Speeder bikes and swoop bikes are small, fast transports that use repulsorlift

Anti-gravity

Anti-gravity is the idea of creating a place or object that is free from the force of gravity. It does not refer to the lack of weight under gravity experienced in free fall or orbit, or to balancing the force of gravity with some other force, such as electromagnetism or aerodynamic lift...

 engines in the fictional Star Wars

Star Wars

Star Wars is an American epic space opera film series created by George Lucas. The first film in the series was originally released on May 25, 1977, under the title Star Wars, by 20th Century Fox, and became a worldwide pop culture phenomenon, followed by two sequels, released at three-year...

universe

Universe

The Universe is commonly defined as the totality of everything that exists, including all matter and energy, the planets, stars, galaxies, and the contents of intergalactic space. Definitions and usage vary and similar terms include the cosmos, the world and nature...

. Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi

Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi

Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi is a 1983 American epic space opera film directed by Richard Marquand and written by George Lucas and Lawrence Kasdan. It is the third film released in the Star Wars saga, and the sixth in terms of the series' internal chronology...

includes a prominent speeder bike chase; speeders and swoops also appear in Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace

Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace

Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace is a 1999 American epic space opera film written and directed by George Lucas. It is the fourth film to be released in the Star Wars saga, as the first of a three-part prequel to the original Star Wars trilogy, as well as the first film in the saga in terms...

, Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones

Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones

Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones is a 2002 American epic space opera film directed by George Lucas and written by Lucas and Jonathan Hales. It is the fifth film to be released in the Star Wars saga and the second in terms of the series' internal chronology...

, Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith

Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith

Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith is a 2005 American epic space opera film written and directed by George Lucas. It is the sixth and final film released in the Star Wars saga and the third in terms of the series' internal chronology....

, Star Wars IV: A New Hope

Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope

Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope, originally released as Star Wars, is a 1977 American epic space opera film, written and directed by George Lucas. It is the first of six films released in the Star Wars saga: two subsequent films complete the original trilogy, while a prequel trilogy completes the...

, and the Star Wars Expanded Universe

Star Wars Expanded Universe

The Star Wars Expanded Universe encompasses all of the officially licensed, fictional background of the Star Wars universe, outside of the six feature films produced by George Lucas. The expanded universe includes books, comic books, video games, spin-off films like Star Wars: The Clone Wars,...

's books, comics, and games.

Origin and design

Various concept sketches came from producer George Lucas

George Lucas

George Walton Lucas, Jr. is an American film producer, screenwriter, and director, and entrepreneur. He is the founder, chairman and chief executive of Lucasfilm. He is best known as the creator of the space opera franchise Star Wars and the archaeologist-adventurer character Indiana Jones...

' call for a "rocket-powered scooter" in Return of the Jedi. While Industrial Light & Magic's (ILM) Nilo Rodis-Jamero designed a blocky vehicle with a large engine, Ralph McQuarrie

Ralph McQuarrie

Ralph McQuarrie is a conceptual designer and illustrator who designed Star Wars , the original Battlestar Galactica , E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial and Cocoon, for which he won an Academy Award....

's designs were more fanciful but with less of a sense of the vehicle's power source. The final designs resulted both in full-scale Imperial speeder bikes used by the actors for film against a bluescreen, along with miniatures mounted by articulated puppets. ILM used a steadicam

Steadicam

A Steadicam is a stabilizing mount for a motion picture camera that mechanically isolates it from the operator's movement, allowing a smooth shot even when moving quickly over an uneven surface...

 recording at 1 frame per second to record the speeder bikes' path through the forest moon of Endor

Forest moon of Endor

The second moon of Endor, also referred to as the forest moon of Endor, or sanctuary moon, is a moon in the Star Wars universe. It appears in Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi as the home to the Ewoks, and is the body over which the second Death Star is constructed...

 -- in reality, a California

California

California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...

 forest. Playing the footage at the standard rate of 24 frames per second caused a blurring effect, what looked like 100MPH actually was shot at 5MPH , which ILM used to simulate the vehicles' high speed.

The BARC speeder in Revenge of the Sith was designed to appear like a predecessor to the speeder bikes in Return of the Jedi. ILM's Doug Chiang

Doug Chiang

Doug Chiang is an American film designer and artist. He was born in Taipei, Taiwan in 1962 and grew up in the United States.Chiang studied film at UCLA and industrial design at the College for Creative Studies. During the late 1980s he worked at various production studios including Rhythm and Hues...

 designed Darth Maul

Darth Maul

Darth Maul is a fictional character in the science fiction saga Star Wars. He is one of the main antagonists of Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace, portrayed by martial artist Ray Park and voiced by Peter Serafinowicz....

's (Ray Park

Ray Park

Raymond Park is a Scottish actor, stuntman and martial artist, best known for his playing the physical part of Darth Maul in Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace, Toad in X-Men, Snake-Eyes in G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra, and Edgar on Heroes.-Early life:Park was born in Glasgow, Scotland...

) speeder in The Phantom Menace to resemble a scythe, and Chiang's initial designs for the droid army's STAP vehicle resembled the speeder bikes from Return of the Jedi. An all-CGI

Computer-generated imagery

Computer-generated imagery is the application of the field of computer graphics or, more specifically, 3D computer graphics to special effects in art, video games, films, television programs, commercials, simulators and simulation generally, and printed media...

 swoop appearing in A New Hope stems from a design created for Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire

Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire

Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire is a multimedia project created by Lucasfilm Ltd. in 1996. The original idea was to create an interquel, a story set between the movies The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi , and to explore all commercial possibilities of a full motion picture release,...

, and the swoop also appears briefly in The Phantom Menace.

Depiction

Return of the Jedi features a speeder bike chase in which Luke Skywalker

Luke Skywalker

Luke Skywalker is a fictional character and the main protagonist of the original film trilogy of the Star Wars franchise, where he is portrayed by Mark Hamill. He is introduced in Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope, in which he is forced to leave home, and finds himself apprenticed to the Jedi master...

 (Mark Hamill

Mark Hamill

Mark Richard Hamill is an American actor, voice artist, producer, director, and writer, best known for his role as Luke Skywalker in the original trilogy of Star Wars. More recently, he has received acclaim for his voice work, in such roles as the Joker in Batman: The Animated Series, Firelord...

) and Leia Organa (Carrie Fisher

Carrie Fisher

Carrie Frances Fisher is an American actress, novelist, screenwriter, and lecturer. She is most famous for her portrayal of Princess Leia in the original Star Wars trilogy, her bestselling novel Postcards from the Edge, for which she wrote the screenplay to the film of the same name, and her...

) pilot a pair of Imperial

Galactic Empire (Star Wars)

The Galactic Empire is one of the main factions in the fictional universe of Star Wars. It is a galaxy-spanning regime established by the series' lead villain, Palpatine, to replace the Galactic Republic in Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith. The Galactic Empire is introduced in Star Wars...

 speeders to chase down scout troopers who might reveal the Rebel Alliance

Rebel Alliance

The Alliance to Restore the Republic is an interstellar faction of the fictional universe of Star Wars....

's presence on Endor. Darth Maul uses his speeder to chase down Qui-Gon Jinn

Qui-Gon Jinn

Qui-Gon Jinn is a fictional character in the Star Wars universe, and a main protagonist of the 1999 film Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace, portrayed by Liam Neeson. He also appears in the Star Wars Expanded Universe of comic books, video games, and novels...

 (Liam Neeson

Liam Neeson

Liam John Neeson, OBE is an Irish actor who has been nominated for an Oscar, a BAFTA and three Golden Globe Awards.He has starred in a number of notable roles including Oskar Schindler in Schindler's List, Michael Collins in Michael Collins, Peyton Westlake in Darkman, Jean Valjean in Les...

) and Anakin Skywalker (Jake Lloyd

Jake Lloyd

Jake Lloyd is a former American actor , who gained worldwide fame when he was chosen by George Lucas to play the young Anakin Skywalker in Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace, the first film in the Star Wars prequel trilogy and currently resides in Chicago. He reprised this role in five...

) in The Phantom Menace. A pair of speeder-mounted clone trooper

Clone trooper

The clone troopers of the Army of the Republic are soldiers in the fictional Star Wars universe, cloned from Jango Fett, a Mandalorian bounty hunter. They first appeared in Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones, and returned in Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith where they were played...

s shoot down a speeder-riding Stass Allie when Emperor Palpatine

Palpatine

Palpatine is a fictional character and the main antagonist of the Star Wars saga, portrayed by Ian McDiarmid in the feature films.Palpatine first appeared as the unnamed Emperor of the Galactic Empire in the 1980 film Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back...

 (Ian McDiarmid

Ian McDiarmid

Ian McDiarmid is a Scottish theatre actor and director, who has also made sporadic appearances on film and television.McDiarmid has had a successful career in theatre; he has been cast in many plays, while occasionally directing others and although he has appeared mostly in theatrical productions,...

) initiates Order 66 in Revenge of the Sith. Film and Expanded Universe depictions of speeder bikes and swoops consistently portray the vehicles as fast and maneuverable: Expanded Universe material describes the speeder bikes in Return of the Jedi as being able to travel 500 kilometers per hour. Speeders and swoops achieve high speed and maneuverability, however, at the expense of size and protection for their riders. "Swoop racing" is described in the Expanded Universe texts and portrayed in LucasArts

LucasArts

LucasArts Entertainment Company, LLC is an American video game developer and publisher. The company was once famous for its innovative line of graphic adventure games, the critical and commercial success of which peaked in the mid 1990s...

 games as a dangerous, fast-paced competition between skilled pilots.

Merchandise

Since their inception, speeder bikes have been included in several Star Wars product lines, including Lego

Lego

Lego is a line of construction toys manufactured by the Lego Group, a privately held company based in Billund, Denmark. The company's flagship product, Lego, consists of colorful interlocking plastic bricks and an accompanying array of gears, minifigures and various other parts...

 models and Hasbro

Hasbro

Hasbro is a multinational toy and boardgame company from the United States of America. It is one of the largest toy makers in the world. The corporate headquarters is located in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, United States...

miniatures.