'Star Wars' toy becomes man's new best friend

Posted Thursday, July 8, 2010 at 4:33 PM Central
Last updated Thursday, July 8, 2010 at 4:33 PM Central

by John Couture

You may remember a few months ago that we told you about Patrick Boivin and his incredibly cool trailer for Iron Baby. It was so cool that even Iron Man director Jon Favreau wrote about it on his twitter feed.

Well, Patrick is back and this time, he strikes a particular chord with men of a certain age who grew up wanting nothing more than a Star Wars AT-AT Walker to play with. Well, he took the obsession to a whole new level with AT-AT Day Afternoon in which the popular kids toy is re-imagined as a live family pet akin to a dog.

Trust me, the short is amazing and if I do say so myself, I think Patrick even outdoes his earlier effort with this emotional piece. But, don't take my word for it, watch it yourself below.

Pretty amazing, huh? Well, if you're like me, you sort of figured out that Patrick must be a whiz with the computer since the AT-AT would have to be CG, right? Wrong.

I'm sure Patrick is a whiz alright, but he didn't use CG to spring life into the AT-AT's steps. No, he used a combination of puppetry and computer matte painting to accomplish the trick. Don't believe me? Watch the behind the scenes clip below.

What I do know is that Patrick is one talented filmmaker and Hollywood better be knocking down his door soon. What do you think of his latest video?