The ANH:SE Redux Ideas thread (Radical Ideas Welcome). — Page 12

But what footage would you use? Fan editors are restricted by the source material, unless you can get Jimmy Smits from something else, but there are all sorts of problems making it all work. You could possibly lift some of the footage from the end of Episode II and age him, but it's not easy.

I'm trying to show him getting away on a ship and getting killed in the planet debris.

Darth Venal said:

But what footage would you use? Fan editors are restricted by the source material, unless you can get Jimmy Smits from something else, but there are all sorts of problems making it all work. You could possibly lift some of the footage from the end of Episode II and age him, but it's not easy.

I'm trying to show him getting away on a ship and getting killed in the planet debris.

Plenty of footage from NYPD Blue DVDs!  Maybe you could CGI his beard back on.

There is quite a lot of him in Dexter season 3 too.

I'll check out Dexter, but really, I wouldn't waste my time doing something that doesn't look very good. If there isn't any feasible footage, it's pointless. And he'd need to have his beard already, so if any of you know if he had it in Dexter...

In a word "no" but...biros (besides how many hairstyles did Obi-Wan have)?

Well, it's not just that, there has got to be feasible lighting and movement. And hairstyles are one thing, but they've got to look feasible for Star Wars. And CGing a costume onto non-Star Wars footage isn't easy.

I can't say the shot is important enough for all the effort it would take.

Darth Venal said:

nd very welcome two cents they are. I know exactly what you mean. I really hate to say it, but it seems the emotional detachment Lucas was lambasted for with the prequels is just as present in the original movie too. I mean, you're absolutely right; Leia's muted response to Alderaan being destroyed is really rather unsatisfactory. If you've heard the Radio Drama, you'll know what real pain should sound like with those wonderful scripts and performances.

However, as much as I find the emotional impact wanting, there is also the fact that Star Wars is a war movie, and the mentality of war and in the underground movements wasn't dissimilar to what we see. Loss was a daily occurrence, where anyone could disappear or die at any time, and you had to carry on regardless. As the exchange goes:

Rebel Commander: "When we heard about Alderaan, we feared the worst"

Leia: "We have no time for our sorrows, Commander."

So I can let it go with that perspective. But then, as you said Darth Plagueis, if I'm trying to imbue more emotional impact will it fit with the responses of the characters? Well, I guess we'll have to see. I must say I'm inclined to remove the planet surface shots, even if they work visually, as I like the momentum of the entire planet being obliterated by the shockwave uninterrupted.

Awesome simply awesome shots and something I brought up with Ady and you hit on the head, short of plasma wave following the shock wave burning everything you created the exact image in my mind...so get out of there and uh ignore what the ladies are doing behind the curtain.

But as for emotional impact for the scene there is an almost impossible shot to fix that.

A 3 second shot on Leia's face her face fixed in shock and mouth open and eye's welling up in tears but only one rolls down her cheek.  Its simple, powerful and incredibly difficult to get but there are few shots of her face doing just that pose but only for an instant. Plus it would have to be cut with Obi-wan's look of shock too at sensing the death of Aldreeran.

TK99:

Awesome simply awesome shots and something I brought up with Ady and you hit on the head, short of plasma wave following the shock wave burning everything you created the exact image in my mind...so get out of there and uh ignore what the ladies are doing behind the curtain.

*blushes*

Well, I'm very pleased that it works for you. I will be experimenting with Leia, Bail Organa and different ways of putting more emotional depth into the scene. The main problem, and I suppose this limitation is self-imposed, is that I don't want to include anything that feels *too* far from the original style of the movie. There are certainly ways of putting more stuff in, but I neither want to completely rearrange/recreate the scene nor use editing techniques that don't match Star Wars. Example; I could put flash inserts over a shot of Leia to indicate she's thinking about the things that are about to be obliterated. In another movie it would work, but that sort of montage does not fit stylistically into Star Wars.

I'll see what I can do to get a good shot of Leia looking devastated (understatement!). And I might be adding the literal sound of thousands/millions of people screaming out, during the shot of the wave consuming the planet, and as it spreads around the screams diminish to nothing.

So many things to try, so little time... 

TK99 said: But as for emotional impact for the scene there is an almost impossible shot to fix that. A 3 second shot on Leia's face her face fixed in shock and mouth open and eye's welling up in tears but only one rolls down her cheek.  Its simple, powerful and incredibly difficult to get but there are few shots of her face doing just that pose but only for an instant. Plus it would have to be cut with Obi-wan's look of shock too at sensing the death of Aldreeran.

It demonstrates how Lucas (ironically in a story about the human spirit trumping technology) is more concerned about the physical props of the story rather than the emotional sweep of it.

It's an irony compounded a bit by us all talking about making the bang bigger and more impressive so I'm really pleased that you made this suggestion TK99 as it might more doable than some of the ambitious additions Ady is planning to the Revisited versions (making models and sets and filming them etc).

Find someone with a reasonable resemblance to Carrie and film a teardrop rolling down her cheek (matching the lighting and grain).

That could add a real punch to the scene, possibly much more than any new explosion.

Luke gets a big reaction shot for the death of his family but Leia hasn't just lost her adopted parents, she's seen almost everyone she's ever known, millions of people, turned into ash and dust.

Well, I for one would never use new footage of anyone who wasn't the original actor unless it was a long shot. It would be easier to add a CG tear to Carrie Fisher's face. I will examine the feasibility of all those things, both on the Death Star and on Alderaan, but most of them will just not be possible.

I might loop in new dialogue and do some snipping and actually not have Alderaan destroyed at all. I'll let them destroy Dantooine instead :-) Yay, Alderaan survives.

Anyway, all this is really asking too much of the original material. If we had raw footage to choose our own takes, you'd have completely different versions of Star Wars already, but we don't. We're really limited to and by the material available.

What I definitely can do is the expanded destruction of Alderaan, and I'm pretty certain we can tease out enough to give Leia some thoughts in her cell as the Death Star approaches. I'm not sure I want to change too much, otherwise we go too far down the road of unpicking the original.

You're right! I totally forgot that! Remind me in more detail (I can't get to my DVDs for a while because of work).

How you doing, anyway?

Wasn't it something like "and you call yourselves human"?

That seems to be more of an expression of moral indignation than emotional turbulence.

Leia possibly had been trained to keep her emotions in check and stay focussed on the task at hand but going by what she does in ESB and ROTJ she often let's that slip and that must have been one hell of an emotional stab to the heart for her.

Bingowings said:

Wasn't it something like "and you call yourselves human"?

That seems to be more of an expression of moral indignation than emotional turbulence.

Leia possibly had been trained to keep her emotions in check and stay focussed on the task at hand but going by what she does in ESB and ROTJ she often let's that slip and that must have been one hell of an emotional stab to the heart for her.

 This line would have been interesting as it would have shortly followed the (then) cut line of "Jabba, you're a wonderful human being."  The contrast of these lines close together is interesting.

Sluggo said:

 This line would have been interesting as it would have shortly followed the (then) cut line of "Jabba, you're a wonderful human being."  The contrast of these lines close together is interesting.

That line's always really irritated me, regardless of how it was meant.  I'm glad Ady cut the Jabba scene just for that, let alone because of the CGI.  Although the second attempt was better than the first, Jabba always looks too small to me.

Jabba wasn't too small in the SE. If you look at him on the dais C3PO and the w humansere taller than him when standing next to him, so that part wasn't an issue for me. I always like the "wonderful human being" line, it's ironic and just like Han.

I was of the thinking, and everyone I know was as well, that Jabba was not meant to be able to move very well. Hence his state in ROTJ. I believe the only reason he suddenly became mobile in 1997 is because there was no other way to make the scene work. Not that it worked very well anyway, but that's why. They did consider putting him on a very thing hover plate, with a sort of curved little railing at the bottom holding Jabba's belly in. I would have prefered that, if only because it would have maintained his natural immobility. And it also might have enable Jabba to spin around and remain face to face as Han walks around behind him.

But no, they went for the catastrophe we saw in 1997.

It might be fun to see someone try to merge the CGI Jabba with the puppet from ROTJ (the puppet elements being the prime ingredients but using the CGI model for motion and lip movements).

The only point I can see to restoring the scene however would be (as I said back in post one) if he said something new in the subtitles that didn't just repeat what the Greedo scene had alredy done so much better.

That would be a tall order because the new subtitles would have to match the responses that Han gives.

Actually, I think new dialogue would be pretty easy to fit. But otherwise, yes, the scene is totally redundant.

The puppet from Jedi would be virtually impossible to mix with the CGI.

Yeah; I meant small in terms of mass.  I don't like the line, however it's meant.

Would be cool to take the best of the two Jabbas.  The Phantom Menace Jabba looked so much better, just in terms of colour.

Darth Venal said:

Yeah, Bingowings is right, I think. The people on Alderaan had to have had some idea they were in peril. After all, Bail Organa was well aware what the Death Star was because of his affiliation with the Rebel Alliance. And he surely would have tried to get his people away.

How about a monitor in the background somewhere inside the Death Star observation room, showing a video of Jimmy Smits' face, him being visibly upset and concerned about the Imperial presence, rambling on in desperation to save his people.

There must be a lot of material that could be used, and what he is actually saying would not be much of an issue. It would only detract from the scene if we heard him. It would make sense for the Imperials to have the sound muted -- they ignore him anyway.

There could also be, like a radar display somewhere, with blips showing ships blasting off from the planet. Seeing that the Death Star II's laser was used to destroy ships, it would only make sense that the gunner's control room would have targeting systems that show ships.