Hal 9000

NeverarGreat said:

The settings would need to be adjusted for each shot.

Sunset would be an easier time than night for sure, but since I just finished it, here’s the final video for the scene at night:

https://mega.nz/#!2JNmTaYK!F7r_Ozv2KWMkxPJVSXdPquFV6G32ApoA0kL8QDD0GJI

Not a bad attempt, though the outlines around items and people are very pronounced. I wonder how it’d look, though, brightening general areas rather than tightly targeted items, with a very large gradient. There is a lot of contrast between these objects and the background. And obviously I am okay with the footage stylistically being twinged blue to telegraph, perhaps too strongly, that it’s nighttime.
Looking forward to DominicCobb’s, then we ought to be able to think about sunset vs twilight vs night vs whatever.

All very cool ideas, but as hokey as the scene is in ROTS, it’s absence feels off to me.

And, Mala, I don’t have time at the moment to respond to each, but many of your suggestions for Ep2 will be either attempted or implemented. Not the droid factory, though. 😛

I haven’t been able to download your edit, but was curious about the droid torture scene. Then cutlist suggests the gonk droid doesn’t scream anymore, but I wonder if the sound has been replaced with something else or simple removed.

I give the 2008 Clone Wars series a “practically unwatchable 4/5 of the time” stamp. There is occasionally something interesting, but the whole thing is ugly and annoying.

I do really like the 2003 microseries, though it’s all style and nothing important. Almost the inverse.

Rebels was okay at first but I got sick of it partway through season 2 and gave up. I think the last thing I saw was a space whale jumping to lightspeed, and I don’t think it was a hallucination, either. I can imagine enjoying Rebels as a way to spend time with a kid or something.

JEDIT: Oh, and hopefully the Solo movie doesn’t suck.

Sweet, dude, congratulations!

I rather like the sunset approach. Would the settings you used for your TFA Starlight clips be applicable to this?

Twilight sounds about right, ideally, so I am looking forward to DominicCobb’s approach. I hope to be able to spend a little time actually working on Ep1 tomorrow, now that I finished actually recreating V4.2 in my NLE over the course of a few hours. Tedious, but at least nothing was truly lost. Hopefully Ep2 and Ep3 aren’t similarly affected. I’m going to convert Ep3 to ProRes overnight, since I couldn’t really do that while I was working in my app.

MalàStrana said:

Hal 9000 said:

I will still keep the underwater sequence out of the edit […]. It’s the Canto Bight of TPM. 😛

Ouch! That’s mean to Johnson… or is it mean to Lucas ? (I really don’t know 😄)

Lol, there’s a good Rorschach test for ya. Wasn’t trying to be insulting to one over the other, just that they are roughly analogous.

^ DominicCobb, I will play with your idea for the apartment scene! That might be a good way to do it.

I’m not holding my breath, but if something better than the existing ROTS Death Star scene is presented, I’m at peace with leaving it at that. When in doubt…

And thank you, Dominic and Neverar, in advance for working on the colors for that. That’ll be the single biggest improvement, I’m sure.

Work on Episode I took on a frustrating wrinkle, as I’ll manually have to piece together most of the video stream for an unknown reason. Doable, but will take time. But I’m on it. Hopefully AOTC and ROTS aren’t similarly affected, but I will find that out later. I only really have good disk space to let one movie’s worth of junk be converted to ProRes at at time anyway.

Yeah, I know it’s far from ideal, but the Death Star will have to stay for the final version. See above for the former footage featuring Coruscant, and please feel free to overlay it for yourself. Nothing would even be thrown out of sync, just re-mux and enjoy!

Without going into too much detail, I agree about the “entire planet” line and “the situation has become much more complicated.” The rest… no thanks. 😃

Please do, however, send me the samples you mention. I don’t think I’ll use the one about Jar Jar and the “secret place,” since we wouldn’t have seen their underwater home anyway. I will still keep the underwater sequence out of the edit, for the reasons I took it out to begin with. It’s the Canto Bight of TPM. 😛

EddieDean said:

Hal, your 4.2s are my archival versions, and I love everything you’ve suggested for 4.3.

The only thing I’m just not sure about is the Emperor, Vader and Tarkin looking out on a prototype Death Star, especially one with the dish on the equator.

Firstly, a prototype Death Star has exactly the same issue as the real one - that it’s just part of the slideshow where pieces are put into place to line up with the OT.

Secondly, there’s nothing in the films that suggests a prototype was ever created, so I think it adds something new to the world without adding anything new to the plot, or any meaningfulness to our characters.

Thirdly, I think the reveal of the Death Star is really beautifully done in Rogue One (and well set up in Rebels, for those that watch that), and that seeing it early takes away from that.

For these reasons I think either of your initial ideas work (leave it, or replace with Coruscant) - personally favouring Coruscant.

EDIT:
One question though - while you are revisiting your edits, could you please consider releasing identical versions but retaining the original titles of the films in the crawls? I respect your right to put your mark on them, and to recognise them as significantly changed movies - plus I’m not a huge fan of the original titles - but personally I’d like to pretend that yours are the master versions as originally released. (I hope you take that as the compliment it’s intended as.)

As much as I like the idea, I don’t think Coruscant works. The Death Star is for the best, unfortunately.
This, and the crawl thing, could be easily remedied if you are not opposed to doing a slight bit of editing on your own.

Here’s the Coruscant footage:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B2lsYRKXLjL9VDBENFBydVJBck0

And here are exports of the prior versions of my crawls with original titles:
https://mega.nz/#!k5RgySRK!TC1avnNyi4-S_4qFuxIoqaY_f83Hm7bBcWmGLP9R4Fc
https://mega.nz/#!tk5XAJ4S!K3rRiBe-RuluoUQmYapJ_yWH3iJcplpNQ2mX7SvXglc
https://mega.nz/#!M5AxkJJI!Hf7fMMi1T5kooHf-tNsCu1S3wOd_LSNI8uwzw4URC0Q

Mala,

• I’ll see about Obi-Wan’s jumps. No promises, but when I get to that point I’ll give it another chance.

• I will experiment with placement of the balcony scene, though keeping it in its original place wouldn’t be a bad thing if that’s the best place to leave it.

• Apartment scene. Doing it the way you suggest would have us transition awkwardly from Anakin to Anakin. I think that scene will probably remain omitted.

DZ-330,
That’s an interesting idea, but I am not sure there’s a good gap there to place such footage. One thing that would be absolutely incredible, though, is if someone is able and willing to add the necklace to the Boleyn footage.

Here is the nighttime scene for anyone to take a stab at. I’ll edit the prior post to include it:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1ijkUtOTbBsQu3OChi0hRm9FMjU3tdq0K

Absolutely, yes.

^ The weird G and Y should be fixed by a new crawl, and I’ll make sure to check before including them. 😉

Thank you for the suggested rewording, but it’s actually a quote from the back cover of the book Labyrinth of Evil. I think it’s be very believable it could have been in a theatrical crawl.

Thanks, DominicCobb. I just looked up your clip and I think that should work pretty well.

Mala, let me take each of those in turn:

• Obi-Wan jumping out of cockpit. It’ll probably stay out, since its so cartoony. I think it’d only be missed due to having already been familiar with the original.

• I think I edited the elevator sequence like that but felt it was too abrupt without something to cut away to in between.

• Balcony scene. Well… I suppose the balcony scene could work. It would be a way to include a very subtle appearance of the necklace, and enhance the tragic aspects of Anakin’s story. It would come at the cost of slightly undercutting a powerful cut from Palpatine’s “…a new apprentice…” to Anakin’s nightmare. I’ll think about this one, but it might be a good idea if I reinstate the necklace in Episode I to let that scene feel solid.

• Opera scene. Sure, why not. Lucas gets back in. I can’t remember why I removed it, but it was probably just because I could. That’s a theme throughout this V4.3. 😉

• Apartment scene. I don’t know. I mean, I’m not sure where else the third rebellion deleted scene would go and that scene’s second half would have to be removed anyway. I think it’ll need to remain out.

• Boga and Grievous. As much as I like Kerr’s edit I think mine will stay as it is in this regard.

• Palpatine still alludes to Anakin’s fear about Padme, capitalizing on (maybe) planting nightmares and stoking them. What’s important is that Anakin doesn’t mention it to his friends, or even Palpatine in his pledge scene. By removing Palpatine’s mention of Padme in this earlier scene, I think we risk muddying the waters too much.

• I think it’d feel abrupt to remove that much of Mace and Anakin’s conversation over Palpatine. This dialogue lets us see ‘principle photography Anakin’ advocate for his idea of justice before acting on it.

• I can’t quite picture the scene well enough without having it in front of me, but I will experiment with removing he lines about the senators. I agree with you in principle; just need to see if it can work practically.

• Not sure how well it would play to have just the first shot of killings in the Temple and a closeup of Anakin. I will play with this. Maybe it would work being placed between Padme crying and Bail arriving there.

• “YOU WERE THE CHOSEN ONE.” I’m open to persuasion on this point, though I like omitting it in order to keep things personal, and I’ll likely keep it that way.

• Removing Mace’s “…putting them together.” Hmm… not sure what the payoff to this would be, or a reason not to. I’ll try it and see how it does. Might do it.

• Padme will still name both kids, since this is a prequel.

I have another request (and I’ll edit this into the prior post).

If anyone can take the following shots and bridge them together near-seamlessly, I’d use it. I wanted to do it this way before but couldn’t blend their very close ending and beginning. I’ve joined them together in the clip below, and you can clearly identify the frame at which the second shot begins. The precise sync should not be a problem when joining them. (A few frames can be added or, not as great, removed.)

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1gb5tAvq2HVSA5N70QXP6idaTOVJNybVn

Here’s Alderaan, for reference:

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1W6YkwC494f0SD9OSh6ZHzR_LgUFdkByV

Well, the necklace has no payoff whatsoever in Episode III because my handling of it does not allow a place for either of its two appearances there. I’m open to others’ opinions though, given this.

I’ll take a look at what Dominic cooked up for the Anakin-Grievous conversation, as I know I’ve seen it but can’t recall at the moment.

The crawls are going to be from Sir Ridley, and look much like his crawl for TFA:R. Hopefully he will be able to have the color and angle of tilt roughly match the existing prequel crawls. I think that’s the best thing for them, to blend in as closely as possible with the source material, to say nothing of the OT or ST. Seems most consistent with my approach to other things like end credits and subtitles.

Absolutely!

DominicCobb said:

I can probably help with the color correction on those scenes.

I’ll upload the day-for-night scene as well once I have it ready.

MalàStrana said:

It’s already in v4.2 !

Ha, very good, then. I must have missed it when I revised the cutlist script which I was referring to while the BluRays are being converted to ProRes.

• I don’t like “This is where the fun begins” because it’s Anakin pre-figuring a Han line. Also the whole “desperate chase” aspect.
• The missile sequence. I’d be okay with putting it back in, as you raise a good point. I will mock it up while removing the sillier aspects of it and see what I think.
• Can’t promise anything about the Anakin-Grevious dialogue other than I’ll give it another chance and see about it. Might help keep the scene from rushing by and feeling cut down.
• I removed Threepio’s “It is an acquired taste” due to the abrupt transition into the scene but I’ll take another listen at it being put back in. The other dialogue was dumb, especially the drunk Australian senator.

So, here are my requests for help from you all. If anyone is able, I would be very appreciative.

• The day-for-night scene in Ep2. Anyone with better capabilities, please let me know and I can send you the raw footage if needed. This is the biggest need. Link to footage: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1ijkUtOTbBsQu3OChi0hRm9FMjU3tdq0K

• The Bolyen footage. I color corrected it as best I was able, but if anyone has any different methods for having it match the existing footage, I’m all ears. Take a stab at it. Also, as a ‘wish list’ thing, I’d love to have the necklace Anakin gives her be added around her neck to this shot. It’d only really be visible toward the end of the shot, though, as her had covers it. Link to this footage: https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B2lsYRKXLjL9QlhwT2d6dDRlVms
  https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B2lsYRKXLjL9eXY2VzU5dTFRaTg

• If anyone can take the following shots and bridge them together near-seamlessly, I’d use it. I wanted to do it this way before but couldn’t blend their very close ending and beginning. I’ve joined them together in the clip below, and you can clearly identify the frame at which the second shot begins. The precise sync should not be a problem when joining them. (A few frames can be added or, not as great, removed.)
  https://drive.google.com/open?id=1gb5tAvq2HVSA5N70QXP6idaTOVJNybVn

• If anyone has any ideas for an alternate establishing shot of the Senate building to be used at the start of Ep2, let me know. Right now the best one is just a distant shot of Palpatine’s office, which is fine but inaccurate.

• This one is just a wish list item, but doesn’t hurt to ask. Turning this mockup from Darth Lucas into reality in keeping with Rogue One and the schematics from ANH:
  

Surprise!

V4.3 announced. With my program, Final Cut Pro 7, no longer being able to run on a modern OS, it is time to revisit the prequel trilogy… one final time. After all the time and effort put into it so far, I think it is worthwhile to give it one more pass before placing it permanently out of my reach. I’ll edit the subtitles, chapter stops, and commentary tracks to maintain sync so nothing will be lost.

The sources used will be the same: Blurays for Episodes I and III, and schorman’s HDTV preservation for Episode II.

Intended changes

(Most of these changes are reinstating minuscule things that were cut with no clear reason, not contributing anything other than making the edit unnecessarily jarring.)

• Brand new, gorgeous, incredible crawl footage from Sir Ridley:
  Episode I

CLOAK OF DECEPTION

The Republic is in decay. After centuries of peace under the guardianship of the Jedi Order, a menace lurks in the shadows of the galaxy.

Attempting to capitalize on the government’s complacency, the greedy TRADE FEDERATION has surrounded the small planet of Naboo with a blockade of deadly warships.

With the newly crowned Queen desperate for help, the Supreme Chancellor has secretly dispatched two Jedi Knights to settle the conflict…

• The Neimodians will no longer be substantially trimmed to attempt (mostly in vain) to make them more threatening. These changes don’t really amount to much other than causing slight jars. [Original version of opening cockpit interior with the Jedi asking to board, Sidious dialogue including “I will make it legal,” and “This is getting out of hand; now there are two of them!”]

• Viceroy tells the battle droid to be on the lookout for the Jedi on the ground (it’s why the droid later tells them they are under arrest)

• Sio Bibble saying “They wouldn’t dare.”

• Reinstate Jabba the Hutt at the podrace. Despite what I may have said, my real intention was to preserve the reveal of his appearance in ROTJ, going against the project’s goals. I don’t mind the Jabba cameo, so I think it deserves to be put back in for this final version.

• Reinstate Sebulba skidding to a stop rather than implying his death.

• Possibly reinstate Anakin’s full line to his mother, “I hope so… yes, I guess” and her response.

• Reinstate Boss Nass’ “Yousa no tinkin’ yousa greater than the Gungans?”

• Reinstate “…this is too close.”

• Brand new, gorgeous, incredible crawl footage from Sir Ridley:
  Episode II
  THE APPROACHING STORM

In the decade following the invasion of Naboo, dissidence has fragmented the galaxy. Over a thousand solar systems have revolted against the Republic.

This separatist movement, under the leadership of the mysterious Count Dooku, has made it difficult for the limited number of Jedi Knights to maintain peace and order in the galaxy.

Senator Amidala, the former Queen of Naboo, is now the Senate’s leading advocate for diplomacy, and stands against growing calls for an ARMY OF THE REPUBLIC to counter the Separatists…

• Attempt to find a different establishing shot of the Senate building rather than using Palpatine’s office twice

• Delete line “And you will learn your place, young one.”

• I will attempt to add Anakin laughing a little as he nosedives the speeder in pursuit of Zam. (There is a stretch without any dialogue or characterization other than a dry chase.)

• Possibly add the end of Anakin’s line “this is a shortcut… I think.”

• Reinstate dialogue between Obi-Wan and Lama Su, the removal of which makes it unclear what is going on. (Still removing discussion of specific unit numbers.)

• Reinstate Anakin and Padme’s “You?” “Of course not me.” “But someone.”

• Ask lovely forum members for help getting the day-for-night scene looking better.

• As Obi-Wan reports to the council in the rain, reinstate Yoda’s line “Do not assume anything, Obi-Wan.”

• Reinstate Yoda’s line about visiting the cloners on Kamino.

• Brand new, gorgeous, incredible crawl footage from Sir Ridley:
  Episode III

LABYRINTH OF EVIL

After years of civil war, the Separatists have battered the faltering Republic nearly to the point of collapse. The fragile government is crumbling under attacks from the ruthless Count Dooku.

In a stunning move, the fiendish cyborg leader, General Grievous, has swept into the Republic capital and captured Chancellor Palpatine, leader of the Galactic Senate.

As the Separatist forces attempt to flee the besieged capital with their valuable hostage, Jedi Knights Obi-Wan Kenobi and Anakin Skywalker lead a desperate mission to rescue the captive Chancellor…

• Reinstate “My powers have doubled since the last time we’ve met, Count.” “Good. Twice the pride, double the fall.”

• Reinstate “Is he bringing additional warrious?” “He didn’t say.”

• Follow suit of virtually every other fanfix Ep3 edit by implementing the quick jump and slice ending to Obi-Wan and Anakin’s duel. It’ll be smoother, given that “I have the high ground” has to go.

• See if anyone here has the ability and interest in making this mockup of the Death Star scene a reality:
  

They will be on TFA:R, but the version out there now was rushed to be out ahead of TLJ. Once I get one thing back I can finish it and get the final version out there with all the trimmings.