logo Sign In

The Force Awakens: Starlight (V1.1 Released!) — Page 16

Author
Time
 (Edited)

NeverarGreat said:

SparkySywer said:

NeverarGreat said:

Collipso said:

i’m a bit confused as to which version is which but even though the newest ones look incredible, i prefer the more radical ones from a few days ago.

Yes, I think the more aggressive curves adjustment on the first attempt was better in the dark scenes (which comprised most of my comparisons), but I had to dial it down because it was overexposing the exterior shots. As the latest comparison shows however, the two grades are pretty similar colorwise and only need slight brightness adjustments based on the scene to work as well.

I’m not a color gradingologist, so forgive me when what I’m about to say inevitably is stupid, but how believable/good looking would it be if you had separate color grading for light and dark shots/scenes?

I don’t have a degree in gradology

i find that hard to believe. have you seen your star wars technicolor recreation? that’s some phd-level work right there.

Author
Time

Collipso said:

NeverarGreat said:

SparkySywer said:

NeverarGreat said:

Collipso said:

i’m a bit confused as to which version is which but even though the newest ones look incredible, i prefer the more radical ones from a few days ago.

Yes, I think the more aggressive curves adjustment on the first attempt was better in the dark scenes (which comprised most of my comparisons), but I had to dial it down because it was overexposing the exterior shots. As the latest comparison shows however, the two grades are pretty similar colorwise and only need slight brightness adjustments based on the scene to work as well.

I’m not a color gradingologist, so forgive me when what I’m about to say inevitably is stupid, but how believable/good looking would it be if you had separate color grading for light and dark shots/scenes?

I don’t have a degree in gradology

i find that hard to believe. have you seen your star wars technicolor recreation? that’s some phd-level work right there.

I think a grad student would have had it easier 😉

You probably don’t recognize me because of the red arm.
Episode 9 Rewrite, The Starlight Project (Released!) and ANH Technicolor Project (Released!)

Author
Time
 (Edited)

I just had a crazy idea for a restructure. Bear with me here.

After Rey finds BB-8, go to the Star Destroyer and immediately to Finn and Poe escaping. Hux orders a squad to the wreckage (without mention of a droid), then Finn wakes up in the early morning and rushes over to find Poe gone. The TIE fighter disappears beneath the sand and cut to Poe back on the Star Destroyer, now without his jacket and interrogated by Kylo Ren. He finds that they’re looking for a droid, and cut to Rey at Nima outpost. After she decides to keep BB-8, cut to Finn traversing the desert and events play as before until…

…Maz’s castle is destroyed, Han and Finn taken into custody. Rey is being interrogated by Kylo Ren, who has just learned that she has seen the map. Suddenly his attention is drawn away by distant explosion happening off screen. He moves away and looks up. In the sky, the Star Destroyer sports a trail of smoke and debris. On the ground, the Stormtroopers look up and then quickly rush forward to face the threat of incoming Resistance fighters. They blow through the First Order and only during Poe’s aerial antics is it revealed that he was freed from the Destroyer and has again joined the battle.

When Finn and Poe are reunited, Poe recounts that he was thrown from the TIE crash, woke up at night without sign of Finn or any ship, and then cuts himself off to talk about BB-8.

So this restructure would take some tricky but not impossible effects work. However, it has some benefits:
-Poe doesn’t simply abandon his mission because the writers couldn’t figure it out. He’s a prisoner until he’s set free over Maz’s castle.
-The sabotage of the Destroyer makes tactical sense, and explains why it was out of commission during the attack on the Oscillator.
-The First Order acts in a more reasonable manner in actually recovering someone from the TIE crash.
-Since we can now follow Poe’s location and actions at each point in the movie, he becomes much more of a main character in the vein of TLJ even though he’s offscreen much of the time.

You probably don’t recognize me because of the red arm.
Episode 9 Rewrite, The Starlight Project (Released!) and ANH Technicolor Project (Released!)

Author
Time

I see what you’re going for. Personally, though, I think the information that Poe delivers to Finn about BB-8 and his mission on the TIE fighter, which he then passes on to Rey, is more important for the audience to know than it is to address though issues, which are relatively minor to me.

Maybe I’m interpreting it wrong but it sounds like from this restructure the audience might learn that during Poe’s interrogation, but Finn and Rey don’t. But they need to know he is important in order to encourage Rey to go on this journey.

And I also think it might be just as unclear for the audience how he was rescued from the Star Destroyer so quick and immediately jumped into the battle, if not moreso than the explanation he gives in the movie.

Author
Time
 (Edited)

The conversation between Poe and Finn on the TIE about BB-8 stays the same in this restructure, I meant that the First Order doesn’t know about the droid until Poe is recaptured after the crash. The audience gets the same information in this regard either way.

As for the Destroyer rescue, that’s difficult. It would be relatively easy to remove his cockpit shots from the Maz castle battle completely (and I’ve considered doing this independent of this idea), but the problem is that he’s clearly flying a unique X-wing so anyone paying attention would place him at the battle anyway. I could use the two shots from the trailers of the X-wing approach instead of the footage of Poe’s black X-wing in the initial assault. This way he appears partway through the battle in his personal X-wing after he has had time to be rescued from the Destroyer.

It might also give his return more power (and help elevate him to primary character status), since we’ve been able to know and follow his progress thus far.

You probably don’t recognize me because of the red arm.
Episode 9 Rewrite, The Starlight Project (Released!) and ANH Technicolor Project (Released!)

Author
Time
 (Edited)

Thinking big picture here, what is this edit all about? What is the core message of the movie? If such a message could be condensed into a single sentence, what would it be? I’ve done this for the Original Trilogy before:

ANH: One can overcome the mightiest empire through the power of the human spirit.

ESB: The true enemy is not an empire, but the darkness within oneself.

ROTJ: Darkness can never prevail when one decides to forgive themselves and others.

But what of the Sequel Trilogy? Here are some tentative theses:

TFA: One can become heroic by striving to be the hero they see in others.

TLJ: The most heroic act can be disguised as abject failure.

Do you think these are the primary messages of the movies? I feel like for TFA at least, the message has to include something about a person’s heroes, whether imagined or real. Finn becomes a hero when he sees Rey and wants to be who she thinks he is. Rey wants to be like Luke, and sees the best in Han. Kylo sees the worst in his family and in Vader.

I think this big picture is really important when it comes to the end of the movie, and informs the editing decisions throughout.

You probably don’t recognize me because of the red arm.
Episode 9 Rewrite, The Starlight Project (Released!) and ANH Technicolor Project (Released!)

Author
Time
 (Edited)

Some more thought on the Poe recapture -

If this idea where to be really incorporated into the movie, there would have to be some more dramatic changes such as adding/changing dialogue for the stormtroopers in the Maz Castle battle, which is where most of the issues lie.

Finn fights TR-8R, who in this version would have been part of the squad sent to the TIE wreckage. He could be dubbed to have an entire one-sided conversation with Finn, communicating that he let Finn live because he was always a decent person, but now he’s just a traitor who has joined with the enemy. My goal with Finn’s character up until this point in the movie is that he won’t kill a fellow trooper except in the most dire self-defense, but this could mark a turning point where he commits fully to the Resistance.

Also, in the restructured scene where Kylo learns of the map from Rey in the woods (but before the Resistance arrives), he sees the explosion from the Star Destroyer then the re-dubbed pair of troopers inform him that the ship has been attacked and the prisoner has escaped. I think this would be all that is necessary to establish that Poe has returned to his X-wing and is about to join the fight.

JEDIT: It’s probably too much for too little payoff. Probably the better approach is to more clearly imply that Poe woke up after BB-8 had left Jakku. As it is, it feels like our heroes get to Maz’s castle long before night falls on Jakku for Poe to leave, but it could be interesting to have the Falcon chase set in the late afternoon or evening and restore the TIE fighter sunset shot from the Maz castle battle. This in addition to some changes to make it seem like more time was spent between Jakku and Takonada would sell the idea. Though there is still the issue of the missing Stormtrooper squad, so I think a dub of TR-8R would still be really promising.

Here’s a quick and dirty attempt at what this might look like:
https://diff.pics/qTb-ghzfDg6p/1

Obviously some shots are too dark, and will need individual adjustment.

You probably don’t recognize me because of the red arm.
Episode 9 Rewrite, The Starlight Project (Released!) and ANH Technicolor Project (Released!)

Author
Time

Continuing from the big picture thoughts and discussing this further with others, I’m rather confident that the notion of borrowing is itself an intrinsic part of TFA. Obviously the film borrows heavily in plot and character from other Star Wars films, but more than that our heroes are an amalgam of what has come before. Rey is literally a scavenger, and this is key to her identity.

So what if Rey’s power in the Force was to ‘scavenge’ the abilities of people/things through the Force?

There is a lot of evidence for this interpretation - in fact every time she uses the Force in this movie it is an imitation of an ability she has just witnessed. It’s no stretch to think that she’s also gaining this ability directly from the person who is demonstrating this power.

As for how to communicate this in the edit, how about editing the ‘You need a teacher’ scene to include Rey remembering dialogue from previously in the film? I am imagining fragments of dialogue such as at least three instances of characters calling her a Scavenger, including herself. Maybe take some dialogue from TLJ where Kylo says ‘you’re not doing this’ or ‘this is something different’, indicating that we’ve never seen this particular power before. The point is to place enough emphasis on the idea of scavenging that Rey understands her power and why she needs a teacher to cultivate a power that is truly her own.

Oh, and it might be cool to reprise her drawing from the history of Anakin’s lightsaber to defeat Kylo Ren:
https://mega.nz/#!rNEknIDZ!4Be7Ys5TWgfM5yRfrDBu8Lyt0cFkYXIemOfyzsZxGbA
(I have limited access to Premiere right now)
Rey

You probably don’t recognize me because of the red arm.
Episode 9 Rewrite, The Starlight Project (Released!) and ANH Technicolor Project (Released!)

Author
Time
 (Edited)

The idea to edit Maz’s Castle battle isn’t going to work in the way I envisioned, due to the placement of the music. In short, the sequence
Han and Finn captured
Kylo finding Rey
Resistance arrival
Kylo abducts Rey
suffers from emotional whiplash, which was the opposite of what I was trying to achieve.

However, there is one change that I think could work quite well, and that is changing the abduction so that Finn starts running to Rey before it’s obviously too late:

https://vimeo.com/295908704
Password: fanedit

It’s music only for now, with the version 6 LUT.

You probably don’t recognize me because of the red arm.
Episode 9 Rewrite, The Starlight Project (Released!) and ANH Technicolor Project (Released!)

Author
Time

I like the change! Not a major change but I think it would be effective. Would it be a big challenge to rescore it appropriately?

Author
Time
 (Edited)

RogueLeader said:

I like the change! Not a major change but I think it would be effective. Would it be a big challenge to rescore it appropriately?

Probably no more difficult than rescoring the destruction of Starkiller Base. The only dialogue that would have to be moved is Finn shouting ‘No!’.

You probably don’t recognize me because of the red arm.
Episode 9 Rewrite, The Starlight Project (Released!) and ANH Technicolor Project (Released!)

Author
Time

Another mockup, this one more complete and aiming to remove the game board distraction from the Falcon:

https://vimeo.com/296208376
Password: fanedit

The biggest issue for me is that Rey sort of comes out of nowhere, so I made another version which attempts to retain some of the comedy they were going for in the scene (and give Rey some sass):

https://vimeo.com/296208409
Password: fanedit

So is the sass worth it?

You probably don’t recognize me because of the red arm.
Episode 9 Rewrite, The Starlight Project (Released!) and ANH Technicolor Project (Released!)

Author
Time

To be honest, I don’t think either of these work. It is just weird for Rey to suddenly be there. Maybe the least you could do is add footsteps before we hear her talk. But honestly I’m beginning to question if trimming this moment is really necessary. Yes I agree with your logic that you want to cut out things that serve no purpose besides being a callback, but going back and watching this scene makes me feel like it does serve some character-building purpose. I think Finn, trying to be ‘cool’ and then just being clumsy/awkward helps Han see that this boy is obviously not a Resistance soldier. I think Han probably was a little suspicious, but when Finn broke eye contact with Han, it basically confirmed it. Which I think is a better character-oriented reason than Han noticing his “Stormtrooper shoes” that the one deleted scene provides.

Have you tried just trimming the few shots that seem to just sit on the hologram? Maybe that would be a good compromise, because I do agree that it might stay on the holograms for just a tad too long, but still feel like the moment does hold some value.

Author
Time

It does serve this purpose for sure. Though I think that we could assume Han would see through Finn’s act regardless, and I kind of like that Han might go on nothing more than his instinct rather than on a cartoonish incompetence that is IMO too much a part of Finn’s characterization.

As for Rey simply appearing in scene, I agree that it’s still too abrupt, and actually made a version 3 the other day before calling it quits:

https://vimeo.com/296396694
Password: Fanedit

Rey now appears briefly entering the room. Added footsteps would be a good idea.

I had shown the previous versions to my brother, who doesn’t care for this movie anyway, and he pointed out that the movie feels cut to pieces in this scene even before any edit, so I tried to consolidate and lengthen shots to give it more substance. That is why Finn’s reaction shot is absent, with Han’s shots on either side stitched together. I tend to agree with you that this reaction shot is necessary however, so the deletion will probably remain just a proof of concept.

You probably don’t recognize me because of the red arm.
Episode 9 Rewrite, The Starlight Project (Released!) and ANH Technicolor Project (Released!)

Author
Time

Damn, nice job. Did you take that part of Rey from the other shot. If you do go back and add the footsteps I probably would add the rolling sound of BB-8 entering the room as well since he is suddenly there as well.

It’s funny your brother said that, because at first I thought it was weird that it went from the shot of Han passing BB-8 to Han already next to Chewie and I wondered if that was a new cut, but that’s how it is in the theatrical version as well!

And yeah, at the very least I would reinsert Finn breaking eye contact if you could. It’s a subtle clue to Han that he’s lying about something, which at the very least is enough to explain what Han says to Finn later on.

Author
Time

RogueLeader said:

Damn, nice job. Did you take that part of Rey from the other shot. If you do go back and add the footsteps I probably would add the rolling sound of BB-8 entering the room as well since he is suddenly there as well.

Yes, that bit of Rey is from the other shot. She’s passing in front of the green Falcon lights in that one, so the masking isn’t great, but it might be good enough for a brief bit of movement at the end of the shot.

It’s funny your brother said that, because at first I thought it was weird that it went from the shot of Han passing BB-8 to Han already next to Chewie and I wondered if that was a new cut, but that’s how it is in the theatrical version as well!

I am pretty sure that these cuts are due to much of the movie being left on the cutting room floor to make it fit the two hour mark.

And yeah, at the very least I would reinsert Finn breaking eye contact if you could. It’s a subtle clue to Han that he’s lying about something, which at the very least is enough to explain what Han says to Finn later on.

Yep, it’s going to go back in.

You probably don’t recognize me because of the red arm.
Episode 9 Rewrite, The Starlight Project (Released!) and ANH Technicolor Project (Released!)

Author
Time
 (Edited)

With the ability to edit again, I’m jumping around rather haphazardly and playing with a bunch of ideas. One of them is to remove the alien subtitles from the Rathtar scene, since Bala-Tik already says the important bits. Instead, I would like to add subtitles first to the alien pirates in Maz’s castle, but also to Teedo’s scene near the beginning of the movie to help flesh out the world:

https://vimeo.com/296737963
Password: fanedit

Just like with the crawl, I’ve tried to accomplish a lot with a small bit of text. For example, Rey opens with a declarative statement which conforms to the structure of the classic mind trick, which shows that she is well aware of how this power was used. Placing this scene right before Kylo’s interrogation of Poe illustrates how much stronger Kylo is at this point in the movie than Rey. That Rey believes BB-8 is a person due to Jedi legend shows how much Luke Skywalker in particular had to do with reshaping the Jedi image in the past 30 years, and gives his character power and influence right out of the gate. Similarly, Rey so easily falling back on Jedi legend shows her to be sort of a religious devotee, which fits with her superiority and isolation from other people. Finally, Teedo’s denigration of the Jedi as a superstition shows how much Luke as a physical presence is needed in the galaxy.

JEDIT: After giving it some thought, it’s too much too fast. Here’s a stripped down version that just focuses on Rey’s attempt at a mind trick or two, which connects to the Unkar Plutt subplot:

https://vimeo.com/296788907
Password: fanedit

You probably don’t recognize me because of the red arm.
Episode 9 Rewrite, The Starlight Project (Released!) and ANH Technicolor Project (Released!)

Author
Time

I like the second one better. I get what you were going for, but I don’t think anyone would really pick all of that up just by the extra subtitles.

I also would keep Teedo saying something like “It belongs to me!”
Because Rey saying “It belongs to itself!” doesn’t work as well without that previous line.

Either a variation of either version, or, “I found it first! It belongs to me!” Maybe Teedo initially thinks Rey wants the droid for herself.

It is a nice little extra moment, and people might pick up on the “you will” mind trick phrase, but I think that is as far as it should go. It could add another layer to Rey, but it doesn’t bend over backwards to try and establish something either. I don’t know it if it is really necessary but it is an interesting addition.

A random thought I’ve been having, but what if you made Ello Atsy, the Abednedo Resistance pilot that dies in the Starkiller battle, the same Abednedo in TLJ and just don’t have him die in TFA? It would give the film a nice additional character that carries over to the next film, like Billie Lourd’s character Connix.

You could just change his English dialogue with alien dialogue (which you might could get from Battlefront 2, since it does feature Abednedo voice lines in an alien language), and cut the shot of him dying. I would also trim the “trench run” as much as possible too, since it is really an uneccessary visual callback. Maybe just show Poe fly into the trench, a brief moment of him flying down it, then him closing is S-foils and flying into the Oscillator.

Anyway, glad you’re able to work on stuff again!

Author
Time
 (Edited)

It’s funny, I thought that it was supposed to be the same pilot in both films, with Rian just forgetting that he did in fact die in TFA.

I like that idea. His dubbing feels a bit out of place anyway, in the kind of goofy exaggeration that JJ seems to like.

The trench run is definitely unfortunate, but it might be a case of cutting all of it or none, due to how it’s held together with the music. I have some ambitious ideas for this part of the movie right now, but I’m going to see if they are at all feasible before saying anything else…

You probably don’t recognize me because of the red arm.
Episode 9 Rewrite, The Starlight Project (Released!) and ANH Technicolor Project (Released!)

Author
Time
 (Edited)

Jumping backwards again, I’ve never been a fan of the glitchy Stormtrooper reveal at the beginning of the movie.

Here’s a look at the opening shot without the Stormtroopers, with the score replaced with ambience and an alternate composition for the scene:

https://vimeo.com/297109785
Password: fanedit

JEDIT: What if there was no music at all until BB-8 rolled into frame?
JEDIT2: Video reuploaded, now with cleaned music track.

You probably don’t recognize me because of the red arm.
Episode 9 Rewrite, The Starlight Project (Released!) and ANH Technicolor Project (Released!)

Author
Time

I’ve experimented with the lighting of the interrogation scene before, but this time it serves a more practical purpose:

https://vimeo.com/298092270
Password: fanedit

Digmod has attempted to preserve the Kylo reveal by keeping the mask on in this scene, but it might be more simple and effective to have Kylo be in perpetual darkness here with this selective lighting and some cutting around Kylo’s closeups.

You probably don’t recognize me because of the red arm.
Episode 9 Rewrite, The Starlight Project (Released!) and ANH Technicolor Project (Released!)

Author
Time
 (Edited)

Hmm, I think this is a good compromise. Because narratively, it is a good character choice to have Kylo reveal reveal his face to Rey, and I don’t think it is really worth losing for just saving the reveal. While we don’t really get a good look at him here, Rey does at least so it maintains that relationship building technically, while still saving a clearer reveal for the Solo confrontation.

EDIT: Also meant to say I did like your village edit too. While I don’t personally mind Poe’s dialogue, since I think it endeared him to the audience immediately, it is a really cool idea displaying Kylo’s mind reading abilities early on in that way. I kinda think Poe shooting Kylo feels a little quick, maybe I’m just used to it, but I get the logic of him trying to go for the kill when he has the chance. I think music-wise I don’t like losing some of the strings immediately when Kylo freezes the laser, which is now overpowered by the fading trumpets. And like I have mentioned on Hal’s TFA thread before, I think it would be nice if you could crop the shot where Kylo pauses right before killing Lor San Tekka, since it seems like his saber is on even before we hear it activate.

Author
Time
 (Edited)

RogueLeader said:

Hmm, I think this is a good compromise. Because narratively, it is a good character choice to have Kylo reveal reveal his face to Rey, and I don’t think it is really worth losing for just saving the reveal. While we don’t really get a good look at him here, Rey does at least so it maintains that relationship building technically, while still saving a clearer reveal for the Solo confrontation.

That was my intention, sort of to have the cake and eat it too. Later in the scene, where there are more closeups of Kylo, I’m planning some Force vision stuff which could replace those shots.

EDIT: Also meant to say I did like your village edit too. While I don’t personally mind Poe’s dialogue, since I think it endeared him to the audience immediately, it is a really cool idea displaying Kylo’s mind reading abilities early on in that way. I kinda think Poe shooting Kylo feels a little quick, maybe I’m just used to it, but I get the logic of him trying to go for the kill when he has the chance. I think music-wise I don’t like losing some of the strings immediately when Kylo freezes the laser, which is now overpowered by the fading trumpets.

Glad you liked it! Definitely the most jarring thing with this change is Poe’s immediate attack and Kylo’s sudden lightsaber activation for a single shot. There doesn’t seem to be a way to fix that however, unless I cut to a shot of Tekka being led by the troopers or something. The music was all very rough and spur-of-the-moment in editing, so any ‘official’ edit would attempt to weave the music together more coherently.

The reason I won’t be using this idea in the final movie actually has to do with Finn. In the original edit, the massacre brought the focus of the scene back to Finn and his dilemma, whereas in this edit the focus always stays with Kylo, and Finn becomes more of a background character.

And like I have mentioned on Hal’s TFA thread before, I think it would be nice if you could crop the shot where Kylo pauses right before killing Lor San Tekka, since it seems like his saber is on even before we hear it activate.

That’s a good idea.

You probably don’t recognize me because of the red arm.
Episode 9 Rewrite, The Starlight Project (Released!) and ANH Technicolor Project (Released!)

Author
Time

With the day off, I had some fun taking apart the Starkiller Infiltration and putting it back together (somewhat).

https://vimeo.com/300872367
Password: fanedit

I intentionally didn’t spend a great deal of time finessing the scenes or transitions, so it’s a very rough idea. Kylo begins the interrogation the same place as in the Theatrical, but it then transitions to Hux and the Starkiller charging, then the Resistance briefing, and then finally back to the interrogation to imply that it has been going on for quite a while (it definitely needs an establishing shot though). I would like to have some indication in this scene that implies that Rey’s connection to Han is what defeats Kylo, which is what Snoke picks up on later.

You probably don’t recognize me because of the red arm.
Episode 9 Rewrite, The Starlight Project (Released!) and ANH Technicolor Project (Released!)