Here is a quick look at the opening shot of ANH:RHD. The one good thing about having to start everything from scratch is that i am able to utilise sources that were not available at the time, like HD scans of many of the original Matte Paintings. Plus i have learned a great deal since i completed ANH:R, so i am able to fix a few things that i wasn’t able to fix first time around. It would have been impossible to accurately recreate the original version anyway.
Fixed the misaligned flash effect on the Stardestroyer…
And fixed the background issue with the trooper…
I like the way the opening shot looks a lot, and the Trooper shot obviously, nice touch on the mis-aligned flash element also.
I looked at this part for quite a time and I will try to pass on some notable things I discovered or found interesting about it.
As the opening shot goes on and the star destroyer shrinks in to the distance we hear quite a lot of Laser fire but see no Lasers… I thought about this a bit and I found a small CGI clip by Lucusfilm for some IMAX presentation. It was a recreation of the opening in CGI… Although it does not look all that good the thing I thought that was good was seeing Red Lasers coming towards Camera around the Star Destroyer as the shot is finishing. It “Could Be” that it is actually missing lasers towards the end of the shot. This IMAX CGI clip might be a restoration of sorts of what was actually left out the shot?
https://youtu.be/qQjY7ZDWFNo?t=59
Upon the next Shot of the Tantive approaching camera there are to and fro splices missing. The sound mix does not match the action unless you splice the footage up. On the Tantive explosion shot the first part of the shot should have the Tantive Firing a Red Laser we then cut back to the Red Lasers Appearing off screen on the 2nd shot. Star Destroyer Shoots again cut back to remainder of Tantive being blown up.
Now in your previous version of the Battle with the Storm troopers in the corridor you did a good job of improving things here… But it is not entirely correct how you re-arranged it. I will give you now a bit of info about note worthy shot continuity order that I found.
When we have the Scene of 3p0 and R2-D2 in the corridor… The splice to the soldiers shooting should be removed from this part…This needs to move to the opening section of corridor Battle.
The shot of the Storm troopers Shooting and traversing the Corner replaces the Dissolve as the Storm Troopers reach the end of the first Corridor.
R2-D2 and C3-P0 traverse the Corridor in one shot without interuption (The explosion is in synch with theatrical mix). cutting between the shots of the soldiers running and the Storm Troopers in this corridor firing is correct. Darth Vaders Entrance comes a bit earlier matching (Synch) theatrical sound mix listen to Vaders footsteps carefully.
R2-D2 in the next shot is also missing a Splice… R2-D2 in corridor (without card insertion) Cut to C3P0 entrance. Now the Long shot of Leia putting in the card splice to Remainder of the opening shot card insertion section. Doing this also synchs R2-D2’s wheels (Theatrical mix) hitting the ground as he comes towards C3-P0.
I understand you have your own ideas and how you may want to do your edit… But many issues can be resolved by simple editing (Splices) Use the Theatrical mix to spot discrepancies between the action and the sound mix. Lot’s of missing Splices in this part of the film… I hope you take a simple approach to some of these issues and give some of these a try at least, I think you might be pleased with some of these results and they are very simple.
Good Luck and keep up the Good work!
EDIT:
The Best way to explain this kind of stuff is to supply a demo of what I am actually trying to say… Too Complex to read. So I will Show instead in this Demo below.
Now looking at how you did the continuity for the first corridor battle part I agree with it but it’s all about that shot from the C3-PO Corridor part that is Missing. I always planned to copy your scene arrangement for the first corridor Battle and then expand on it with that shot but never got around to doing it basically. So Ignore the scene order here only the placement of that shot of soldiers from the R2-D2 and C3P0 dash that should move to the first corridor battle. The rest is just a different interpretation but this was just me fiddling about to be honest and trying to get it running a bit more smoothly or better and trying to find a way of making it make a bit more sense. Ultimately I never finished this sequence entirely but it is a rough framework.
EDIT2: Further Thoughts
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Should the point the Tanitive get’s hit coincide with C3-P0’s comment about the main reactor being hit rather than a while after the fact?
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On the second corridor fight should we see the rebel troops running to the end of the corridor before R2 and C3P0 make a dash across and the sequence ends on the expolosion? I have a feeling that on the shot of the Rebels running one guard turns and fires this might lead into the stormtrooper being hit? It’s all there but it’s totally out of sequence…
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There are definitely more splices to be found.