When working on Interstellar, our team was brought in early on, in pre-production, to work with the art department on designs for the screens in the various ships. We were tasked with the goal of making a very utilitarian, functional, NASA style design. After much research into actual space shuttle control screens, we were able to use the real-life examples as a starting point.
Graphic designers Chris Kieffer, Coplin LeBleu, and Sal Palacios did a great job finding a visual middle ground between what would be futuristic space travel to the audience yet antiquated to the crew of the Endurance.
Although I was also involved in the design process, wrangling all of the various content and transforming it into interactive media that could be controlled seamlessly whether it appeared on monitors, tablets, or laptop computers was my specialty.
This film called for me to develop special software to remotely control an iPad mini which was built into a prop featuring fake buttons that needed to respond to Anne Hathaway's interaction.
Both the TARS and CASE robots each featured two additional iPad minis that also needed to be controlled remotely via this same software. Although I have since created more flexible tools for controlling devices, this was the first time we were able to utilize other iOS products to remotely trigger the iPads across a wireless network.
The crew of Interstellar was among the most talented group of people I've ever had the pleasure of working with and I feel very fortunate to have been a part of making this film.
