Bingowings

Ripplin said:

No offense to A-M, I think I should have talked to him first and asked why it is so pixelated and such before I made the torrent. I just figured I don't have any control over the video quality side of things, so just put it up and tell people it's rough.

Maybe he could still make a more watchable copy to distribute. To that end, I dunno what to do now. I think people over at the Noid are gonna hate me when they see it. :p (not understanding the concept of rough drafts and such, y'know?) No matter how much I say it's not my fault, as Adywan and I have said, people will shoot the messenger.

I don't think anyone here will, I also don't think people will shoot the message if they can follow it in a small window and get the basic idea of what the current state of play is.

I think it's more the side issues of asking for donations and the like which gives more cause for concern.

You offered a service to a fellow board user and you should be applauded for that and A-M has put effort in to revive interest in a brilliant idea (possibly the next stage of evolution for Star Wars edits if it was done successfully).

Who cares if people don't understand the idea of Work Copies?

If the edit reaches a successful conclusion it will open up a whole new set of options and will take it's place in the must see list of fan-edits.

The idea of fans adding new life to films has moved from basic editing, to changing the story, through to adding new special effects and elements to editing a whole sequence of films to tell the story in a different order.

It's exciting stuff and hopefully if A-M controls his urge for self promotion the work he does will do that for him.

It might add to the impact of the full force of the Imperial legion entering onto the scene if we saw them actually arrive in large numbers with support vehicles and the like.

In the current version the Rebels sneek in and when they are captured and lead outside we see a medium force of troopers with a few AT-STs and a few bikes (not really that much more than would expect would have been at the base in the first place going by the size of the buildings around the landing pad and the nature of the project they are protecting.

If while the Rebels were in we had a sense of the approach of a thousand strong deployment of previously hidden troops and the associated equipment it would underline the threat in Palpatine's boast. Imagine the impact of seeing a large army crunching down the forest on their approach to finish off the "pitiful little band" of Rebels and match that with the excitment of having an equally surprising counter attack.

That coupled with evidence that the Ewoks were planning to attack the Imperials before the Rebels turned up (by showing they had already killed some troops) so the traps don't magically appear overnight and adding some evidence of the Rebels using equipment they brought with them on the Tydirium (which could be more if the ship was a captured Imperial transport ship and not just a shuttle). It would add tension, drama and credibility to the ground battle and enhance the mood of the other battles rather than detract from them.

It might even be fun to have a few more Wookees in the strike team by pinching a few from ROTS (Chewie can't be the only Rebel Wookee and it would be a nice nod to the original intent of the battle).

The ground battles in the other Star Wars films had approaches which cranked up suspence (ESB, TPM) and large reveals of the forces involved (AOTC, ESB).

Something like that in ROTJ would really raise the bar for the finale of the saga.

Ady I don't know where you get your energy from.

There is I imagine, a bit of a crossover (if you clean up a HD version of the post DVD cut making a version of the Theatrical cut is, in theory, made easier) and both will possibly help you eventually when you come to do your TPM:R.

But it's still work on work on work.

As grateful as we all are please don't burn yourself out.

"Dozens of people spontaneously combust each year. It's just not widely reported"

I don't have a problem myself with watching a low quality proof of concept cut in a small window to access and comment on to aid coming to a better quality version along the line. It does seem a bit strange however that it is this rough (even at this stage) as is asking for donations for what is essentially a straight edit (no new elements created as in projects like Ady's).

It would be a crying shame if the central concept of this project goes into hybernation again as it is such an elegant idea.

I was really looking forward to (as were a lot of people here) the Reborn project proposed by InfoDroid and TJDavis1138 http://originaltrilogy.com/forum/topic.cfm/Star-Wars-REBORN-The-Complete-Saga/topic/6871/

It was a bad day for all involved (especially ID and TJ who had already put in so much work) when they were forced to abandon their edit.

Looking at the downloads for this rough work copy the interest in this incarnation of the concept is very high.

The call for donations and the over-dwelling on things like ident-logo design needs to stop.

It's a fan-edit that a lot of people want to see and mudding the waters with things like this set back the possibility of seeing this concept (and variations of it) from seeing the light of day.

Peregrinus said:

Bingowings said:

short of reshooting the films how could your ideas be converted into dialogue, footage and slipped into the material that already exists?

Stealing and re-purposing footage from all three movies in the PT and tweaking them as needed to fit (de-greying Obi-Wan, or adding a beard, losing a Padawan braid, etc.)... CGing some meat puppets with synthetic nervous systems to fill in action scenes and whatnot. I was rattled by the fact that, in ROTS, I empathised more with the Clonetroopers than the flesh-and-blood actors. I also know plenty of people in the Rebel Legion and 501st who would be delighted to shoot new footage to insert, as well. Degree of technical hassle would need to be addressed for each scene in turn.

With most of the changes suggested here there are possible technical solutions to putting those dreams onto the screen.

That was my thinking. Dream big, and then see whether it can be done, how easily, etc.

--Jonah

 

Keep dreaming big!

I thought it was one of the more impressive aspects of the PT that I too managed have an empathy with the Clone troops (I've described them elsewhere as brainwashed slaves) you can see how they both bonded with their Jedi generals and turned on them both down to a pre-programmed loyalty to the state that created them.

I know that the EU would have us believe that the Clone Troopers were eventually phased out and replaced by career non-clones and conscripts. I don't buy that myself. If the Emperor has a pre-existing and proven weapon (in the form of totally loyal and mass produced armies) why would he surrender that for troops who may change sides against him?

I'm actually more surprised that he didn't start to replace the population of the Empire with equally brainwashed drones.

There could be entire planetery populations of civilians and military bred and programmed like robots to serve the Empire (not to mention droids themselves becoming less and less like droids and developing individual awareness and loyalty).

The mess left behind by the two trilogies would make a worthy sequel trilogy in it's own right.

Peregrinus said:

Episode III probably tomorrow...

--Jonah

These ideas may work but and they are radical but how might they be done?

Don't let that question put you off thinking or indeed posting your ideas but short of reshooting the films how could your ideas be converted into dialogue, footage and slipped into the material that already exists?

It would be interesting to hear other postees reactions to this too.

With most of the changes suggested here there are possible technical solutions to putting those dreams onto the screen.

skyjedi2005 said:Are all the Tom Baker episodes going to ever be remastered and released?

That was the Doctor Who i loved as a kid, the one they used to show on pbs around the mid to late 1980's.

Yes he wears a funky scarf and is dressed like a hippie, but this show was really cool when i was a kid. I used to pretend time travel based on this show, using a telephone booth because that is what the doctors time machine looked like, lol.

I still find it funny that Peter Cushing aka governor tarkin played dr who in a movie. Which i read somewhere not entirely sure that it was not canon.

Cushing is awesome in those old hammer horror films as DR Frankenstein, Van Helsing etc. Also funny how Count Dooku (Christopher Lee) played Dracula.

The DVD releases have been through various restoration processes (as were the VHS ones back in the day).

http://www.restoration-team.co.uk

They are released in a rather piece-meal fashion (you can't get all of any of the Doctor's adventures yet other than McGann and Eccleston).

There are still many missing episodes (sadly most of them from the Patrick Troughton era and I love Pat's Doctor) some of them turn up now and then.

Here is a list of what is missing (as original video though some has since been returned in other formats) :

http://www.lostshows.com./default.aspx?programme=d6488108-4abb-42c8-810e-8f98536258e5

The soundtracks for all of them exist (thanks to fans who taped them of the television back in the day) so there are fans working on animating the missing episodes :

http://www.wired.com/underwire/2008/09/who-recon/

The DVD set for The Invasion was completed with animation from Cosgrove Hall (of Dangermouse fame) and works really well.

There have been some fun attempts to add colour to some of the monochrome episodes :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9YhTGyfLDU4&feature=channel_page

Wendy's last role is soon to get an airing (along with the swansong of Ken Campbell).

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/8154224.stm

The Superbattledroids look particularly impressive here (you can almost smell the machine oil).

I was thinking about The Omen remake yesterday (long story) and I thought it would have been a worthy undertaking if they dropped the whole Damien actually being the Antichrist from the story. So instead there was just this little innocent kid that one bunch of religious nutjobs think is the antichrist and want to worship and another think he is the antichrist and want to destroy him, with an increasingly paranoid adoptive father stuck in the middle of this (the evil being the people around the child not the child himself). All the deaths could be accidents or deliberate murders.

He could then grow up to become the thing everyone said he is because everyone said he was the thing he would one day grow up to be.

This could could be extended into the Star Wars prequels, you have one bunch of force wielding warriors who support the Republic despite it faults and another who think the Republic is beyond saving and want a start from scratch despite the chaos it would cause. To each other the other side would be seen as evil. The evil would come from what they do to maintain their point of view rather than there actually being one group who are evil and another who are good.

You get hints of this in the PT as we saw it but it's never really followed up (it more of a ploy used by the already evil Palpatine to get the already twisted Anakin to drop the pretense and put on the black hat).

Mark comunicated his miffedness about this on the Kevin Smith Dinner For Five, Starts here :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6NxmReMFVd0

Is this the right time to remind people that this the ESB:R thread and that ROTJ and PT threads are already around?

Feel free to pelt me with eggs and fruit (I can always make a trifle).

Davnes007 said:

EyeShotFirst said:

The-Lion said:

... the line in ANH won't have to be changed. There's only one problem, Obi-Wan says that his student Darth Vader killed Anakin, but it's seems that Obi-Wan killed Anakin if you let him burn in Ep III.

Obi wan is lying to Luke anyway

...From a certain point of view.

That would be the truthful point of view ;-)

If Ben wasn't already dead I'm would have been surprised if Luke had gone ape and killed him on the spot (he could have got Father Merrin in to get rid of the fibbing spook) he had more reason to do it than his father did.

It would have been a nice twist in ROTJ if Luke refused to turn to the Dark Side or pass on his Jedi teaching and got rid of both sets of crazy wizards in one swoop.

theslime said:

Good clip!

Based on this, I got another radical idea. Would it work, story-wise, to have the short Vader scene - getting the headgear on, with the Emperor standing by - as the very first scene of ROTS? As a way of building mystery - "who's this guy? Looks evil" - and introducing him early on as a central character. Then when Anakin fails, this other guy finishes the job. There should be at least one instance where Palps refers to his new apprentice Vader by name, so we could put that line earlier in the film. That way we just assume Sidious got a new apprentice after Maul (Dooku was never his apprentice, as far as I'm concerned), since we're not supposed to know he and Palps are the same man yet anyway. And when it's revealed, we could just assume he has two apprentices. (Oh, and btw, screw the "rule of two". At best it's just a Sith survival mechanism, but once they're out in the open (after Maul), it wouldn't make sense to keep it.)

It's blatant trickery, of course, to admit it was really a flash-forward two films later. Of the very worst kind. Still, it's fun as an idea, at least.

EDIT: Thinking about it, using the Vader name earlier in the film to imply there are two, is way over-the-top. I got a little carried away. :)

I love this thread!

I suggested the idea of moving reference to Vader before Anakin starts killing people quite a few pages back so if you are getting carried away so was I back then (this is the place to get a bit carried away in, that's the fun of this thread).

I still think there is potential in the idea (Sidious gives Vader his Sith name and is pretty sure of himself so why not have him assume there will be a Vader to send to the part before he has actually fully fallen?)

If you got rid of the OTT death of General Grievous and had him fall to his death and scooped up by the troopers it could add to the ambiguity of who Vader is (It could be Grievous working under his new Sith moniker).

You could even redub Grievous so he claims to have been a former pupil of Obi-Wan (after training Anakin he might have had another Padwan).

Presumably the machinery used to build the first one still existed after it's destruction (it wasn't built in the Yavin system after all) but the time scale is still an issue.

Other than that nothing could have survived that explosion to be salvaged, the thing was blown to glitter.

Fully colour altered and sharpened versions of these films (in this style) would be a valuable resource (especially if taken from the HD versions kicking around).

While it would make sense to start a new thread for such an undertaking I hope you do keep posting here ideas of a more radical nature.

Simply providing such a resource will however aid other people in doing more root and branch shake ups of these films.

I'm moving my response to this chain of discussion here for obvious reasons.

doubleofive said:

mrbenja0618 said:

EyeShotFirst said:

I hope ady showcases the space battle and the death star battle for our main attention. All I need to see is the rebels on Endor turning off the shield generator. Then back to the important dark duel. Coz the Endor Forrest battle is a mood killer.

It really does kill the mood.... But the space battle in ROTJ is still IMHO the greatest of all the films. I'm still amazed at how well the ships maneuvered with them being models on wires. Great work.

Seriously I agree.  I mean, each ship is a separately shot element composited who knows how much time later.  It's impressive.  And to only have a couple mislayered/disappearing elements is extremely impressive.

All three layers of the battle need to be expanded in my view.

How does a small group of Rebels defeat an entire legion of the Empire's best troops to bring down the reactor to allow the Rebel fleet to survive being attacked by a large Imperial fleet and a full armed and operational Death Star?

The ground battle is only a mood breaker because it currently makes little sense and has no real visual and emotional impact.

All thos improvised traps show pre-planning how can they plan unless they know that the troops are coming or unless the Ewoks have already been fighting the Imperials?

You can't diminish that aspect of the story without diminishing the whole finale of the saga.

The duel needs the least work on it (beyond the obvious technical clean up, sabre corrections and the like) but both the land and space battle are vital to the resolution of the story.

I like a space battle as much as the next guy but as Lucas once said and never followed through with "story does matter" and there is more to the story than just a big space battle and a sabre duel.

The Ewok side of things carries the key to downfall of the Empire (the Emperor and the Empire see things in such broad sweeps they forget about the power of the little people be they Rebels, Droids or Ewoks).

The scale of some of the original shots was amazing at the time but it is astonishing how fluffed up more simple shots are even after the so called element by element restoration we were told happened back in 1997.

Dooku looks good in black.

Though I've said it before colour alteration (and sharpness) is only really applicable to this thread when it changes the story elements in a radical way.

Great as these are Cade they don't really alter the mood of the films or the story (though they often improve the look of the shots).

Angel has posted changes that change the nature of the locations and the mood of the shots, I'd love to see you have a go at some of that sort of thing.

It might be fun to have the Executor hidden in a huge cloud bank and suddenly break through the clouds as the Falcon escapes, like the Ajax (or was it the Warlock?) in Flash Gordon only not crap.

Before the PT I wouldn't have thought a ship that size would be capable of atmospheric flight but now I guess it could.

It would have a lot more impact than Leia pointing at a dart in the distance but it would have to be one hell of a big cloud to hide something that big.

The Golden Idol said:

Cade Skywalker said:

Rhikter said:

Cade Skywalker said:

50MB split screen

I would have uploaded this to YouTube but this time I also applied a sharpening filter (with moderate settings, I hope), since it was bugging me to see that the whole movie was just blurry for no reason. It's a 2500kbps MP4, that way you'll be able to notice the sharpening and the details.

Is this the same split screen you posted earlier?  I have satellite internet with a low download speed and a bandwidth cap, so I'd rather not download this if I don't have to.  I hate to ignore someone's hard work, but do you think I'd be alright without seeing it?

Some screenies for you (and whoever doesn't want to download a 50MB video)

Guess I'll have to open a thread soon.

 

 Great work, but that video reminds me just how horrendous the acting is in AOTC, especially by Natalie Portman.

Going by almost all accounts of George's directing style every Star Wars actor can make a Nuremberg Defense.

I mentioned this in my first post on the ROTJ Wishlist Thread.

George made three films where two droids were meant to be characters we cared about and two where the torture of humans was suitably horrific (within the set audience parameters naturally) and in ROTJ he dropped in a comedy droid torture scene.

This carried over to the PT where the battledroids do little comedy skits in between killing people and where R2 laughs his socks of in ROTS at the prospect of his pal Threepio getting a forced lobotomy.

C3PX said:

Having purchased the regular DVD version, I have no disc five. Still really irritates me. For us old fashioned DVD guys, we only get five discs if we decided to dish out $80 + dollars for the brief case version. Yet BD and HD guys get all five discs in the basic version.

I have the HDDVD of the 5-Disc Ultimate Collector's Edition on my shelf. There's a commentary by the person who wrote that Blade Runner book I also have

 

Whoa! The work print has a commentary by Philip K. Dick? I had no idea! That is freakin awesome! No I wish even more that they hadn't decided to short non HD adopters by excluding the workprint.

It's a bit difficult to believe seeing as he died before the film was finished wasn't it Paul Sammon's audio interviews strung together?

I don't know where you saw Star Wars but all the films were shown in Odeon Cinemas when I was wee and it was Rank Advertising for that chain (and Pearl and Dean for ABC Cinemas) :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZ8fkJOQlBM

Hannibal: Desserts Served With Your Main Course, I would dearly love to get my hands on this not only just to watch (it's always a joy to watch an ADM project) but also with attempting a stab at trying to get a version even closer to the novel by mixing in parts from Hannibal Rising as flashbacks.

I'm a bit green when it comes to Rapidshare and the only time I ever saw this project up as a Trnt it was unseeded.

Will NuV detractors refer to the series as VINO (hic)?

The original was fun back then just as original Galactica was I'm not leaping to the conclusion that this will be a masterpiece but there is plenty of room to run with the idea from a fresh perspective.