Kyber Raiding Droid (KR-D7)

Designed and forged by the Dark Lord himself, this droid’s purpose was to seek and collect Kyber crystals throughout the galaxy. The Kyber Raiding Droid (KR-D7) is an amphibious one, capable of retrieving Kyber crystals both in water and on land. Darth Vader created the droid after the destruction of the first Death Star. The Empire needed to find and retrieve any and all Kyber Crystals they could find to power the next Death Star. To aid in that task the droid was equipped with the following:

- An abdomen to store 7 Kyber Crystals at a time.

- Front arms capable of extension for easy mining and retrieval.

-Legs with suction that attach to the Kyber Crystal and withdraw the energy inside when they are too large to store.

- Antennae on top of its head are able to trace the energy signature of any Kyber Crystal within a 100 mile radius, even underwater.

-A roll down support for the abdomen to carry the load when the Kyber Crystal compartment is full.

-8 eyes around the top allow the droid to see in all directions, especially useful when navigating through the water. The eyes are equipped with a thermal filter for detecting enemies as well as the Kyber Crystals.

-Side flashlight for extra illumination.

-8 highly flexible legs that allow the droid to climb virtually any type of terrain and also swim underwater.

-The Kyber Crystal energy tends to leave a bluish radioactive trace on the KR-D7

Droid Design Process

I had not seen many underwater droids in the Star Wars films and thought it would be interesting to design one that could navigate both underwater and on land. Since the octopus and spider are my favorite animals, and share a common ancestor over 540 million years ago, I fused the two into my design. Both animals are incredible organisms that have stood the test of time and I feel their aesthetics have a unique place in the Star Wars World.

I looked at several droids from Star Wars but focused most on the Empire’s droids, especially the Viper Droid. It’s eyes, colors, and silhouette inspired much of my droid’s design. Another point of inspiration came when I was modeling the head of the droid, I noticed how similar it was to Darth Vader, so I embraced it and ended up adding lines to the droid’s abdomen so that when it is in Octopus form, the lines line up and look like the iconic front section of Darth Vader’s mask.

It was also interesting to incorporate the Empire's logo into the design of the droid.

Rigging the droid was probably the biggest challenge outside of modeling. I rigged an eight-legged creature with both FK and IK. Modeling the objects with 3D printable parts and geometry was also challenging. Although, seeing the model evolve as I kept its primary function of retrieving Kyber Crystals in mind, was a treat.

Regarding the animation, I wanted to incorporate as much of the droid’s functionality as possible into the 8 second limitation. Having the droid swimming as an octopus, grabbing the Kyber Crystals, and then surfacing to transform into its spider form demonstrates its versatility in both environments. Furthermore, it shows how quickly the droid can get in and out of areas with its strong legs. I was inspired by the incredible Droidekas who could roll through terrain quickly and then transform into a robust powerhouse that made them unstoppable in The Phantom Menace. I would have enjoyed making an entire animation on what the droid could do and fully immersing into a Star Wars story of some kind as more ideas kept coming into my head as I animated it.

Star Wars has inspired a lot of my work since I was a child, and the entire film industry owes a great deal to that series, especially when it comes to computer animation.

All Droid animation, modeling, rigging, texturing, shading, lighting, rendering and SFX by me.

Thank you for your consideration.