focuspuller said:
Not to be anal, but, do the two new shots have continuity? The building placement looks completely different. That being said the new shots at the very least are visually pleasing.
Also, didn't some kind of tram pass under in one of the new shots? Is that still going to be there?
Monroville said:
You may want to play with/consider blurring the buildings more and more as they recede into the background due to atmospheric effects (like when you look at a city from far away and it has an almost transparent bluish look). Maybe that was one of the problems with the city effects of the prequels was that everything in foreground to background looked sharp, when you would have focal issues and atmospheric effects that could have made the scenes more realistic.
Things like the monorails and air traffic could be nice visually, but at the same time the focus should be on the main action, not the stuff moving in the background.
I would nix the trains, but maybe put those slow pulsing red lights that buildings here have on the top (for airplanes at night) and have one or two cloud cars VERY far in the distance... maybe just reduced to a black dot with running lights. Maybe something enough to bring the city to life (like maybe the addition of audio effects to indicate a busy city behind and underneath them) but not enough to pull away from what we are supposed to be paying attention to.
Yes, i've been keeping an eye on the continuity of buildings. as you can see from the shots below but they added a large building placed behind the platform in the approaching shots that knocks out the continuity. I tried adding the building to these mattes but it just didn't look right and took over the shot so I'm either going to have to try and omit it from the SE approaching shots or just screw continuity for one shot.
I still haven't finished the mattes yet, these were more of a teaser.
The buildings are actually more blurred already the further back they are but its difficult to see due to the small res of the pictures. There is also quite a bit of sky traffic too but again hard to spot. I already have cloud cars flying past as well as distant glows from engines, like the ones seen in the SE. The monorails is also still in there. Its hard to see without seeing moving images.
Bingowings said:
Some of those ideas I'm very keen on but one of the things I remember from seeing the film all those years ago was the feeling of dread that such a huge city being so quiet instilled in me at the time (I'm not sure if that was a deliberate directing decision or just down to not having enough money to bring the place to life back in 1980).
It foreshadowed that something wasn't right about the place (with the Imperials kicking around it would make sense for Lando to try and keep as many people away from danger as possible without looking like he was...you know, administrate casual).
The daytime scenes kind of blew that out of the water but the quiet did set a tone which was backed up by Leia's apprehensions.
I think it was more to do with FX limitations or budget reasons back in 1979. I always saw it as a busy mining colony. I think if it was too quiet then Han would have been suspicious the moment they arrived. plus we saw all the activity inside the city pre-SE so i guess it was always intended to be a busy place.
DF Shadow said:
If I remember correctly in the SE DVD the consistency of the millennium falcon when entering cloud city is off. The falcon is thinner in the the new CG shots and thicker in the old shots. I think this is most obvious when it lands on the platform.
Once the ship has docked it's back to it's usual thickness.
Something to look at AdY?
yeh i always thought it looked a bit flat but having looked at it closer it seems the shadowing is off giving it the flat effect. Its the same CG model that is used in the previous shot when being pursued by Slave 1 and also used in ANH SE and it looks fine then. I'm not sure what i can do with it but something does need to be done.
doubleofive said:
I found some transparency issues while the Falcon is being chased by Star Destroyers. That's just ridiculous.
yeh, i mentioned this previously. the whole film has serious transparency issues , many which are impossible to fix without having the original separate elements. They figured out a way to minimize the black matte lines for the hoth battle then used it for the rest of the FX shots. They did the same thing with ROTJ too. In the opening shots the Shuttle becomes transparent and you can see endor through its wings.
almonkey said:
adywan, do you have a photo album comparing all the old shots and your shots? i really enjoyed looking through your work in picture form for star wars (yeah, yeah, a new hope now!)
No, there won't be one until the movie is complete because many shots go through changes throughout the editing process it just wouldn't be worth starting one yet
