The Mandalorian has finally returned to screens, taking fans on more adventures through the Star Wars universe. The hit Disney+ series – created by filmmaker John Favreau – follows lone bounty hunter Din Djarin (Pedro Pascal) as he becomes the adoptive father figure of a little green critter called Grogu – AKA Baby Yoda.
Its latest series sees the unlikely duo reunited after Grogu’s short-lived Jedi training with none other than Luke Skywalker. Din is facing the consequences of removing his helmet, meaning he can no longer call himself a Mandalorian.
With his little green friend in tow, Din must travel to the planet Mandalore in a bid to redeem himself. The show sees the unlikely duo traverse a galaxy far, far away, visiting different planets and meeting a host of new and familiar characters along the way.
READ MORE: When is The Mandalorian set in the Star Wars timeline?
The pair travel to some iconic Star Wars locations on their travels, including the sand-covered planet Tatooine – the home of both Anakin and Luke Skywalker. The series has been praised for its visual effects and the way it brings the Star Wars universe to life.
It has won several Emmys for its production design, visual effects and cinematography. The creators use cutting-edge technology to help create many vast, otherworldly locations, but which real-life locations are used in the filmining of The Mandalorian?
Where is The Mandalorian season three filmed?
According to reports in Variety, the production design department began working on season three of The Mandalorian in April 2020, six months before season two had even aired. The show boasts some big Hollywood names getting in the director’s chair, including Ant-Man director Peyton Reed, Sin City director Robert Rodriguez, actor Carl Weathers and Jurassic World star Bryce Dallas Howard.
The series is filmed almost entirely on a soundstage in a California film studio. Production takes place in Manhattan Beach Studios in the beach city of Manhattan Beach, in the southwestern region of Los Angeles County.
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According to IMDb, the production also erected a temporary set for some of the show’s exterior scenes. A rougly 100,000 square foot stage was built in the beachside city of El Segundo, around half a mile north of studios.
To create the various locations of the Star Wars universe, The Madalorian utilises a relatively new technology called The Volume, a filmmaking tool that was used for the first time by any production during the show's first season. Most often used in place of green screen, The Volume is an LED panel of digital screens with a full ceiling and a 360-degree view that surrounds actors and displays an environment around them.
Speaking to The Hollywood Reporter, Favreau revealed that there is “limited location work” on the show, but the production team travel the world – to locations including Iceland and Chile – to shoot the environments that ultimately display on the on-set digital screens.
“There is real photography being incorporated,” he said. “But the actors aren’t brought on location. The location is brought to the actors.”
Physical sets and props are used during filming to add to the realism of the scenes, such as sand placed on the floor to match the digital images being displayed on The Volume. Realism is further enhanced by using studio lights to give the illusion of natural light coming from the scene’s environment, used in combination with the light being emitted by the digital display.
Because it is digital, The Volume can respond to the camera’s movements by adjusting lighting, perspective, and the displayed images during filming, giving the realistic illusion that the actors are in a real-life environment. The technology uses the Unreal Engine video game engine to allow the images displayed on the screen to quickly adapt to the camera movements.
The Volume was also notably used in the production of The Batman, a film which earned an Oscar nomination for its visual effects. According to The Cinemaholic, the cast and crew of The Mandalorian were also seemingly spotted taping several key scenes in Burbank, a city in the southeast of Los Angeles County’s San Fernando Valley.
The county has various types of terrain, including mountain ranges, valleys, rivers, lakes, deserts, islands, and forests, making it useful for a science-fiction series taking place across the galaxy.
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