one more thing about ralph mcquarrie-- i love how functional his art was. during production, design elements would change; and rather than make wholly new art to reflect these evolutions, he'd simply paint over old artwork to update it.

case in point, this hangar view from docking bay 94 in mos eisley. you might recognize the ship in the first image as the rebel blockade runner¹; that ship began life as the millenium falcon, but its similarity to the spaceship in space: 1999 made george lucas pivot. when the new design of the millenium falcon was finalized, ralph simply came back to this artwork and painted the new ship in, saving as much of the foreground elements as he could.

i like that star wars has always been a living document, even back to the preproduction. the thing is what you make it; so reach in and start changing things already

1. the ship's name is, of course, the Tantive IV; which I have pronounced as "TAN-tihv" my entire life, but which, according to Pablo Hidalgo, is actually pronounced "tan-TIVY"-- a tantivy being an archaic term for a gallop. I think that's fascinating, both in how the use of an old word feels as alien as a made-up word; but also that there's a Zeon ship that's called a "Gallop". We love to draw from the same well!