This isn't so much an update as a sort of... well... story....
Years ago when I joined the forums online, I joined only two or three.
One was Jurassic Park Legacy, which I slowly moved up the ranks to be the co-admin for...
And JWFan.net.
It was through JWFan.net that I was introduced to the idea of making my own edits for films cores. I had tried for Jurassic Park but to my novice ears, it sounded fine and to their more gifted ears, it was quite lacking.
I've grown... a lot...
But I thought that I'd say this here and now:
The Star Wars: Episode I The Phantom Menace (Complete 4 Disc Score) was something that I made.
It's getting a lot of attention now in the fan base with a certain release by ggctuk, but the original production was mine.
But I dont' want to take all the credit. There's a story.
Lord Skylark , one of the people on JWFan.net, managed to track down a lot of the games and programs that had the Episode I music in it. He ripped them and spoke to a few people on JWfan.net about making a complete score edit.
He spoke to one Henry Buck and King Mark who agreed... The two were at odds with some things. King Mark (or was it Henry Buck? Its been a while) simply wanted an expanded UE set (which to all of you means that he simply wanted to add in some missing bits to the Ultimate Edition which was commercially released.)
Afraid of sending out all these files because of copy right claims, he then created a thread on JWfan.net talking about how others could make this edit, and had someone at ff.net host these missing pieces of the score that people could then insert into their Ultimate Edition scores.
I downloaded these files and spoke out about certain alternates that been missed.
My edits eventually caught the eye of Lord Skylark who then proposed that he could send me the RAW WAV RIPS from the games. The same source material that King Mark had, but unlike the stuff hosted online (which was all 320 mp3).
I took him up on the offer to create a complete set and poured over nearly 12 GIG of music searching originally for missing pieces of the highest quality (mind you, each game had music saved at different quality levels and several could ahve the same missing piece but one might have it in nearly flawless quality while the others wouldn't).
I then had to work my way through the UE, undoing all the edits, deciphering all the problems and replacing all the lost music.
Now, years earlier another fellow by the name of .... I can't recall... but he went through a lot of the material and wrote up on his website exactly what he'd found.
I did not go by this. I went by some of King Marks work in the breakdown... but a lot of it I did myself.
I worked in an almost literal vaccume. I worked to find everything I could... I started finding pieces that sounded similar to what was released, but would have slight variances.
Late in the game, I realized I was finding raw , alternate takes of the cues.
I then took these cues and decided that they, too , should be presented on the set.
I went to Sony's website and ripped the audio for the John Williams interviews.
Then Miguel sent me some files along with King Mark to add as extras... live recordings of JW in concert and the premiers of the music... The Trailer Audio... and so on and so on..
I released the set to many attacks. People said it was bad. THere was a time when one person in particular (king mark) lambasted the set for being jockular and novice in sound. I took offence because I'd asked him months before for advice and to listen to my set and let me know if I'd missed anything.
He never responded.
I then redid the set in about a week and released it again.
This is the set you are all familiar with.
I Have since found small pieces that need to be added... but they did not become available until the starwars.com mashups showed up online so the lateness of the hour can be forgiven.
I plan to redo my episode I set as soon as I'm done with my Episode II edit.
The 4 disc set that is getting so much attention is NOT my set.... but without my set it wouldn't have been possible. Much of the extra material has been taken from my set and reordered... restructured in a different way.
The differences between my set and his are negligable. I have things he missed and had to correct him on, and he has two alternate takes I did not find.
But as I said, I'm set to redo my set as I was very pleased with it but as of late, I'm not as pleased as I use to be.
So...
With that all said and done, I would like to say that my Episode II set is nearly finished. I'm doing the final touches to it now... and I hope to have it uploaded and done by Monday.