Land of The Lost (1974 TV Series) - Production

Production

Land of the Lost is notable for its epic-scale concept, which suggested an expansive world with many fantastic forms of life and mysterious technology, all created on a children's series' limited production budget. To support the internal mythology, linguist Victoria Fromkin was even commissioned to create a special language for the Pakuni, which she based on the sounds of West African speech and attempted to build into the show in a gradual way that would allow viewers to learn the language over the course of many episodes. The series' intention was to create a realistic fantasy world, albeit relying heavily on children's acceptance of minor inconsistencies.

In a 1999 interview, first-season story editor and writer David Gerrold claimed that he largely created the show, based on photographs of various science fiction topoi that were bound together in a book and given him by Sid Krofft and Allan Foshko.

It was a marked departure from the Krofft team's previous work, which mostly featured extremely stylized puppets and sets such as those in H.R. Pufnstuf and Lidsville.

The series for the first two seasons was shot on a modular indoor soundstage at General Service Studios in Hollywood, and made economical use of a small number of sets and scenic props which were rearranged frequently to suggest the ostensibly vast jungles, ancient cities and cave systems. As is traditional in many effect scenes, miniatures or scale-version settings were used for insertion of live-action scenes. Additional locations were often rendered using scale miniatures and chroma key.

Spencer Milligan departed the show at the beginning of its third season for financial reasons. In addition to a salary increase, he believed it was only fair that he and the rest of the cast receive compensation for using their image on various merchandise. His character Rick Marshall was replaced by his brother, Jack Marshall, played by actor Ron Harper. Milligan did not return for the brief scene, also shown in the credits of the third season, showing Rick Marshall being transported out of the Land of the Lost. One of the show's crew played the role instead, wearing a wig resembling Milligan's hair and standing with his back to the camera.

Non-human characters were portrayed by actors in latex rubber suits, or with heavy creature make-up. Dinosaurs in the series were created using a combination of stop motion animation miniatures, rear projection film effects and occasional hand puppets for close-ups of dinosaur heads. Wesley Eure points out on a commentary track for Land of the Lost's first season DVD that the Grumpy hand puppet has no hole in the back of its throat, even though it is often seen opening its mouth wide to roar. The series marked a rare example of matting filmed stop-motion sequences with videotape live action, so as to avoid the telltale blue 'fringe' produced in matting with less exacting processes. Though this occasionally worked very well, the difference in lighting between the video and film sequences sometimes brought inadvertent attention to the limitations of the process.

Special effects footage was frequently re-used. Additional visual effects were achieved using manual film overlay techniques, the low-tech ancestor to current motion control photography.