aalenfae

I really love the effect this idea has on Anakin's character. Making him the by-the-book, "perfect soldier" is perfect for setting himself up to become Vader. Anakin renouncing his love and his emotions in favor of his own self-righteousness is much more effective and MUCH more tragic than the original movies would have it. 

Keep the ideas coming, Mithrandir.
Hopefully at some point, a spark of inspiration will hit me as to how I can harmonize this new Anakin throughout the PT.  

Just to clear up my side of the story:

• Angel was working in cooperation with somebody else to do an ANH redux.
• They were keeping it kinda secret (not TOO secret, as you can easily look at Angel's work on Deviantart) until more work had been completed.
• Basically, I think the goal was to replace every single effect and matte painting.
• I was helping Angel with VFX for a bit until he mysteriously disappeared. Not sure what's going to happen to his work now.  

Now that's put to bed... back to ESB:R discussion. 

Right. I'm not just cutting the bad stuff. And I'm not just leaving the stuff I like.
Sometimes, I've even cut out lines that I like. Sometimes I have to leave lines that I hate. Because my goal is to make the films work as best as I can make them work, with as little stupidity as possible. I honestly strive for balance.

 

The problem with larger cuts (and mine are already pretty large for this scene!) is that the scenes are already edited pretty tightly. Cutting larger amounts of material (apart from a few lines and stuff) tends to have the effect of making scenes feel unnaturally short, which is sometimes just as bad as the stupid stuff that was cut. 

There has to be a very fine balance between content and natural flow. If stuff feels cut out, it'll feel like an edit. And I want to avoid the "edited" feeling as much as possible.

Yeah, I've seen these, surely!
Unfortunately, it just makes one depressed to watch these. The ideas are good, but not feasible with the material. In this case, a complete remake is in order.

But I have my own plans for a complete re-imagining of the story. Maybe sometime in the future I'll release my scripts. Or make my own radio drama of the prequels. 

Yeah, I was about to say - Mithrandir cut the scene very well to make them seem like friends. The words they exchange in the apartment aren't "friendly", but they're almost kind of bickering. Like they're getting on one another's nerves, but they both want to accomplish the same goal. Just in their own way. It does indeed communicate friendship. 

Well, it looks like I have two scenes to play with today, haha.
I'll see what I can do about the landing at Coruscant scene, as per timdiggerm's comments. And I'll see what I can do about the elevator/apartment.  

I could understand if maybe Ric mentioned the chancellor more than a few seconds before he's introduced by Palpatine. But his line is obviously just added to assist the clueless audience who couldn't pick up on the "May I introduce Supreme Chancellor Valorum" just a few seconds into the scene.
Knowing who he is ahead of time doesn't change anything, except make us feel a little dumber when Ric starts narrating. We don't need a narrator to explain something that the characters are JUST about to explain. It's silly, and that's how it comes across in the original film.
Imagine if a random Rebel trooper said "There's Darth Vader boarding our ship!" when Darth Vader walked into the blockade runner in ANH. Sure, it'd help us know who the guy in black was... But in reality... we don't learn who Darth Vader is until seven minutes into the movie. And nobody's ever complained about that. 

Though, I do agree - after watching it a bit - that the landing sequence might seem a little dragged out. Especially the over-the-shoulder cockpit shot, which isn't too visually interesting. Might mess with that to improve the flow.

timdiggerm said:

aalenfae said:

Alllllllrighty guys!
Here's some progress I've made on TPM!
Finally something that's not very actiony.

Here's the heroes arriving at Coruscant in TPM.
This is essentially my first run-through with editing, so expect more changes and streamlining along the way.
http://vimeo.com/71182240

The removal of Ric's lines make it so we have no idea who the Chancellor is until the scene is almost over, not to mention the really long sweeping shots with nothing happening.

I kinda hope you're commenting a little tongue-in-cheek here, haha. The removal of random exposition (especially exposition that's restated in-context by the characters later - such as introducing the Chancellor) is a major goal of my edit.

And the soundmix is unfinished, so the really long sweeping shot feels much more lifeless than it will in the final cut. But I'd like the viewer just to appreciate the scenery a little bit. Like when Han and Leia arrive on Bespin. 

Now in response to the video I mysteriously didn't post here....
I can confidently say that I posted the video on vimeo, and literally while it was processing, I had a more radical idea for the scene.... which remains to be published. Keep posted, guys! :D 

TV's Frink said:

Please ignore the couple of minor rendering blips in the video, I checked the timeline and it has resolved itself.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QK7RmvSjBVo

Also, I should probably find a different shot right before the hanger door starts closing than the one out Anakin's cockpit.

You mean you're not gonna use the "we got 'em, R2!" line after he blows everything up? 

Ah, yes - I forgot about the time they actually use it in the film on the droid ship as Qui-Gon is cutting the door. 
That musical cue - as of now - is staying. So currently, in my existing edit, that's the first time we hear it.

I'm glad you like how the scenes are arranged.
One of the biggest reasons behind that was the fact that I hate hate HATE the taxi bit between the landing pad and Palpy's apartment. It just does not sit well with me. So I chopped it. But that brought up new issues with flow. So I went to Qui-Gon's line, and felt that was a really natural way to set up the Council scene. And that's how that idea was born.

Hmmm - I hadn't thought about that, actually.
But I'm pretty sure we'll be hearing the Force Theme on Tatooine somewhere.


And yeah, I'll be pitching her voice back up.
But the current work is only for demonstration. I'll be doing it a little more high-tech for the final version.

Alllllllrighty guys!
Here's some progress I've made on TPM!
Finally something that's not very actiony.

Here's the heroes arriving at Coruscant in TPM.
This is essentially my first run-through with editing, so expect more changes and streamlining along the way.
http://vimeo.com/71182240

Ahh, some very interesting work!
You definitely struck a chord with Anakin killing Dooku. Really ramps up the sensation of Anakin just murdering the guy. 

Requires a bit more work, but good job!


I'm currently working on hammering out some fine details with my dooku battle before I move on to something else. I can only work on something so long before moving on.

Surely - there's a great deal of power in implication.
But sometimes it seems like fanedits rely way too much on implication, and things just get confusing. 

In this case, it's not an issue. But it can get to be that way with certain things.

Yeah, I suppose I could make the time in-between seeing Dooku on the balcony and seeing him on the floor longer, and that'd fix everything.

Edit:
Alright, I've cut the scene up slightly differently, and I timed it and acted it out, and if Dooku's taking the stairs at a reasonably brisk pace, he'd reach the bottom in time.

Well - that kicking off the balcony has another problem - and that's the like... 3 jerky frames of Anakin teleporting down. My least favorite 3 jerky frames of the entire movie. 

But the problem with removing the flip - and even in Bob's edit (which is really clever!) - there's no drama to Dooku appearing, because we lose the shot of him strolling in like he owns the place.

But again, I'm looking for solutions. I'll figure this out.

I won't assert that the flow cannot be maintained without the flip, but I will say that there is very little material in the Dooku scene to begin with. It's already cut very closely, so to say, so there's a very limited number of things that can be done with the shots.

Dooku flipping down is a crucial moment in the pacing of the scene, but it doesn't have to be the flip. It just needs to be SOMEthing of Dooku, but it simply doesn't exist.
(I recently had the idea to film a guy in a Dooku costume stepping down the stairs from the knees-down, which would accomplish the same thing in a more down-to-earth way, but would be way more work than it's worth.)

I'm gonna be totally honest, and say that I've never actually had an issue with flipping Dooku. Crazy, I know. And I've mentioned that before, and got lectured on why it should go. All the arguments make sense, and I still don't really mind it xD

That being said, I've been making an effort to remove it from my edit - for the sole reason that it's distracting to viewers. I've removed some other things for the same reason.

So I will continue to look for the best solution to the flip. The best may not be favorable to everybody, though, as I'm far more concerned with pacing and natural flow than removing nitpicky details. 
What does the "best" solution look like? Well, I'm not sure yet. I have to explore all the options. But you can be assured that I'll explore every option I can think of. 

Okay, yeah - gotta address the Dooku flip.

I fixed it by removing him from the balcony altogether, and just having him strolling down the floor.
But... when I rearranged the scene for a more dramatic buildup - with the dialogue and all - it felt really awkward for him not to have his epic walking in. And in order to have that, he needs to be on the balcony, and it's weird to have him teleport.

However - I could go with Bob Garcia's approach, and have Dooku enter through a door on the ground level.

http://vimeo.com/70743656
Work continues on the Dooku duel! I leave you with the most recent version.
However, there is quite a bit of work yet to be done - especially in the music category.

Haha, I'm simply expanding on your idea!
I've totally cut this scene from my particular edit, but seeing how you've improved it with clever cuts and music... I almost want to put it back in!

Just an amendment, but MrInsaneA, I love your solution to getting Grievous out of there without the whole window exploding thing!

But I felt it was cut kind of awkwardly. 
Maybe this might work in a more fluid way?
http://vimeo.com/70733599

Yeah, the music is perfect! Same for the Attack of the Clones clip. 
It's amazing just how much atmosphere you can add just by changing the music. 

And I don't think Ben Burtt was ever drunk on any power. The only issue is that he didn't do nearly as much original work for RotS, using almost entirely existing sounds, so some of the sound design is somewhat bland or uninspired.

I myself am not totally sold on the cuts. 
I wanted to make an opening that had zero exposition. I'd save that for the opening crawl. In ANH, we didn't need a shot of an imperial officer saying "Princess Leia's ship is dead ahead!", because the action was explained ahead of time. 

However, I'm not totally sure about losing almost the entire action sequence in the beginning.

Hey everybody! It's been a while, but I recently had some crazy inspiration, I suppose. What if the opening scene of RotS was REALLY short? Well, as I was listening to ESB music today, I had the thought to match up the scene with some Battle of Hoth music. 

http://vimeo.com/70160554