Possessed

Yeah man, sounds great.  And no rush either, I mean as long as I have it by the time I'm done with the edit it'll be the same :)

And just to be clear I'm scratching the idea about removing mentioning tatooine, just use the same text.  Thanks

Hmm that would help too. I'll try that.

And for the crawl, I say use MSHasllets original wording, and use the correct starfield if possible.  I much prefer your original better, the line "Luke seeks the guidance of Yoda" is much too matter of fact and simple, I think your first one was fine.

Yes but I can't use the crawl unless the starfield matches that of the opening shot of rotj.

And like I said we could just remove mention of them already being on tatooine, and then I could use the menu shot without rotoscoping.  Because that's not going to happen.

Edit: Actually I don't know if it's usable.  I mean it's a nice shot, but its really really short, I think the EPIV shot works just fine.

And how could I work this new crawl into the movie? The starfields are different, is there anyway, TML, you could redo the crawl and remove mention of the friends already being on tatooine, and use the starfield from the opening shot of ROTJ?

Something like:

"But Luke's friends desperately await his help in their plan to rescue han..."

Hmm, your right I guess the shots of luke leaving degobah aren't needed.  And I bet the suspensful music could fade into the imperial march of the DSII scene really nicely.

And hmm, I want to have the shot of the falcon and the xwing on the planet, otherwise we won't know where the droids come from.

Maybe we could alter the craw again to remove mention of anybody already being on tatooine, and just use the menu shot of the xwing and falcon entering tatooine and then show them parked, and then cut to the droids?

Are there any ideas of a better piece to use as transition fanfares? I liked the piece I originally had but that's when the transition was straight from degobah to tatooine and instead of two short transitions it was one long one.  Now that I had to cut off the cue halfway through, it sounds awkward.  And From DSII to Tatooine, I like having the music from the original song fading into the film score but going from the DSII music itself into that needs something thats I guess kindof a "medium" between the dark and the light, and I guess that would be a good place to use Luke's theme too.  And there's little motion in the last DSII shot, so I'm sure I could slow down the frame rate unnoticeably.  And the matte shots... a matte shot.  I can make it as long as I want.

TML said:

Possessed said:

Oh snaps, I have no idea how to make a crawl.

Since I'm a nice person, I'll make you one.

For now, I'll just do a little test with this:

MTHaslett said:

Briefly avail-- here is the crawl I quickly came up with. (More thorough reply later):

 

Shaken by his disastrous battle with DARTH VADER,

young LUKE SKYWALKER flies to Degobah to seek

guidance from YODA, his Jedi Master, before rejoining

his friends on Tatooine. But Luke's friends desperately

await his help to rescue HAN SOLO from the

clutches of ruthless gangster, JABBA THE HUTT.

 

Little do they realize... (etc.)

 

But tell me what you want for the crawl if your happy with what I do... (It'll be done by the end of the day)

Thank you so much man, that will help me alot.  And yeah, what MTHasslet came up with is fine for the paragraph.

If someone wants to make an ending credits sequence for me, I'll put your name in the credits, and MTHasslet too and everyone else that helped me with ideas or whatnot.  If not I'm fine to leave the original credits, but I shall give all you guys credit in the cover art and I'll make sure your name is mentioned everywhere that the edit becomes available at.

Yeah, the transitions do kinda suck.

And I might just put the yoda scene back to the way it was.  It seems off because that line about him being a jedi was taken from closer to where he dies so I guess his voice is more horse.

And what was so hard to follow about the ben scene?  The only things I cut were: "You told me vader betrayed and murdered my father", but since Ben immediately starts talking about his father I think it can be inferred that he knows luke was talking about his father.

And the only other things I cut were lines about "a certain point of view".  Everything else is the same.

But I'm starting to get overwhelmed, every change I make results in me having to change something else to compensate and I'm getting way out of my league.  Creating new sequences and transitions, I'm not used to doing that.  And frankly I don't have the time.  And schools about to start again so you guys can expect the same lack of activity soon I'm afraid.  I might have to put the scenes back in the original order just to get this out.

Nobody noticed I replaced Lukes stale performance of "Why didn't you tell me?" with a more angry sounding lift from esb that also matches his facial expressions better? :)

And are there any suggestions for the planet transitions?

Oh snaps, I have no idea how to make a crawl.

It isn't perfect, but here is the promised preview.

http://rapidshare.com/files/439998250/return_of_the_jedi_opening_preview.avi

It's quite long for a preview clip, it includes more than I originally anticipated.

That's a good idea, if you've ideas of things in between there that could be cut I'm interested.

Vaderios:Yes, but you forget that I have no absolutely no idea how to do any of that.  Unless somebody wants to do this shot for me, it will have to just be a slow zoom in on the painting with a little film grain.  I don't have the time or ability to do any of this.

And MTHasslet, you do have some good ideas, and I'm sure I will use some of them.  I will retain the first bit of the wicket and Leia scene I think.  As for Vader, I have no problem with his personality in this movie, at all.  I always assumed that having connection with his son had drastically altered his view on everything.  He had plans before, but harming his son and then connecting to him with the force sort of softened him up a bit.

Most, if not all of ewok silliness will be removed.  They will be in the final battle, but mainly on their serious shots will stay.  (Which means, when they reveal themselves, when they kill something, and when they get killed themselves). No more will wicked hit himself in the face with a rock and strangely have no damage done to his face.

vaderios said:

Possessed said:

And thanks alot Angel that's perfect.  And this edit's going to be a DVD, so being displayed at 720 X 480 I don't see why it should need clean up.  Just color altering.  And would you care to enlighten me to DE's camera projection technique?  Because the slow zoom doesn't work that well, it still just looks like a slow zxoom in on a still image.

http://originaltrilogy.com/forum/topic.cfm/The-Darth-Editous-Episode-IV-DVD-Info-and-Feedback-Thread-a-partially-de-specialed-DVD/post/406851/#TopicPost406851

I think it will work well for a subtle shot like this.

Still tho if you want to go with the pure OT route, any matte is static with a fake zoom with it.

Blowing sand some moving clouds or some human elements from an other source placed in the distance might give life to the matte.

I hope you will consider to erase/replace the black hole in the mountain (where supposed to be a cave?) because it distracts the eye from the ships.

 

-Angel

Thanks.  That does look good, but I wouldn't know how to do that.  Or how to add sand blowing.  I'm just an editor.

I might see if I can find a way to cut the whole.  Maybe since the painting is much higher res than a standard DVD I could just crop out the sides?  That way the hole wouldn't be there and the ships would appear closer to the camera.

I was actually planning on cutting the luke/vader conversation exactly as it was in the preview clip I posted, and what went out in the draft.  I quite like the way it turned out and I think his lines take a better tone in the way I've arranged it.

I think so too

That's not a bad idea, about using the shot from a new hope and then cutting to the unused shot.  That's alot of wipes in a row though, do you guys think a regular crossfade could work?  I mean, there's one in a new hope I don't see why just one in Return of the Jedi would be so bad, and I think it would work alot better than a wipe.

And thanks alot vaderios that's perfect.  And this edit's going to be a DVD, so being displayed at 720 X 480 I don't see why it should need clean up.  Just color altering.  And would you care to enlighten me to DE's camera projection technique?  Because the slow zoom doesn't work that well, it still just looks like a slow zxoom in on a still image.

Erik, nice idea indeed!

So I'm going to make you guys a nice little preview for waiting so long.  I was thinking just the edited film as is right now from the beginning up until the droids enter the palace.  (Now remember, this now includes the degobah scenes as well)

Thanks, with some color tweaking I think that will be usable.

Erikstormtrooper said:

Possessed said:

Sluggo said:

The music sounds great!

 I think the clip works fine without the orbital shot of Tatooine.  It is R2 and 3PO out in the desert.  Where else would it be other than Tatooine?  If you wanted to announce it is Tatooine through the music instead of a visual, you could drop in a very small segment of music from the original Star Wars score from when the droids were wandering in the Jundland Wastes.

Well, see from a storytelling point of view it looks fine.  The main reason I added it was just to slow things down a bit.  Imagine how fast that would be, that would have the story literally jumping from luke and r2 on degobah and r2 and 3p0 on tatooine in the span of about 9 seconds.  Now with the orbital shot, it's at least 15! lol.  You're right tho, it doesn't look very good.  Maybe I should replace it with a generic shot of just a desert of tatooine?  Would be a better establishing shot and still slow the pace down.

What about a slow zoom in on the matte painting of the X-Wing and Falcon parked in the desert? Could that work as an establishing shot?

Yes that would be great... I didn't know such a thing existed.  Could you point me in it's direction?

(Sorry, I really don't know much about star wars other than whats in the movies and what I've happened to read here)

Yeah but then I'll just have the same problem later with them all zipping from tatooine to the rebel briefing.

Sluggo said:

The music sounds great!

 I think the clip works fine without the orbital shot of Tatooine.  It is R2 and 3PO out in the desert.  Where else would it be other than Tatooine?  If you wanted to announce it is Tatooine through the music instead of a visual, you could drop in a very small segment of music from the original Star Wars score from when the droids were wandering in the Jundland Wastes.

Well, see from a storytelling point of view it looks fine.  The main reason I added it was just to slow things down a bit.  Imagine how fast that would be, that would have the story literally jumping from luke and r2 on degobah and r2 and 3p0 on tatooine in the span of about 9 seconds.  Now with the orbital shot, it's at least 15! lol.  You're right tho, it doesn't look very good.  Maybe I should replace it with a generic shot of just a desert of tatooine?  Would be a better establishing shot and still slow the pace down.

Which one transition do you find rough?  Because to be quite honest I'm very pleased with how I put the cue from AOTC in to the end of the Ben scene.  Now transitioning to the tatooine scene I agree is very rough and I was planning on dealing with that tomorrow, so I hope that's what your talking about.

I just cut out all the "informalities" after lando and han's discussion and make it just mainly the information the rebels are being given.  It just goes by now that you don't really think about Luke.  After all, it's not like hes running the briefing so there's no real need for him to be an active member of it. We can just assume he's somewhere listening. 

Does anyone else have opinions on the clip? If it works I will use it but I'm just worried it comes across as moving way too fast.

Oh dear.  It turned out rather Prequel-y.  Maybe because of the music I used.  And it's really fast.  Bascically it sucks but I'm posting it anyway because I spent all afternoon on it.  I might have to just change it back to the original order and move on with my life... involving this edit.

http://rapidshare.com/files/438588715/Flight_to_degobah.avi