The Bladerunner blaster perhaps in my opinion the most iconic handgun in film history
Here's a little edit of my history with the Blade Runner blaster
Wow! Oh man! Huh!
Right now that we've established that behind me in the prop Department
are more than a dozen Bladerunner blasters and Blade Runner prop master Doug Harlocker is going to give me a tour of them
Both the old blasters that they've remade for this movie, and the new ones that they've designed for it
Let's go look
Okay, I mean most people when they think of Blade Runner they tend to drift their mind over the blaster
It's such an iconic piece and you guys have replicated the original blaster as well as some new ones
Can you talk me through the process. 'Sure you know we'
We contacted the person who owned the original blaster. He got it. I guess he bought it at auction years ago
He's a good friend of mine 'yes, Dan'
And and so we took we studied his
Intensively and we basically backed into ours that way so we built them from scratch
But I will say for the most part by the end we made
replicas
and
Rubber ones of course for our stunt
people. So you can see
That's one of the rubber ones with the paint
Wow!
as you can see so we went from
Very lightweight 'yes' to the replica which is
heavy yeah to
The we built real ones with a Steyr rifle receiver and the bulldog that's even heavier than this go yeah
right so
Harrison who basically hurt his wrist a little while ago was like mother of god
You know that is like give me the rubber one now. You've got to use the replica now
You got to use the real one you know, so he's he?
You know it's all coming back to him the weights and measures of sure this is sorry
I'm just completely gobsmacked that this is rubber this weighs
Yeah, six or eight ounces. And again, this is the the beauty of paint finishes right is that you can really replicate?
The metallics really are are there for you. I'm blown away. It's absolutely gorgeous
Wow
This is the next-generation
blaster of course
The original blaster had a real bulldog
Revolver in it so it could blank fire. Yeah, big muzzle flash out of that
We tried to design around smaller revolver
so we could get a real muzzle flash out of this gun we found that we
Started started to get a little fat a little too big and we wanted it to have maintain a little bit of an
Elliptical feeling and you can see this this now how we really wanted to maintain some you know
it's a big gun on the side, but it's actually got a nice profile on them in the beginning so in the end we decided
uh, uh
Form over function
That we would prefer to keep it as a perfect design and not have to worry about
Making it all you know misshaped by putting a real gun in it, so we'll it'll be a CG muzzle flash
okay, and I'm
From the way, you just the way you're talking about it you're not just
Constructing a bit deeply part of the design process an iterative process as well
We you know we spent a lot of time of course big
responsibility going from an iconic handgun to the next generation of that gun so we yeah, we took our time and
You know we wanted to make it as
interesting as possible this was a an iteration of a
Design that started you know
Six generations early in other words we went through lots of design and changes until we got to it
and
I
Know we of course give it a little bit of age. Give it a little bit of you know deniz
But really likes the brutal concept of it of of this his movie
They love the brutal aspect of the last movie, and so you know he really wanted it to feel like it was a handled
Well used. Yeah, I
also, really liked the
You know the the the front piece of the original blaster is so it's so different than a normal pistol. Oh yeah normal gun
It was I remember from making sketches of the VHS on
Freeze-frame when it was 18 and trying to figure out all these different parts, and you guys have really
Upgraded and still carried forward that kind of unique profile. Yeah, I mean it's hard
you know you've that's
A lot of people been designing guns the last 15 years or so 20 years and really coming up with some great concepts
District 9 and different people that are really coming up with great finishes and great
you know just really unusual designs, so it's
it's hard you know and
You know we did oblivion and oblivion had again coming up with a handgun and a rifle and different variations of that thing
It's another movie that
Everything we designed everything
We made was designed absolutely so I saw I love the guns in Oblivion version wonderful, and this this has a little
Lighting component, so there is a little just one little LED and basically
I put a little a little piece in there so that when it fires
There's a little right we can we can get a little something. I know it seems. Oh, it's an electromagnet so okay. There you go
cool
So at least we see some functionality yes
And you see you just something that the audience can take a look at it's just not an inanimate object and again
You've got the little light. That's I mean you've you
really tried to address the
Iconography that's lovely mmm and again all of these. We make are stunts as well and
Real and you'll see all the great fun. There is right
it's
Again, but the finishes you know it used to be the rubber you could never match the finishes now
It's we're getting you know the finishes are right there, and this is because also the materials technology and the painting technology are yes
yeah, certainly the quality of paints and
The the paint techniques and the painters out there becoming very skilled it's great
Doug having made my own Blade Runner blaster from scratch took me about four years of working up the nerve to
Mill every surface and little bit, it's it's nerve-racking and they're all different hardnesses
Um it's thrilling to see so many of them all in one place. Thanks for thanks for showing me all the toys yeah
It's a pleasure. Uh you're gonna try and make one of these now is that you
Probably not kidding no
I'll probably just want to visit your shop now and see
What's your what you're working on you'll have to come by all right? Well. This is a pleasure I?
I know. I seemed a little subdued in there. Look, the fact is Doug is such a legend,
I'm such an admirer of his work
And it was so overwhelming to see all those blasters in one place that I tried really hard not to become a screaming fanboy
But Doug has told me I can have another few minutes with the blasters, and I'm gonna take it.