Flat Black and White '66 Batmobile?

[d3rdbaseace]

There where only 5 made. First was the 55 Futura(that you only seen pull up and away from City Hall), and the second was for travel shows. The #3 was the stunt car here(test scene used before movies where made ) early footage.The white was for test reflection on cameras during the day. They say the #5 is the cleanest...??

[jwramc]

@d3rdbaseace No, the Futura became Batmobile #1 and is the ONLY Batmobile used in the entire series AND the film. #2 and #3 were built (on Galaxie chassis) between seasons 1 and 2 *only* to tour the country's custom car shows. #4 was built for exhibition drag racing. No #5 was ever built by Barris' team. A fan-made replica was built from a Thunderbird and the builder started showing it for fees...got sued by Barris and paid a big penalty and Barris took the car, now calling it #5.

[d3rdbaseace]

@jwramc I wonder which one was sold back in early 90-92 in Patriot's point from Herbie Livingston's Auction? It supposed to have been one of the originals.

[d3rdbaseace]

@d3rdbaseace That would be in Charleston, S.C.

[d3rdbaseace]

@d3rdbaseace Reason i ask, is because yes, i own one. I enjoy these sites. they are fun to watch the people who have never even sat in one to know so much wrong information. I own the #3

[glory777]

They had a few Batmobiles during the series. Any TV series or movie with a distinct car will always have from 5 to 10 of the same car. I think "The Dukes of Hazzard" tv series had like 17 General Lee's, and the movie "Christine", they had somewhere like 15 to 20 Christine's.

[jwramc]

@glory777 Other shows later on, yes, but the batman series and '66 movie all use just the one car- no other. The copies that were built AFTER the first season were for the touring show car circuit, never film usage.

[Marvcohen]

You need to get out of the basement and get some fresh air

[jayce79]

Stunt car.

[jwramc]

@jayce79 No such thing for this TV series nor the '66 movie. It's the same car in different paint.

[trapped45]

That's Evil Batman's car. He  lol :P

[DesertRatDoug]

There was only one batmobile in the show. Originally Dean Jefferies was to do the batmobile but he couldn't customize the Cadillac fast enough to make the deadline. That's how Barris got the job. But there was only ONE Futura so only ONE (very unreliable) Batmobile. That's why there are 2 Black Beauties. As for the flat black paint, the high gloss was murder to film without reflecting things they didn't want in to the shot. You'll notice, both Black Beauties got redone in flat black as well.

[lst1195]

@DesertRatDoug Question: does that mean that during the filming of the series the Futura was painted matte Black? then re-Glossed for display when the show ended?

[jwramc]

@lst1195 No. The original (former Futura) Batmobile was painted flat black with white for a camera test to see if it would eliminate reflections. It looked terrible & they repainted her gloss black, then just let it get a bit dirty/dusty to help control the reflections. You can see swirls in many close-ups caused by this. This one car is the ONLY car to appear in the entire series AND the '66 movie. The fiberglass copies, built between seasons 1 & 2, were just for traveling car shows.

[lst1195]

@DesertRatDoug Thanks

[GoliathAngelus]

Thanks for sending in your funny video.

It isn t that strange,every one knows that there wasmore than one Batmobiel.

[jwramc]

@GoliathAngelus Yet only one Batmobile appeared in the show. The others were built to tour car shows around the country. Only the #1 car was used in the show and film.

[GoliathAngelus]

@jwramc .ok,thats news for me i didn t know this.

If you are right,Than it is strange.

I believe that they used one car for the show in all the Batman episodes and one car only for the stunts.

How else can you explane this video?

[jwramc]

@GoliathAngelus Easy. As others have mentioned before, the flat black paintjob was done as a filming test (to control reflections of light sources and such). But it looked boring on film, so they repainted the car before filming the first episode. Somewhere in editing, tho, someone decided they needed a shot of the car driving by and found this one- not noticing the paint was different- and used it.

[GoliathAngelus]

@jwramc O.K i can live to that story but they took a risk by using only one car for the series.

You seemed to know all this stuf,is it your job,hobby or you like to know things?

[jwramc]

@GoliathAngelus Check out my website at javelinamx (dot) com/Batmobile :)

[nozcr]

They made three Batmobiles for the series. In the 1960's there wasn't a big need to make them look exactly alike, just close enough so that the stunt and second units could film all the needed stock footage. The next thing you know, you're probably going to say that the Millennium Falcon in Star Wars doesn't match the one in The Empire Strikes Back. Of course it doesn't. It cost less to just trash the original and rebuild it three years later.

[jwramc]

@nozcr There was only one car built and used in the TV series. All the copies were built to travel to custom car shows and exhibition drag racing. Only the original, Futura show car-turned-Batmobile is ever seen in the show- no stunt cars, no extras.

[gubbadog]

The original batmobile was covered in felt (Bat fuzz) but was to hard to keep clean.

[jwramc]

@gubbadog Not so. The felt covered Batmobiles (2 of them) were the cloned fiberglass show cars that toured the country. They started out gloss black like the TV car, but they were sloppy, rushed copies, so the constant travel caused stress cracks and it was quicker and easier to just cover it up with the felt than to repaint the cars every few weeks. The flat black car seen here IS the original paint job of the TV car for testing purposes. The footage was used in this episode by accident.

[HornungMoeller]

It was altso with in the first klip -the trim??

Look again...

[DiscoKat]

I was under the impression that Mr. Barris only had three weeks to build the Batmobile and was behind schedule. So he shipped the car to 20th Century Fox in flat black primer. Pre-Production footage showed the car didn't look good on camera, so they air-brushed (by hand) the white stripes, outlining the car. Once again, not a very good effect. Eventually the car was shipped back to Barris where he completed the paint job and added the Fluorescent Cherry stripes all around.

[jwramc]

The three of you are correct. I posted it to see what other 'theories' might pop up, despite knowing the correct answer.

[evel74]

The actual story is that the flat black and white car was the original paint scheme. After seeing it on film the producers realized it didn't look as good as they'd hoped. They changed it to the gloss black and red paint scheme.

[APennyW]

This preproduction test footage and paint scheme (1965) showing the flat black and white striped Bat was added into the first episode for whatever reason. After this test footage was filmed and viewed they painted the car gloss with red (fluorescent cerise) stripes.

For more information on the history please visit 1966batmobile(dot)com

[AdrianHoliday]

i suppose they had another concept for the batmobile in the early days of the show and they experimented with both this was a oversight in the editing...goofs like this in shows and movies happen all the time