Star Wars was a major breakthrough in visual technology and effects. When the original trilogy was being made the technology needed for all the shots wasn't available. They had to create everything from scratch, from the models to the cameras. In order to create the shots they created cameras that can recreate the same motions which were incredibly advanced at the time. The other thing that made the effect shots innovative for the time was the fact that the camera moved around the model. Sorry about the image. I couldn't find one that fit what I was talking about.