Darth Venal

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Well, that kind of was what they were about, after all. Nazis in space, the lot of 'em!

Just the other day at work, some little twerp whose name I won't mention (Harry) popped his head into the conversation and asked "Well, what was so bad about the Empire?" and followed it up a few minutes later with "Well, if the Rebels just did what they were told, like everybody else, then..." 

The human mind, it's a terrifying thing.

Monroville:

Hey DV,

Is your friend using the blu-ray release of NEVERENDING STORY?  One was released in Denmark I believe - got one off of eBay and it looks pretty good.  I can send some screen caps if you like.

Could you PM me some screencaps? That'd be awesome. Obviously one of the matte painting I've been using would be awesome, and any others you think are pretty :-)   Anything with a matte painting, like Atreyu riding on Artax towards the rock pillars etc. Merci!

As for my friend's edit, he's not using the Blu-ray because the material he has for the deleted (from the US version) scenes are only just about DVD quality, and not all of it. We'd prefer to keep it as consistent looking as possible, rather than the image quality jumping around.

Do you also have the SW movies on HD?

It really does look Borg, doesn't it.

Yeah I think we gathered that. What do you have in mind for it?

Well, isn't that ironic. You used images of the Large Hadron Collider, which many fear might rip apart the planet, to represent something which destroys planets. Wonderful! Personally, I find the CERN LHC project incredibly interesting, and my fingers are firmly crossed that we live to see the results. :-)

Where did you get the metalwork for all that? It's really great.

... double post... sorry...

SomethingStarWarsRelated:

Repainted the entire thing? woah! How long did it take you?

Yeah, I didn't think it could be the sharening tool...

Ah, I didn't even think about the whole scaling down the image business.

So will we get to see this never ending story edit?

Thanks for replying!

Yeah it took a little while. Because it's a fantasy image, it's hard to find photo elements that work, so sometimes it's just better to start from scratch and do it all yourself. I obviously used the original layout as the guy I'm doing it for wanted a new version of the same scene, basically. I made it higher vertically because he wants to pan up to the tower. The trees will also be animated slightly, to make the leaves move a bit to go with new sound effects.

Scaling down images to show really does undermine how much work you've put in sometimes! :-)

Wow, Angel, those are fantastic. What did you use for all the metalwork?

I would LOVE to see one of those with a laser out into it. Awesome stuff.

SomethingStarWarsRelated:

I certainly don't know this stuff like Angel does...but I would tend to agree with him...

Yeah, it looks a little too saturated...the greens...

But wow! How do you take a crappy screen cap like that and turn it into what you have? specifically how did you sharpen the image? Did you simply use the sharpening tool?

Great stuff!

Actually, I repainted the entire thing, except for the foreground trees, where I painted one and pasted it for speed. Trust me, there is no sharpening tool in the world that can do that. I repainted the Star Trek logo, too, but that was very easy in comparison. Regarding the greens, unfortunately scaling it down into a jpeg changes the way it looks. Bear in mind that the original image is over eight times larger, and the greens are far more varied at that level; you can even see blades of grass under the trees. It's too bad that you can't see all the detail at this level.

Thanks for the feedback!

Thanks for the feedback. I know those trees stick out a mile, I'll change the most obvious ones (there are five from two designs). And how about this one? I was "renewing" the Star Trek Federation emblem/logo and all I had to work with was the very rough image of the original.

And now I promise, no more off-topic images. You can all spank my bottom till its blue at the next Fan Editors Meet to Mingle Evening, or FEMME.

Just while we're in the middle of a summer of matte painting mock-ups, can anyone give me an opinion on this that I've done for a Neverending Story edit? My buddy has gotten hold of an un-dubbed version of the German cut and he's restoring it all. Personally, I think this matte is a bit too saturated, although my mate likes it that way. (I promise not to post OT mattes, I just needed quick opinions as he wants this by tomorrow). Cheers.

OLD:                                                                                                                                        NEW:

Just a quickie mock-up. I want to show the Ion Cannon as actually being part of the base. The original shot of it just doesn't place it anywhere. So far I've added the power generator in the background. In the mid ground I might add the Rebel trenches, to at least place the cannon in the geography.

With a hell of a lot of typing.

:-)

Hi Angel,

Not quite sure what you mean on a couple of those points. This really is only a mock-up, none of those aspects have been finalised, I'm just trying out a few different layouts of things.

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Okay here's another version, a bit busier. Probably too busy, but there you go.

DuTwan:

Hey Darth Venal, love these pics but just got a few things ive noticed, the Palace pic, the sand by the palace is lighter than the rest so maybe if you changed one or the other to the same colour to keep it all the same.

In this pic which i also love its the small matter of the reflections of the shield lights. at that angle i would of thought the reflection would of been more of a 45 degree angle.

The sand by the palace, or rock as it is, is supposed to be different. When I painted it originally it was all the colour and there is absolutely no depth in it. And I'm not sure in an area this big all the rock and sand would be the same colour.

About the shield lights, they wouldn't be at 45 degrees. Why should they? Ones position to the reflection is irrelevant to the direction of it. The angle of the surface the reflection is in determines its relation to the original light source. Besides, that reflection is in the original matte painting and it's in the right place.

I don't think I'll be adding any more ships to the shot, either. It's very busy already, and I tried putting the TIEs back in outside and it was too much. I also tried one Star Destroyer, which looked okay, but it doesn't need it.

The Jabba's Palace matte isn't finished, as I said when I first posted. I'm adding the other side of the canyon on the left, so the plain will be covered and modified. At the moment it's just there to fill the ground. The garage/hangar in the wall is also just an idea, not the final image. These are just mock-ups.

Well, the CG shuttle in Empire SE is definitely different to the model used in Jedi and VERY different to the matte painting shuttles in Jedi. The main problem is that all the matte painting shuttles done for Jedi are completely inaccurate to the model, and the live action mockup used for some shots is even worse. So the Emperor's shuttle being different doesn't bother me, as it's only seen in one scene.

And yes, I did use the Empire SE shuttle, although I had to modify that too to make it somewhat more like the original model, as it also varies a lot. I've also added detail back onto the CG model that was on the matte painting shuttles.

Those Endor pics are really, really nice! I wish someone could paint more unusual looking trees to take that Earth edge off the forest views. But those look so much better than the bland shots used in the movie.

This is my Jabba's palace idea with a hangar in the wall, the hi=res version looks a lot better as the ships are quite detailed. Anyone got any ideas what else I can do with the Death Star landing bay?

Hey, don't apologise. Sharing ideas is a good thing. Just not all ideas a good ;-) But it's always worth mentioning to see what people think.

Sorry, no.

LOL! The Great Purge indeed. No, no revenge going on at all there.

DarthBo:

Personally, if Luke can forcechoke guards and slice anyone who gets in his way with his lightsaber, I don't see why he wouldn't be able to take revenge. Anakin (no longer Vader) sure takes revenge on Palpatine.

Exactly who does Luke "slice" who gets in his way? Star Wars? No-one. Empire? No-one. Jedi? No-one, he just defends himself in a fight on the Sail Barge, then duels with Vader. Hardly a raging psychotic. And if you don't know why Luke won't take revenge yet the Sith do, I wonder what exactly you think the difference between the two is. And Anakain is saving his son and restoring good to the galaxy when he kills Palpatine. It's not simple revenge for what he's done to him personally.

This shot is after leia and han kissing each other.

i found that shot very boring and without mood.

A sunset with a dramatic landscape with ewok village at midground it would fit better.

Things id like to add: smoke and fires from the battle, Endor planet in the background. but i left it as it have because it could get busy.

-Angel

Angel, that really is excellent. I've always been disappointed with how the forest moon just looked liked Earth. No effort was made to make it look different. I think should also replace the shot where the Rebels in the shuttle fly over the forest when they first arrive - first impressions are everything :-)