Shelter Islander Counts Down to 'The Force Awakens' with Daily Toy Photos
Shelter Island resident Matt Rohde is well known on the Island as a proud Gulf War veteran and South Ferry captain, but he’s even more famous online as X_Captain_Kaos_X, one of Instagram’s preeminent toy photographers. And his nearly 14,000 followers have been watching closely as the ferryman counts down with a photograph each day to the release of the much-anticipated new Star Wars sequel, The Force Awakens.
Rohde’s beautiful and imaginative pictures, often with laugh-out-loud-funny captions, feature a large cast of characters from movies and comic books, but he’s always had a special place in his heart for the Star Wars films, and it shows. Using mostly 3.75-inch and 6-inch Hasbro action figures of characters from all six films, Rohde recreates what could be scenes from the movies, but he really shines when devising his own unique take on George Lucas’s galaxy of Jedis, smugglers and Sith lords.
Since December 7, 2014, Rohde’s online alter ego X_Captain_Kaos_X has been posting his daily Star Wars-themed photos and counting down the days until December 18, 2015, when J.J. Abrams’ The Force Awakens begins showing at cinemas across the country. When DansPapers.com posted an article about Rohde last year, coincidentally on December 18, he had nearly 6,500 Instagram followers. That number has since doubled in less than a year’s time, and it’s a good bet his countdown helped inspire that growth.
Below we present some highlights from the past 311 days of epic photography. And Rohde still has 66 more days to go!
To see all photographs by Matt Rohde (aka X_Captain_Kaos_X) and the complete countdown, visit instagram.com/x_captain_kaos_x.