muddyknees2000

I've asked Ady about this scene because I am bothered by a whole different issue here.....but he has said that the audio doesn't exist in separated channels for this to be reverted back to a more original form.....so unfortunately it has to stay as is.

yoda1138 said:

Any plans for a stop motion Nobby spider as a background element?

 No plans for a stop motion nobby spider as a background element.

ben_danger said:

I seem to remember one April Fools day, Adywan posting about his hard drive breaking and losing some essential stuff. I laughed... but it turned out to be true.

There seems to be a new trend of bad luck around this time of year...

asterisk8 said:

(Does it take anyone else a long time after clicking "reply with quote" for the page to load? It's seems like it's always been very slow for me. Too slow to wait this time.)

 Had been like that for me for a couple of months....only just stopped doing it yesterday.....so now it loads more or less like any normal page should...maybe just a bit slower.

DF Shadow said:

Keep in mind even ESB (darkest movie in the saga) had some lighter moments here and there to break the tension.

 Because ESB doesn't come out of the dark at the end.....it ends dark. ROTJ has a happy ending, and so can afford to feel a little more dire until we get there.

Bingowings said:

When Luke comes back and Leia is missing Han orders them to stay put while he, the remainder of the command staff and two brightly coloured, reflective noisy machines go off to be captured for plot reasons.

 Yup, Han flips a switch and that part of the film just turns off until he gets back. They weren't supposed to be captured, so the rebel troops wouldn't have expected them to be gone for so long....and were they supposed to attack the shield generator that day? Or was the plan to wait till the next day all along? The story structure really falls apart (again) as soon as they're captured by the Ewoks.

ray_afraid said:

No no, that's after the battle. I mean where are they when Han & Co. are caught in the net, about to be eaten ect.

 Yeah, I've got a write up about that waiting to present it to Ady when we get there. Basically that whole segment feels like the film just stops....there's no tension, and it would be very easy to inject some back in with a few simple shots.

-The Endor strike team completely disappears from when Luke, Han, Chewie and the droids find Leia's discarded helmet until the morning of the attack on the bunker. Perhaps a few cutaway scenes to explain where they've been and what they're doing during the night (this is easy to do as it does not require any main characters and can be accomplished by shooting extras in Endor gear). Additionally this next part of the film is missing crucial types of shots/scenes that make up basic film mechanics and make for good story flow, so these additions wouldn't be just for the sake of adding something new, there's an actual structural reason for including them. My suggestions are as follows:

 

    a) The scene where Luke leaves the Ewok village to turn himself in to Vader is immediately followed by the scene where he is delivered into Vader's hands. Usually a film has whats called a cutaway shot, or scene, to allow for the passage of time in the viewer's mind, but in this instance it is lacking. A simple night scene of some rebels in a hideout or encampment, hunkered down, staying out of sight, perhaps as an AT-ST goes by in the distance. They could even be discussing how they've received a message from Han and co. about where to meet the next morning to attack the shield generator. (as mentioned, this does not have to be a full scene with dialogue if you do not want it to be, but can all be achieved in one shot of the rebels hiding from the Empire during the night...simply to allow for some time to pass so that it is generally believable that Luke has had the time to turn himself in)

 

    b) Vader tells the AT-AT commander who delivers Luke to "continue his search", then has his conversation with Luke and then in the next scene Han and co. have joined back up with the other rebels and are already on the attack. The attack scene starts off WAY too suddenly. What is missing in the beginning of the "attack on the bunker" scene is a series of establishing shots. Sentries or scouts watching distant Imperial movements, engineers setting up traps or mines (perhaps with the help of Ewoks), men gathering their equipment for the battle ahead or taking down their camp and just generally getting ready (or perhaps THIS is where you'd want to put a quick shot of someone running up to the rebel in charge to tell him that Han has made contact). All of this could be done in early morning hours....maybe with some mist....and THEN you have the opening shot of Chewie, Han and Leia peering over the fallen tree at the landing platform a little later in the morning.

 

    OR c) Both. (This section of the film not only does not have enough coverage on some of the background elements but is also rather badly edited in my opinion. When Han and co. are with the Ewoks its almost as if the story in progress just stops, and the Empire ceases to be a threat.....almost as if the Ewok village is a secret dimension or a place that the Empire cannot get to. Even when Vader tells his commander to "continue his search" you never see the consequences of that order. There is no feeling of urgency for them to get the shield down for the imminent attack. That sense of drama/suspense only comes back the next day when the attack starts. If there were a few cutaway shots of the Empire hunting through the forest for the rebels at night or some Ewoks avoiding Imperials in the dark woods it would add that ever so slight reminder that the Imperial forces are still out there looking for them) Using both these scenes adds some suspense back into the film at a point when all suspense virtually disappears, but it also has an interesting side effect, in that it increases the surprise when the Emperor's "best troops" show up at the bunker. If you show the Rebels interacting with the Imperials during the night, and then prepping for battle the following morning, you're building a sense of apprehension and/or suspense for the coming battle....and don't forget, at this point the Rebels think they're attacking the shield generator head on, so they think they have quite a fight in front of them, but then there's the relief of finding out that there's a back door, and probably a much smaller fight (that they can probably easily win). So we're torn from worry, to relief, and then back to worry when the Imperial troops show up after all. It adds more impact to a scene already in the film if you make a couple of small additions probably totaling no more than 10-15 seconds of screen time.

darth_ender said:

 I am a bigger George defender than many on this site.  He has said (yes, he's said lots of things) that he intended to have the droids in all 9 films, even years ago before he began denying that he ever had plans for 9 films.  I'm a bigger fan of George's true original vision than the one he has promulgated in more recent years.  I think it's not such a bad idea.  It's sort of a link between movies.  The problem is that the droids probably should have somehow introduced us to the main characters as they did in ANH.  Somehow the plot follows them for a bit till we met Obi-Wan (who should have been the main character of the whole PT anyway).  Sadly, I see no way to pull this idea off, but it would have been the best way to use them if one were to use them in the PT.

 I know Ady has said that he's toying with the idea of having 3P0 only show up in Ep III........but an alternative idea would be to have them both around from the very beginning but not necessarily together from Ep I. Possibly have them both present but never meeting in TPM, actually meet in AOTC, and then together for the whole of ROTS.

timdiggerm said:

I spent several minutes trying to think of an explanation for the Jabba plan.

It's worse than the convoluted Dark Knight & Skyfall situations

 Yeah, it's pretty bad.....I'm hoping Ady's wanting to clear it up somewhat, and I have an outline prepared as to how it could be achieved in very few steps.

EDIT: 005...I always liked that vid.....it lays out the problem quite effectively.

DF Shadow said:

Considering all the work being put into the wing flaps I'm sure they will look awesome in motion. Was that an idea of Ady's to change or something that one of us suggested along the way?

 I believe it was something he wanted to do from the beginning, but was unsure if he'd be able to achieve it at that early time.

Possessed said:

Not knocking the film or anything, just think you are overthinking things a bit! Just enjoy the movie, did any of this bother you when you first saw the film?

 Yes, and clearly this is a film we've watched more than just the one time......otherwise a project like this probably wouldn't exist.......and those little niggling details will stand out all the more upon each repeated viewing.

Personally I don't look at it so much from an in-universe standpoint as I do a film-making one. If the rebels just weren't shown after we find out their weapons are useless (until we see them retreating later) I'd have much less problem with it.......but the fact that they're continually shown to us, fighting some phantom battle, has just always raised flags for me.

Discussion is the best thing that happens here, so no worries there.

Prior to the battle...no, no-one COULD have known. But the ground troops would have figured it out VERY quickly, and then Luke's announcement to the same effect is made for the audience...very early on in the battle....and yet for the entire rest of the sequence we get shots of rebel troops firing away (aiming horizontally over the ground as well). That's often bothered me. I always felt they needed something to be shooting at once they figure out that their weapons are ineffective against the armour advancing on them....and yet keep shooting.

.Mac. said:

I can understand what you mean Muddy, how it seems like the Rebel troops were still hopelessly plugging away at the end and dying for no reason... but for me that IS what works perfectly from a visual storytelling standpoint... it emphasizes how outmatched the Rebels were to the Imperials and yet they desperately did ANYTHING they could to try to stop/delay the behemoth walkers...

 We'll have to agree to disagree then. I totally get that the battle is supposed to feel hopeless. It's supposed to end in defeat for the rebs, but as it stands now the battle isn't hopeless......it's pointless. As a commander you don't send your troops out to certain death if there is absolutely zero to be gained from it (you hold them back to fight another day when you might actually have an effect). They're sent out as a delaying action....but none occurs. If they could have slowed them down even a little then there might have been SOME point in sending them out.....but the walkers are completely unaffected by the ground troops and get within range of the shield generator in exactly the same amount of time they would have had there not been ANY ground troops. I think the film fails on this visual level in that it showed a very one sided battle. We have all kinds of shots of ground troops firing away....but they've nothing to shoot at, as their weapons are completely ineffectual (something they'd have discovered VERY early on in the fight, and a point which is driven home when Luke says that even the snowspeeder's weapons are not strong enough). 

And having enemy ground troops would actually have enhanced the hopelessness of the battle.....take out as many of them as you like, those lumbering behemoths towering above them are still coming at you and there's nothing you can do about it. You've done the best you can do, and yet you're still going to fail.

doubleofive said:

Dammit Muddy, you're not supposed to post images from the workprint! ;-)

 I just felt that it was in the spirit of the conversation ;)

BlueCardinal said:

After all, the huge bodies of those AT-AT's wouldn't just be used for carrying refreshments.

 WRONG!

http://laughingsquid.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/8895519208_f3ebb6bd55_z.jpg

I agree that shots should not be added.....I had hoped, however, that troops would be worked into existing shots. They'd be tiny to small in the shots...but it WOULD have given the rebels a reason to have all been plugging away until the end of the battle. The battle is super busy and involved on the rebel side....but when you switch over to the imperials they're just lumbering on....not at all bothered by the shooting that is going on. The rebels on the ground should have been shown having SOME effect....even if it WAS just to stall/delay. They need to die for a reason. Right now they die for NO reason.

Again, I sound like I'm still pushing for this....but I'm not. I'm simply pointing out what, to me, seems like a major flaw in the visual storytelling of the battle sequence. Guys in a trench with rifles aren't shooting at armored vehicles.

BlueCardinal said:

Sure, they probably didn't expect snowspeeders to be able to knock them down with tow cables, but they could easily stomp and pick off any Rebel ground troops in their way, whose blasters aren't going to do any good.

 Exactly why it makes the rebel ground troops' presence there completely pointless. The way I saw it you've got the big walkers for the heavy lifting...the chickens to protect the big ones....and the ground troops to protect the chickens. The rebs needed something to be shooting at...otherwise they're just wasting their time (and dying while doing it).....but the point IS rather moot as Ady has said he's not doing it.

DarkRha said:

Either way I'm sure the edit will be awesome

 The last full workprint I've seen was from early Jan.....and since then a few clips and images here and there.....and I can assure you that it will be.

DarkRha said:

I saw that someone on facebook suggested adding Imperial ground troops during the battle of hoth for scaling purposes, however I like the idea of ground troops only because it will make sense of the rebel ground troops in the trenches since there is no way they could take down the walkers with their blasters alone. Just random ramble as I wait for the final masterpiece!

 I had pushed for this same thing as I also felt that once the rebs knew that their blasters were ineffective against the walkers they were pretty much there for nothing and not really delaying anything. I had suggested not to incorporate any new shots, but to simply include ground troops into existing ones.....but I don't think Ady's going to do it. It's not his preference for this edit.

Sweet!

The Terminator said:

 Adywan, I apologize for getting your balls twist in a knot. 

 You were told that profiting off of something like this was against site policy AND copyright laws.....and you responded by saying that you were going to do it anyways. You only changed your tune and "apologized" when everybody started telling you what a douche you were for endangering the project by insisting on profiting off of this edit. And I think it's more than clear that apologizing for someone else "getting their balls in a twist" is not really an apology at all.

Somebody should have replaced George between ROTJ and TPM.

Allow me to clarify that. The SHOOTING of the new canyon is complete. Integrating it into the film is still ongoing.