AT-AT raceday

Artist Franco Brambilla is selling this sweet AT-AT race-day painting ("AT-AT Lido Cup") as a post-card on Zazzle.

At At Lido Cup! Postcard (via Superpunch)

Previously:

I write books. My latest is a YA science fiction novel called Homeland (it's the sequel to Little Brother). More books: Rapture of the Nerds (a novel, with Charlie Stross); With a Little Help (short stories); and The Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow (novella and nonfic). I speak all over the place and I tweet and tumble, too.

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Anonymous

As a big postcrossing participant, I jumped at the chance to send some of these cool cards.

But no! I placed my order this morning and just moments ago got a message from zazzle saying the item has been removed from their listings due to a violation of copyright.

It leads me to ask this: Is there a reason Lucas Arts needs to protect the Star Wars brand so closely?
coop

Made me smile… but the real fantasy part is the lack of sponsorship logos on the racers!

coop
ill lich

They just have some superior tarmac to withstand a pummeling of that magnitude.
MrGlowbug

I took this as parody (and hilarious). I thought parody was protected from copyright laws.
Anonymous

Lucas lawsuit in 3, 2, 1…
slappy

Maybe the lead at-at jumped over the low-flying tie-fighter that just landed in the parking lot. Or it’s just excitedly running to play fetch with Darth Vader (who appears to be standing by the parking sign with c3po). I love it.
snakedart

Am I the only one who remembers AT-ATs on Hoth galumphing along at roughly 3 m.p.h.?

Somehow, the prancing and capering seems to run against their innate character.
- mdh
  
  perhaps some Robot Chicken would clarify things for you?
bignerd0823

i like star wars.
harryhoody

So bummed that they canceled my order too! If this indeed a painting (and not some photoshopped image), wouldn’t an original artistic representation be exempt from copyright?
scifijazznik

Forget whether or not quadrupeds could really run like that. The real artistic inaccuracy is the total lack of potholes these things would create running down the street like that. I mean, duh.

I totally dig that there’s a Citroen DS in the parking lot.
jaybell

My money is on Scampy in the front there.
furanko

more At At here:

francobrambilla(punto)com

or on my flickr

best

Franco
Nasty

Fantastic and mesmerizing.
amycamus

Interesting that a more than a century after photographer Eadweard Muybridge demonstrated the physical impossibility of quadrupeds running in the manner shown here by the AT-AT in front, artists are STILL making this mistake.
- MrsBug
  
  Um, maybe not? cheetah running.
- Anonymous
  
  That AT-AT is running exactly the way my cocker spaniel does. Or I should say, hops, like a bunny.
- jrhd
  
  What is even more interesting is that you are having difficulty realizing that AT-ATs are NOT real and this is an artist’s conception of something that could NEVER happen. This is something that is called “Suspension of Disbelief”. Try it sometime; it is a wonderfully freeing experience that allows things like “Alice in Wonderland”, “The Lord of The Rings”, “The Matrix”, etc, to take on a sense of being without ‘being’ real. We can escape for awhile and still have fun w/out worrying that Leia and Han were able to breathe on an asteroid that didn’t have an atmosphere.
  - amycamus
    
    Forgive me. I took it as a given that this painting’s utter fictionality would be understood and also that my comment – or any else’s comment about it, for that matter – would be understood in that context. My sole point was to remark on an historically interesting question about quadruped locomotion, one that was put to rest by Muybridge after a couple centuries of artistic depictions of horses running – impossibly – in the same manner as the AT-AT depicted here. I assumed the painter was simply doing what painters have done for centuries. To be fair, I should have allowed for the possibility that Mr. Brambilla actually intended the depiction as a commentary on a rather well known problem in realist art. Obviously, a robotic quadruped – even (or especially) a fictional one – would not be bound by the earthly constraints of flesh, bone, and ordinary functional orthopedics.
- Anonymous
  
  I respectfully refute your claims that quadrupeds cannot run this way and site this muybridge photo as evidence:
  http://www.cmp.ucr.edu/exhibitions/dogdays/images/muybridge1.jpg
  
  Second row, third/fourth picture. The AT-AT is in a pose about as close to the dog pictured as can be expected given the mechanics of the machine. Nice try, next time check more than just the horse photos that muybridge did.
  - amycamus
    
    Hands up – I accept defeat. Thanks.
- dculberson
  
  I’m also not sure that Muybridge ever demonstrated that it was impossible, just that horses and other extant quadrupeds did not run like that. Doesn’t mean it’s not possible.
Anonymous

amycamus,

An AT-AT is not a horse.
lgatlin

waaah. My order cancelled, too. And I was so looking forward to a few of these….
nanuq

If it were meant as pure fantasy, sure. But this is supposed to be science fiction which means they’re obliged to pay lip service to the laws of physics.
Anonymous

This reminds me of the work of Bruce McCall.
Brainspore

Ah, Robot Chicken.