skyjedi2005 wrote:
I think there was a work in progress cgi x-wing on the John Knoll books cdrom meant for when they started discussion early in the nineties the special edition.
I think it was called 365 days or something, just a lol quality animated computer model i think. Not sure if its the same as the one none suggested but probably it is.
Not what I was suggesting good remembering. Have the book, will dig it out.
3 pages here's the text:
pg. 114
A New Hope Special Edition
From 1993 to 1994, I (John Knoll) experimented with the idea of using off-the-shelf software to create computer-generated (CG) final shots. I made an X-wing CG model and some TIE fighter models,and created a four-second-long dogfight. It was a fun shot but it was also a technology test: Can one do stuff like this with off-the-shelf software? I thought it came out pretty well and eventually showed it to George. I really didn't know him all that well then, and he just said, "Yeah. Hmm," and that was the end of that.
At te time, I had some strong opinions about how the ILM computer graphics department should operate., It had been built up around the idea of doing really complex creature work. Terminator 2: Judgement Day (1991) and Jurassic Park (1993) had been the big landmark films that we were famous for - but we didn't have any good way of doing some of the things that inexpensive commercial systems could do. We just weren't geared toward creating simpler hard-surface shots (vehicles, metal textures, etcetera) since we didn't have trained hard-surface modelers. Everything went through the creature pipeline instead, which was great for doing these really complex things that nobody else could do, but we couldn't compete when creating simpler objects. Consequently, the numbers we bid for hard-surface CG shots were astronomical (like all visual effects houses, ILM made bids for films; depending on a variety of factors, we then either get the assignment or not).
When we were starting up on the Special Edition of Star Wars, visual effects producer Tom Kennedy already had pinned to his office wall a whole bunch of space-battle storyboards from A New Hope that George wanted to redo. So I said, "Tom, I want to take a crack at a couple of these." He was a little skeptical, and decided to do a parallel test. We picked two shots that were technically equivalent - I would do one of them my way, and the computer graphics department would do the other one their way. I spent a little over a day animating mine, another day lighting it, and another day running the renders and putting the composite together. Meanwhile, the test over in computer graphics went on for about two and a half weeks; they were making slow progress and eventually the plug was pulled. (Top right, my test footage from 1993; middle right, the CG department's attempt; bottom right, a quick preview render for one of the Special Edition's new shots, known as "SB1"' opposite, a grid of Special Edition final frames.)
The next step was to show George. He was pretty happy with it, so I go the contract. "Okay." he said. "You want all these shots? They're yours."
pg.115
The Empire Strikes Back Special Edition
I had just finished the final "final" on The Empire Strikes Back Special Edition. It was a Friday (in January 1997) and I was at ILM's wrap party for A New Hope Special Edition. There were tents in the courtyard, everyone was having a good time, and I ran into George, who said - and this was exactly six days before we were supposed to ship the last CG film out for Empire - "I have one more shot I want to do for Empire. But we can talk abut it Monday."
And I said, "No, no - we have to talk about this now! What is it?"
"After Han's Falcon is parked on the Star Destroyer," he said, "it's not clear that Boba Fett is in the junk, and that's he's following Han. I think we need one more shot in there to explain what's going on."
So that night I went home and got out my Art of The Empire Strikes Back book and used it as reference for a really quick CG model of Boba Fett's ship, Slave 1. I paired that with an already constructed CG Millennium Falcon model.
Over the weekend I cobbled together an animatic (a three-dimensional digital storyboard) of Slave 1 clandestinely following the Falcon, and showed it to George on Monday (top right, a wire-frame of BG1 - the "Boba Fett one" shot). He had a couple of comments on the timing, so we started a revision. Meanwhile, Rod Woodall had been working, as a prersonal projct, on building a detailed CG model of Slave 1, so I got him to ive me a copy with the textures. The rest of that Monday we worked on the shot revision, also completing the CG version of Slave 1. On Tuesday morning, I showed George the revision of the animatic, and he approved it. The afternoon was spent lighting the shot, and by the end of the evening I was pretty much satisfied. I spent Wednesday continuing to light and render elements. Thursday, I put the comp together, and filmed it Thursday night. We screened the completed version Friday morning , and George gave it the final thumbs-up (bottom right, final frame). If anything had gone wrong during that weekmk we wouldn't missed the deadline. (Other sequences were also enhanced in The Empire Strikes Back Special Edition. Opposite, Howie Weed in the wampa suit.)
pg.116
Rreturn of the Jedi Special Edition
The Coruscant celebration shot, which appears at the very end of the Special Edition version of Return of the Jedi, was something I really wanted to do. For a long time there have been talk about the conceptualization of this particular planet, which is one big city. In fact, Ralph McQuarrie had done paintings of it quite a while back. Coruscant promised to be really different from anything that had been depicted in Star Wars before.
The final shot was a mixtures of elements. Some of the Coruscant buildings - three or four - were built as miniatures, and Brian Flora did the matte paintings. The whole plaza had to be populated with extras, so we did a live-action shoot on the main stage. I designed the camera movements, and got approval from George. We used one of our track cameras switched over to a servos, so we could really haul down the track. We had scaffolding building and put the heavy motion-control dolly track on top of it, about twelve feet off the floor, which meant we had this three-thousand-pound camera just careening down the track - it was a big, scary thing to watch. By the time we got to the mid-point of the shot, the camera was probably going over fifteen miles per hours. But that was necessary be cause it was a sixty-foot move that covered a lot of ground. It was the longest and most complicated shot I did on the three Special Editions; creating and putting all the elements together took about a month. (Right, final frames; opposite, the scene in Jabba's throne room was also enhanced in the Return of the Jedi Special Edition.)
doubleofive wrote: I have scans of all of those magazines
If someone's got the Cinefex 69, would love to read them.
(there's a one frame red window frame under Chewie in these comparisons, haven't noticed this before. Might be specific to this video.)
