 Robby was designed by members of the MGM art department and constructed by the studio's prop department; The design was developed from initial ideas and sketches by production designer Arnold "Buddy" Gillespie, art director Arthur Lonergan, and writer Irving Block.These concepts were refined by production illustrator Mentor Huebner and perfected by MGM staff production draughtsman and mechanical designer Robert Kinoshita.The robot's groundbreaking design and dazzling finish represented a radical advance on the conventional "walking oil-can" depictions of robots in earlier features and film serials, and the only previous film robot of comparable style and quality was the "Menschmaschine" created for Fritz Lang's "Metropolis" (1927).