Via our good friend Albin Johnson, news of the Golden Gate Garrison forming an honour guard for the late ILM modelmaker Ira Keeler, who passed away on 15th April. Given Keeler’s part in the creation of the Biker Scout, it was fitting that the GGG would represent Star Wars fandom at Ira’s funeral.
“Somebody had to carve those helmets in wood,” Lorne Peterson, who was the longtime head of the model shop at ILM, said. “Ira was the person who carved those kinds of things…He was an incredible carver. You don’t realize how hard it is to make things totally symmetrical when you’re just doing it by eye, but Ira was the one that carved those things.”
For the next 20 years, Keeler worked on the models and effects for some of the biggest movies of the period, including the “back to the Future” series — where he created the model for the iconic DeLorean time machine, the “Indiana Jones” series, three “Star Trek” movies, “Who Framed Roger Rabbit,” “Jurassic Park,” “Mission: Impossible,” “Men in Black” and “Starship Troopers.”
Steve Gawley, another ILM employee, said Keeler brought in his own tools and had a knack for creating. A few years ago, Gawley said he went over to Keeler’s house to learn how to make model airplanes, which he said Keeler was pretty adept at.
“It was amazing what he could do with so delicate of a touch to make these planes,” he said.
