ImperialFighter

vaderios said:

How is possible that the MF travels all along the side of the executor, reaches the nose and vader can see them so big from the bridge? Not only the distance but the MF is not possible to be visible from the bridge cause of the diferent position of the ship. Impfighter correct me if im wrong :)

Okay vaderios, I said I'd get back to you about this with an answer.  I don't know if it's the right answer or not, but it is an answer -  

The problem is, that I don't know for sure if you were refering to Adywan's new shot of Vader at the front big window, or not....or if you meant the original 'close-up' behind-of-Vader shot where we saw the Millennium Falcon travelling downwards towards the LEFT through the window....  

If you are meaning his new shot, then another problem is that I don't know for certain if it's been slotted into the point that I previously speculated on, or not....nor if the Falcon has been made to travel in the opposite direction now, or not....  

However, for the sake of more speculation, let's say that you meant Ady's new shot....and let's also say that it DOES replace the 'problematic' tiny Falcon shot (well a problem to my personal preferred order of 'positioning' for Vader anyway, as the Falcon was going the wrong way to fit in properly!)....and ontop of that, let's say that Adywan's tiny Falcon is heading towards the RIGHT-side of the frame now....

In that case, I can only offer that the sequence now looks something like this, and would flow fine (although you'd have to watch the 'movements' of the current shots onscreen to get a proper idea) - 

We'd first see the shot of the 3 TIEs firing behind the Millenium Falcon as they make it head roughly towards the Command Tower of the 'Executor' in the distance.  But before the very end of the shot we see the Falcon manage to veer off to it's RIGHT.  It is still a good distance away from the front of the 'Executor's' Tower at this point I'd say. / Then we cut immediately to Adywan's new shot, where his tiny Falcon can now be seen heading towards the RIGHT of the frame instead.  Judging by the size of his tiny Falcon element, I'd say it seems fine after you've seen it in conjunction with where the Falcon was last seen generally veering towards, in the previous shot. / You then have approx. 20 seconds or so of Vader 'communicating' with Luke, and some 'Falcon Crew' shots, before we eventually see the Falcon again....where at this point, we now see that it's very close to the front of the RIGHT-side of the 'Executor's' prow. During this intervening time, I'd say that the Falcon has eventually continued to veer towards the front body of the 'Executor' enough for it to be seen in the new Vader shot, as it then dives downwards in front of Vader's view, towards the front RIGHT-side of the 'Executor's' very long body, in front of where he stands....where it then ends up following alongside the RIGHT-side of the 'Executor'....sticking very closely to it, until the TIEs eventually chase it past the 'prow' altogether..... 

Well, that would certainly work for me a lot better than the current shots vaderios, but as I say, I really don't know if this is the sequence order of shots that is actually going to be done, or not.

By the way, I can't remember who first suggested the idea of Lando and the Falcon NOT surviving, a while back....was it really Adywan?   Mmmm.  Could work out neat, but I guess it will depend on whether Ady wants the saga to end on a bit of a downer, or not.  Personally, give me that seat-of-the-pants 'triumphant' existing outcome, anyday!

Meanwhile, I've got some AT-AT screenshots to sort out.  :)         

adywan said:

I've also fixed the control panel that breaks away when the stardestroyers collide (thanks seven for pointing that one out. I totally missed that).

Nice matte by the way, Vaderios. I probably won't be using that matte painting though because it just stands out too much as a painting with the live action. I'm hoping to create a new matte but i may have to build part of the hangar and then photograph it to use as an element to give the matte a more 3D feel

Another fix just done is just after vader cuts off Lukes hand you hear a very faint sound of the lightsabre being turned off, but its so quiet that it looks odd when we see it is off in the next shot. You now see the lightsaber disengage.

....and even more awesomeness.  Can't wait to eventually see your new 'Rebel hangar' shot!  :)

adywan said:

well first, the executor interior problems. Well its not just a few shots that are messed up but pretty much all the bridge scenes. As you can see from the pic below, the bridge is nowhere near the control room and is in fact up the stairs, so the final shot of vader walking down the stairs is correct

So you can see that the first interior shots of the Executor when they receive the probot transmission, Vader should really be coming from up the hallway and not appear suddenly as if he just walked out of shot. as if the bridge is just out of shot. then, later on when they are pursuing the Falcon from cloud city the shots of Piette in the control room are totally out of place. I'm tackling this now by changing a couple of shots to not only fix this, but also the problems with Piette suddenly on the other side of the bridge. Also i have fixed the problem of vader being at the side window one minute and looking out of the front window the next. I have added a couple of brief shots of Vader walking down towards the front window.

 

Impressive....most impressive.....

Adywan, you are several steps ahead of things as usual.  Wonderful work on the new Vader shot above!  That is more than I could have hoped for yet again.... 

But I'd also like to speculate on a couple of things on this (Which I just know is gonna end up a little complicated to follow again!  Anyway, here goes, and pardon my prose) -

Firstly, I'm guessing that since there is a tiny Falcon in one of the windows in your shot above (I'll get back to you shortly on this vaderios), that this shot is going to replace the one where Vader's got his back to us, as he stands looking out of the window at the current tiny Falcon that seem to travel 'downwards to the right' (this was the problematic shot that I previously suggested should be the front big window, rather than a 'side' one).  If this is the case, then I'm very pleased that it will now look as if Vader has moved directly to this 'position' at that point, since we last saw him a minute or so earlier in the 'alcove' section with Piett....as that's the way I always thought it would work best.

However, I really like that 'close-up' shot of Vader 'from the back' as he looks out....so I'm hoping that rather than removing it totally....that you are instead planning to use part of it, to replace EITHER of the slightly shorter FIRST or SECOND 'close-up' frontal' shots of Vader's mask that come next, as we hear the words "Luke", then "Son, come with me".  The current neat shot of him looking out (with the tiny Falcon amended of course) would definately work very nicely at either one of these points....especially since we are just currently seeing exactly the same kind of 'close-up' frontal shots close together anyway. 

I reckon this new order of shots will look fantastic with your latest one, if you just lose one of these similar 'frontal' shots, rather than lose the Vader 'from the back' shot.... 

That's if I correctly judged where your new shot is going, of course! 

And about the 'Bridge' area shot at the top:  please don't 'Force choke' me Ady, but here's a couple of things to consider on that, if you will (and you'll need to use the 'pause' button to look at these!) -

Although that is a 'behind the scenes' photo of course, it seems that during our first look at this area in the movie (when we see Admiral Ozzel coming towards us, and then being called over by Captain Piett)....that the inside of the the area that is indicated as being the 'Bridge' (just beyond the 'steps') by your arrow, actually seems to have a totally different 'interior' look to the one seen in the photo above....but more importantly, ALSO looks different to what the overall inside of the actual 'Bridge' should actually look like....

If you check it out, you can see that there is some kind of different structure and lights in the movie 'interior' there. 

Because of this, I personally always looked on that area as NOT being meant to be the 'Bridge' in the movie, but rather a different area with 'steps' leading up to it, altogether.  That is why I think it is seems fine for Admiral Ozzel to be 'heading' towards the actual 'Bridge'(which we don't see yet) somewhere just before it in this 'mid-section', to join Vader there, just as Captain Piett calls to him.  (Take note of the round 'black and white' structure on the floor of the section directly opposite where Captain Piett is, as I'll come back to it....) 

Anyway, this 'mid-section' area....which is somewhere between the 'steps' leading up to the 'Bridge', and the other area with 'steps', is ALSO clearly seen during the scene where Vader is talking to the 'holograms' (note that you can more clearly see the 'interior' of the other area with 'steps' in the distance here, before Vader heads round towards his 'Chamber' to contact the 'Emperor'....and that when Vader talks to the 2 remaining 'holograms' nearest to our viewpoint, that the area behind him still isn't quite at the point where the 'steps' of the 'Bridge' could be, yet), and well as during the scene where Vader is 'Force choking' Captain Needa....and is also seen in ANOTHER scene that I'm going to come back to....

Also, when when we see the 'close-up' shot of the bottom of Vader's cloak as he goes to exit off where I consider the 'Bridge' to be (towards it's 'steps' presumably, although the previous long-shot has a flat floor!), I personally don't worry about the sudden cut to Vader beside Ozzel and Piett, as I've always looked on it as just one of those 'slight jump ahead' cuts....to get him to beside them in the mid-section' area straight away in the action.  It's just that he happens to come round past another crewmember beside them. 

It's something similar to the instance I mentioned a while back, about the 'slight jump ahead' cut involving the 'Lando walking through the city towards Vader' shots....where the the group goes from 'real-time' walking, to suddenly being in a different area to 'shorten' their journey onscreen....before going back to 'real-time shots as they head nearer to the awaiting Vader and Boba Fett....

Anyway, going back to that OTHER shot of 'positioning' for this same 'mid-section' area I mentioned - 

It seems that you can make out the round 'black and white' structure on the floor, in the distance behind Vader and Piett, just after Vader 'steps down' (from what looks like the narrower 'Bridge' entrance 'set') from the 'Bridge'after ordering "NO disintegrations" to Boba Fett.  This is a clearer look at the the inbetween 'mid-section' that we don't quite see when Vader 'steps down' off the 'Bridge' at the end of the movie.  (Unless it's yet another confusingly-different section of the ship altogether!....) 

See what you think.

I see you agreed about the 'hull' thing then.  ;)

Ripplin said:

Monroville said:

I think that's my biggest gripe is that they are merely dots on the horizon when it would be nice to tell that they are star destroyers (yes, Han tells me that, but I'd like to see them)

In this case, though, if they were clearly visible, it would become a 'master of the obvious' moment. If they're just dots (and the passengers are thinking 'what is that?'), then Han is looking at the instruments and telling his passengers 'star destroyers ahead.' If everyone could see them, it would be like 'no kidding, Han...'

 

I don't know if you remember my previous description about this shot, but Leia is sat directly behind Han at this point in time, and is looking over at what Chewie is doing.  She's quite petite, and it's only when she stands up to come around Han, that she can see what He's just seen.

Also, the Stardestroyers could be even positioned  more slightly to the left, in the 'windows', even further out of her 'eye-line', as they start to come directly towards them.

Hope this helps.

adywan said:

TheTome said:

Adywan, I have a question.  At the end of Empire when the Mellenium Falcon is trying to escape the star destroyer, it seems to get really, really close, and yet it's out of tractor beam range.  Are you planning to do something about this?  Or can something even BE done about it???

Well when Piette says "they'll be in range of our tractor beam in moments.." the falcon is pretty far away. Its doubtful that the Executor would have a tractor beam as powerful as the Death Star so, plus they would have to lock onto the target so i dont' think there needs to be anything done to this.

Would just like to offer that after Piett has said this to Vader....that although there eventually comes the shot of the Falcon (having been previously chased towards the direction of the 'Executor' because of the laserbolts of the 3 following TIEs) where it's then seen to be travelling very closely alongside the front right-hand side of the 'Executor's' prow....that by this point, because it got so unexpectedly close so rapidly... that it didn't 'show up on the scopes' properly for a bit (as with the 'Avenger' earlier), enough for the 'Executor' crew to 'lock on' to it in time....and that it couldn't be located accurately by the 'Executor' crew again until it had been chased past the front of the prow, into it's path ahead....where it was 'picked up' again, and Piette could order "Ready for the tractor beam". 

So would also agree along the lines of what professa said too.

nohandluke said:

ImpFighter - I laud your keen observation! I just don't know HOW these issues could be resolved...and now my brain is doing crunches trying to figure it out...

Apologies everyone, but that 'keen observation' wasn't so observant it seems!  Well I did say things get a little 'complicated' where some of these 'Bridge' shots are concerned, lol.

I just checked to see if the so-called 'troublesome' shots were 'static' ones or not (they are, by the way), to get an idea of how much work Adywan would have to do to amend certain 'backgrounds', if he attempted to do anything to them.  When doing this, I've now found a BIG flaw in my recent 'positioning' shots for Vader....

(It would be good to get the various screenshots for this sequence, as it will be a whole lot easier to show some options, so I'll see if I can get them organised sometime)  

But just to say at the moment -  I've belatedly realised that the shot at 1:53:01, where (according to me at the time) we see Vader positioned at the very front big 'Bridge' window, as he watches the trajectory of the Falcon's dive downwards towards the 'Executor's RIGHT-hand side, in front of him....further ahead of him....as it headed closely towards the 'prow'....does not fit properly, because the tiny Millennium Falcon element (that I wanted a hint of TIEs firing laserbolts added to!) in the shot actually makes it look like the Falcon is wrongly crossing across the path of the 'Executor', on it's way to the LEFT-side of it, at this point!  

So if that particular shot was to work in representing Vader at the front big window in the sequence I described....then we actually WOULDN'T see the tiny Falcon at all, through the window, and it would need to be removed from the shot altogether, instead! 

On the other hand -  I can now also see a totally different order of possible 'positioning' for Vader, if the 'movement' of the Falcon in that shot is left as it is....  It means that Vader was meant to be looking out of 'side'-windows at some point, after all (although still not necessarily the 'side'-window that vaderios alluded to), and that some of the 'troublesome' backgrounds can maybe make sense, after all.  Not all of them though.... 

So might be worth looking at further options on this yet, if I can get the shots, although I've no idea if Adywan has done anything here at all yet, or even sorted everything to make sense already! 

By the way vaderios, I love the work you did on your 'matte'!  That is certainly one of the shots that I really look forward to seeing improved on a little.  The colouring vastly improves on the SE version already of course.  I hope you do get the time to have a go with the 'JEDI' one sometime too. Great stuff.

Adywan, I was hoping to post a few little AT-AT-related things today, but since taking a look at the various points of the recent post by vaderios, I've discovered a couple of troublesome things with the 'Vader on 'Executor' Bridge' shots in general, that I wanted to get out of the way first, while it's fresh in my mind.  You are probably aware of most of this, even though I wasn't (I previously just 'went with the flow of the action', and didn't notice), but it turns out to be a whole new 'continuity' nightmare, lol!!

I don't have screenshots for everyone here at the moment, unfortunately, so I will just be able to give PAL timings/descriptions of where the issues in question are, as I go through them -

At 1:52:17, we see Vader first enter the 'Executor's' Bridge, and walk towards the 'alcove' section on the right-hand side, where Admiral Piett is.  (note the bottom-section of the 'Bridge' entrance that Vader's cloak brushes against at the start of the shot, as I'll come back to it)

At 1:52:22, we see a side-on 'close-up' of Admiral Piett and Vader standing beside the smaller side-windows in the 'alcove' section (as seen above in the top shot of vaderios' post), as Vader starts to say "Did your men deactivate the hyperdrive on the Millennium Falcon?"

At 1:52:27, we see a frontal 'close-up' of Vader's mask, with his back to an 'array of lights' (note the big red round one, as I'll come back to it) inside the 'alcove' section, as he says "Good.  Prepare the boarding party, and set your weapons for 'Stun'."  (he then turns to look out of the smaller windows beside him, as the scene ends at 1:52:33)

Then we cut to an approx. minute-long mixture of 'Falcon crew antics' as they continue to be chased from underneath Bespin City, which culminates in the Millennium Falcon being chased towards the middle of the side-on 'Executor' in the distance by 3 closely-firing TIEs, before it veers off to the right towards the general direction of the front of the 'Executor'....

At 1:53:01, we now cut back to Vader, who has now moved forward in the intervening minute, to look out of a bigger window on the Bridge (as seen above in the second-last shot of vaderious' post), as he watches the distant Falcon diving downwards somewhere towards the front of the 'Executor'....

(Ady -  would you consider adding a hint of the 3 TIEs firing behind the distant Falcon that Vader looks out at, during this shot?  It could really help to tie-in better with the 'before' and 'after' shots where the Falcon is chased by the TIEs.  Just a thought)

Now here's where things get a little COMPLICATED....because it's at this point that I have to disagree with the previous speculation by vaderios, that Vader is actually looking out of the 'side-window' that he's indicated with the number 3....

....because we now cut to 2 frontal 'close-ups' of Vader's mask at 1:53:04 and 1:53:08 respectively, as we hear the words "Luke", followed by "Son, come with me" -   The problem I have in believing that Vader is standing at the big 'side-window', is the fact that the background shown behind Vader in these 2 shots now, is NOT the expected opposite side of the 'Bridge'!  The 'Bridge' is somewhat symmetrical, so we should be seeing some of the other windows on the other side, behind Vader at this point, if he was meant to be looking out one of the big 'side-windows'.... 

Instead, the background that we see behind Vader at this point looks like an 'out-of-focus' closed doorway that suspiciously looks like the doorway that we more clearly see on the right-hand side of Vader as he exits down the 'steps' from the 'Bridge' later on....  

Also, I personally always believed that Vader had moved all the way forward to the very front big window of the 'Bridge' during the intervening minute since he was last seen at the smaller 'alcove' windows....so that he could follow the view of the trajectory of the Falcon's previous veer right to go downwards towards the right-hand side of the 'Executor's' prow, way in front of him....and where he stayed to privately 'converse' with Luke, away from the other crewmembers, until the Falcon escaped, before eventually turning round to exit the 'Bridge'.  However, if this is the case, then we should really be seeing an 'out-of-focus' open entrance directly behind him in these 2 shots now, rather than the current 'closed doorway'....  (Although I'm sure you are able to tweak the current shot a little, so that we don't see the 'closed doors' anymore, if you agree that this is where Vader is actually positioned now) 

Anyway, the 2nd shot of Vader's latest frontal 'close-up' ends at 1:53:12, and we then cut to approx. 30 seconds worth of scenes showing Luke and the crew, and the Falcon passing closely alongside the prow of the 'Executor', before eventually passing it.... 

At 1:53:42, we now cut back to a more side-on 'close-up' of Vader's mask facing the right of the frame, as we hear the words "Luke, it is your destiny" (remember the 'flashing lights' background of the initial 'alcove' section he entered?  Well a similar backdrop is now seen behind him again, except in reverse!  The big red round light is the other way round now, for instance)

This makes it look that he has now moved into the 'alcove' on the LEFT-hand side of the 'Bridge', but I still like to think that he is still standing in front of the big front window, as the Falcon (which he has been watching from there) has only just passed in front of the tip of the 'Executor's' prow at this point....  So unless he's 'wandered off' into the left 'alcove' briefly, from his position up front....then the background in this shot should really be some of the 'Bridge' windows on the left of his 'at front' position...

So now, this shot of Vader ends at 1:53:46, and we then cut to approx. 45 seconds worth of scenes showing the 3 TIEs still chasing the Millennium Falcon, as Admiral Piett prepares to use the 'tractor beam', just before Artoo fixes the hyperdrive, and the Falcon escapes....

At 1:54:30, we now cut back to a 'close-up' of the back of Vader's helmet, as he looks out of a big window. 

AT 1:54:37, we see that Vader has been looking out of the big front window, as he turns around to exit the 'Bridge'. 

However....we clearly see in this shot (as well as earlier on, when Vader watched the Fleet massing) that the sides of the 'open entrance' to the 'Bridge' are WIDER now, compared to when he initially enters it at 1:52:17, or when he exits it too! 

Ontop of that, we clearly see that the whole floor area approach to the 'Bridge' is FLAT now, and that there are no 'steps' for Vader to exit down!!

Finally, at 1:54:50....as we see Vader now exit the narrower 'Bridge' entrance to go down the 'steps' that suddenly appear there....we also see that a crewmember holding some device or other is firmly rooted to the spot as Vader passes him, whereas he wasn't standing there in front of the 'Bridge' entrance in the shot beforehand!

LOL!  As Han once said to Chewie -  "I don't know how we're gonna get out of this one...."

I haven't a clue what you will decide to try to do in any of this sequence Ady, or what you'll agree with out of the above, but I won't be expecting miracles....  However things pan out, I realise that some of this is probably unfixable.... 

No worries, it's still gonna be a monster of an improvement over the current release.  :)

Next stop (hopefully....), the AT-AT's!  Yay!  :)

Monroville said:

Hey Ady:
any chance of updating Page 1 with any changed plans or details?  I know someone else posted a link that was keeping track of all the changes as well as items brought up.  If someone could post that link, I will permanently link it to all of my messages (so everyone can click on it and see what's up every so often).

Monroville, I reckon you're refering to this thread that GoodMusician started.  Unfortunately it seems to have gone by the wayside a little, and I don't think it's been updated in quite a while now.  I just missed out in offering to do the updates at the time, as GM just nipped in before me. 

However, there are quite a few ideas missing from that page, and there has also been quite a lot of new stuff that Adywan has already been confirmed as having either completed, or is now attempting to do since then, also.  I've been taking a note of what I've seen done along the way since that list was laid out though....  :)  Perhaps GM's been a bit tied up recently.

http://originaltrilogy.com/forum/topic.cfm/Adywans-ESB-edit-Suggestion-Terminal/topic/9477/

 TheHelmetDork -  You'll be pleased to know that Adywan is covering that on item 52 of his page 1 list of 'to do's'.

vaderios said:

It seems ImpFighter that the Executor has enough big ass to be a bit on screen :)

First i tryied to be closest the the angle/camera/position with the render of this shot:

You can see it,

 

and secondly i find something interesting...( maybe wrong)

it seems that Mr vader isnt standing in one position during the falcon pursuit.

The window that he is talking to luke is the no 3 in this^ image

so i assume that when he sees the falcon enters to hyperspace we see him in the center window, so he was walking during this conv.

 

Fingers crossed :)

 

-Angel

vaderios, I've now had a chance to look at your examples above, which have led me to some other things during that sequence, that I didn't realise before....and that I can't believe that I never picked-up on before.  But it's another write-up that's a little complicated to do, so I'll need to come back to it.  I'm not sure that Vader was actually looking out of the window you think he is though, and I'll go into why shortly.

As far as seeing the hull from our vantagepoint inside, I can only say that I still think it's a subjective 'perspective' issue, as far as all the 'window' views we see are concerned. 

What I mean is, that for me anyway, the level of all the 'camera angles' show a view that I'm content to believe are correct ones, when seeing 'straight-ahead' from those camera positions, out of what is supposed to be a higher-up 'Bridge' Tower.

(I've posted 2 examples in my post immediately above this one, that give a better indication of just how much of an angle the 'Executor's' hull 'slants downwards', and 'away' from our higher 'Bridge' Tower position). 

It's subjective I think, about exactly how you view the 'camera angles' that have been used to shoot the 'interior' shots, and I'm in the 'straight-ahead, not downwards in any way' camp.  In fact, when it comes to some of these trickier-to-judge 'vanishing point' perspectives, there's a case to be made that the 'camera positions' are meant to give the impression of things being seen from a 'slightly lower than straight-ahead' position, even.  That's why I can easily believe that we'd only see the 'starfield'....and none of the ship below us.

But that is only my own way of looking at these 'window' views, and Adywan may be looking at them in a similar way to you.

Thanks for those vaderios.  I'll 'bookmark' them, and get back to you when it's 'JEDI's' turn, about why I reckon these could be okay as well.

I meant to say about the top 'Executor' shot that I posted there -  I really hope Adywan picked up on the good spot by someone (sorry, can't remember who) ages ago, who noted the orange 'glow' from the enginess wrongly overlaps part of it's rear hull there....

vaderios, after digging around a little, it does seem that as far as some of the 'Executor' Bridge 'interior' shots are concerned, that it is a little tricky to work out if there should be a little of the hull showing through the 'windows' or not.

As the shots above show, the hull is certainly wide on either side of the Bridge Tower....but I still think that the way the hull is 'angled' downwards, combined with the 'eye-level', close-up camera angles through the 'windows' you've shown, allows for us not to see any of it.  I don't know if that's the case with any 'JEDI' angles though, without seeing a screenshot of where you mean.

On the other hand, you could be right, as from what I can gather, it seems the positioning of the actual 'Executor' Bridge is a little unclear according to some of the info. in the link below.  I'll be interested to see what Adywan decides on this himself, eventually. 

This resource has masses of photos and details, and I've only gone through a fraction of it, so I'm not sure how much is speculation.  There seems to be a lot of interesting stuff here though, for anyone that wades through it -

http://www.theforce.net/swtc/ssd.html

seven said:

While looking out the front windows of the bridge of the Star Destroyer we should (shouldn't we?) see the main hull of the ship (the nose), but we don't. On the Executor as well, we should most definitely see the hull through the windows since it is much longer.

I'd have to absolutely agree with Siliconmaster483 (and vaderios too, if he is making the same point) on this one seven.  Every time we see 'Bridge' shots of inside either the 'Avenger' or 'Executor' sets in 'Empire' and 'Jedi', the camera angle is fixed at a certain low enough, straight-on 'point-of-view' so that we just wouldn't see any of the hulls in those particular shots. 

This goes for the shots of Vader on the 'Executor's' Bridge when we first see him on it, as well as when we last see him on it, even though his ship has a very long hull.  We just aren't positioned at enough of an angle to see any of it in these shots, so no extra work for Adywan necessary. 

Lol, yes, he must learn control too!

Patience....you must learn patience....  (in best Yoda croak)

The Stardestroyer seen on the top-left of this shot is almost identical, and lasts for approx. the same amount of seconds onscreen (or more), as the one it would replace!  It also comes far later in the movie, and seems a superior element.

Alternatively, perhaps you can somehow 'fill-in' some of the dark section that is missing from the 'shadowed' Stardestroyer? 

Either way, I reckon it would look a bit better if something could be done to take away from the look of this poorer 'shadowed' one, considering it stays onscreen for so long in 'Empire'....

Just before I go for today Ady -  If you haven't got round to any of your proposed 'lens flares' yet, then there's a new 'Winter Sports' program that starts here this Sunday on BBC2 at 11.30 p.m., that seems to be full of great examples!  It has 'reflections' on show from the snowy peaks of New Zealand, and might have some nice ones for inspiration for you.  Might be worth recording.

I'm hoping to show some 'AT-AT Ground Battle' proposals over the weekend, if I can escape the wife....  ;)  

Adywan, while looking at some of this Stardestroyer stuff, I remembered yet another thing I wanted to mention -  During the sequence of the initial 'Imperial Fleet' shots, we see a 'shadowed' Stardestroyer at the bottom-left of the shot below , which is onscreen for several seconds, and which is very dark in places - 

Now because this Stardestroyer element was already used by you in your new 'ANH:R' Death Star 'reveal' (onscreen for shorter, but not 'flipped' into reverse), I wonder if you would consider REPLACING this one in 'Empire', so that it won't stand out as such an obviously 're-used' element by the time we come to it?

Allowing for the fact that you would be able to colour-'match' these different elements together, perhaps you can use something like the Stardestroyer that is shown in the following post below, instead -  

Monroville said:

ImperialFighter said:

Monroville said:

(3) you could use this shot from ANH (move the right SD more along side the left SD) to replace the distant SD shot in image (1) - these are a bit closer and thus allow us to see more detail, not to mention the SDs probably should have been closer (to the MF, not each other), considering how fast they closed in on the Avenger in the following shots.

I also think the reverse bridge shot looks fine, not to mention it should be a lot easier to flip Needa's rank placement than mess with what is outside the window.

On another note: the sounds of the SDs crashing together in the bridge shot could have been the shields of both SDs hitting/repelling each other, as opposed to the physical bulk of the ships making any sort of contact themselves.

 

Monroville, I didn't go all the way and suggest using those actual 'nearer' unused Stardestroyer elements at the time, because the 'cockpit' shot in my above post is approx. 2 secs. long in itself, and then the intervening 'close-ups' of the crew are approx. 10 secs. long, on top of that.  During all this time, the Stardestroyers are coming towards the Falcon at an unknown rate, and the Falcon is certainly heading towards them at quite a rapid rate, as it's chased by the TIEs and 'Avenger' during this approx. 12 secs. 

Another thing to consider, is that during the full shot of that unused Stardestroyers one above, they seem to get 'nearer' to us pretty quickly over the approx. 2 secs. it lasts.  The shot above is the START of that shot, and below is the rest of it, to see what I mean:

The middle of the shot -

The end of the shot -

 

So it's hard to judge if these elements at the START of the shot (levelled off, more in line with each other) would seem too big to use or not, as a starting point in the 'cockpit' shot, at the size that they currently are.  But I do like the idea of how this could look and fit into the overall sequence from a 'visual' standpoint, considering the 'stately' speed of the Stardestroyers in the other shots anyway....only I reckon the 'starting' size should probably have been somewhere between the 2 sizes, to begin with, but I'm happy with whatever Adywan decides himself.

By the way, I really like that idea of yours that the 'crashing' sound is just the noise of the Stardestroyer's SHIELDS coming into contact with each other, rather than them actually coming into contact with each other and scraping the sides of each other.  That would have been good to see on the 'subtitles' rather than [Crash].  :)

On the other hand, if Adywan decides to add a subtle hint of 'debris' floating from the area where they might have actually collided a little, then that is neat too.  The choice is his.   

Yeah, I was aware of how wierd the SDs were moving in that ANH shot.  Even so, the 2 SDs outside the MFs cockpit aren't moving towards the MF at any noticable rate, so Ady could just use the first shot and use CGI to move them forward at the same rate as the originals (which would be not very much at all if any movement).  The point is that by bringing the SDs closer you can see them better visually.

 

A thing I just noticed Monroville, is that I made a 'timing' error in my comments about this whole shot of the small 'Tattooine' Stardestroyers.  I said it lasted approx. 2 secs. long, when it is in fact approx. 4 secs. long.

As this means that the Stardestroyers in that original shot only reach the 'positioning' of the MIDDLE shot above after approx. 2 secs. now, rather than the END shot, which takes another approx. 2 secs. to reach in fact....I think that you are right now, and that Adywan possibly could incorporate these ones into the approx. 2 secs. long Millennium Falcon's 'cockpit windows' shot now (adjusted a little in height perhaps, and placed at a different level when Han first points to them perhaps too), and they would fit in fine with the shot that eventually comes afterwards, which shows the Millenium Falcon starting it's dive downwards.  OR as you suggest, if he is able to 'manipulate' them somewhat, then he can make the ones at the START of the shot above approach at whatever size/speed he decides on, during the approx. 2 secs. that the 'cockpit' shot lasts.

On a side note -  I read somewhere that the Stardestroyer seen during the 18 secs. long 'JEDI' introduction, is supposedly the 'Avenger'....  Can anyone confirm that this is what was truly intended by George, or merely speculation?  Just curious.   

Monroville said:

adywan said:

well i just popped in to do some catching up and... wow. So much reading to do.  I just wished i'd known you were going to post all that, ImperialFighter, because i have already finished the stardestroyer scene and have fixed the positioning problems.

because i was already going to be cleaning up the Fx i decided it would be easier to redo the whole position of the stardestroyers than use any form of flip shots ( i just hate flip shots. lol)

If that indeed is the ESB:R shot, you will have to fix this one too to make the Avenger closer to the center SD as opposed to the far left one (the Avenger will probably have to be pushed more towards the right side of the screen):



Also remember that Needa can see the side of the other SD outside his bridge, which means the SDs would be overlapping each other, not side-by-side as indicated here (being that if that was the case, Needa should have seen the upper superstructure and conning tower of the closing SD, not the SDs side)

WOW Adywan! - lol, no worries here about my being a bit late on that sequence, considering your new 'positioning' is MUCH more than I could have hoped for in the end.  Making the 'Avenger' go nearer to the 'oncoming' Stardestroyer on it's LEFT instead, is the BEST outcome possible that could have been done.  And you've definately still got a little of that 'convergence together' thing going on at this point.  And those stars.  And that colouring....  Fantastical (haven't used that one yet!) stuff once again.  :)

Sorry Monroville, but I've got to agree with Sbassen above, who reckons the initial shot (immediately above) is just down to 'perspective'.  Although I also said that in my long post a couple of pages back, one thing I didn't bother to mention at the time, was that I ALWAYS used to think that the 'Avenger' seemed to come across as being nearer to it's LEFT 'oncoming' Stardestroyer, nearest to us, rather than the one on it's right.  If Adywan has tweaked this shot a little too, then fine, but it certainly works for me as it stands now if he hasn't, considering he's put a 'gap' between them in the following shot, meaning that the 'Avenger' isn't shown as being underneath the other one at this point, unlike before. 

I just wasn't sure how much Adywan was wanting to amend in all this, but he's placed things far better now in that 'comparison' shot of his.

As far as the 'Avenger' Bridge 'windows' view (no 'flipping' required now!) goes -  Bear in mind that the 'comparison' shot that Adywan has shown is not at the END of that whole shot.  There is still a bit of 'moving forward' that his newly 'positioned' Stardestroyers have to do yet....so that by the time we cut to the 'Bridge' shot, things should look better as far as 'continuity' out of the 'windows' is concerned.

Here's the END of what the original shot looks like below, as a rough guide as to how much further ahead Adywan's 'Avenger' will have travelled by then (though still not necessarily underneath).  In fact, in the shot he's previewed, his 'Avenger' already looks to be 'further ahead' at that MIDDLE point, compared to the middle of the original.  He's got it perfect!  -

LOL, yes,....my wife would consider me obsessively detail-orientated, but I prefer to think of it as just trying to be 'thorough' when it comes to things I care about.  ;)

Adywan, you'll remember that I've previously hoped that you would include 'JEDI's' approx. 18 secs. long 'overhead' Stardestroyer element (or at least some of it), somewhere else into your 'Empire:R' or 'JEDI:R' edits instead, if you DO remove it from the 'intro.' because of your future 'Executor' plans there.... 

(although I'm guessing that it probably will remain, only with 'differences' during the actual shot....) 

I still don't want a definitive answer to this, as I'd like the bulk of whatever's in store for 'Empire:R' to mainly be a surprise, but on the subject of Stardestroyers in general at the moment, it reminded me of something else I'm interested to see -  Will you consider incorporating some of the great 'A New Hope' Stardestroyers that were previously unused by you, into either 'Empire:R' or 'JEDI:R' instead?  They were really good elements at the end of the day, and it would be great to see them still make an appearance elsewhere in your edits....

Here's an example of that 'overhead' shot that doubleofive knocked up for me (along with a few other 'speculations' for fun) on page 108, for those that may have missed it since -   

....and in addition to the previous small 'Tattooine' Stardestroyers, these are the other unused Stardestroyer elements that I'm referring to, that I'd also like to see somewhere, if possible -

Start of shot   (lasts approx. 2 secs. long, and comes just after the scene in Ben's Hut, as it heads towards the Death Star.  Although Adywan's new 'reveal' scene is superior, I've always liked the 'angle' of this Stardestroyer element, especially.) -

Middle of above shot -

End of above shot -

OR 'flipped' into reverse as an option, of course.  ;) -

....and this one just afterwards, in it's original 'way round', as it recedes away from us. 

Start of shot   (lasts approx. 4 secs. long.  Note: Adywan only partially used this in 'ANH:Revisited', as it headed towards his new Death Star 'reveal'.  He also 'flipped' it into reverse for that new shot.) -

Middle of above shot - 

End of above shot -

Fingers crossed, and just a thought.

vaderios said:

the time in a movie is diferent from the runtime.

Not sure what you are meaning vaderios, but the shots I've mentioned are supposed to be running concurrently to one another, in actual 'real-time' as far as I can tell.

I'll have time for one more quick post about something else today, before the wife really starts to get mad!  Glad my boys understand....  ;)

Monroville said:

(3) you could use this shot from ANH (move the right SD more along side the left SD) to replace the distant SD shot in image (1) - these are a bit closer and thus allow us to see more detail, not to mention the SDs probably should have been closer (to the MF, not each other), considering how fast they closed in on the Avenger in the following shots.

I also think the reverse bridge shot looks fine, not to mention it should be a lot easier to flip Needa's rank placement than mess with what is outside the window.

On another note: the sounds of the SDs crashing together in the bridge shot could have been the shields of both SDs hitting/repelling each other, as opposed to the physical bulk of the ships making any sort of contact themselves.

Monroville, I didn't go all the way and suggest using those actual 'nearer' unused Stardestroyer elements at the time, because the 'cockpit' shot in my above post is approx. 2 secs. long in itself, and then the intervening 'close-ups' of the crew are approx. 10 secs. long, on top of that.  During all this time, the Stardestroyers are coming towards the Falcon at an unknown rate, and the Falcon is certainly heading towards them at quite a rapid rate, as it's chased by the TIEs and 'Avenger' during this approx. 12 secs. 

Another thing to consider, is that during the full shot of that unused Stardestroyers one above, they seem to get 'nearer' to us pretty quickly over the approx. 2 secs. it lasts.  The shot above is the START of that shot, and below is the rest of it, to see what I mean:

The middle of the shot -

The end of the shot -

So it's hard to judge if these elements at the START of the shot (levelled off, more in line with each other) would seem too big to use or not, as a starting point in the 'cockpit' shot, at the size that they currently are.  But I do like the idea of how this could look and fit into the overall sequence from a 'visual' standpoint, considering the 'stately' speed of the Stardestroyers in the other shots anyway....only I reckon the 'starting' size should probably have been somewhere between the 2 sizes, to begin with, but I'm happy with whatever Adywan decides himself.

By the way, I really like that idea of yours that the 'crashing' sound is just the noise of the Stardestroyer's SHIELDS coming into contact with each other, rather than them actually coming into contact with each other and scraping the sides of each other.  That would have been good to see on the 'subtitles' rather than [Crash].  :)

On the other hand, if Adywan decides to add a subtle hint of 'debris' floating from the area where they might have actually collided a little, then that is neat too.  The choice is his.   

It might be nice to have an added TIE laserbolt to this 2 secs. long shot, considering that in the shots before and afterwards, the TIES are firing furiously at the Millennium Falcon.  In fact, just after Leia says "Saw what?" as Han starts to speak, there seems to be some kind of sound effect from outside the cockpit that could tie-in with this.  It would add subtly to the 'intensity' of the whole scene a little, just before the Millennium Falcon dives downwards. 

HotRod said:

ImpFighter...Dude..Way, way too much time spare!!  ;) 

Well my problem at the moment is that I don't have as much spare time as I'd like, to concentrate on this!  I actually have quite a hectic life between work and family life at the moment, which is getting in the way of contributing a few more things on the actual suggestions front yet.  I'm trying to get the wife to see just how 'theraputic' it is for me to work my way through certain....er....'issues' here, that I have with my favourite trilogy, and that I'm nearly there, but I don't think she's fully convinced yet.  Girls, eh? 

Just forgot to add that Adywan can't 'reverse' the other shots instead, as this would mess-up the 'arm' of the Millennium Falcon then!