Planet of the Apes and its Spaceship
Web site by: Phil Broad

These pages are dedicated to the first motion picture depiction of the first interstellar exploration missions to be mounted by the United States.  What would be in real life undertakings of truly epic proportions, they sadly occupied only a few minutes of the films in which they were portrayed.  Yet these brief appearances are actually stunning examples (for their day) of motion picture art direction and they were executed under the conditions of increasingly limited budgets.  Below are links to various pages describing the events as seen in the films, one possible description of the mission plans, my computer generated images of the entire vehicle(s), and a description of my personal experiences with this ship.  This is my all time favorite science fiction vehicle so you will find these are the most in depth pages on the site.  Please enjoy your visit.

Please contact Phil Broad if you have comments about these images or corrections to the information presented here via E-Mail.

NEW!
(as of 04/01/04)
SCI-FI & FANTASY MODELS MAGAZINE ARTICLE:
Issue number 38, article and plans by Jim Key. Thank you Jim.

NEW!
(as of 04/01/04)
DISCUSSION ABOUT THE JIM KEY ARTICLE
The plans, the mockup and the studio miniature.

NEW!
(as of 04/01/04)
HOW TO FIND THE CRASH SITE AT LAKE POWELL:
Map and photos.

INTRODUCTION:
The movie and its times.

STILLS GALLERY:
Photos of the ships from the motion pictures and TV series.

PHOTO GALLERY:
Photos of the astronaut costumes, the Ape City, and my re-creation of the "third mission" and their discovery of traces of Taylor's lost crew.

SCREEN SHOTS:
These are a few shots which I actually took off a movie screen!  Yes, that does work... f 1.8 at about 1/30 of a second with ASA 400 film (but don't tell anybody).

MISSION PLANS:
One possible explanation of the original mission plan.

CGI IMAGES:
Images of the vehicles based on the above mission requirements.

PERSONAL ACCOUNTS & PHOTOS:
My experiences at the studio during the early '70s and the photos I took there (photos now available!).

THE LARRY EVANS COLLECTION:
The material in the following portion of the Icarus pages has been kindly donated by Larry Evans who is a long time fan of the Planet of the Apes Spaceship.  This section includes additional photos of the ship in the lake, pre-production renderings and a copy of the original two stage rocket rendering. Thank you Larry.