Eyepainter

Darth_Zounds said:

Eyepainter, I’d like a link to your fan edit of Episode 2.

Also, sending you my condolences for your family situation.

Thanks for the kind words regarding my mother, Darth.

As of right now, I only have a demo of episode II, which is low quality. It isn’t the final version, and a lot of things are incomplete (such as video transitions, sound editing, and color grading). I’ve even rearranged a few scenes since releasing it. However, it does give you an idea of which direction the edit is going for. I’ll PM you a link to the demo, and when episode II is completed, I’ll be happy to send you the link to the official release.

My Mac Pro has arrived. I’ve been spending some time getting it set up. I still have a lot of stuff to take care of, but the basics are looking good. However, my Mac is distracting me from completing v2, so I’m going to take a break from getting things taken care of with my Mac and go straight to finishing up v2. It’s been a long and exhausting journey, but I want to get it finished ASAP. I still have a lot of work at my day job, but I’m hoping to finish v2 within the next couple of weeks.

Hal 9000 said:

lol YES

Redub Boba Fett in the Holiday Special to sound New Zealandish.

Or redub him to sound like Jar Jar Binks.

The “download quote exceeded” thing is very common when downloading RAR files like HAL9000’s. Usually, the best thing to do is wait a few hours and try again. The download quote might exceed again, but it will continue to download the files. I know it’s inconvenient, but good things come to those who wait.

I’ve begun work on the color grading. I’ve started with the opening ship landing assassination attempt on Coruscant. So far, I’ve managed to change the color scheme from white to blue. I won’t know what the rest of the color grading is gonna look like until I’ve done it all, but I’m guesstimating that a lot of the white color scenes (specifically Coruscant and Kamino) are gonna end up with a similar blue tint.

I personally don’t have a problem with this, as I always felt like the white color scheme was boring to look at. But I figured it wouldn’t hurt to inform everyone in advance.

I’m doing a similar thing to v2 of my episode I edit in that I’m giving it a green tint in order to liven it up.

Finally! Finally, I got to escape from my relatives. Yeah, sorry it took so long to get back, but I should be free of distractions now. Anyway, while I was dealing with the relatives, I learned how to use the curves on Resolve. Let’s just say I’ve gotten spoiled by them. So much so that I’m grading it again. I promise this is the last time I’ll play with the color grading for v2. Then, I’ll release it.

In other news, I’ve got a few updates. I got some money from my mom’s life insurance for Christmas. So, I spent some of that money on a Mac Pro and I’m hoping to switch all of my editing work towards that computer instead. I expect that it will be very useful for my fanedits in the future (I’m confident that episode III is gonna be completely edited on this Mac).

I also bought a new microphone, since the one I was using for my commentary is a cheap pile of garbage (which is why my commentary track still hasn’t been completed). I will be working on the commentary track as soon as either 1. The microphone arrives and/or 2. v2 is released.

In addition, I’m considering buying an external blu-ray drive, so that I can rip the transfers from my blu-ray discs. This would give me a good chance of submitting my edits to fanedit.org, which is something I’ve wanted to do. However, this is going to be a while, and I still prefer the Schormann files over the blu-ray discs (especially Episode I for the film grain and muppet Yoda). But, for those who are curious, I will probably call the blu-ray rip v3. So yes, a lot of interesting things are about to happen soon. For now, though, I want to devote myself towards finishing up v2 within this month, because I’ve delayed it long enough. Hang in there, folks! V2’s a comin’.

theprion said:

Eyepainter said:
Jango is to Epsiode II what Jar Jar is to Episode I.

Ha, so tragic and so true!

Sorry, Prion, but I tried (and it ended up being a disaster).

I’m glad that you tried, though. It’s nice that you were open to the suggestions to try new approaches. Also good reference to know how far you can push the film until it breaks.

Looking forward to what you make of it!

Thanks!

So I tried theprion’s suggestions on Jango Fett, and it ended up being a disaster. I started by removing Obi-Wan’s first meeting, but it derailed the structure of the edit. There were now too many Anakin/Padme scenes and not enough Obi-Wan scenes to cut or transition to.

Then, I came up with another idea to work around this problem. I rearranged everything so that we would start with Obi-Wan’s investigation first, then Anakin and Padme’s plotline would start about halfway through instead. It didn’t work either, because some scenes didn’t transition well into each other. For example, there were several scenes where Obi-Wan is either entering or exiting doors on Kamino. So one scene would begin with Obi-Wan exiting a door, but in the very next scene, he’s exiting another door. So for continuity reasons, that wasn’t going to work.

After those two attempts, I gave up. Sorry, Prion, but I tried. Jango is to Epsiode II what Jar Jar is to Episode I. They’re both characters I want to get rid of, but can’t because they’re already so heavily ingrained into the film that it’s extremely hard, if not impossible, to remove them.

Remove John Williams’ classic Cantina Band from episode IV and replace it with Jedi Rocks. It’ll be like poetry in that it rhymes.

theprion said:

Eyepainter said:
I’m not sure where I said that Jango wasn’t on Geonosis.

Sorry, I meant to write “doesn’t die on Geonosis” and got lost in the train of thought.

My only concern is that Mace Windu’s entrance might be needed. Having just a bunch of random jedi appear out of nowhere seems a little vague and hard to follow.

You’re right, I had completely forgotten of Mace’s entrance. First thing that comes to mind would be removing Jango from the shot to be replaced by one of the neimoidians, but I don’t know how feasible (or worthwhile) that is to the scope of the edit.

I’m having the same train of thought. I’m not a CGI expert, so I really wouldn’t know how to replace Jango if I tried.

I have been entertaining the idea of getting rid of Obi-Wan’s visitation with Jango. This would mean that Jango attacks Obi-Wan on Kamino, most likely because he’s trying to assassinate him. It would also mean that Jango is allied with the separatists (which works for my edit). But it comes with a big drawback. My edit has Zamm muttering “Bounty hunter… From Kamino… Called…” before she (or it) dies. I did this to get Obi-Wan to Kamino sooner rather than later, since I believe that less is more, but I would have to change it to the theatrical version again if I made that call. This would mean I would have to bring up the archives scene where Obi-Wan can’t find his planet (a scene I never liked since it goes nowhere), and I would have to bring back Dexter Jettster (ugh). So I’m kind of in a bind with this. I’ll give it some more thought while I’m celebrating Christmas.

theprion said:

Some interesting workarounds.

But since Jango isn’t on Geonosis in your cut, why not completely cut him from the film? He was always an useless fanservice of a character anyways.

Consider this: the kaminoans might have their gene pools or something like that. Why would they (or Count Dooku, for that matter) need a random mercenary to be either an outside asset or a loose end on this monumental operation? So Obi follows the dart trail to Kamino, discovers the clone army, and when he is about to meet the unknown “supervisor” who ordered the clones, a ship (still Slave I, but who cares) departs hastily upon learning of the jedi’s inquiry, but not before Obi whips him a tracking device. This should improve the veil of secrecy involving Count Dooku and the assassination plan when Obi-Wan finally uncovers him in Geonosis, rather than just skip leads from one bounty hunter to another. What do you think?

As for Shmi, I’m curious to see how you make it work. Paired with the downplaying of Jango, these are some promising changes I have no knowledge of prior attempts.

I’m not sure where I said that Jango wasn’t on Geonosis. All I said is that his purpose had been served once Obi-Wan followed him to Geonosis, which means that he still goes there.

I sympathize with the notion of getting rid of Jango in his entirety, though. It’s just that I couldn’t find a way to explain how Obi-Wan arrives on Geonosis without him following Jango there. Still, I’ll see if it’s possible to get rid of the Jango scenes from the arena. My only concern is that Mace Windu’s entrance might be needed. Having just a bunch of random jedi appear out of nowhere seems a little vague and hard to follow. But I’ll see if it works.

theprion said:

The cut list is very promising. I might have missed something though: what is the fate of Shmi and Jango Fett?

Aah yes. One of the downsides of change lists are that they’re good at showing what’s been taken out and not what’s been kept in. Talking about what’s still around is the hard part.

In regards to Shmi’s fate, she still dies. However, all we see is Anakin bringing the body home followed by the funeral scene. We don’t get to see the scene where Anakin finds her before she dies and his eventual killing of the tuskens, or his Darth Vader-esque rant at Padme. (Which is a shame, because that moment when Anakin meets his mom after so long was a rare good moment from the film. However, the whole thing with Anakin becoming a cold-blooded killer made him a villain way too early in the prequels, so it didn’t make sense to keep it. Besides, there’s enough hinting at Anakin’s turn to the dark side without that scene anyway.)

As for Jango Fett, I’ve decided to let his fate be unknown. Mace Windu’s decapitating of Jango right in front of his kid seemed messed up. (Not to mention uncharacteristic of the jedi.) Besides that, Jango’s purpose in the plot had been served once Obi-Wan followed him to Geonosis. Anything about what happens to him (or Boba) afterwards isn’t that important. He’s still in the Geonosis climax, but less so.

Okay, I’m an even bigger jerk. Who would’ve thought that Christmas was gonna get in the way of working on my fan edits? I’m getting to it, folks. I’ll see if I can get v2 tested for real this time. (Whilst juggling over the family, that is. That’s what’s been delaying me so far.)

Thanks!

Full list of changes are now on the main post.

danieldubb said:

Eyepainter said:

Good to have you on board, dude.

I have a fan edit of episode I that’s already been released (episodes II and III are still a work in progress), and most of my audio issues are minor. Still, any updates I can make to the edit, however small, are nice.

I’m editing on Davinci Resolve 16 in case it’s important. I’ve been able to fix most of my audio problems through crossfades and cutting out unwanted lines and sound effects (you’d be amazed how much more tolerable Jar Jar is without his sound effects). However, I’ve noticed a few instances, specifically with removed dialogue, where you can hear the audio get somewhat quieter whenever there’s a line or sound effect I’ve removed.

For example, because I’m a fan of l8wrtr’s edit of episode I, I wanted to do a similar thing in which I got rid of the sports commentators and their voices. At the beginning of the race, I tried to get rid of the line, “start your engines!” However, when I tried to remove each instance of the line through the audio channels, I realized that I was cutting out most of the audio channels. Which resulted in a very odd moment of near silence. I had to keep the quieter channels in so that the audio would sound louder, but it does seem weird that it can be heard (albeit quietly) through the rear speakers. I’d like to get rid of it entirely, but I also don’t want the audio to suddenly go quiet either. I have similar issues with the quietness of a few crossfades as well. Even when I use the +3db version (the loudest possible crossfade I have in my arsenal), there are still a few where you can hear things get quiet for a brief moment.

The only other issue I can think of is that I’m trying to work on recording an audio commentary. However, it’s turned out to be a lot harder than I expected since the sound quality happens to be really bad. I’m not sure what’s going on, but when my voice starts to go into higher pitches, the audio starts to have this weird echo-ey, ringing effect. I tried using the equalizer, but the best I can manage is to make my voice sound somewhat muffled, and even then, you can still hear the ring-y-ness anyway. Simply put, I have no idea how to fix it, and I’m kind of overwhelmed by the number of audio effects that are available. I can’t find the one that gets rid of it.

Again, I’m happy with the way my fanedit of episode I has turned out (although I’m getting a bit perfectionistic about the color grading). Still, it would be nice if I could fix those things for future updates to my edit. If you have some advice, I would love to implement it.

Hey Eyepainter

so in regards to ur audio commentary you say there is a “ringing” or buzz in ur track, this could be a result of a few things, mainly mic quality/room you are recording in/or possibly interface issues? did u try a different mic or recording device?

in regards to cutting audio out in spots like “start ur engine” the easiest way to deal with that in my opinion is take a part that has just ambient noise from the same section and just replace whatever u cut out with some abstact scene noise from another spot nearby. in the pod race scene there is a lot of ambience thru out the section… thats my first thought… if u are taking something away u have to replace that spot with other noise so u wont get the drop outs… might seem like the obvious thing to do but i believe in ur situation without doing a ton of work this would be the easiest way

if u need more advice happy to speak further

In regards to the commentary, I was afraid those problems were the cause. I live in an apartment that has a noisy wood pellet stove, and the microphone is a pretty cheap one. (only $30 on eBay.) I don’t have another mic lying around because buying another one is a lot of cash for my budget. (I did think about buying a blue yeti mic because I’ve heard good things about it, but $50 is a luxury for me.) I’ll see if I can find a different room in my apartment, and hope that changes the quality. But I have a pretty strong suspicion I got a bad mic.

I’ll take a look at your advice on finding some ambient noise, as well as HAL9000’s, and see if I come up with anything. It’s probably something as simple as copy and paste. And since my editing software is a highly professional one, there should be some feature on there I haven’t used before.

Okay, I’m a jerk. I’ve been so caught up with Christmas this week (and being with the family) that I didn’t get to work on tweaking the color grading. I’ve just worked on making the color grading more consistent and I’m going to do another test to see that everything’s been taken care of. If everything works out, I’ll be releasing v2. (Although I’m still disappointed that I wasn’t able to do the commentary track. I’m getting to it, and I’ll release that version as 2.1 when I can fix the audio quality.)

I have decided to release the changes that I have made to Episode II soon. (Hopefully, this weekend.) I’ve been trying not to reveal the changes because I feel like releasing them is final, but I’ve had no responses with the demo as of this post. At this point, trying to keep them a secret is pointless.

I’ll try to suffer through the theatrical cut of Episode II and write down all the changes I have made to the film in the future. It might take me a bit because my family is getting into the holiday season, but I’ll try to get my memory refreshed as soon as possible.

Good to have you on board, dude.

I have a fan edit of episode I that’s already been released (episodes II and III are still a work in progress), and most of my audio issues are minor. Still, any updates I can make to the edit, however small, are nice.

I’m editing on Davinci Resolve 16 in case it’s important. I’ve been able to fix most of my audio problems through crossfades and cutting out unwanted lines and sound effects (you’d be amazed how much more tolerable Jar Jar is without his sound effects). However, I’ve noticed a few instances, specifically with removed dialogue, where you can hear the audio get somewhat quieter whenever there’s a line or sound effect I’ve removed.

For example, because I’m a fan of l8wrtr’s edit of episode I, I wanted to do a similar thing in which I got rid of the sports commentators and their voices. At the beginning of the race, I tried to get rid of the line, “start your engines!” However, when I tried to remove each instance of the line through the audio channels, I realized that I was cutting out most of the audio channels. Which resulted in a very odd moment of near silence. I had to keep the quieter channels in so that the audio would sound louder, but it does seem weird that it can be heard (albeit quietly) through the rear speakers. I’d like to get rid of it entirely, but I also don’t want the audio to suddenly go quiet either. I have similar issues with the quietness of a few crossfades as well. Even when I use the +3db version (the loudest possible crossfade I have in my arsenal), there are still a few where you can hear things get quiet for a brief moment.

The only other issue I can think of is that I’m trying to work on recording an audio commentary. However, it’s turned out to be a lot harder than I expected since the sound quality happens to be really bad. I’m not sure what’s going on, but when my voice starts to go into higher pitches, the audio starts to have this weird echo-ey, ringing effect. I tried using the equalizer, but the best I can manage is to make my voice sound somewhat muffled, and even then, you can still hear the ring-y-ness anyway. Simply put, I have no idea how to fix it, and I’m kind of overwhelmed by the number of audio effects that are available. I can’t find the one that gets rid of it.

Again, I’m happy with the way my fanedit of episode I has turned out (although I’m getting a bit perfectionistic about the color grading). Still, it would be nice if I could fix those things for future updates to my edit. If you have some advice, I would love to implement it.

Make this the final scene in Return of the Jedi:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=8DGDcUWN_sQ

Got my file exported and tested. Overall, the color grading turned out to be pretty much the same except for one difference. I reduced the reds, and I placed more emphasis on the greens. Surprisingly, this made the edit look more cinematic, especially during the Naboo scenes. It also made skin tones look better, specifically on Tattooine. I did notice some inconsistencies here and there, so I still have work to do, but I think it’s looking good.

NFBisms said:

I’m still stoked about this finishing this, but I’m pacing myself so that I don’t burn out like I did with NCC

As far as I’m concerned, anything that involves Cowboy Bebop is a winner in my book. Take care of yourself. Whatever ensures the completion of this edit works for me, even if that means protecting yourself from burnout.

NotTheDri0ds said:

Still working on patching up the edit, but I sorta randomly wanted to try redubbing the alien characters manually, instead of just reversing their dialogue and using that.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bStCaO2sU4M

Not quite sure if I’ll do it for the full thing, it’d be a fair effort, but if it makes a good amount of difference I might, who knows.

Well, I like it.

Darn it. Resolve closed on me again while it was in the middle of exporting. I will try to test it out as soon as I possibly can, but I’m gonna be very busy this weekend. I’ll see if I can get it taken care of sometime next week.

Hal 9000 said:

I think he meant the YouTube clip, despite its name.

You’re right, but I still think it’s silly how he managed to associate the phrase “1080p announcement” to mean the youtube clip when it’s about Adywan’s 1080p update.