Eyepainter

After getting a somewhat lukewarm-to-negative response on the film grain overlay (mostly from my friend, NotTheDri0ds), I decided to change it up and try again. Since he felt that the grain was too distracting, I decided to use a low film grain overlay this time. This was one of the overlays that suffered from the gamma problem I mentioned earlier, so I readjusted the offset in order to get the color grading as close to what it was before the grain was applied, although I want to make it clear that this is an approximation, and not a re-creation. With my technical jargon aside, here’s my latest idea on the grain:

https://vimeo.com/734275343

NotTheDri0ds said:

I think there’s definitely a bit too much grain, to the point it’s a bit distracting imo.

I see! I’m still waiting on some other folks on fanedit.org, but I’m guessing that Star Wars fans don’t like film grain all that much. I’ll probably switch to a different grain overlay (although how soon I will do it depends on what response I get on fanedit.org).

The teaser trailer for Black Panther: Wakanda Forever didn’t make me cry. In fact, I found it to be a cynical attempt at inspiration that exists to manipulate the viewer because of Chadwick Boseman’s death.

Also, the slow, inspiring version of all your favorite songs in every trailer over the past decade needs to die.

I finally watched v3.5 (sans audio commentary) on my 1080p HDTV! Everything looked good except for the film grain overlays. The inconsistencies between them were too obvious. I was hoping to use multiple overlays as a way to simulate alternating film reels, but the overlays have different gamma levels, and I also didn’t want to lower the opacity of the overlays because I hate the idea of making the grain less visible. So my plan of attack now is to use just one overlay and stick with it. I’ve thought up one, but I’m not sure if it works for most people. Below is the opening negotiations scene with the color grading and a sample of the film grain overlay I’m thinking of using. What are your thoughts on the this one? Is it too dirty?

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1LH5bseEoRbsR17IucRW_fRDAMnXFrGI7/view?usp=sharing

Now halfway through the climax for the audio commentary! 😊

To this day, I have nothing but sympathy for the poor souls who are unfortunate enough to have seen The Garbage Pail Kids Movie.

I’ve almost finished reading Jeff Bartsch’s book, Edit Better, and I decided to take a few pieces of advice for the sound editing and audio mixing. I decided to apply both audio compressors and EQ to each audio channel and adjust them individually. I’m already in love with the first 5 minutes of audio in the edit, but I will probably have to test it out on my 1080p HDTV just in case my computer speakers are lying to me on something.

I’ve also been entertaining some ideas to fix the export issues I’m having, and I think I’ve come up with a few solutions! I found out I can export the commentary track via an audio only track in Linear PCM. So, when I’m going through the film grain overlay stage, I can just pull out the audio-only track and apply it to the rest of the edit! And I think I can do the same thing for the stereo track as well! The only question, though, is whether it will work or not without crashing. There’s only one way to find out, but I’m keeping my chin up and assuming the best! The only downside is that I’ll probably have to do chapter markers again when I go through the film grain overlay export, which can be a time-consuming annoyance. But otherwise, I think I might be able to export the file with the grain after all!

And finally, yes, I’m recording more commentary stuff for the ending! 😊

Just made a big speech on the commentary track, and I’m now officially at the climax for the audio commentary! 🥳

Just finished The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent (say that three times fast), and as a meta-movie about Nicholas Cage, it works just enough that I can’t really hate it. I wish the film had been less formulaic and taken more risks, but it was entertaining enough that I can’t complain. Pedro Pascal’s performance didn’t hurt either.

In Episode II, replace Anakin’s voice for an AI-generated Fabio, so that it’s more understandable why Padme would fall in love with him.

Censored cover art posted on the main topic. Thanks again, ArtisDead!

Cover art is now on the topic. Thanks again, ArtisDead!

Superweapon VII said:

Eyes Wide Shut. Feature-length troll post, that’s what it is.

Hopefully, I’m not endorsing myself too hard, but I’m currently working on my own edit of EWS, and I’ve cut out roughly 36 minutes and brought it down to a two-hour long running time. Still in the works, and I have to start work on the audio commentary once I’ve prepped my edit of Episode I for fanedit.org for submission, but I figured I might let you know in case you’re interested.

Spuffure said:

I don’t hate it (more like indifferent), but I didn’t really like Monty Python and the Holy Grail all that much. I found it just OK. I honestly think the opening credits are literally the best part of the movie. I did have some scattered laughs throughout the movie after that, but no belly laughs (apart from the opening credits).

Hate to say it, but I’m also one of the few who agree with you. Although I think the movie peaked with the infamous black knight scene. After that, it all went downhill for me, and the jokes became more… Ehh.

On a much happier note, I’m almost done with my commentating on Coruscant, and I have only the last third to go on the audio commentary! Here goes nothing!

SparkySywer said:

I never really knew how many Stormtroopers were from Minnesota. Maybe a fanedit is in order to reflect that?

Yah! Yah!

BrotherOfSasquatch said:

I’m curious… Couldn’t you just export it with the color grade, import that file back in and then add on the grain?

I decided to try this out. I exported the file in GoPro Cineform, put that file in a new project for the grain, copied and pasted the overlays, and exported yet another GoPro Cineform file. I then deleted the original file to save my disk space, and converted the grain file to mp4 via Handbrake. All in all, the first file was about 87gb, the grain file, 127gb, and the converted Handbrake file 10gb. It’s not my favorite way to export a file, but it did work. The downside is that the final result is very bare bones. Only one audio track, no chapter markers, no commentary, etc. It’s just the edit itself in 5.1 surround, and nothing else. So, those issues need to be taken care of before I can be satisfied with this. But it did work, so this option is worth keeping on the table.

I have another update. I finally tested my theory out. I redid the film grain overlays, replaced the cleaner overlays with filthier ones, and changed them around to see if my luck would improve if I exported again. And to my sadness, it crashed again. So, for whatever reason, it looks like I may have to sacrifice the film grain if I want to get a good export.

I’ve been asking myself whether to try again with the color grading or not. Ideally, I don’t want to. I’ve gone through a lot of trouble to get this edit looking good. But at the same time, I’m not a fan of making it look soft and overly clean.

I’ve been entertaining a few ideas off the top of my head on what to do next. One is to throw in a film look LUT. This would compensate for the lack of grain, but I would have to go back and re-adjust the Resolve FX features all over again due to the change in contrast such a LUT would add. Another idea is to use the techniques I’ve learned from Jeff Bartsch’s book, Edit Better, but I think those techniques are designed for someone who is more of a professional colorist than I am. It would also require me to start the grade all over again too, since it doesn’t utilize Resolve’s FX features, which my current grade does. Third option? Same as option two, but with a LUT. Fourth option? Get over it, and stick with the grade as is, warts and all.

I guess there are a million possibilities for the color grading right now. I’d love to hear some more thoughts on this, as I’m not sure what to do next.

EddieDean said:

I’d vote to skip rather than overdoing it. But, if your pipeline is near-lossless you might be able to render it all twice - once for everything BUT overlay, then a separate project to add film grain?

I wish I could say that this’ll work, but alas, I already tried something like this with my Last Jedi fanedit. The quality deterioration was visible, and I never took the second project any further than reviewing it myself. It’s a nice idea on paper, but I don’t think my work is near-lossless enough.

Hal 9000 said:

In ROTJ, as Luke hides from Vader during their duel, we now find a new motivation for him to lash out in anger toward Vader.

“Your feelings for them are strong. Especially for… Third Sister. So, you know Third Sister. Your feelings have now betrayed her too.”

Later, “Tell Third Sister… you were right.”

We had third sister, yes. But what about second sister?

I think I’ve made a breakthrough on my current editing woes!

So, after my announcement that I was going to change the grading again, I bought Jeff Bartsch’s book, Edit Better, and I skipped over to the chapter on color grading. I took some of the advice and set on grading the edit using only the shadow, midtone, saturation, and contrast and pivot options on Resolve. I also added in my favorite film LUT onto the timeline.

Well, after I graded the whole thing again, I tried exporting the file, and it still crashed. Then I realized that the only other possibility is video track 3, which contains my film grain overlays. I disabled that track, and presto! The file exported! Then, I thought to myself, what if it’s the film grain overlays? I went back, changed the color grading back to my previous grade, and while it did crash the first time, it got to 96%. I tried again, and it worked! 😄

So, it looks like the main culprit is the film grain overlays. I’m not sure why Resolve is having a hard time, because my Eyes Wide Shut fanedit also has film grain overlays. My best guess is that I used dirtier overlays for my Eyes Wide Shut edit, and for some reason, my computer can take those grainier, dirtier overlays better. The overlays I’ve been using so far for Episode I are cleaner.

So this leads to my biggest issue right now. What to do about the film grain. I could choose to get rid of the film grain entirely. This option would probably be easiest on my computer, but the drawback is that the grading suffers from looking so soft and clean. The other option? Go for grainy and filthy. Now admittedly, I like that kind of aesthetic. However, I’m not sure Star Wars fans would agree, especially since a lot of fanedits opt for a cleaner, light grain look. HAL9000’s edits are a perfect example of this. I should also note that as of this post, I haven’t gone back to do anything with the film grain yet. So I have no idea if I’m right about dirtier grain overlays being easier to export. It’s currently a theory.

I guess I’ll ask for others opinions on this. What do you think? Should I skip the film grain, or go all the way with it?

I have some bad news on the color grading.

Over the course of the last week, I’ve been trying to export my edit so that I can test the color grade on my 1080p HDTV. Trying, because every time I’ve attempted to export the file, my editing software keeps crashing in the middle of the export. I’ve tried a lot of things. What’s even weirder is that it’s only crashing when I export Episode I. I did an export for my Eyes Wide Shut fanedit, which is a much larger file than my Episode I edit could ever hope to be (in GoPro Cineform, no less), and it exported the file without any problems. I’ve tried exporting my Episode I file to my external hard drive. It crashed. I tried exporting it using a brand new USB flash drive. It crashed. I looked up a bunch of YouTube tutorials to stop the export from crashing. It crashed. And I’m at that point where I believe the culprit is one of the Resolve FX features I used for the color grading. I don’t know which one it is (I have a faint suspicion that it has something to do with the luminance), but this means that I’m gonna have to go back and work on the color grading again.

I will do what I can to keep the color grade from being changed a lot, but I can’t guarantee that until I’ve figured out why Resolve keeps crashing for “this” specific edit, and none of my other edits. My apologies for the inconvenience this may cause. If anyone has some troubleshooting know-how, I would appreciate it very much at this time!

JackNapier said:

My mood for the past few days is Batman mourning his parents in an alleyway while sad music plays and the camera spirals around him.

I’ve been feeling the same way this past weekend, especially since the overturning of Roe might affect my life due to the start of my transgender journey early this year. Even now, I’m not sure what I’m going to do if my own rights get overturned.

However, what I do know is that despair and hopelessness are not solutions. At some point, you have to let go of bitterness, and get up. I know how hard that is, but you don’t get anywhere by worrying and being miserable all day. You get somewhere by, to paraphrase the late Hunter S. Thompson, buying the ticket and taking the ride.

Obi-Wan Kenobi ends like this:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=u61F_qvdid0

Thanks Mario! I hope the edit meets your expectations!

Just finished commentating about the Coruscant senate hearing.