Death Star
Although details, such as the superlaser's location, shifted between different concept models during production of "Star Wars", the notion of the Death Star being a large, spherical space station over 100 kilometers in diameter was consistent in all of them. George Lucas gave the original task of designing a "Death Star" to concept artist and spaceship modeler Colin Cantwell, who had collaborated with Stanley Kubrick on the 1968 film "". In a 2016 interview, Cantwell related that "I didn't originally plan for the Death Star to have a trench, but when I was working with the mold, I noticed the two halves had shrunk at the point where they met across the middle." As it "would have taken a week of work just to fill and sand and refill this depression," Cantwell suggested a trench to Lucas to save the labor. Lucas liked the idea, and the Death Star model was created by John Stears. The buzzing sound counting down to the Death Star firing its superlaser comes from the "Flash Gordon" serials. Portraying an incomplete yet powerful space station posed a problem for Industrial Light & Magic's modelmakers for "Return of the Jedi". Only the front side of the 137-centimeter model was completed, and the image was flipped horizontally for the final film. Both Death Stars were depicted by a combination of complete and sectional models and matte paintings.
White Star Line
The new steamers, which were intended to be named "Oceanic" and "Olympic", were designed to be both the largest and most luxurious the world had ever seen. In March 1897, the first keel plates for "Oceanic" were laid at Harland & Wolff, but almost immediately problems arose. Because the shipbuilder had never constructed a vessel of this size, work on the ship was delayed until an overhead gantry crane could be built. Her launch on 14 January 1899 drew an immense crowd of spectators numbering more than 50,000, as the launch placed "Oceanic" in history as the last British Trans-Atlantic liner to be launched in the 19th century as well as the first to exceed the "Great Eastern" in length. In all, she measured in at 704 feet in length with a beam of 68 feet, and had a gross tonnage of 17,254, making her a full 42% larger than North German Lloyd's "Kaiser Wilhelm Der Grosse". Like "Teutonic" and "Majestic", "Oceanic" was designed with capabilities to be converted to an armed merchant cruiser in time of war if needed, specifications for which included her to be built with a double-plated hull and turrets on her upper decks which could be quickly mounted with guns. She was also built with triple expansion engines geared to twin screws capable of achieving a respectable, if not record breaking, service speed of 19 knots. Additionally, she had a considerably larger passenger capacity of just over 1,700, providing for 410 First Class, 300 Second Class and 1,000 Third Class.