The facility had to be fully operational in a matter of weeks, including among other things: CAD design, electronics lab, machining, welding, fiberglass fabrication, test tanks, and a whale of a paint booth. But could it be done?īefore work could start, Walt had to ramp up a facility and assemble a team. The dream, for Walt and the filmmakers, was to make a full-size version of the Star Trek whales, in other words: a self-contained, self-propelled, free-floating animatronic killer whale that could be used interchangeably with Keiko. The arc of the relationship between the boy and whale was at the heart of the film and had to be completely believable, quite a different challenge from the quick action cuts required of the Jaws shark. The big challenge in Free Willy was that the animatronic model would have to convincingly perform extended emotional scenes. Although quite an accomplishment at the time, the shark scenes were realized by using only partial shark models (left side, right side, hero head, etc.) that were attached to a pneumatically powered rig. Until Free Willy, state-of-the-art for full-size aquatic animatronics was the shark created for Jaws.

So they called Walt Conti, who had recently achieved breakthrough success by creating the free-swimming miniature humpback whales for Star Trek IV. The filmmakers had no idea how they were going to pull off these critical scenes. However, almost half the story would be dedicated to Willy’s dramatic rescue from the park and triumphant return to the open ocean. A real whale named Keiko would portray Willy in scenes that take place at a marine park.

In 1992 Warner Bros was planning to make Free Willy, a film about the friendship between a boy and a killer whale.

The making of free willy 2