Chairs From the Future?

[FalTorPan]

For obvious reasons many fan films and movies with similar budgets, such as my own ASTRONUTS movie, have spaceships from space docks of the far future with chairs from office supply stores of the present day. (In the case of ASTRONUTS, the chairs came from Goodwill stores of the present day.)

Does anyone have ideas for how to find (or make, if it isn't too insanely difficult) chairs that look "futuristic," but which won't break a very tiny bank?

 

[Avon]

get a bunch of whicker furniture and have a character mention its sacred blabla-vine sculpt-chairs grown in the sacred gardens of minbar.

 

[Potemkin_Prod]

Does anyone have ideas for how to find (or make, if it isn't too insanely difficult) chairs that look "futuristic," but which won't break a very tiny bank?

You're quite right about the office chairs. All of Potemkin's chairs are office chairs from Flint River Office Equipment here in Albany with one exception: the center seat. Our captain's chair was actually made from the driver's seat of a car from a junkyard. Took me a while to get it to work, mounting it to the base of an office chair, and then building up the sides with wood. Thing probably weighs a hundred pounds.

 

[DestinyCaptain]

Salvaging chairs from the junkyard is probably a solid way to go. Cardboard, foam board, plywood, and plastic can help make the chair look better. Another way to go is with video gaming chairs. These are as cheep as 50 and look interesting, they just need a decent base. I just googled them and found some kewl ones.

 

[lennier1]

Salvaging chairs from the junkyard is probably a solid way to go. Cardboard, foam board, plywood, and plastic can help make the chair look better. Another way to go is with video gaming chairs. These are as cheep as 50 and look interesting, they just need a decent base. I just googled them and found some kewl ones.

Depends on what Google Image Search will show you:

 

[Potemkin_Prod]

okay, definitely a moment there

 

[94253]

I thought the Potemkin chairs worked very well, actually. I didn't even think of them as "normal office chairs" until I read this thread. Good work there, guys!

 

[94253]

EDIT: My Internet seems to be crawling quite slowly this morning. Sorry for the double post...

 

[Maurice]

You could try just building some chairs. Really, if they're designed simply, you could have the pieces cut out of MDF at the local home depot type place then just screw them together, paint, or wrap fabric around them. The pretty much insures they won't look like anything store-bought. If you need them to swivel, that's more complicated.

 

[Potemkin_Prod]

I thought the Potemkin chairs worked very well, actually. I didn't even think of them as "normal office chairs" until I read this thread. Good work there, guys!

The secret for us is to avoid showing the chairs in their entirety unless we've someone sitting in them. If you were to see an empty chair sitting on the bridge set with its casters, adjustment levers, and arms, you might see "office chair." But if you limit how the chair is shown (occupied, from the back or side with little detail visible), then you can pretty much eliminate the chair as an "oh, it's an office chair" thing and think more about the character who's sitting in it, what they're doing, and what they're saying.

 

[FalTorPan]

The Potemkin captain's chair looks pretty cool!

 

[Potemkin_Prod]

Glad you liked it!

That poor car. There was blood on the seat next to the one I got. The car was t-boned by another. No fatalities, thank heavens, but there was a suspicious stain on the one we took. Cleaned it up repeatedly, and still ended up getting a $10 seat cover from Walmart for it. Thought about getting one with Tweety Bird or Taz, but opted for plain black.