GMatias

(End of) April Mini-Update!

Wanted to hold off until I had a video to show, and I am close on that, but I also didn’t want to get into May without giving an update. So while some of this is already integrated into the first post, here’s what’s happened since the last update:

• I’ve expanded the story scope from ‘just’ the Sequel Trilogy to the entire Saga (including SOLO, which I wasn’t originally planning to do). So looking at around 40ish chapters instead of around 15.

• REALLY kicked the tires of Premiere Pro to figure out workflow & best practices for things like captions & proxies & color grading & organization & exporting & future-proofing & VFX work and more thru a ton of trial & error.

• Got R2 blurays with appropriate audio for all Saga films.

• LOTS of YouTube tutorial watching.

• Remapped the entire story (see OP), most notably having RONE footage take place parallel with the Sequel Trilogy material instead of between the Prequels and the OT. I know that sounds counterintuitive, but I’m finding its cinema style syncs up with the Sequels so much better than ANH that you can buy it being part of that era easier.

So what’s the plan now?

My next goal for May is to get the first chapter of the Sequel era out as a workprint. Clocking in right now at around 30 min, it so far pulls footage from RONE, TROS, TFA, and TPM, so it should be a pretty good barometer for seeing how stuff originally from different eras can work in different contexts.

How close to final will that be? I’m guessing there will still be audio work to finish and placeholder cards for a VFX shot or two, but the pacing, grading, and re-captioning will be done.

CaptainFaraday said:

GMatias said:

CaptainFaraday said:

Does anyone have clean audio of Obi-Wan’s Jedi Temple message from Rebels? I can find countless videos that have put their own music under it, but not just the dialogue itself.

This version?

https://youtu.be/r1jINh8qE7g

Yes, but without music. I know a clean version must exist somewhere, because heaps of people have taken the speech and put their own soundtracks under it.

I checked the center channel of the 5.1 mix and it’s pretty clear but there’s a little bit of Luke’s theme in the back half.

PM me and I’ll send you a wav file if that sounds usable.

CaptainFaraday said:

Does anyone have clean audio of Obi-Wan’s Jedi Temple message from Rebels? I can find countless videos that have put their own music under it, but not just the dialogue itself.

This version?

https://youtu.be/r1jINh8qE7g

NeverarGreat said:

I guess you can argue with that.

Ha! Didn’t see your earlier comment before coming back & responding to the prior one. Wasn’t trying to prove you wrong, but this did legitimately make me laugh.

One thing I’ve been thinking of is what Ben could do post-Kylo if an edit were to have him survive Exegol. I’ve seen ideas of him going off as a Caine-in-Kung-Fu-type nomad to try & atone for his actions, but that doesn’t seem like enough of a benefit for all the trouble of redeeming him. Even if he straight-up defected right after Exegol, yes he wouldn’t part of the First Order’s arsenal, but that still seems like missing an opportunity.

What if he went back & tried to shut down or de-escalate the First Order from within? As far as they know, he’s still Supreme Leader Kylo Ren. A good-guy Ben masquerading as Kylo could do a lot of damage to First Order operations by making some ‘disasterous’ orders before somebody figured out what was going on or his generals just rebelled against him. Obviously you couldn’t show much of this in an edit, but I think you could seed the idea given the right circumstances (like using foreign language dubbing & rewritten subtitles to change some dialogue).

Visually:

• A shot of Kylo’s ship heading back to a Star Destroyer.
• The shot of him in full Ren gear in a hallway before turning & going through a doorway. (TROS 1:07:15)
• Ben walking around the table at the First Order staff meeting (20:22 or so, after the shot of Boolio’s head on the table)
• Let that scene play out for the most part. Again, the dub allows dialogue re-writing but they are doing the same general bickering. And you made need to do some judicious cutting depending on if Hux or Pryde are alive or not in your edit at this point. But even if you just use General Conjurors & Soothsayers, it could be enough.
• When Ben goes for the force choke, cut out that guy getting choked & lifted. I go right back to the shot of Pryde talking about how great that fleet would be (moved it up a bit) & Hux’s reaction.
• Cut back to push-in shot on Ben soon as the choking General is out of frame. He’s about to give them all new orders.
• Cut from that to Hux & Pryde on the bridge right before Chewie is brought in (42:40).
• Cut to two shots of Ben looking out of a Star Destroyer window from the start of the TLJ extended incursion deleted scene (scar will need to be fixed).

Basically this is Ben going in and Jedi mind-tricking his command staff into following his obviously destructive orders. The bit with Hux & Pryde should help sell the idea a little more. (Ben staring out the window is where I cut to Rey looking in his direction from the Tatooine shot of her looking at Luke/Leia force ghosts - her smile is one of support & approval).

Typing all this out makes me realize its probably less broadly applicable than I’d originally thought because of dialogue replacement, but hopefully the general idea can spark an insight for someone.

If I have time this week I’ll try mocking this up.

If you take out the Force healing then Palpatine can’t kill Kylo because Rey would have killed him first on Endor.

alexp120 said:

GMatias said:

I’m looking to make a Japanese language track for Adywan’s ESB:R edit.

I feel for you in your challenge in making an audio track for ESB:R. I’ve made a recording of the ‘film-with-live-orchestra’ concert of ‘ESB’ where the cut shown to the audience was the 2011 version. I wanted to sync the concert audio to ESB:R because I wanted to check-out Adywan’s edit that I’ve heard so much about and I was bored with the 1980 and 1997 English surround-sound audio mixes.

While working on it, I found that Adywan had extended several shots in the film–the downward pan to an Imperial Star Destroyer after the opening crawl, Luke’s X-wing in the Dagobah pond. As a result, I had to stretch the concert audio in the music to match the length of those shots. I didn’t add-on any of the additional sound-effects from the ESB:R sound-mix to the re-edited concert audio, because, for me, it was all about hearing a new performance of this score with the edit I choose to watch.

Yeah, those were a bit of a surprise. The irony is I remember pouring over his changelist looking for extended shots and added scenes when he was working on the edit, and now I’ve been groaning every time I see he made a timing change!

Maybe try & mix in a camera drone or two somewhere, possibly floating next to one of the walker heads before it fires? I keep thinking of those little drones hovering next to the Mos Eisley troopers in ANH.

I’m working my way through it now and looks like the only stereo line I’d be moving over is that “Bring my shuttle” line. So I was thinking of just splicing in one of the stereo channels for it over the center channel, with a little extra before & after since the replacement is much longer. Adywan also used the old version of the Vader/Emperor call but that looks like it would just be cutting out the new sentences from the JPN 5.1, not importing anything into it.

Beyond that, and I need to check with him about this part first, I might just get the JPN 5.1 track to sync up to the ESB:R video and then send it to Adywan for him to add on any ESB:R-specific audio tweaks (like extra laser blasts for Hoth vehicles he added). Since he’s doing the HD versions now, he may still have the audio project files saved where he can just drop the JPN base in and have the additions line up automatically. That would be a ton easier than me trying to duplicate it by hand, so to speak.

Jar Jar Bricks said:

I do like the idea that Kylo ordered their last stand to be broadcast to the entire galaxy, and then it cuts out when Luke is a badass lol.

Too bad there isn’t a Kylo line you could throw into TLJ like, “Let the galaxy witness their end.” That would be the most subtle approach.

Feels more like a Hux overconfidence move (especially for TLJ) to have that broadcast live only for Luke to not only walk out but to do the shoulder brush move in front of the entire galaxy.

That looks really good!

Need to watch it some more, but the only thing tripping me up (and this is probably just me) is having those insert shots of Kylo and the rebels AFTER you start showing the Crait shots as broadcast/reaction footage. I’d move them up in the edit to before that changeover, so once the footage starts, the only live shots we see are people watching the footage itself.

Great job!

4throck said:

Adding color to the Emperor’s shuttle creates a strong connection with the prequels.
And of course solves the problem of reusing the same shuttle on ROTJ again and again 😃

Man, that does look snazzy!

So would this be the only shot you’d have to color? The others we see in ROTJ are either Tydirium or Vader’s shuttle, right?

Here’s a question for ya!

Asking this here instead of a PM because I think the answer might be broadly applicable:

I’m looking to make a Japanese language track for Adywan’s ESB:R edit. I plan on keeping everything else about the track the same. Here’s what I have to work with:

• I’m using an Adobe Premiere/Audition workflow (tho personally I’m more comfortable with Goldwave for straight-up audio-only editing).

• I have Adywan’s ESB:R audio and a 5.1 JPN track from the R2 2015 theatrical blu-ray. I also have the 1981 stereo dub for lines like “Bring my shuttle” that got lost along the way.

How would you go about putting this track together?

I feel the best approach would be to first match the JPN track volume to Adywan’s, then swap out the ENG spots on various channels with JPN versions of those channels and adjust from there. Would you agree?

Been deep-diving this thread today and wanted to note a few things that jumped out at me:

SparkySywer said:

I was working on a 3-in-1 fanedit of the OT that just had one Death Star (and one rebel base on Hoth).The 3-in-1 part didn’t pan out in a way I was satisfied with, but I’ve been thinking about reviving the project and giving it another go, or maybe trying a different format like a 6-part series.

There being two Death Stars has always been something that bothered me though and this makes it extra relevant.

SparkySywer said:

My plan was to cut out the whole Battle of Yavin from ANH. After leaving the Death Star, they head to the Rebel Base: Hoth, but the Empire gets there too (since they’re being tracked and all), and they storm the base, and don’t wait for the Death Star to destroy the Rebels, they want to make double sure the Rebels are crushed and the destruction of Hoth would be more symbolic. I had the idea of moving the Trench Run fight to the Battle of Hoth, and having Gold Leader fail to destroy the Death Star, damaging it, but killing Tarkin. However, I never got around to implementing it.

I’m expanding the scope of my B&W dubbed adventure serial edit from just the Sequel Trilogy to the whole saga (1-9+R1) and this Death Star idea and its ripple effects over the rest of the OT are really landing with me.

thebluefrog said:

It’s not something I’d LIKE to do to ROTJ since I don’t really like the sequel trilogy’s story…but:

There may be a way to change the Emperor’s explosion slightly to have his energy “leave” the Death Star and dissipate into space offcamera. Just an implication that something went off into space that leaves it open to how his “ghost” got into the clone body.

This is also something I think could work and be open enough for interpretation that other FEs could use it for ST fodder or just ignore it as a cool flourish. I think just quick 1- or 2-second establishing shot from outside the Death Star between when the ‘spirit’ blast comes out of the tunnel and when it reverses back in (about 1:56:29 or so) with a similarly colored flash should do it.

Lots of good ideas in this thread!

(In my ST era I have Palpatine basically possessing Ben Solo in my ST edit and one of the ways I justify that is the shaft explosion IS him breaking up his consciousness and sending all these bits out to, if not the Force, then the Midichlorian ‘cloud’ (for lack of a better term) with the hope that he can reconstitute it in some form later. I end up having Vader’s helmet acting like a beacon for Palpatine to do that in Ben’s subconscious because (1) the helmet/armor gets a full blast of his ‘spirit’ in that explosion, (2) it survives relatively intact since Luke takes it off the Death Star before it blows, and (3) Ben presumably keeps it close to him for a while so its ‘Palpatine spirit radiation’ infects him over time. Or something like that…)

Have Dooku as one of the Force-Ghosts helping Rey against Palpatine, reaching out with his stump instead of a hand. (From jonh’s TROS addition)

Blackened Mantle is my go-to, both for conciseness and getting the most out of the material available. But comparing it to other fanedits feels unfair because of the liberties not having to deal with English audio affords it.

As for ‘normal’ fanedits, I’d got with HAL’s trilogy although I do have a soft spot in my heart for the Phantom Edits I and II.

Ed Slushie said:

Yeah. I would probably remove that whole line, to be honest. Hearing Leia say that someone “seduced (her) son” makes me uncomfortable no matter what pronouns you use or whether you follow it up with “to the dark side.”

I’m almost positive they were going for a callback to Obi-Wan’s “Vader was seduced by the Dark Side of the Force” line from ANH, but it does come off as awkward hearing it from Leia.

Offhand I think Leia refers to Snoke as he when talking to Han on D’Qar.

Jar Jar Bricks said:

“He embarked on a quest to the desert planet of Pasaana with Luke Skywalker to find answers about the growing darkness in the Force, but failed to uncover anything. Seeking to bury the pain of those memories (his daughter), Calrissian settled on Pasaana and led a solitary lifestyle where he was known as the “Hermit” to the native Aki-Aki. He lived alone for some years while keeping contact with the Solo family and was later asked by Organa’s Resistance for his aid in the war against the First Order.” -Wookiepeedia

Same thing as Luke, really.

I read this and immediately thought of Luke’s description of Obi-Wan as ‘the strange old hermit out beyond the Dune Sea’ from ANH and now I can’t stop thinking of him as Landobi-wan.

SparkySywer said:

I think this is the third time I’ve mentioned this on OT.com, but different threads every time so it’s the first time I’m mentioning it in this thread.

I wonder if it would be a good idea to use the Japanese Dubs to Blackened Mantle a new conflict for the ST.

…

Issue is I have no idea where to get the Japanese dubs of the ST, or if they’re even as good as the dubs of the PT. So this is firmly in what-if land. I also have no idea how this would be executed.

edited after I realized I’d already said basically the same thing on another thread

I got my ST Japanese dubs from Region A blurays. They actually play perfectly fine in my regular bluray player, so they can still be useful after ripping. Picked up the three ST films, ROGUE ONE, and the 2015 Complete Saga set from cdjapan.com for about the same cost as full price retail. That would be my first recommendation.

And I think the Japanese dubs sound good across the saga.

HumanShield said:

What if the sequels took place after a Cold War type stalemate? The remaining Empire on the fringes and Republic exist with a DMZ boarder.

The fleet at the end is the fleet that always existed.

Starkiller base isn’t a new super weapon in itself and is never used. It breaks the peace treaty by manufacturing death star weaponry to be equipped on their fleet.

Leia’s group isn’t the only force in the galaxy, just the most forward operating group that is allowed by treaty.

I feel like that line of thought has shown up in a few places on this board and seems to be a pretty straightforward change to implement (context around things instead of adding new things). I like it, personally.

Yeah, that’s pretty dope.

Those voices really work! Great job!

Was it this one?

BrotherOfSasquatch said:

Looking forward to this edit!

Me too! 😃

I think it’s pretty good, all things considered.