Hal 9000

Well there’s room for one more offscreen line from where there used to be “in 16 hours he’ll start killing everbody.” If there’s anything else we want to shoehorn in there.

“He’s been planning his revenge. His followers have been hiding something for years. An enormous stockpile of Star Destroyers from the old Empire. He calls it the final order. [By the way he returned via cloning.] His followers have been hiding in the Unknown Regions, on a world called Exegol.”

Here’s where things are with the Poe scene: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/11itAzDZGR02gwOft3MPnw5OiVwdP9-Ll?usp=share_link

That URL links you to a folder, which contains a test clip as well as the footage that needs to be doctored to fit the new line. If anyone with the ability to do so could make it work, I think we will have gotten away with this change pretty effectively.

Cinefy said:

Hello There.

Can you smooth over the visual difference where I cut midway through Poe’s line?

Here’s how they sound in context. The line about his followers building something has one edit point halfway through to bring it into sync, and the lipsync even looks good as-is. If someone is able to apply a surgical morph to mask the cut, it’d work. Or, we just can’t show Poe for that shot.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1jTZfPqEHWMolAu3Ghp4iR6AuaZUBKN1e/view?usp=share_link

I imagine that being perfect for the shot. Well see if tonight favors me with any free time.

I’ll sit down with these whenever possible, and see how they shake out. 😃

That does sound like an improvement, and about the right register. Is there a way to direct it to deliver it more slowly? If there is, that may help tailor it to the scene. Or really any variation.

The line “he calls it the Final Order” in particular should be slower, and not necessarily have emphasis on any one word. It’s the one that needs to be able to match Poe onscreen.

YES.

Also, if the “his followers have been ___ something for years” could be told to slow down, or try to get several iterations so that with any luck I can lipsync it close enough to be able to have the line onscreen. The line as originally delivered emphasized “hiding” and did not emphasize “years,” so doing likewise may help.

If the rest of the lines can sound like what you just generated, and we can get that line to match lipsync, I think we’ll have this in the bag.

If possible, multiple line readings or variations would be nice for the “His fleet is a such and such from the Empire,” to play with and see what fits best.

Now I know how Lucas felt directing TPM from the editing room, splicing together takes.

Excellent work, JJB, and thanks for continuing it.

I don’t know how the adjectives work, whether there’s a list to choose from or you come up with your own. But if I could address the AI, I would try to get it to use a “raised” voice as though delivering a speech to a large room. Or maybe “speak up.” But if it could get the idea of what we’re going for, I think it could be perfect for this scene.

Here’s the best I can get the Poe lines to sound. It’d be nice to lipsync the line “His followers have been hiding something for years,” but with what’s available now this is what I can do. I don’t think it’s half bad and I doubt anyone would have batted an eye in the theater.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1MsJjLxDxVwrjR8KjZNzToTiKnMRxtFVX/view?usp=share_link

Also, I can’t really remove Finn’s line about Endor being “where the last war ended” because it makes the switch in focus of the scene happen very quickly, even for TROS standards.

ALSO, I am going to use yellow lightning for the primary version of Ascendant just like the ‘Rey Nobody’ version, as I very much like how it recontextualizes her yellow saber as an integration of what she feared. BUT, I will continue to honor the poll which showed people favoring using Vader’s TIE rather than the shuttle.

Yeah, seems like a bridge too far. Thanks for trying it out.

Oh, I wasn’t suggesting creating a whole new voice profile, just wondered if his current one could be directed not to be gravelly and work fine.

And hey, it’s just a quick thought as I was watching the latest Mando. 😉

Rather than post this semi-random thought elsewhere, since the Luke voice AI has been discussed here already, would it be fairly easy to get a few line readings to replace his line in ANH “this R2 unite has bad motivator” with “R5”? The radio drama has him call it an R5 unit, but the delivery is very different and can’t really be edited in very well.

Not bad.

Edit a snippet from TLJ into ESB, touching it up with VFX to fit into the Hoth environment.

A rebel solider preparing for the battle dips his finger into the ground, tastes it, spits it out and derisively says, “Snow.”

Count Dooku is 400 years old.

This may be a longshot but I’d like to request from anyone able and willing, to take the counseling scene between Anakin and Yoda and turn Yoda into a hologram.

I feel it’s an important scene and I hated to lose it. The only reason I had to was because Yoda has already left the planet by the time Anakin has his first nightmare.

But I wouldn’t put anything past us these days, compared to 2014.

Add questions to the opening crawl to make them more engaging to the audience.

Jar Jar Bricks said:

• I really enjoyed the scene in Hal’s edit where Hux suggests to Snoke that they target the Resistance base next. Also, that part that mentions how long it will be until it is recharged. It makes Poe’s attack on the oscillator much more than just an attempt at revenge. I would prefer it if this were reinstated.

To the best of my recollection, the reason I didn’t adopt his version of the destruction of the Hosnian system is because the reordered sequence didn’t leave room for that new scene.

I just flipped through the workprint and I couldn’t really think of a good reason not to adopt this as my own personal go-to version. TFA:R isn’t going anywhere, but I was re-floored to rediscover the intricate and masterful threading Nev has done with this project. It makes this movie sing.

Ascendant V3 will feature its only shot of Jakku made to match Starlight so that a viewer of any version of TFA would not be thrown. (Granted, I’d be gobsmacked by a hypothetical viewer who would have THAT to complain about while walking out after TROS.)

Just like Harmy saying, “Hey guys, watch 4K77,” I feel that way about this project. Very proud of our Neverar; he’s great!

It looks pretty much like that in the Leia flashback already, and it seems to have been the Exegol scene only.

Oh gotcha then! Maybe soon we will have a music generator trained on John Williams’ corpus.

I gotta create an account and play with this sometime. Hope the clips help with tailoring it to what we have to work with. But I think we could just replace every single line for Poe in the scene, with two (or ideally three) that have to be dubbed over his face speaking.

Also, I love Leia’s two new lines, “He’s too dangerous,” and, “A Jedi needs her weapon.” However, when mixed directly into the movie opposite other lines of dialogue, I can hear some AI cruft. I would NOT even sweat it were it not Leia in TROS, which had all viewers’ eyes and ears primed to hone in on “Gee, how did they repurpose scraps to contrive Leia being there?” They are short lines, and even if that AI cruft has to remain, I still think they work well enough.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1a3oq8BMJxapMMnsRXEE6MfX7lbIoUZXn/view?usp=share_link

This one hasn’t been fully tucked in, but has most of Poe’s lines replaced with the AI. The only snippet original to TROS is, “The Emperor and his followers have been–.” And even that line could be replaced. The one available from JJB was too wordy to fit into the footage available. (I could use the longer line if the line, “His followers have been ____ something for years” could be tailored to closely fit his mouth movements, because in these tests I had to use a cutaway shot of Rey when he says this. If I could dub this shot of Poe, I could use that shot for the removed ‘16 hours’ line.)

https://drive.google.com/file/d/149clMZ5a9FsFFGqS1mfCq5IO6sSY_NsM/view?usp=share_link

Here’s how those Poe lines sound in context. It really comes close to working. I wonder if the AI could be directed to deliver the lines sorrowfully, like its delivering bad news.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1jqyj3hhj-j1Qwqs7yfPCKGsMkl2zAZRb/view?usp=share_link