We're going back to Comic-Con.

The idea obviously is to kick last year's butt.

We have to make sure that this will actually work

or we're back to the drawing board.

Now we're through the design phase.

We know what we're going to build.

The next step is to prove that it's possible.

That's where prototyping comes in.

So pretty much today what I need to do is prove

that this concept can work,

that we can have multiple people.

This will have one person down below,

probably three people up here.

So that's the concept is that this is gonna be

the largest autonomous free-walking character

that we've ever done.

This is all human powered.

So getting something this big to move around is,

you've got to test it.

You know, okay, will that arm actually move?

Can we actually make an arm

that's eight feet long move by one guy?

It's huge, it's massive.

I don't know if the cameras caught it

but my favorite moment in that little meeting

that we just had was when Alan looked

at the printout of his creation

and then looked over at the AMP suit

and was like (drops head).

When I saw that arm printed out,

I was like, Oh, we're so screwed.

I don't know how we're going to do this.

One way we like to refer to prototyping

in the creature effects industry is

a garbage bag test.

This goes all the way back to aliens

and Stan Winston's studio.

And that's how they proved the Alien Queen

would even be possible as a puppet.

We'll apply the same principles to Giant Creature.

We started out the build with the day one proof

of concept of the base which was to see

if three people can get up there

on a three wheeled vehicle and have it be stable.

It's huge, 14 feet tall.

Is it safe?

Is it's center of gravity with that many people

that much higher?

Can it move?

Can it drive around?

And you know, is it going to fall over or not?

[Man] And from there we basically learned from that

where our weak points were.

And we started doing heavier steel work.

It wasn't a doubt that we couldn't make it work

with the three wheels, it's just how much steel

and stuff do we have to put in there to make it safe.

Then we built the real thing.

We built the real thing, the wheel base

and then while that was going on

I was also prototyping the arm.

The other real challenge mechanically was creating

this arm mechanism which had to be prototyped

in order for us to figure out how it would work

and how it would perform.

[Man] Last year the big problem was getting

the movement of the shoulder in line

with a puppeteer shoulder.

If it was out of line, then that could cause

a lot of stress.

I think with a bigger arm now the problem is going

to be worse so we just want to get

a nice shoulder move somehow so we can also bungee assist.

The big challenge about these arms is that they're huge

and we know they're going to weigh a ton.

So that's where prototyping is essential.

It's got a two to one so it's actually harder to lift

but we're not worried about that

because you can bungee assist.

So it only has to move 45 degrees

for the arm to go 90.

So it will be less work for the puppeteer

as far as how far he needs to move his arm.

(intense music)

We figured out the geometry and now we've gone back in

and we're starting the real build

which includes bearings and making sure everything's

strong enough and light enough that it's going to work

to the best of its ability given our schedule.

The prototyping helps a lot for us to visualize it

but I try and approach anything of this scale

with a kind of stupidly optimistic attitude

that it's all just going to work.

But, you know, it always breaks when it's

in front of an audience.

So that's the part we're trying to avoid.

It's all doable if you have enough time and money.

That's the biggest, it's the biggest glitch here is

we've got a deadline unless we can get them

to push back Comic-Con a couple of weeks.

That'd be cool.

[Narrator] Go to hyzs518.com for the entire

Giant Creature series.