TheDerider

Gotcha. I still think that there's something about the way we see so many speeders in that shot that it loses some of the impact, and if there was a way to have less of them while maintaining continuity I would prefer it (as you can tell, I had trouble with the continuity of that scene even looking at the Despecialized version, where I saw five in one shot, but could only track four throughout most of the battle). These are just my opinions less on the logic of the scene, and more on the feeling it might inspire for the viewer. But it is just that, my preference and opinion, not an attempt to offer an edict or attack the fine work you've done, and I want to be very careful and clear about that. The clip got me even more pumped for release. You rock.

I watched the clip and I was completely blown away by how much work went in to this. Improving the stop-motion on the AT-ATs was incredible, and a lot of the things we take for granted in modern movies being added was just fantastic.

I did feel there was one place that went a little too far, which was the snowspeeder count. In the clip we see, at least, there's a very clear count of four speeders (save for the "Echo Station Fox Seven" shot), and it further emphasizes the impressiveness of the fight by showing how under-equipped and inventive the Rebellion is. With the additional speeders, whom we do not see during that fight, some of that impressiveness is lost for the sake of one shot. If there are more speeders for the sake of continuity that I'm unaware of, I'm not sure it would really be that many.

In terms of the AT-STs... I'm honestly not sure why they're there in that reveal shot. Maybe I'm missing something. I'm not the biggest Star Wars guy around. But in these clips the AT-STs aren't serving any purpose in the battle. But more importantly, they're taking away some of the impact of the AT-AT shot. Basically, the Rebel base is a small, carved ice cave, nice as it might be.There's an important focus on the cramped feeling in the framing during the Base scenes. They're a blip in the ice, barely scraping by. Even the initial confrontation was with a wampa, a large beast: But off-screen, and even then not much bigger than Luke.

And then we see the AT-ATs. These huge, behemoth things that dwarf the snowspeeders on a scale of at least ten to one. If they chose, just one of them could crush the Rebel base by walking over it.

And there's five of them.

By having the smaller AT-STs in the frame of that particular shot, you lose some of that "Oh God" impact by having your eye drawn to these smaller mechs, and the scale is lost.

I dunno. Maybe it's just me. It makes, as far as I can tell, two cameos in the Battle of Hoth. In both cases they feel like something that could be removed altogether without losing anything related to the story or atmosphere.

While saying that, I want to strongly impress that I love the work you've done here, and that I will be a day-one watcher of ESB:R and ROTJ:R. Your talent and skill is stunning and we are all lucky to have you working on this project.

Studio space.

Update from facebook regarding some of the Third Unit's role in production and why they're asking for donations for studio space.

"As Gordon has said , the shots needed are to replace either bad compositing blue screen work or for a specific added shot. There will be no added scenes (well maybe but only for the special features and not to be included in the movie). Acouple of the things that will be shot by the 3rd unit will be Vader, to replace the terribly composited hologram during the Hoth battle, Vader for a shot near the end where i originally used a shot from ROTS, but the CG cape used in that shot in ROTS is horrendous and a few other shots, including one for a teaser for the prequels:Revisited - Adywan"

Perhaps a dummy youtube account without appropriate tags, or simply a livestream chat for OT.com members for the purposes of this kind of video?

I'm not so much debating the merit of the scenes as much as I am curious if anyone has tried. I don't have access to the discs right now so I can't give any sort of critical eye as to their shape, but I was still curious. It seems like they would be a valuable resource both for this edit and others.

That said, I just about weep watching the medical center scene and knowing it's cut though. It's probably my favorite moment of straight up human interaction in the movie, and it FELT missing in the finished version of Empire. Not having Luke say that he's leaving makes the whole thing feel sudden and abrupt, and it was one of my biggest qualms with the movie originally. If there was any one thing I wished in Empire Revisited, anything at all, it would be that some version of that scene remained, subtext and the reveal in Jedi be damned.

And no, I don't have ANY illusions that such a thing would happen.

I am extremely excited for both a taste of the Complete Saga and for the edit of Empire. Particularly because I watched Return of the Jedi's theatrical restoration yesterday, it got me thinking about what modern technology can do to movies. Adywan, I want you to know that there will be a weekend devoted entirely to Star Wars, and it is in large part your fault. :)

Additionally, I wasn't quite sure where to put this question, so I thought I would ask here, because it is related to Adywan's edits...

Has anyone made efforts to perform restoration on the deleted scenes in the Blu-Ray? I know it's an entirely different form of work than color correction, much more extensive, but it seems possible. Just very difficult. It's beyond my scope of knowledge to say what exactly needs to be done, but I just wanted to know if it had been attempted by adywan or anyone else. And yes, I am asking in large part because of 'that' lightsaber scene.

Apologies if I am off-topic.

Hope you don't mind a question/suggestion from a first time poster, and a bit of gushing... I recently watched The Empire Strikes Back for the first time since... well, the 1997 Special Edition re-release (which was my very first Star Wars experience), using Harmy's Theatrical Reconstruction. I watched A New Hope Revisited last week, and I could not have been more impressed. Even as a kid I knew the New Hope Jabba scene was ridiculous, and I honestly look back at it as the reason I never got in to Star Wars the way so many people have. I can't wait to watch the completed, Revisited OT with fresh eyes.

One thing stuck out to me for Empire Strikes Back, and while I have read a lot of this topic, I don't know if this has been brought up in the last 1002 pages, but it wasn't in your original post for specified changes...

In the Theatrical Reconstruction (I do NOT know if it is in any other edition), the scene where Han is frozen in carbonite had a continuity error where Han changes outfits, specifically during the 'I love you' exchange. I know for certain that it happens twice, once with 'I love you' and once with his reaction shot of his cuffs being tightened. In the long shots, he's in the white shirt, in the close-ups he has his vest.

Is this something you are aware of, willing to fix, capable of fixing?

And a really huge, sincere thank you for all the hard work you're putting in to this edit.