CTV Network in Winnipeg, doing work for them in the art department. And then I left Winnipeg and moved to the coast and started doing music videos and commercials and you name it. Anything I could, and worked my way up from not really knowing much about film at all to becoming a fairly seasoned designer over what? Ten years before, eight years before I started at Stargate. And then …

David Read:
That’s it.

James C.D. Robbins:
… went backwards a little bit when I started at Stargate ’cause the union didn’t recognize the independent stuff I’d done. It wasn’t in their book, so to speak. So, I started as an illustrator. I was amazed that they were gonna pay me just to draw them. I couldn’t believe that. And one tiny correction to your intro is I actually wound up being the designer for all three things. That was the last two …

David Read:
Oh, you were?

James C.D. Robbins:
Last two seasons of Stargate SG-1.

David Read:
My apologies.

James C.D. Robbins:
No, it’s fine. Last two seasons of Atlantis.

David Read:
But I should’ve known that by now. OK, got it. What year did Bridget, was Bridget there for Seasons Four and Five, or …

James C.D. Robbins:
Don’t ask me what year. She did Season Eight, I did Nine and Ten. So, you can figure out what years that was.

David Read:
That’s OK.

James C.D. Robbins:
And I did Four and Five of Atlantis.

David Read:
Got it, OK. That makes sense.

James C.D. Robbins:
And the first two, I wound up doing two years each of all the shows, ’cause Universe didn’t go beyond two.

David Read:
There we go. James C.D. Robbins, production designer of Stargate SG-1, Atlantis, and Universe. I’m thrilled to have you back. I’ve got some fan questions popping for you. I think we should get to those first before we get to the show and tell.

James C.D. Robbins:
Sure.

David Read:
Brice Ors, “Was it he who painted the picture of the city of Atlantis, the one painted by Major Lorne in ‘Sunday’ … ”

James C.D. Robbins:
No.

David Read:
“… and then it later hangs over … ”

James C.D. Robbins:
I have that here at my house.

David Read:
The original?

James C.D. Robbins:
Yep. Going for the low, low price of … Make me an offer, come on. There you go. You got a print already. Where’d you get that?

David Read:
I asked for your permission before I did it, and you said yes. So, this came from Hobby Lobby.

James C.D. Robbins:
OK, cool. Very nice. And that’s actually a …

David Read:
It looks like acrylic.

James C.D. Robbins:
It is acrylic. That is an acrylic painting.

David Read:
No, but it looks like acrylic. I know it was, but it looks like …

James C.D. Robbins:
Yeah, the original.

David Read:
… the print looks like it could be. It’s not gonna pass for one when it hits the light because the light doesn’t hit it. But …

James C.D. Robbins:
No, they did a great job on the colors. That looks very authentic.

David Read:
Exactly. I think … OK, you opened this door. OK, so you have Evan Lorne’s painting from Atlantis.

James C.D. Robbins:
I do.

David Read:
What else of the paintings do you still possess?

James C.D. Robbins:
From Stargate? Not much. I did that one other painting from, oh my God, what was it called? “Harmony?”

David Read:
Do you have Harmony’s Victory, at the end?

James C.D. Robbins:
I do not have that painting. I found a reference to it, but that was printed on canvas and hung at the other end of the hall, where the writers and producers …

David Read:
I sold that.

James C.D. Robbins:
… all lived. It went somewhere.

David Read:
I sold that, and I can tell you what it went for. It was not a song. It did pretty well. But yeah, and then there was one that I’ve never seen since. I’ve only seen it in screenshots of the show. And it is Satedan officers in their gold armor on a dark battlefield, and it’s Ronon’s. It belongs to him. And I have never seen an art file of it, I’ve never seen a reference to it anywhere, other than in the episode.

James C.D. Robbins:
I would have to see an image of it. I don’t know that that’s something I created. That does not ring a bell with me.

David Read:
OK. It’s two or three guys standing on a battlefield in their golden armor, that was made really fast for “Runner,” and then we saw again in Sateda in the flashbacks. If someone can point out where that is, I’d love to share it, but …

James C.D. Robbins:
Shoot me an image of it. I can say pretty quickly whether I did that or not. I did so many drawings and …

David Read:
If anyone has an eye on the Satedan painting, or a screenshot of it, they can send it to me at [email protected]. I’ll give you credit for it right now if you’re in the live chat, because … And away they go. It’s a tremendous image, and I’m really curious if you could see it and just be like, “Oh, yeah, that was so-and-so.” ‘Cause you had a couple of folks under you as well, didn’t you?

James C.D. Robbins:
I primarily was hired on, like I say, in Season Six as the illustrator. And then when I became art director, I kept on doing all the illustrating. They didn’t have me hire an illustrator, and I did it for both shows. And then when I became designer, I kept doing my own, because that’s how I design. It’s a visual way of getting everything understood by all parties, and it seemed very redundant to me to hire an illustrator that would maybe give me something close to what I had in my head, when I can actually output exactly what I have in my head. So, it just keeps the through line clean.

David Read:
That’s the thing that, and I think I’ve articulated this to you before, the thing that always amazed me, and Martin Gero said it to me, was I can think up something in my head, and I can write it down on paper, and I can have a conversation with the art department about it, and within a couple of weeks, I can freaking hold it. That’s kind of awe-inspiring.

James C.D. Robbins:
That’s the magic.

David Read:
That’s wild.

James C.D. Robbins:
It is the magic. Designing sets, designing … I mean, how many props did I design over the years? And they’d bring me axes, and they’d bring me Ronon’s gun and the blade he carried, all the stuff. And I never got over the excitement, the childlike excitement almost of, “Oh, look at this. This is so cool.” But that’s also because you’ve got a team of incredibly talented people. You can hand anything off to somebody and what you get back is not necessarily what you put out. And I’ve experienced that since Stargate on many occasions, where I’ve anticipated that level of perfection or talent … and it’s fallen short in certain cases, and it’s just, “Oh, OK,” and you really start to appreciate the world that we lived in there, where the talent that they amassed on that show, it was all the way through. It wasn’t just a couple guys at the top that knew what they were doing, it was everybody who was on that show brought so much to it, so. They were very fortunate. But you go that many years, and you redefine your infrastructure, and everything becomes in-house. A model shop, they had, we were the first ones to start doing 3D scanning and stuff back when it was unheard of. And they had their own water-cutting machines to create stuff …

David Read:
My God.

James C.D. Robbins:
… so they could work with almost any material. It was unbelievable, it really was. I was very, very lucky.

David Read:
Martin Wood and some of the producers would go off to these shows and find out at these trade shows about some of the new machines that were being created to fabricate things, and they’d be like, “Guys, we saw this this weekend. Should we get one?” “Oh, it’s a couple hundred thousand dollars.” “Yeah, we’ll make it work.” It’s like, “Well, we could use it to do this, that, and that.” So, there’s only so much that you can do with what it is that you have, and then someone comes along and creates something that you can create … These new tools come along, and your eyes open wide. It’s like, “Well, there are some possibilities here.” I’ve got the image for you. Are you ready?

James C.D. Robbins:
Yeah.

David Read:
OK. Ring any bells now?

James C.D. Robbins:
It does. It wasn’t me. Possibly Rodrigo, Chris Beach? I’m not sure. I’m not sure. I do recall the image now. I haven’t seen that before. But it was not created by me.

David Read:
He had it hidden in his dreadlocks along with all of the throwing knives when he fled from Sateda. Or I think more likely he had Lorne create it for him, and they had long conversations about what it would’ve looked like. This is one of those things where it’s like, OK, he’s a runner. You can’t exactly take paintings. But of course, at the end of the day, they did go back to Sateda, so maybe he went back to his boss’s place from when he shot and killed and nabbed it. That’s probably what happened.

James C.D. Robbins:
Who knows? Not every single aspect of a storyline is entirely thought out, I guess.

David Read:
That’s it. And that’s Brice Ors, who created the opening sequence for this. He was actually the one who went and made that. This is actually a little bit of a better shot of it here, but whoops.

James C.D. Robbins:
I don’t know, man.

David Read:
Thank you, GateWorld.

James C.D. Robbins:
It’s vague … Maybe I did? Like I say, so many images, I can’t decide.

David Read:
That’s the thing. Raj …

James C.D. Robbins:
Thousands of drawings.

David Read:
Thousands. Raj_Luthra is asking, and I wanna figure out how I wanna phrase this. The design and … The idea comes from the writer, obviously. You get to mold it and shape it into something that can be created, and then it gets to be actually brought into the physical or digital space, depending on what it is, by another department. I’m curious if there are any stories that you remember, not from writer to you, but from you to the model shop, where they were creating something, and they had to come back and say, “We’re having a hard time cracking this.” Things like the drone weapon in Atlantis. It’s got, the tentacles, each link in the chain is its own piece. Or was there a prop or a design element that was like, “It’s crystallized. It’s right here,” and they boom, they went and did it? I’m curious if anything stands out to you after all this time.

James C.D. Robbins:
There were a couple things. One of the first things that I drew up for SG-1 was the … It was in the gate, hung in the gateway, and it was to counteract the ancient weapon that Anubis was firing into the gate, and they didn’t …

David Read:
Yup, and it did this.

James C.D. Robbins:
It was a pulse generator, exactly. And what I did in my drawing was, I did a rendering of it. I’m like, “This is other people’s problems,” and then Bridget said, “Now, draw it up so they can build it.” And I’m like, “OK.” Drafting, that’s … I’ve done that, but my God, it was a long time ago. So, I figured it out through looking at other drawings that were in the art department of how to draft again, and basically, there were two things that were on the same axis going in opposite directions, two spinning wheels. And the special effects guys, Ray and company, figured out how to do it. So, that was pretty amazing. But the only other thing … The model shop was under, especially under Gord, they were unbelievable what they could do with …

David Read:
Gord Bellamy.

James C.D. Robbins:
Love Gord. What was it? It was a bracelet that … There you go. There’s a very detailed drawing. Gets you an idea of what it’s supposed to be like.

David Read:
Hey, we work with what we got. Are you referring to the bracelets that Vala and Daniel wore, the gold ones?

James C.D. Robbins:
Yes. My wife, years before, I had bought her this fur bracelet, but it was a stick, and basically as soon as you go and hit your arm with it, it just wraps automatically, and I loved the action of it. So, I managed to go find these things, and we brought a couple in, and the guys in the model shop tried to reverse engineer it, but were unable to. And I think that was the only time that I drew something that they were just like, “Well, I don’t know.” And that became a much more involved version of it. Look at you finding this stuff so fast. And I’m not sure now, it’s so long ago, I don’t actually recall how we did it, whether we did a flat one and had a formed bracelet that they wore, which is probably the most likely thing.

David Read:
Exactly. And a visual effect transition.

James C.D. Robbins:
Once again, it’s been a couple years, so I beg your forgiveness if I don’t remember all the details of how all these things panned out.

David Read:
No, there was some, look at that. It’s got a little …

James C.D. Robbins:
That was a fun one.

David Read:
It’s got a little face in it, with pinchers and everything. I’ve never really paid a lot of attention to this. Glowing gems should be dimmable. The fact of the matter is, I have a number of these things in my house with the concept art hanging with them, and every single one of your notes, pretty much, I can’t think of any that aren’t, are addressed in what was created, largely.

James C.D. Robbins:
Absolutely.

David Read:
They didn’t look at it as, “It’d be great if you could do this.” It’s, “No, this is what the production designer wants. We’re gonna find a way to make this work. And if we can’t, we’re gonna have a conversation.”

James C.D. Robbins:
Beyond that though, David, it’s not just what I want. I do the drawings. And those all have to be signed off by the executive branch, the writers, Brad …

David Read:
That’s fair.

James C.D. Robbins:
… Rob, whomever it was, Paul and Joe. Now, they all had to sign off on this stuff, and at the end of the day, they were making my drawings come to life. But they were doing that on behalf of the production because this is what had been agreed to. So, you can’t … There’s no point in doing a very specific detailed drawing if they give you something that’s kind of over there and isn’t really representative of it, or doesn’t … And a lot of the time, it’s how the physical piece works. It has to perform in a certain manner on camera. So, they were brilliant. Paco Don, Gord Bellamy, the gang, there was nothing they couldn’t do, except for that one bracelet thing. But that’s a pretty good hit-miss ratio I would say. Their batting average was 99.9.

David Read:
We can make weapons. We can create, along with Todd Masters’ team, we can create alien races. A bracelet, that is one bridge too far. So, I would think that every once in a while, they would come up with something that was like, “You know, this is amazing stuff that you create. This one trips you up and I’m honestly surprised.” Occasionally it would have to be like, “This was what you guys stuck on, this one? I’m honestly surprised that this is a troublesome thing for you.”

James C.D. Robbins:
And so, was I because the last thing I want is to draw something they can’t build.

David Read:
It’s like, “Gotcha. Oh, damn.”

James C.D. Robbins:
The analogy is like watching your wife, ex-wife, drive off a cliff in your brand new car. It’s like, “Yeah! Oh, damn.”

David Read:
What? Now there’s an image. When you’re creating these things, is there part of your mind that’s like, “Oh, I wanna put this down.” Because this is part of what … Not what they were asking, the guys, they’re asking for one through five. I’m assuming you’re allowed to make six, seven, and eight in terms of this design as well. Because not adding functionality onto something, but you want it to articulate a certain way, it, it’s like something that the model shop would create. Is that typical? Or is it like, “No, they’ve asked for one through five on this. Time is money. I’m gonna give them one through five,” in terms of designing a weapon.

James C.D. Robbins:
I had read the script, so I know how the weapon needed to perform.

David Read:
Yes.

James C.D. Robbins:
And I would have that obviously forefront of my mind when I’m drawing these things up. But on top of that, I would add my own iterations, if you will. Ronon’s gun, for example, is a perfect iteration. Started off from a Peacemaker, 1800s pistol, and redefined it, and then put the shell into it that glowed thinking this is an energy shell, and he would have a bandolier potentially. Maybe he carries extra energy shells with him, or there’s some way to tune this thing up. And then the three different settings, I just put that on. That wasn’t scripted in the first place. But the three different settings of, what was it? Incinerate, there you go. Amber is stun, red kill, and green is incinerate. So, I’m not sure that, I think they kind of backed into two settings on the final gun. And I don’t know …

David Read:
I don’t think we ever saw him incinerate, disintegrate any … incinerate anything other than a piece of paper, that he was shooting at as a target. That was gone.

James C.D. Robbins:
No, no. There was a female … She shot through a door with it to get out. So, it, I mean if …

David Read:
So, she … Oh, wow. OK, it did get used.

James C.D. Robbins:
If she’d hit a person with that, that probably is, you know, metal as opposed to …

David Read:
Wouldn’t ‘ve had a good day.

James C.D. Robbins:
Exactly. So, maybe that was the incinerate mode. But they didn’t specifically put that in as a scripted thing. But I put the little bells and whistles on it, even if these things don’t get addressed specifically, it just adds a little more eye candy to the piece. It makes it a more interesting prop to look at and play with.

David Read:
For sure.

James C.D. Robbins:
And my understanding was that Jason quite liked that gun. He became very good with it after a while, like a gunslinger.

David Read:
It’s oversized. I’ve held it. But it’s not for him. It fits him completely, along with that great big piece of cow that the costume designer put him in. It was Valerie Halverson. It’s just so outsized, but he wears it. It’s not wearing him.

James C.D. Robbins:
And I was fortunate. I was fortunate because I met him in person right before I was assigned to create this weapon for him. You know, I’d heard of him at that point, but I … And they said, “Oh, he’s really big.” I went and met him, I’m like, “Holy crap. OK … ”

David Read:
He is big.

James C.D. Robbins:
“… this gun is gonna have to be large.” That’s all there is to it. Big boy like this doesn’t want a little gun.” So, …

David Read:
That’s it.

James C.D. Robbins:
… that’s what we came up with and that was a, out of the park, from the get-go. He loved it, production loved it.

David Read:
He did. And there are scenes …

James C.D. Robbins:
And the nice thing was, it doesn’t key. In other words, he can’t press a button that makes it light up ’cause production hates that, ’cause then if they hit it by mistake all of a sudden they either have to either send a blast out from the gun or erase it in post, which …

David Read:
Digitally. That would be such a pain in the ass. I remember …

James C.D. Robbins:
True.

David Read:
… Bruce Woloshyn talking about the Wraith. They were like bazookas. They put them over their shoulders and they fire with them. And the model shop had designed a light at the end and a depressible button, and I think they worked for us as well. They just existed in the first season. They went and upgraded to the pistol version, made a more practical version of it. But then Bruce was like, “Yeah, every time that they light that, we either have to digitally remove the light or … Because it locks us in, in terms of when the shots come in.” Like, these things have to articulate that way. And if you’re looking really closely, I think one of my favorites is, there’s an episode in Season Eight called “Sacrifices” where Teal’c is doing, he’s made a double-ended staff weapon by tying these things together. And he’s running and doing this, and the staff blasts conveniently go exactly where he wanted them to, even though 90% of the time the staff wasn’t properly aimed that way. So, my dad says, “You gotta buy it.” There’s only so much that you can pull off when you’re executing things that way. You gotta tell the story that you’re gonna tell.

James C.D. Robbins:
Exactly. When you have a porthole that has a sideways swimming pool and if it takes you to other planets, the level of believability, I think, you can play with that a bit.

David Read:
You gotta make it work.

James C.D. Robbins:
That’s a given.

David Read:
That’s it. The mandate first, and foremost, is be entertaining. Brice went and wrote me, “found it. Season Four DVD disc number one,” and here it is one more time, in all of its full glory. I’m curious if those folks are anyone specific. Do you recognize those guys at all?

James C.D. Robbins:
Oh my God. You know what?

David Read:
Anything stand out?

James C.D. Robbins:
I can’t say I did or didn’t have my hand in there. There’s no signature on it, obviously, so …

David Read:
Ah, no. This one doesn’t have a signature. The people in it.

James C.D. Robbins:
I would have to go back. Which episode is that?

David Read:
Brice, which episode is this? There’s a good chance that … Let’s have a look here because this is fun. This is what we do. Sorry, Darren. Let’s see. Atlantis Season Four. I think that may be the episode “Reunion.” That’s gotta be “Reunion” 4.03. Because that’s the one with Mark Dacascos.

James C.D. Robbins:
4.03, “Reunion.”

David Read:
That’s it. I was curious if you recognized the guys standing in the shot.

James C.D. Robbins:
It’s one of those things. Yes, I have seen it. Did I do it? I don’t recall.

David Read:
It’s still cool.

James C.D. Robbins:
I don’t remember. Anyway.

David Read:
Let me see here. Lockwatcher, “I was able to acquire a production print from Propworx of the prosthetic wraith arm from the Atlantis pilot. How did that develop and how were they used in production?” Because that one actually crawled across …

James C.D. Robbins:
It was a severed limb.

David Read:
… the ground, I think.

James C.D. Robbins:
After they took down one of the wraith’s darts, I think they found a limb. Knowing that we were gonna get close on that, I designed that with all the metallic finger cots and the whole bit. And the guys came back and, of course, it had to have the feeding thing in the palm. There’s the drawing. We started that, and I don’t think they gave the finger cots to anybody except the wraith queen at the end of the day.

David Read:
Now, Andy looked at these as armor to protect herself when she would close her hand, and I think that they served a dual purpose as well, because they could slice open clothing. Not that you needed the clothing removed for them to do whatever it was that you called a sucking life, or whatever it was that you called that. But was there any … What are these things meant for in general?

James C.D. Robbins:
To me, it was an adornment, that was all. I didn’t see it as having strong function. Obviously, they were sharp-ended, and if you’re in a cat fight with someone who was wearing those, you’re gonna lose.

David Read:
Two queens.

James C.D. Robbins:
There’s a scene we never saw.

David Read:
Exactly. She looked at that as … When they close their hand up, they’re protecting their most vital organ. Which, I mean, when you think about that, that really does make sense. If they’re too low on life, they’re not gonna regenerate that easily.

James C.D. Robbins:
You know what? That’s part of the beauty of … I do these drawings and then they live another life beyond whatever I had in my mind. Because the director has his input on it and the actors that wear them … Now, in this case no one was wearing it, but it just … Other people can spin to their heart’s content. And if it’s something that works, then great. Move forward with it. But they did a great job building that. They brought that actual prosthetic arm to me at the end of it, and I’m like, “Shut up.” It had that soft, dead flesh feel to it too.

David Read:
God.

James C.D. Robbins:
It was crazy. Nothing they couldn’t do.

David Read:
Let’s stick around with the Wraith for a little bit here. Let’s start with the Queen. The gal from the top. I’m curious if this was the image that you really began with. When you conceptualized the Wraith, what shot really is the one that …

James C.D. Robbins:
Yeah. Nobody has ever seen the earlier versions. They stayed with me. And rightly so because they were really nothing airable. I started out with the Wraith as something that would have had to have been almost a complete digital fabrication. The first drawing that I did was out of a horror movie rather than a pilot where you can put a person in a suit and do the thing. And then got some notes very quickly. “Oh, no, no, not like that.” It’s gotta be a person, the whole bit. And she’s super tall and she’s super scary. And so, I gave her cat eyes and came up with the idea of putting the pits, the sensory pits like a snake, in their faces. And there were various incarnations: old, wrinkled, young, bald, all sorts of different incarnations of what they could look like. And then that drawing came out, and the initial one, she had white hair when I did the drawing of The Wraith Queen. And then they said, “There you go.” So, that was the original version. And then they said, “No, no, we’re gonna make her a copper top.” So, I basically just redid that drawing and changed the hair to the red color and that’s what we got. And they never did the headpiece. I was kind of sad about that because …

David Read:
They didn’t?

James C.D. Robbins:
There is a thing at Stargate, and different people you talk to had different takes on it, but basically the adage was, “Hats are stupid.” So, whenever you could avoid having some sort of headgear, they would potentially choose to avoid it. I thought that was more like an extension of the decorative stuff that she had on her fingers and what have you. They don’t really wear jewelry per se, but it was also a crown that only she would wear, because she was the queen or the Keeper. But …

David Read:
Do you realize why?

James C.D. Robbins:
… for whatever reason …

David Read:
I can tell you why, because the last time that there was a Keeper on the show, and his name was The Keeper, his hat was this. So, I’m not surprised they would have thought that hats were stupid.

James C.D. Robbins:
Don’t know where that came from.

David Read:
I’m sorry. Probably Egyptian mythology or something there but it’s Dwight Schultz in Season Two.

James C.D. Robbins:
Don’t recall that particular hat. But as you say …

David Read:
That was 1999. So, ’98, ’99.

James C.D. Robbins:
Season … gotcha.

David Read:
Way earlier, in SG-1. Exactly. But Andy often talked about there are only so many women who are her height and her shape who could pull that off. And I don’t know if it was in relation to, “Can I please have this clothing because I can actually wear it?” Probably not, because she wouldn’t probably be able to take it out of a dominatrix bedroom. But her body type was so specific, like, “You’re either going to find this person or you are not.” And then on top of that, they have to act their asses off. It’s one thing to find the shape, which you can do relatively easily, but then to find an actor to portray that character in a certain way. When you were creating this thing, what do you recall were the notes from Brad and Rob? Did they say vampire? Did the word vampire ever enter the equation? I’m really curious. What were they going for?

James C.D. Robbins:
Certainly not in a traditional sense of what people take to be vampires. I just did a vampire movie about a year and a half ago. It’s so dark, it was great. But vampires, I know …

David Read:
“It’s so dark, it was great.”

James C.D. Robbins:
It was. Vampires feed in the way that everybody knows. They have fangs and they suck your blood. And these guys were vampiric, but they sucked your essence or your soul out, or your life force out. And obviously, not in the standard way, through this palm feeding device that they have. So, that would be the only correlation to vampires, I would think. But I wanted her to be beautiful and scary at the same time. And super strong. And this was done before anybody had been cast. So, she’s got this giraffe neck on her. Think of Audrey …

David Read:
She sure does.

James C.D. Robbins:
Think of Audrey Hepburn. Or Morena, she was very much like Hepburn, I thought.

David Read:
Baccarin?

James C.D. Robbins:
So, I threw that together and this became the direction that all the other departments who weighed in on this were working from. So, once again, it’s just creating some sort of unified direction that everybody can take and run with and amalgamate at the end so that you’ve got what the producers, writers, directors were looking for and helping to push the story forward.

David Read:
Here’s the male version.

James C.D. Robbins:
And there’s the male version, exactly. And once again, they came out with something that was very, very similar to this at the end of the day. The one thing they didn’t do were the ears, which I thought was a wonderful …

David Read:
I see that now.

James C.D. Robbins:
… way to dehumanize them. So, that was gonna be too much to do on every actor that had to come through and be a Wraith.

David Read:
I talked with James Lafazanos about this character, ’cause he hissed a lot.

James C.D. Robbins:
It’s what they do.

David Read:
It’s what they do. So, these came from a snake. Were they more olfactory, smelling fear, sensing fear?

James C.D. Robbins:
That’s what I had in my mind when I did it. So, you could be in a dark room, and it doesn’t mean they’re not gonna find you. Because they can … they can sense heat perhaps with them, or life force with them. But it’s a secondary smell or olfactory sense.

David Read:
Wow. This is interesting. It doesn’t take up the whole face. It takes up just the top here. This is one of the coolest guys. He stands downstairs in my dining room.

James C.D. Robbins:
Dan Shea.

David Read:
Dan Shea.

James C.D. Robbins:
Once again.

David Read:
Very much. Here’s the Wraith bazooka.

James C.D. Robbins:
Oh, that’s what you’re calling the bazooka. OK, cool.

David Read:
Exactly.

James C.D. Robbins:
The pointy bit.

David Read:
Was this always a self-destruct device from the beginning? Or did that only take place, did it only come, manifest itself three or four episodes later in “Suspicion?” You just wanted to add that then? OK.

James C.D. Robbins:
I think the writers just took that and said, “Hey, that could be … ” and went with it.

David Read:
Got it.

James C.D. Robbins:
I didn’t have any distinction. All I was trying to do is get the sense that there were some mechanics underneath the translucent shell. And that potentially that was adding to their strength, their abilities.

David Read:
Eye holes to see through.

James C.D. Robbins:
It has to do with it.

David Read:
That’s it. So, there were two versions of these that I’m aware of. For the first few years, they were all rubber. And then you guys had a couple of versions where we finally see the drones getting born and they don’t have them on their faces. They add them on after birth. And then it just sucks onto their faces. But I’m not sure who it was who said it. It may have been you, it may have been Bridget. I’m trying to remember. They went to set with the masks and there were no eye holes in the masks. The model shop needed to take drills and make the holes so that Dan Shea and company could see. Because it’d be kind of nice if they could see.

James C.D. Robbins:
Dan Payne. Sorry. Dan Payne.

David Read:
Dan Payne did?

James C.D. Robbins:
He was one of the first ones on it.

David Read:
Sorry. Dan Shea, I apologize.

James C.D. Robbins:
Essentially.

David Read:
No, I think you said Dan. I think you were right.

James C.D. Robbins:
I said Dan Payne. I don’t know.

David Read:
Dan Shea was over on SG-1. But Dan Payne was the bigger guy who was the Kull warrior and everything else.

James C.D. Robbins:
Exactly.

David Read:
It’s a remarkable piece to look at. And it’s important to factor those kinds of details in because I would think it would be relatively easy to overlook something like that. It’s, “Yeah, this is gonna be worn on a person.”

James C.D. Robbins:
That’s why I made the notes in there in the first place. You know you’ve gotta do something here. These guys obviously need to be able to see. And even with what they did, drilling the holes the way they did, very limited viewing for whoever happened to be wearing that. So, you try not to put the actors through hell but sometimes it’s …

David Read:
That’s it.

James C.D. Robbins:
And Dan was a trooper ’cause …

David Read:
He was.

James C.D. Robbins:
… the Kull warrior thing. I think I’ve told you the story about “Evolution,” where he overheated wearing that neoprene. It was …

David Read:
And buried himself in dirt for …

James C.D. Robbins:
Yes.

David Read:
… and held his breath for a huge amount of time to pull that off. I don’t even think he heard … I think it was DeLuise. I don’t even think he heard Peter say, “Action.” He knew something and he came up, and they got it in one take, thank God. This is a little bit more detailed view on this. I love this. This is one of those details that they didn’t really illustrate on screen. I was thinking they were gonna do this, and then it would come and open. And that really is articulated in this particular shot here, which I love.

James C.D. Robbins:
I was thinking about Venus flytrap.

David Read:
Exactly right. “Glowing tendrils protrude from pores surrounding the palm vent. They whip out in a frenzy with lights that pulse toward the ends.” You missed your true calling as a novelist. I’m just saying. This is so cool because I think it would have … “The small nails that held the vents shut now assist in adhering to their victim as they feed.” And you’ve got all these little tendrils and pulsating things around it. This is cool, man. This is you going to town.

James C.D. Robbins:
And honestly, it’s what I did with every one of these things. Wherever I was able to, I had to, in this case, pardon the pun, I had to flesh it out. It has to live for me too. How does this do it? It’s got to function a certain way. I never knew if they were gonna see that action actually happen. And as it turns out, I don’t think they did, really.

David Read:
No, not this.

James C.D. Robbins:
I think they just showed the hand going up against the chest …

David Read:
Exactly.

James C.D. Robbins:
… and then the person starts screaming. And when they get old really fast, then they understand what’s going on.

David Read:
Absolutely.

James C.D. Robbins:
And then being able to give life back, that was a cool thing too.

David Read:
That was a great twist. That was like one of those … Because we see all the young folks with them in the second season, the Wraith worshipers, and we’re like, “Who are these people and why are they all kids?” And it wasn’t like … I don’t even think they knew then that that’s what it was doing. These were beings whom they gave back their life to. That came in Season Three. A great episode with Chris Heyerdahl who explained that. That you don’t know as much about us as you think. I think it’s the best Wraith episode of all of them in terms of character development.

James C.D. Robbins:
Heyerdahl was awesome. He played more than one Wraith … as I’m clicking through.

David Read:
He sure did.

James C.D. Robbins:
Todd.

David Read:
Todd. That was the main one. But he’s impossible to get on this show because he’s so busy and it’s like, “Uh, how can I feel bad?” The dude is doing what he loves. So, one of these days we’ll get him. But this is some cool stuff here. Let’s look at, let me see if I can get this. This is the back side of the piece. What is this, “Do not remove?” What does that mean? Like, just do not remove from this location?

James C.D. Robbins:
I have no idea. That is not an internal stamp to my knowledge. That might have been after we wrapped it. Somebody else took hold of it.

David Read:
Got it. This is the back of the carapace, and you’ve got several layers here.

James C.D. Robbins:
Because you gotta do both sides, that’s all.

David Read:
That’s it.

James C.D. Robbins:
What would it look like from behind? So, there you go. It’s the same thing I did with the head. Side, back, front.

David Read:
Exactly. And here is what it looks like underneath with the plastic shell removed. Just really busy and mechanical. Let’s look at some of their hardware. Let’s take a look at the big kahuna here. Bruce Woloshyn actually said to me during production on Season One, they weren’t sure if they ever were gonna show the Hive ship itself because the thing was so gargantuan in size that it would just dwarf anything and it would eclipse anything in it. And this was actually rendered for the pilot because you have to … Whoops. Hang on just a second here. If I can get my stuff right. There it is. You have to show a certain amount of it outside of the ground because it had grown into the mountainside. It laid there dormant for so many thousands of years that trees literally …

James C.D. Robbins:
… had grown on it. Exactly. And that was scripted. That was from Brad. This thing had been grounded and the Wraith were asleep, and it obviously had been asleep long enough for trees to actually grow on top of this ship. And then when it pulled out of the ground, there was gonna be this hole. And I think I did a charcoal drawing of that, but that’s as far as it got. But I did a complete drawing with the ship on the ground. There you go.

David Read:
You had to start with what was underneath.

James C.D. Robbins:
And that’s what it is. Gives you a sense of the scale of the whole thing. Little tiny trees, or great big trees growing on it makes it look like a mountainside rather than anything until you get close and you can see the lights and stuff, which theoretically would have started popping on after we interrupted their sleep.

David Read:
“Someone’s at the door. Can someone please get it?” So, I’m curious as to what point the design of the Hive ship just evolved. I guess it was later on in the first season …

James C.D. Robbins:
Well, I don’t know if this ever aired. I don’t know if that version ever aired.

David Read:
That version did not. No.

James C.D. Robbins:
No, because we came back after a break and saw the vis effect versions. And went to Brad and was like, “Whoa, whoa. What happened, what happened to the Wraith ships? Those don’t look anything like what I drew.” And he’s like, “Yeah, I know. We tweaked them a bit.”

David Read:
I see.

James C.D. Robbins:
So, whether it was they were just too bony. I don’t think the scale changed. I think they were still massive ships.

David Read:
They were.

James C.D. Robbins:
But yeah, that version or the … Bridget had said, “Let’s do the Wraith ships like bird skulls.” So, that’s where it started from. So, the bony exterior, the whole … And I really like the flow of it because, you know nature, you know, you’re taking nature’s designs and playing with them. So, everything flowed beautifully, I thought. And I love the side, that close side view where you can see the sort of cross-section of a bone with all the …

David Read:
Is the front to the left?

James C.D. Robbins:
Yes.

David Read:
So, it reminds me of a fish.

James C.D. Robbins:
A fish?

David Read:
A fish. And then the darts. We’ve got some darts here.

James C.D. Robbins:
And the darts were very much a bird skull that I went all the way through and I did three incarnations. So, it was the charcoal drawing, then I did one that was sort of metallicized of it and simplified a bit. And then this version is the final that had the cockpit thrown in so you could reasonably expect somebody to be able to pilot this thing. But it’s simplified over two or three iterations.

David Read:
Man, there’s so much that goes into conceiving, giving birth to something like this. I don’t know how you manage to get through the volume of work. Something like the drawing of that arm, would that have taken a day, a couple of days? How do you … I guess in terms of, you have to prioritize your time somehow.

James C.D. Robbins:
And especially later when I was designing and doing. The first season that I was there, all I did was draw. So, I had all day, every day, all day long, and I would go home and draw some more.

David Read:
Wow.

James C.D. Robbins:
A couple of days maybe for the Wraith arm. They all differ in complexity of … I remember doing one for, which was the … Was it “Trio” that was the underground mining?

David Read:
The Genii mining … yep. Went way over budget.

James C.D. Robbins:
So, I did drawings just of the rock face opposite and stuff where the tunnel came out of the bottom that ultimately they swung into, and the whole … Those drawings took me over a week to do, which is an inordinate amount of time, but I wanted to … Sometimes it’s how much realism am I trying to achieve in the drawings? There’s probably not one drawing that I wouldn’t go back to and want to finish, because time was the enemy. So, I get them to the point where they say what they have to say and then push them onto production, because I’ve already got a script for the next thing, or I’ve got five more things in that episode that I have to do as well. So, time management became a large part of it, but a lot of these drawings could be realized to a much higher degree, basically.

David Read:
Man. Oh, man. Lockwatcher went in and sent over the shots of his of his collection, so that’s …

James C.D. Robbins:
There you go. It’s also got the “do not remove” on it. That’s so weird.

David Read:
It sure does. It’s a production thing. It must be from the drafting boards and the different rooms where it was in. And this is Season Two.

James C.D. Robbins:
The weapons from …

David Read:
This is the “Trinity.”

James C.D. Robbins:
“Trinity.”

David Read:
Yeah. Project Arcturus, it was. Pipe structures and tiered pedestal to tie into existing mat. Yeah, there’s so much that’s involved here. Matthewhammond wants to know if you were asked what your … OK, we’re just asking you. What do you think is your design pinnacle in Stargate, all of your production work? If you could hang one item from Stargate in a space that you care about, I’m curious which you would pick. I’ve seen so many of your beautiful charcoal designs; the Unas have taken all of the Jaffa materials, and they’ve made this shrine against their enemies. That’s one of the coolest things that I ever saw. What do you think back on that’s, “I really thought that that was cool. If I could have a piece of that to hang.” I’m curious, what would you pick?

James C.D. Robbins:
Oh, wow. From the thousands of drawings?

David Read:
Exactly.

James C.D. Robbins:
You’re talking about artwork?

David Read:
Yeah. Why isn’t this coming to your head right now? Yeah.

James C.D. Robbins:
Artwork as opposed to just which finished sets or pieces I like? What kind of question …

David Read:
From a conceptual phase. He says, “What is your magnum opus?” is what he’s really indicating. So, I suppose you could look at it both ways, yeah, in terms of a finished product, and in terms of what you created on paper or on the screen digitally that you loved the most.

James C.D. Robbins:
I gotta say, the very first drawing that I was set to do for Stargate was … Was it Anubis’ weapon? Is that the baddie who was … That big, huge thing with the firing thing that we had to get the electromagnetic pulse generator to try and defeat?

David Read:
Yes.

James C.D. Robbins:
But it was an exterior, and Bridget had come up with a design for these shapes that would run all the way around it. And this is the first time I saw one of my drawings transformed into a vis effect that was used over and over from different angles. I believe it was Rya’c that took a dart and … Not a dart, a …

David Read:
Oh, Rya’c. He did a strafing run with it.

James C.D. Robbins:
He just … There you go. So, I spent a lot of time on that drawing. I wanted to be able to indicate that there was a lot more, as much underground as there was above ground, which is why it had this chasm that had cut through part of it. And that’s the thing. The model shop was able to make stuff. The design, the set decorators, and construction people were able to make it. But vis effects. Oh my god, the work …

David Read:
My god.

James C.D. Robbins:
… that they did was stunning, outstanding, all the way through, and so once again, you can see with this thing, I spent a bunch of time trying to figure out what this all looked like. And that was, for me, so much fun. “Oh my god, look at this thing, it’s alive!” It’s got this …

David Read:
So, you’ve never seen any of your stuff created like that before. It was the first time on Stargate?

James C.D. Robbins:
Yeah. That’s one of the… someone else did that drawing, but that’s where we,

David Read:
Oh, sorry.

James C.D. Robbins:
No, that’s fine. But that’s the same units. That was where they broke through and were able to get inside was because that unit had split apparently. So, the shield keeping them out was not intact in that spot. I believe that was the storyline. I’m only going back 25 years.

David Read:
For sure, only that much time. Absolutely. Raj Luthra also wanted to know, ’cause you brought this up at the beginning, and I wanna make sure that we cover it because it’s something that’s in development for you right now. “Are you on social media anywhere, or do you have a website so that we can look back on your work that’s in development or your archive of work?”

James C.D. Robbins:
I have not had a website for a number of years. I did have one. It was primarily Stargate, and I just got busy doing other things and then wasn’t paying attention and it went down, and I didn’t resurrect it. So, I’ve just created a website, finished it a couple of days ago, I guess, for the most part. But I have yet to add my Stargate work to that website. I’m gonna be doing that, but that’s more James Robbins artist rather than film guy per se, but I can’t ignore the impact that film has had even on the way I paint now. I love narrative works. For example, and this is not saying I’m great or I’m better than the other guy, but I have a different way of coming to it. I think the world probably has enough paintings of lion heads and tiger heads and things like that. So, if I was to do a wildlife painting of a lion or a tiger, I want it to be in an environment. I want it to be telling a story and look like a moment out of the life of that animal, rather than just be a decorative, “Here, here’s a lion head, here’s a tiger head, here’s whatever,” disembodied and with no, I don’t know, story quality to it. So, I did one painting which I quite like, and it’s now gracing someone else’s walls happily, but Charles Dickens, Miss Havisham. Are you familiar?

David Read:
No, I am not. But my favorite book is A Christmas Carol.

James C.D. Robbins:
OK. And I can’t believe I’m gapping right now. Great Expectations. Pardon me. So, in the story Great Expectations, and I’ll make this very quick, there’s this old crone of a woman who invites this young kid to come and play at her house with “her niece.” And she lives in this mansion, and the mansion is decrepit and falling apart, and she’s wearing a wedding dress that is literally rotting off of her body. She’s 80 and a spinster and nasty and she’s mean-spirited, and there’s a layout in the big dining room of a wedding that never happened, and the cake is moldering and there’s cobwebs on it, and the whole … it’s just this spooky, crazy environment. And in the story, this woman lost her mind when she was jilted on her wedding day, and she stopped all the clocks in the house at the moment she got the letter and became this, over life, became this embittered old crone. And, “Wow, what would that moment have been like?” So, I did a five-foot by six-foot oil painting, a canvas of her holding the letter in her hand as a young beautiful woman with a veil over her face, and there’s an upturned chair and there’s wine spilled on the table, and for me, I just love that moment. It wasn’t specifically in the book, but it was alluded to in the book, and it’s like, between the scenes, if you will.

David Read:
You have to figure out who these people are, and if you have a traumatic experience, being stood up on your wedding day or anything remotely like that, it would transform you forever. And the right person, or should I say the wrong person, it would break them.

James C.D. Robbins:
And that was a major part of what made Miss Havisham who she was in the story and how it affected the main character, little Pip. But, at any rate, it’s not often that I read a story and I have those little … I could see the painting in my head when I was reading the story, so I just thought, “I’ve got to do this. I gotta put that down.”

David Read:
Do you find that the more of it you do, the easier it is to manifest stuff ahead of time in your mind, or is it the opposite? I’m curious ’cause Neal Acree, the last surviving composer for all three Stargates, I had that conversation with him a while ago and he said, “No, the more you feed it, the more you want to do … ” It is a muscle that just gets stronger and stronger.

James C.D. Robbins:
I would agree with that. No matter what I’m designing now, whether it’s for a movie or whether it’s my own personal paintings, I spend a lot of time in the prep period getting something that I feel is gonna tell the story I want it to tell. And once you’ve been down that path, it’s easier to find the path again. Hope that answers the question.

David Read:
It absolutely does. I have something here that you’re gonna recognize.

James C.D. Robbins:
Uh-oh. There we go.

David Read:
This was …

James C.D. Robbins:
That was fun.

David Read:
… an image?

James C.D. Robbins:
That was …

David Read:
Originally?

James C.D. Robbins:
… several images.

David Read:
Several?

James C.D. Robbins:
Joe Flanigan was not available to be photographed with David and, oh my goodness, I don’t remember her name. Jodelle?

David Read:
Yeah, Jodelle Ferland.

James C.D. Robbins:
Jodelle, that’s right. I had the two of them, and this was just on the lot out at the bridge. I took them out and he had his P90, and they posed like that in front of me, and I took their shots, and then I had to leave room to put Joe cowering in the background ’cause this is Rodney’s story. Or, Rodney’s, or her …

David Read:
Of course.

James C.D. Robbins:
… her version of …

David Read:
His heroic moments. It’s her version of her victory. Yes, that’s correct.

James C.D. Robbins:
Pardon me. So, I put that together. But those are photographs that I manipulated to look more like paintings. And I would actually, one of the things that I thought about doing was taking this and actually turning it into an actual oil painting, which I think potentially might have value, but I do personally do not have a large, high-res image of that. After all that I did, I have no idea where that image went. It’s probably on a disc somewhere, but …

David Read:
I think we took a pretty high-quality image of the painting, and I can at least get that to you. I do have that. The photographer of all of the props and I came to an agreement a few years ago, and I purchased copies of all of the images that we took for an upcoming project. You heard it here, folks. I will get that to you and kick me in the pants if I haven’t in the next couple of days here because I know exactly what’s going on.

James C.D. Robbins:
Honestly, no rush. I’ve got a bunch of canvases already planned that I’m working on, so I’m not in a hurry to get to it, but to have it in my hands would be great.

David Read:
For sure. That’s the thing. Now, do you know how much it sold for? Or tell me how much you think it might … That’s not fair asking the artist that.

James C.D. Robbins:
No, no, I’m not gonna play that game. What did it sell for? Come on. Depending on the size, that’s around what I sell a lot of my original paintings for.

David Read:
So, it’s 82 inches tall, so what is that? That’s six feet, seven feet? So..

James C.D. Robbins:
Ooh. It’s original scale though.

David Read:
… it’s pretty enormous. Exactly. It was the original piece that was hung on the wall there.

James C.D. Robbins:
But if I were to do a painting of that scale, the price would be a little higher than that, ’cause what it comes down to at the end of the day is you have to look at a bunch of evaluations for price in paintings and stuff like that. Some people do a set price per square inch of canvas, and I’m like, “Well, I look at how long did it take me to do and what would be a reasonable wage for me to anticipate, for having spent my time that long on things.” So, some things like that, the painting I was telling you about with Miss Havisham, I got it to a certain degree of finish, and then it sat for eight years.

David Read:
Wow.

James C.D. Robbins:
And I finally went back last year and finished it, because I had somebody telling me they wanted it very badly and I accommodated them.

David Read:
Is it listed somewhere? Something like this that … How do people know that that’s a thing? At first, I thought it was something from production and then you said you hung onto it. How do people become aware of these things? Were you doing shows at the time? What’s the process there for something like Miss Havisham?

James C.D. Robbins:
You mean my paintings? My personal painting? The process is I had no process. I was just doing the paintings. I was the awful marketer, so I’m doing painting, and pretty much word of mouth or a little bit of Facebook and getting little to no traction. So, I’ve built a website now and I have prints for sale and I have originals for sale on my website.

David Read:
So, that is on its feet right now?

James C.D. Robbins:
If you wanna go to — my God — jamesrobbinsfineart.com. I did not intend on this being a plug. Oh my God. There it is.

David Read:
I did not ask you. I wanted to see it, and thank you, thank you for it because I am a fan of your work and fans here are. So, that is jamesrobbinsfineart.com. And we will take a quick poke around in here and see how you capture the world. Is this Miss Havisham? No. No, she’s too pretty for that. That’s Miss Havisham? Wow.

James C.D. Robbins:
You gotta remember, this is the moment she got the letter when she was a young raving beauty.

David Read:
I see.

James C.D. Robbins:
But if you go to the … to give you a sense of scale, that was me working on it. So, it’s a five-foot by six-foot canvas, I believe. And if you scooch up those three, if you hover over them, you should get portraits. Go into that one. Portraits and narrative work. I had the opportunity to do RFK Jr. as well for his 70th … A gala for his 70th birthday. He’s been a falconer his whole life.

David Read:
Wow. Look at that falcon.

James C.D. Robbins:
He’s written books on it. There she is.

David Read:
Man, look at that.

James C.D. Robbins:
You click on that little thing in the corner, it’ll make it a little bit bigger on the screen. There you go.

David Read:
Boy. Man, dude. Hits me right in the feels with the … Look at that, with the wine, and … Boy, oh, boy.

James C.D. Robbins:
It’s a multi-time …

David Read:
I love your use of color here. This is solid stuff, so … Man, very cool.

James C.D. Robbins:
That’s a recreation of The Lady of Shalott.

David Read:
I love this simplicity of this.

James C.D. Robbins:
It’s a friend of mine, a cinematographer. I call him beer and cinematographer.

David Read:
AKA Adam. Wow.

James C.D. Robbins:
Yes. And, van Faux.

David Read:
Van Faux.

James C.D. Robbins:
So, you see, there’s a lot of … There’s a lot of value in doing master copies, which is why I did both The Lady of Shalott and the van Gogh. You learn a lot when you put these things together. It’s like looking at a painting is one thing, but recreating it, you have to walk that path to a certain degree. So, I think there’s a lot of value to doing those. The Lady of Shalott, the original was in the Tate Gallery when I was in London at college. And every single time I went to the Tate, I found myself gravitating back and sitting in front of that painting. So, I thought, “Ah, I’d like to have my own copy,” so here you go.

David Read:
So, you’ve done … That’s cool. I’ve never thought of it like that before, where someone just goes along and says, “This means a lot to me. I’m gonna do my own.” And what a precious homage to an artist that you admire. So, that’s really … And I’m thrilled that you are selling your pieces on here. Can we expect some Stargate pieces to appear here at some point?

James C.D. Robbins:
I have not put up a Stargate section yet, but my intention is to do so. And then we’ll see who yells at me.

David Read:
Once you do that, I’m gonna have you back, because I know a number of people who have reached out to me over the years saying, “You’re the only one that I know who’s sold the Stargate stuff.” And it’s like, “Can I have this file?” And it’s like, “No, you may not. I’m sorry. That is not happening.” So, even when I printed my, like the Disney piece out, which is one of my all-time favorites of yours. I was like, “I’m not doing it unless James says yes,” so …

James C.D. Robbins:
Hey, you know, you hit the size almost exact. That’s very close to the size of the original.

David Read:
Exactly. He walks past it in the shot, and it was when it was mounted on the wall after he had finished it. ‘Cause you had a couple of different versions there which was really cool about it.

James C.D. Robbins:
I think it’s like 22″ by 30″ or something like that.

David Read:
Exactly. The Daedalus class is sitting behind his desk. Did you render that as well, or did they take that from a photograph? Because it’s …

James C.D. Robbins:
The Daedalus class? A photograph? If it’s a photograph, that was probably done through …

David Read:
I’m sure he’s painted it.

James C.D. Robbins:
I don’t know who was doing our vis …

David Read:
I’m sure he painted it. So, that would be Marc Savela at the time. I’m sure it’s Lorne’s painting of the Daedalus class, but I was wondering if it had been taken from a photo. I can pull that up for you.

James C.D. Robbins:
Yeah. That would have been through … from vis.

David Read:
OK. Got it.

James C.D. Robbins:
Would have supplied that.

David Read:
All right, cool. Let’s see.

James C.D. Robbins:
I would have thought. I don’t know that we did any 3D. I actually … Remember I’d said I didn’t draw … I didn’t design the Daedalus? It was Peter Bodnarus.

David Read:
Peter Bodnarus did that.

James C.D. Robbins:
I found two versions that I did do that didn’t fly, so to speak. So, I …

David Read:
Well, I hope I get to see those at some point.

James C.D. Robbins:
I could show you at some point. No problem.

David Read:
Awesome. Things to discuss, sure.

James C.D. Robbins:
Maybe they’ll go on my site.

David Read:
Absolutely.

James C.D. Robbins:
I’ve got that … I’ve also got a plethora of my original charcoals here, so …

David Read:
The next time I’m in Vancouver, I wanna stop by and …

James C.D. Robbins:
Come on down. Don’t wait too long, though.

David Read:
No, I won’t. There’s this little thing called …

James C.D. Robbins:
‘Cause I may be moving to your neck of the woods. We’ll see.

David Read:
Really? Really? OK.

James C.D. Robbins:
Where are you now? Are you in Tennessee? Where are you?

David Read:
I’m in Nashville now. I needed to be closer to my folks, so there’s things happening. But no. If a lot of that stuff is gonna disappear and not move with you, then absolutely, because there’s so much of your work …

James C.D. Robbins:
Well, I have to have that conversation with my wife.

David Read:
Sure. Absolutely.

James C.D. Robbins:
That’s not going in the truck. That is not going in the truck.

David Read:
God. No. It’s … Your body of work over the years through this franchise. It cannot be understated how much of an impact you had on this thing. ErpelHomo4686 asks … It says, “Ask an artist. Do you know Loving Vincent, and what do you think about that kind of art?” Does that mean anything to you?

James C.D. Robbins:
No. Loving Vincent?

David Read:
Loving Vincent. Let’s have a look here. Let me preview it in case I can’t pull it up on the … It’s a crime thriller. “A young man comes to the last hometown of painter Vincent van Gogh to deliver the troubled artist’s final letter and ends up investigating his final days there. It’s a crime/thriller.”

James C.D. Robbins:
But there was one that the whole movie was painted. Is this it?

David Read:
Not a clue. Let’s have a look.

James C.D. Robbins:
He was amazing. And Lord knows, I’ve done enough self-portraits but nothing in the way that he does. There you go. And it’s all combined with hand-painted original work, is what I heard. There were a number of artists employed on that one, apparently.

David Read:
I would say so.

James C.D. Robbins:
And I do not know the story very well, but I think it’s astounding what they did.

David Read:
Well, I’m adding that to my Netflix queue, I can tell you that right now, wherever it is, at least.

James C.D. Robbins:
I can’t say if it’s a good movie at the end of the day, but I certainly appreciate the fact that they’re trying to do a movie representing an artist, and they actually paint a good portion of the movie. That’s pretty cool.

David Read:
Absolutely, that’s a great idea. Matthewhammond9575 wanted to know how much free rein you had on the aliens from the Daedalus Variations in Season Five of Atlantis. So, we had this episode where the team was jumping from reality to reality, and we come upon this race of very technologically powerful creatures in one of these realities. Their ship is triangular-shaped, very similar in look and design to a Star Destroyer, in my opinion, and they come on board and they’re massive. They’re twice the size of Ronon, Jason Momoa. Big gray heads, red protruding thing up out of their eyes. They’re… and does that ring any bells, me articulating it this way? OK, perfect.

James C.D. Robbins:
Yeah.

David Read:
Because I was about to sing and dance.

James C.D. Robbins:
I drew them, I’m pretty sure.

David Read:
How much, when you’re creating something like that that’s gonna appear in this one-off episode, and intrigue the audience by the possibilities of this other place, this alternate reality, how much more flexibility are you given in a situation like that, or is it all of a piece? Is it all the same?

James C.D. Robbins:
No, I think it’s the same. There’s a workflow no matter what happens. They have a script. This creature came to me in the form of words, and I had to translate that into an image of some sort. And I recall that I had a couple of different versions of it, but at the end of the day, it was glowing under the skin. They had this thing on the head …

David Read:
There was a little protrude … exactly, and that was awfully cool.

James C.D. Robbins:
But all of them, everything went through. It didn’t matter if it was a little blurb or a little bit, there was scrutiny. I did have an inordinate amount of autonomy on the show, especially once I became designer. And Brad even said that. He says, “Yeah.” ‘Cause I talked to him after the fact. I’d moved on to other shows. We were golfing one time. I was like, “Man, I had a really long leash on Stargate.” And he goes, “Absolutely you did,” but I said, “Not finding that on these other shows.” It was like thumbprint, thumbprint, thumbprint. Everybody had to get their 10 cents in. And too often, it was detrimental, in my view, to moving forward with a design. They wanted their thumbprint on it to have their thumbprint on it. That’s counterintuitive, and that’s happened in several places since then.

David Read:
For sure.

James C.D. Robbins:
And no names will ever be mentioned, but that’s just the way of it. I didn’t realize how good I had it at Stargate.

David Read:
That is frequently articulated on this program, that precise sentiment. I’ve actually had the conversation with Peter Bodnarus when he came on. I asked him, “Do you ever … ” I think he called it cheese for the mouse, where sometimes they’ll put things into what they’re working on that are so obvious that they’re specifically put there because someone who’s so insecure about their job has to have their hand in everything will eventually come along and ask for something to be removed, and that can be the thing. And by the way, it was put there for them to do that.

James C.D. Robbins:
I don’t design throwaways as a rule. I don’t have time for it.

David Read:
Throwaways?

James C.D. Robbins:
I don’t have time for that, as a rule. Sometimes, there was one. Which one was it now? It was, I wanna say Atlantis. It was Paul Mullie’s script, Paul and Joe, and they described this creature as half gopher, half squid. And I’m like, “What …

David Read:
That’s missing.

James C.D. Robbins:
“… the hell does that look like?”

David Read:
He pulls it out of the ground.

James C.D. Robbins:
And they get it with a stick and they spear it. And I’m like, “OK, well you gotta start somewhere.” And the one thing that I will say is no matter how good, bad, close, or not a drawing is, it starts you in a direction. It starts a conversation. So, you can get something tangible, “Here’s an image,” and they could go, “No, not like that.” So, I had …

David Read:
Is that what we’re talking about?

James C.D. Robbins:
That’s what we’re talking about. Joe had that one on his desk.

David Read:
I have not seen this before.

James C.D. Robbins:
Joe, it’s not in any of the shows. That wasn’t what made it through.

David Read:
I know, I’ve gone through all the art. I’ve never seen this.

James C.D. Robbins:
How’d you find … You certainly found it very quickly.

David Read:
This is called Reddit. Someone has posted it. Look at this.

James C.D. Robbins:
I did that more as a joke than anything and showed it to Paul, and then literally he started laughing, and I was like, “Well, you said half squirrel, or half squid, half gopher.” At any rate, that was the start of the real conversation which led me in the direction he wanted to go. ‘Cause he then sat down and went, “No, no, no, no, no. More like … ” “If I had to change this drawing, how would it change?” I said, “Well, you throw that one out,” and started imagining it would look like this. And then he got very descriptive with me.

David Read:
It was much more a jelly kind of thing.

James C.D. Robbins:
It was a gooey thing at the end of the day.

David Read:
Man, oh, man, that’s awesome.

James C.D. Robbins:
More squid, less gopher.

David Read:
That’s it. One of my favorite– Because we’re talking about critters, one of my favorite that only had a name off-screen because it was canceled was the Nakai. These things were so friggin’ cool. I love the look to them. We don’t know really what their role was to be later on in the show. Image Engine had successfully done the Prawns with District 9, and they had literally taken the scaffolding that built the skeleton of the Prawns and applied it …

James C.D. Robbins:
Applied it.

David Read:
… to the Nakai and saved you guys apparently tens of thousands in development in the process. Because they could turn around to the skeleton that they had already an asset that they had had.

James C.D. Robbins:
And that add new textures, basically.

David Read:
And add new textures. Fish textures and gelatinous and … what do you remember creating these things?

James C.D. Robbins:
I had some very specific direction from Rob Cooper on these. He brought me … He says, “Have you ever heard of a barrel fish?” And I’m like, “No.” And he says, “Apparently some of the tsunamis, these things got washed up.” They’re really they tend to be very deep water creatures. But they have a translucent head, and you can see their eyes sit back inside the head. They don’t have eye sockets per se. And you can see the I guess the fish brain and stuff too. But if you look up a …

David Read:
They live so deep.

James C.D. Robbins:
… if you look up a barrel-headed fish, you’ll get what was the initial inspiration for those creatures. And then the body type, they wanted them to be impossible to be human, so I gave him the backward knees and so thin that there’s no way somebody could put a … There you go. That’s where I started.

David Read:
Which is funny because …

James C.D. Robbins:
Pardon me.

David Read:
… where they’re in their head and so when we … the cameras are on it, we see the person. And so, there were human versions of the outfit that Louis Ferreira and Robert Carlyle and Elyse Levesque were wearing. And you cut back to the alien creatures, it’s like they have so much more fabric that’s on them than that guy actually … But you have to sell the idea, because you’re seeing their essence. They’re not actually standing there. The creature is standing there. At that point, that’s the story that they’re telling. When we see cameras looking in on the rooms we see the actual thing. But generally speaking, when we’re there in front of them, we have the privilege of or the ability to see the person who is actually standing there. A lot of stuff went into the design of these guys. They were really cool.

James C.D. Robbins:
I think it was a really successful rendition, of our aliens. Also the little guys that were on the seed ship. I like them.

David Read:
The Ursini.

James C.D. Robbins:
I did a few jobs for them too. Ursini, yes. See, you keep all these names present. I’m like, “Those are just the little guys.”

David Read:
That’s what I do, man.

James C.D. Robbins:
“Little guys.”

David Read:
The little guys. I love the design of these creatures. I think that there is a gentle quality to them. We found out that they were ultimately wiped out by these drones in that season. Very, very …

James C.D. Robbins:
Exactly.

David Read:
… bony, very alien-looking. But still recognizable with a head and arms and legs. But you definitely could not fit a person in there.

James C.D. Robbins:
No, no.

David Read:
And I think that was, we’re so far out, the ancients did not see this part of the galaxy with life, you’re gonna find some aliens.

James C.D. Robbins:
You’re gonna find stuff that doesn’t look and act like us, right down to bacterial life, which they kind of addressed in “Water.”

David Read:
Yes.

James C.D. Robbins:
But they came through and was sucking dry the water tanks. And there was just a little cloud of …

David Read:
The dust devil. It was left behind.

James C.D. Robbins:
From air to water. Came back from the sand dune planet and then …

David Read:
Also known as New Mexico.

James C.D. Robbins:
… started … Yes.

David Read:
I’ve been to White Sands three times. I can’t get enough.

James C.D. Robbins:
It’s a big secret. You can only look three ways there. You can’t look that way in White Sands.

David Read:
That’s it. Then you see a highway.

James C.D. Robbins:
Initially, I came very much off of a reptilian thing for them and then decided to go full exoskeleton.

David Read:
Whoops.

James C.D. Robbins:
If you had an exoskeleton that actually looked like bone, what would that happen to look like? I had to do …

David Read:
So, this isn’t a suit. This is actually part of them.

James C.D. Robbins:
No, that’s a suit over top, but look at his shoulders.

David Read:
I see. For sure.

James C.D. Robbins:
Shoulders and the skull and all that. It’s like it’s all on the outside.

David Read:
Man, you went through a lot on that.

James C.D. Robbins:
Crunchy on the outside, soft and gooey on the inside.

David Read:
Soft on the inside. They’re nice and friendly. That’s why they all got wiped out. But yeah, there’s a couple of phases of this. I don’t know if this is …

James C.D. Robbins:
That was one of the first renderings that I did.

David Read:
Very tortoise-like, that head.

James C.D. Robbins:
Tortoise, lizards and …

David Read:
It just doesn’t stop, man. We could sit here all day.

James C.D. Robbins:
There’s one other one that’s a full lizard.

David Read:
Wow. OK. If it wasn’t for Joe taking pictures of these pictures … As of right now, we wouldn’t have this stuff, and I’m so thankful for him that he …

James C.D. Robbins:
There is one other way, except for Universe. I have CD-ROMs, remember those?

David Read:
Yes.

James C.D. Robbins:
I actually … There you go. That was one of the other first ones before I figured maybe they should be bipedal.

David Read:
You have CDs of this stuff?

James C.D. Robbins:
I have CDs of everything.

David Read:
But we’ve been talking about hard drives for three years.

James C.D. Robbins:
Universe. I lost everything to do with Universe.

David Read:
And not on CD?

James C.D. Robbins:
The CDs are not here in my house anymore. I don’t know how that happened, but the hard drives that they were on got toasted, and I have very little of Universe stuff. I have some but certainly not everything, not even close to everything I drew. And I drew probably as much for that two years of that show as I did for five years of …

David Read:
That’s …

James C.D. Robbins:
… either of the other incarnations.

David Read:
… what makes … That’s what makes me sick, man. Because if you have CDs, and I have time, I have certain technologies, and we can get together, and …

James C.D. Robbins:
I got a CD player here.

David Read:
By our powers combined …

James C.D. Robbins:
It’s, believe it or not, an old Sony that I actually used. My God, how old is it that it still works?

David Read:
There you go.

James C.D. Robbins:
But it was from the last days of Stargate, that was the last time I used it.

David Read:
Man, it’s such a treasure trove of work. And to be able to look back through it with you and be able to discuss some of these details, when I come back to Vancouver, and hopefully it will be sooner rather than later, we will, we’ll make a day of it and go through a lot of this stuff because there’s just, there’s so much, man. There’s just so much.

James C.D. Robbins:
All you gotta do is let me know in advance, and I can …

David Read:
I will.

James C.D. Robbins:
… get that stuff laid out for you.

David Read:
Absolutely. Let’s go ahead and have … I’m starting to … The content from December that we built is launching in 27 minutes with a round table between Jacqueline Samuda, Tom McBeath, and Garwin Sanford. And I’m really interested to see how well it does, because there were eight or nine pieces that we did, and if they do well, we’ll bring everyone more. If they don’t, that boat will probably sink with the Titanic. But there’s a lot more to do. Paulbrickler, “Did James do the Battle of Sateda painting that was in Ronan’s room?” No, that, we’re pretty sure probably not. We established that earlier.

James C.D. Robbins:
It’s a hard question mark, but it’s not totally discounted.

David Read:
Exactly. There we go. I think that’s really what I want. Oh, a couple other Wraith pieces before we go. Let’s finish off the Wraith. This one here is their technology. Not the Hive ships.

James C.D. Robbins:
It is. The USB interface.

David Read:
Exactly.

James C.D. Robbins:
This version.

David Read:
That’s it. That’s exactly it.

James C.D. Robbins:
My God, unbelievable this shit comes back to me.

David Read:
No, you got it in there. It just has to be referenced. What I love about the process of this is that you had two versions. We had these first, obviously, because we were obtaining and stealing and dealing with their technology, and this is the technology that they had. And then you literally turned around, and with the model shop, made versions of it that were actual USBs, that had adapters in the back so that you could see on screen that we were reverse engineering their tech to make it compatible with ours. Because when you have a foe for that long of time, and you have the resources of the United States military, as long as it’s not too alien from us, it makes sense that we would have developed that stuff in order to access their data, their material.

James C.D. Robbins:
Absolutely. And once again, that’s all hats off to the model shop. I don’t know that I ever drew that version, but they needed it to work that way. Ain’t nothing those boys couldn’t do, boys and girls.

David Read:
That’s it. And speaking of boys and girls,

James C.D. Robbins:
Ooh.

David Read:
This is a child’s …

James C.D. Robbins:
Love that one.

David Read:
… toy. Yes. “To be worn by an approximate 12-year-old talent.”

James C.D. Robbins:
Dream and nightmare.

David Read:
Dream and nightmare?

James C.D. Robbins:
Yeah.

David Read:
Wow. Leather and horse hair.

James C.D. Robbins:
Let’s go play Wraith.

David Read:
That’s it. And you would. You wouldn’t have cops and robbers. You would have humans and that … ‘Cause that’s not just their folklore. That’s their enemy. And it’s one of those really cool design things where …

James C.D. Robbins:
That one just … That image just totally came together in one go. There were no amendments really made to it. Other than maybe I flattened the nose a bit. It was too much of a human nose. They wanted it flatter, so I spread it out a bit. But ultimately, you’re gonna put that over a person with a nose. I think they understated the size of the pits in the face on the mask that was actually produced. And the teeth were a little bit bigger. But other than that, these guys constantly amazed me, ’cause they would bring me back something that looked just like that.

David Read:
Exactly.

James C.D. Robbins:
And I went, “Oh my God, really? Wow.”

David Read:
They didn’t get close. I wonder oftentimes if they placed bets on how close they could actually get it to look, because a lot of my stuff, I sit it down on top of the 11 by 17. What was it? And it’s exact, so many of what you created, so many of those pieces were made to scale on the image, and they just went to town on it in terms of development. The one thing, the only thing that I can think of that was not exact was you made these ancient ice cone, ice cream cone stunners for Aurora in Season Two, and it was this little … There was a metal piece on the end that was the … They had hero and they had stunt ones, and it was enclosed under this fogged acrylic, and on the inside was all of these acrylic pieces together. And in the drawing you can see how they’re put together, but in the physical prop, it’s much more frosted over. And I always wondered, I guess that was a design decision that was made because you can barely see into the interior of it when it lights on. It glows beautifully and it’s … I love the piece, but in that situation, the front of it, they didn’t make a carbon copy of, and I guess it was someone’s choice to do it that way

James C.D. Robbins:
They ran into, I’m sure, physical issues on creating certain things and making … Anything lights up, you gotta have somewhere to get the guts into it to make it do so.

David Read:
That’s true.

James C.D. Robbins:
And it needs to have onboard batteries, and … So, their decision to frost the glass on it might have been driven by the fact that you don’t want to see the battery pack, and that’s the only place you could go possibly.

David Read:
That’s right.

James C.D. Robbins:
I don’t specifically remember or know why it was different, if it was, but that’s something that would make sense to me. “We’ll frost it over and it still lights up and everybody’s happy at the end of the day.”

David Read:
You make it work with the materials that you have, but more importantly, the time that you have to pull something off because, you know, you guys were always running to beat the clock and pull this thing off for the record.

James C.D. Robbins:
Especially the early years of Atlantis, obviously the first two seasons, I think, we did 40, 22 episode? Was it 22? Or 20?

David Read:
Atlantis always had 20 a season.

James C.D. Robbins:
20?

David Read:
Yeah. You did 100 …

James C.D. Robbins:
So, we were doing 40 …

David Read:
… episodes in five years.

James C.D. Robbins:
We were doing 40 episodes a year, and concurrently. So, that’s a lot of work for anyone to try and handle. That’s why a lot of these things were still spectacular, and they were done in half the time that theoretically they should have been. But the model shop people probably have the same mindset that I do: all these drawings of mine are, in a way, unfinished drawings because I can only have the time to take it so far. And they also are led by the same timetable. Some of it would be cost. I didn’t have to worry about that ’cause my pencil is my pencil, so to speak. But given the time, I’m sure they could have made that exactly like that particular drawing, but there may have also been input. I put the drawing out, and maybe one of the execs said, “Oh, and by the way, when you make this … ” Because there are also … I wasn’t privy to every single meeting that went down, obviously. So, they would have conversations and say, “Well, we don’t want this to be that way. Can you just make this change?” Great. No problem. So, I don’t know where the diversions from my renderings come, but usually if it’s not the same as my drawing, it’s somebody further up or down the hall, as it were, had some input there. Or failing all of that, it was just time and money, which are our enemies.

David Read:
That makes a lot of sense.

James C.D. Robbins:
More than the Wraith.

David Read:
But it is the same kind of thing. This thing is sucking the life out of you.

James C.D. Robbins:
It gave me life. Can I tell you …

David Read:
There you go.

James C.D. Robbins:
It gave me life for a decade, man.

David Read:
Good philosophy. Last question for you, Lockwatcher. “James, do you own the images that you created for Stargate?” Are they owned by the studio in conjunction with you? How does that work? What … In terms of your contract with Stargate Productions?

James C.D. Robbins:
I’m not a lawyer. I assume that MGM, Sony, now Amazon potentially own the IP. And I do drawings and … The way I look at it is the drawings that I do that were signed off and sent out to other departments, potentially those versions should belong to the show. Any original drawings that I’ve done that are my method of thinking, my sketch pads that I have that are full of scribbles and stuff, that’s more my work, my hidden work, if you will. Now, technically … Here’s the other part that’s hard to break down, is ’cause I worked so much time on my own after the day shut down. But I would say at least a third of it was conceived not on company time. So, honestly, I’m not alone.

David Read:
Where does one end and the other begin? That’s what I’m hearing.

James C.D. Robbins:
That’s just it. And I think that’s why I ran into problems putting out a book, was just that they … MGM was fine with it, they didn’t care. Sony had a book division, and they wanted me to pay them an inordinate amount of money up front. I presented to them that we should just make the book and get it out there. It promotes the show. I could make money, they could make money, and I could pay them out of residuals if it was successful enough. They go, “That’s not how we work.”

David Read:
I think we need to have that conversation with Amazon.

James C.D. Robbins:
We’ll see how it goes. I’m chatting with a couple of people in the background as well and trying to see what, if anything, I’m able to do about it. I mean, they speak to my website. If I put stuff up there and I put out prints for sale, now that I’ve told the world, they’re gonna come gunning for me possibly, I don’t know. Or maybe they’ll just look at it as this all helps to push the Stargate franchise, and it’s free advertising on their level. So, I don’t know.

David Read:
You have 60 viewers who have hung on for nearly two hours. That suggests to me that something is working.

James C.D. Robbins:
And they’re not football fans.

David Read:
They are not football fans, no. They are … Come on.

James C.D. Robbins:
Isn’t it today?

David Read:
Or ice skating fans apparently with the Olympics.

James C.D. Robbins:
Is the game today?

David Read:
It is indeed the big game.

James C.D. Robbins:
OK. See, that’s how big a football fan I am.

David Read:
Exactly right. You know how much in your corner I am, so if there is anything that I can do to help bring this to the table for people, do not hesitate to call me because …

James C.D. Robbins:
No, I won’t, and I appreciate that, David. I know you’re very invested in all of this on every level.

David Read:
That’s it, man. Stuff that you created, I mean, sits, and the second episode … did not turn this damn thing on. All right. Turn it on, there it goes. All right. Amazing people have designed so much of this production.

James C.D. Robbins:
I think Mr. Godfrey can take credit for that one.

David Read:
Boyd? Yeah.

James C.D. Robbins:
Boyd.

David Read:
For sure.

James C.D. Robbins:
He was just, and his thumbprints and fingerprints are all over everything, the Kull warrior down to just about everything. Every tablet that came out, he did the …

David Read:
That’s the thing.

James C.D. Robbins:
… graphics and stuff for it.

David Read:
And I’ve been trying to get him on …

James C.D. Robbins:
He’s establishing.

David Read:
… but he’s on the water all the time.

James C.D. Robbins:
He is, he is.

David Read:
And the fact of the matter is, I’m looking at a picture of myself in my digital frame here of me sitting on the ancient steps. I mean, he created that font, you know? I mean, there’s so much stuff that he was key for. It’s just extraordinary, the talent of the people he’s working with.

James C.D. Robbins:
And he made it translatable, which they discovered later was maybe a mistake. Better to have gibberish that people can’t decipher, or you have to worry about what you’re actually putting out.

David Read:
The ice cream cone, this is the fourth time I’ve said it on this show. The ancient stunner from Aurora, on the side of it. It says, “Made in China.”

James C.D. Robbins:
There you go. Perfect.

David Read:
God. That’s it. There’s just a little, a little wink wink and nod nod there. I had, who was it, one of the model shop people, he put something in. It was a name of a girlfriend or something, I can’t remember what it was, and then he’s like, “You’ll never find it.” But it’s on screen for a fair bit. So, it’s the little things like that that make it all worthwhile. Bruce Woloshyn said “You know, we put our kids in everything, in composite shots and all this stuff.” They’d bring them in, they’d shoot them, they’d put them into the shot, and they’d take ’em home. You know, they get the elements for them. It’s, where does one thing and then the other begin? The artists and the show are on some level one, because it is, right from the writer and the conceptual artist, all the way straight on up. So, it’s a cool process.

James C.D. Robbins:
And now the new one’s going to London, my old stomping grounds.

David Read:
What do you think?

James C.D. Robbins:
I haven’t gotten a call yet.

David Read:
This is true.

James C.D. Robbins:
I congratulated Brad after I saw your show, you and Darren revealing it with Martin Gero, speaking out loud about it. I was, “Oh my god, that’s so freaking awesome it’s coming back.” And to have Brad and Joe as part of it proves that Martin Gero is a really, really smart guy.

David Read:
And that Amazon is willing to do …

James C.D. Robbins:
I’m sure he could have tackled the show entirely on his own but …

David Read:
He could have.

James C.D. Robbins:
… Joe and Brad, you want guys that have led the canon for forever.

David Read:
That’s it.

James C.D. Robbins:
So, they got the greatest team ever and I don’t know, I can work remotely.

David Read:
For sure. No, I think …

James C.D. Robbins:
If they need, or I could go back to bloody England where I spent my time growing up. Four years, mate. Four years.

David Read:
There you go. James, thank you.

James C.D. Robbins:
Just painting. I like to paint.

David Read:
That’s it.

James C.D. Robbins:
Pleasure, absolutely, David, as always.

David Read:
This is tremendous, and hope to have you back really soon here, and keep me in the loop on anything that I can help with. I’m gonna wrap up the show on this side.

James C.D. Robbins:
Been a pleasure, always. And thanks to all the fans that keep watching, keep this show alive. Whether I’m involved, ongoing or not, it’s a great show. And I think it’s coming back largely because of the fan base.

David Read:
I agree.

James C.D. Robbins:
Kudos to you guys.

David Read:
Thank you, sir. James C.D. Robbins, Art Direct … excuse me, Production … Gosh darn it. James, I apologize, Production Designer. Let me get these earbuds off in case he yells at me. Production Designer, Stargate SG-1, Universe, Atlantis. My name is David Read, you’re watching the Stargate Oral History Project. If you enjoy the show and you wanna see more content like this on YouTube, please click that Like button. It makes a huge difference to this process and really helps us get our reach out there to other folks. And if you know a friend who’s into Stargate, point us to them. If you hit the Subscribe button, it really helps extend the reach as well, but you’ll get my notifications of any last-minute guest changes and notifications before any show goes on. My tremendous thanks to my team of moderators who are pulling this episode off on our first weekend back. My thanks to Antony and to Kevin for making this one possible. A number of folks involved now are pulling this one off with me in terms of video production and the folks who are making the archive process on the back end at DialtheGate.com possible. We’re transcribing every single one of these. We’re feeding it into a system that’s gonna provide an interactive experience for you at some point this year. I’m not gonna give you the exact date yet because we don’t know, but that’s what’s going on. After this, we’ve got Jacqueline Samuda, Tom McBeath, and Garwin Sanford coming up in our first roundtable discussion from Vancouver. It’s all about an hour and 45 minutes long, and I hope you enjoy it. And if you enjoy it, share it with some Stargate friends, because then if it does well enough, we may be lucky enough to produce more. But these folks have more stories to tell still. My name is David Read for Dial the Gate. I appreciate you tuning in. Thanks again to James C.D. Robbins. I’ll see you on the other side.