sherlockpotter

Hey all, happy holidays!

Exciting news: according to my notes, all major scenes are now complete! Thank you to everyone for your feedback on the test clips I’ve shared over the months; it’s been a great help. I am trying to keep a few scenes under wraps until release - mainly because I think it will improve your enjoyment if there are still a few surprises in store!

So, what am I working on now? Since the beginning of this project, I’ve been isolating each scene into separate timelines for safety purposes (e.g. so I won’t accidentally desync the entire film if I bump the wrong clip). At this point, I’m going through and stitching all of those individual scenes together into the Master Timeline - which includes final edit checks, sound mixing, mapping audio to the correct output channels, etc. I also plan on including a subtitle track, which I’ll have to write.

Because I’m locking the edit down, any remaining Kijimi audio submissions must be submitted by next Friday, January 3rd. Additionally, there are still a few pending shots that need some VFX touchups. I promise, the VFX aren’t too intensive or unrealistic; they’re just beyond my own ability. So if you know how to do VFX, please consider reaching out!!

Also, as a holiday treat, here’s a bonus clip: Rey and Leia in the hangar. This scene ended up being much more complex than I had anticipated. First of all, I wanted to restructure their conversation so that the emphasis was on “Rey not feeling like herself,” which foreshadows the rest of the film. Also, because I’ve pushed the training course sequence to later, that means that BB-8 has not been damaged yet, and so I’ve had to edit around all of his broken plating for continuity.

https://streamable.com/qgwqf2

Hi all, as Hal pointed out, the original AI voice I was using for Sith3PO didn’t maintain the British accent. Ironically, the voice was derived from the theatrical 3PO voice clips; but no matter what I tried, the AI wouldn’t spit out a British line reading.

So, I’ve come up with an alternative option. Hopefully it’s a bit better? https://streamable.com/4zl2l6

Ha! It is an AI 3PO voice, with custom audio effects applied. I figured that would be the best way to make it sound emotionless and inhuman; but if this one sounds too off-the-mark, I’ll redo it… maybe making sure the AI preserves his natural accent. 😉

Much appreciated, Hal!

Rey’s line isn’t AI; but she says it very softly, and I think the music just has such a huge crescendo there that it’s drowning out the dialogue. I’ll work on improving the balance. For the throne shot, the goal was to establish where Rey needs to go on the Death Star to find the Wayfinder; but I agree it’s not a super dynamic shot. Most of the shots from that set seem to be fairly locked off… but maybe a bit of zoom or something could help to give it more energy?

Excellent feedback, I really appreciate it!

Okay everyone, this is one of the most important scenes in the edit - not to mention one of the most complex; it’s also a scene that I’m creating almost entirely from scratch, so I’d really appreciate any feedback: the Dagger Vision.

A few things to keep in mind for context: remember that in Untold, nobody knows about Palpatine’s return yet - not the Resistance, and not the audience. Also, Poe is not shot in my version - the entire Chewie Rescue is streamlined so that they don’t all immediately get double-captured and then double-escape (redundancy of storytelling).

In this version of the film, the inscription on the dagger simply instructs the user that they must embrace the Dark Side to see the path to Exegol.

That brings us to the Dagger Vision, which has a lot of ground to cover:

• Rey tapping into her anger and embracing the Dark Side.
• The vision showing her that the Wayfinder is on the Death Star on Endor.
• Palpatine has returned, and awaits her on Exegol. (This is the Palpatine reveal for the film.)

When designing this scene, I had a few goals in mind: I wanted to edit it in a very chaotic, “J.J.”-esque way, so that it fits with the tone and style of Rey’s earlier vision (during the training course). At the same time I also need to make sure the character and story beats are presented clearly. Strictly from a directorial perspective, I don’t want any music; I want the vision itself built purely on sound. I don’t know why, it just feels right to me; and so, I’ve come up with an all-new audio mix for the scene. I’ve also included the “Anthem of Evil” Theme before Rey touches the dagger - it’s very underutilized in the Theatrical film, but I’m using it throughout my edit to represent the Sith Cult.

Even though Poe isn’t actually shot in “real life,” I included it as part of the vision in an attempt to set up the “Your new family dies” thing during the finale.

This single, one minute scene basically incorporates everything I’ve learned over the course of this project - lots of complex cutting, audio work, effects, color grading… the entire Kylo Bedroom scene is basically the lynchpin of the entire edit - both the plot and the character arcs all rely heavily on this sequence working, so feel free to offer suggestions on any of it!

Shoutout to RogueLeader, for the initial concept of Rey tapping into the Dark Side to activate the dagger. And shoutout to NeverarGreat, for spending a lot of time helping me to dial in the Sith Eye effect.

Great to see you again, sade! I’ll make that adjustment to the volume that you mentioned; I was worried initially that it would be too jarring to make the off-screen dialogue too soft and then cut back to 3PO. Like, Merry’s dialogue in the original is even softer, but it doesn’t matter if the audience misses it, you know?

My hope is that Untold will fill that gap for you and others when it’s done. And I’ll keep some space on my hard drive in case you find the time for those lines!

Hi everyone, a bit of housekeeping here. A while back, I shared my “Mission Briefing” scene; and there was some concern that my 3PO voice additions weren’t quite up to snuff. And yeah, I agree. I’ve spent the last several weeks redesigning my entire 3PO effects pipeline. The results are (I hope!) much closer to the official Lucasfilm sound design. (Plus some additional audio tweaks and refinements.) https://streamable.com/o3l4hy

Thank you to everyone who’s offered me feedback - this scene, the previous Board Meeting scene, etc. - these are the sorts of critiques that will make the final product much stronger!

I’m working on a very interesting scene that I plan on sharing soon, so stay tuned! And don’t forget to submit Kijimi lines if you want to be a part of the film!

Anakin Starkiller said:

T-202 said:

This version definitely works the best so far in my opinion.

This. It’s not great per say but it’s easily the best so far. I still don’t fully buy that it’s the same location and the constant cutting is a bit erratic but really the biggest issue is that it’s still not clear to me without prior knowledge that it’s one of the knights talking. Still, I think we’re getting somewhere.

The one you posted after the one T-202 is talking about is worse. The second shot of the knights feels random and redundant. I think the one T-202 complemented is solid, but I would cut to the creature’s head when the knight says "creature, skipping the shot of the officers at the table. If you need to, put it in after the severed head.

That’s a shot length problem, I’m afraid. The shot of the Knight is pretty short, so there has to be something else there to fill the gap. I can try slowing it down more than it is, but then you’re getting into interpolation issues. And I wanted to start the shot as early as I did specifically because I’m trying to clarify who’s speaking. Kylo orders someone to speak, cut to the Knight, they step forward, a voice starts talking (it’s not Kylo; and it’s someone with a mask, so it’s not one of the officers)… to whom else would the voice belong at that point, if not the character literally on screen?

there was the problem of the off-screen voice which sounds too much like a Kylo impression.

Easy solution: make the knight female. An accent would work too.

If someone with that sort of voice wants to play the part, I’d be down for it! Otherwise I’m limited to the resources I have available, I’m afraid.

Also…

there was the problem of the off-screen voice which sounds too much like a Kylo impression.

Let’s be honest, J.J. made the Knights themselves basically bad Kylo Ren cosplayers. Not much we can do about their design/aesthetic/role in the story at this point.

Obviously it’s an homage to Jedi Knights being given military rankings (Generals) during the Clone Wars, and it has nothing whatsoever to do with all of the “Captain” lines that I was able to splice in from LEGO Force Awakens 😉.

I wonder if you saw this slightly older version, which doesn’t have the Knight backing out of the scene (and therefore has fewer cuts): https://streamable.com/jatlgf Does that version work any better for you?

Hm, that’s an interesting idea. You’d need to modify the dialogue a bit to make it work, I think. So it could go something like:

KOR: We found the source of the intelligence leak and dealt with him.
Kylo: Very good, Captain.

[In the conference room]

Kylo: We had a spy in our midst, who sent a message to the Resistance. They are of no concern. With what I’ve seen…

It could work, although I’m worried that the order of information feels a bit weird (The Knights are with Kylo right before this during the helmet forging scene > they decide to wait to give their status report to Kylo until he’s storming down the hall > Kylo proudly displays Mark Hamill’s head - whom the audience already knows was dealt with, so the head is only for the council’s benefit - just to never remark on it again.

Keep in mind also that the hallway scene is the first time we’ve established to the audience that these are the “Knights of Ren,” so making it more about wordy exposition than about the dramatic weight of the introduction might hurt the pacing/tone of the scene.

Perhaps you could elaborate more on what is making the conference scene confusing?

B is now posted on Page 1 (without the watermark). Thank you all for the feedback!

Hi all, kind of a different update today. I thought that it would be nice to have some sort of cover art for this project; and so, I used my total lack of Photoshop experience and tried to put something together. Version A here is more of a standard Hollywood “floating head” design; whereas Version B has more of a minimalist approach. Thoughts or preferences? (Or are they both garbage?)

Awesome - progress! Yeah, I agree cutting away from that original shot is probably a smart move in this case; my one concern (that I didn’t mention, because I didn’t want to draw attention to it) is that you can see the head wibble slightly at the end of the new insert shot - which kind of betrays the fact that the footage has been reversed. I was thinking of having the Knight(s) back out instead, but I wasn’t sure if that would be more obvious…?

https://streamable.com/ge2jo1

Anakin Starkiller said:

Cutting back and forth to the moving shot doesn’t flow well. You can clearly tell it’s one shot interrupted and it’s jarring. I would instead place the shot of the “captain” immediately after the shot of Kylo going around the table then cut to the shot of Kylo walking past Pryde.

And no, the shot you have there doesn’t really work, but I get what you’re saying. You absolutely picked the best one you could from the movie itself. The footage you need for this scene to work doesn’t exist. My mind immediately jumps to cosplay. They wear masks so anyone can do it. Here’s a two second shot of Adam Savage as the coolest knight (seriously, why didn’t they give Kylo that mask?!) with another beside him. It’s roughly the same length as the shot you used but more clearly communicates that the knight is talking whereas in yours the knight is shot like a silent background character. Just blacken out Adam Savage’s eyes under the mask and color grade the non-descript elevator bluish grey and it could work. You could also do like they did with the Tusken Raiders in ANH and loop the clip a little since it’s so short. You obviously have to cut before he grabs the George Lucas cosplayer.

Unfortunately, that shot wouldn’t work at all. Getting the background to match tends to be much more difficult than you realize - you’d probably have to roto them out and composite an entirely new background instead. Even if you do that, you’d also have to work around the lighting not matching, differences in the camera lenses, the exposure being off… and even if you can get past all of that, you’re still left with a really awkward shot of the characters talking directly into the camera, which doesn’t match the framing in the rest of the scene. I mean, heck, the shot isn’t even focused properly…

However, maybe something like this could work?

https://streamable.com/jatlgf

If you or someone else wants to provide a different voice for them, I’m sure we can figure something out. Otherwise I think the current version matches the aesthetic that Hal put together in Ascendant. Yeah, it’s similar to Kylo’s voice; but so are the costumes themselves.

As for adding an additional shot… I’d love to feature them more; but it’s tricky, considering they’re in probably about 25 seconds of the entire film, and most of that footage wouldn’t really lend itself to being moved here.

However… maybe this shot could work?

https://streamable.com/brz9xe

New scene! As promised - I’d like to preview my new take on the Board meeting.

Does anyone else think it’s really dumb that Alien Mark Hamill is apparently the only lead the First Order has towards discovering the mole within their forces, and yet Kylo responds by… immediately killing him, before he can reveal his contact? My idea is to have the Knights of Ren kill him instead. This has two benefits: 1) It allows Kylo Ren to pass the Idiot Ball to someone else; and 2) It establishes the Knights of Ren early on as being an actual threat, rather than just set decorations.

A surprising amount of work went into making this happen: We’ve got new dialogue - both spliced “character” dialogue, and all-original dialogue - which also means all of the music and foley (doors opening, footsteps, etc.) had to be replaced in order to get a clean background track. The Palpatine Theme that plays here doesn’t exist on the soundtrack, so I had to find a creative way of rebuilding a clean version of it. There’s also a new shot of Kylo and his posse entering the room, which meant all new color grading. With the additional time, I was also able to add the Knights of Ren motif to the score - after all, this scene is essentially their introduction.

Hope you like it! Let me know if you have suggestions!

https://streamable.com/6q10vy

Hi everyone, I’m back! I’ve been doing some administrative work the last few days to get a sense of where we are in the project. Here’s the latest status:

• Changelist updates - I’ve gone back through the changelist on Page 1 and made sure everything is up to date. There aren’t any major changes from the original plan (the complexity of this project basically means most things had to be planned out from the beginning), but a lot of things have been tweaked in smaller ways. For example, my original plan during Rey’s Training vision was to foreshadow Finn and Poe in danger; however, it seemed more important when I was editing to foreshadow the Sith Fleet instead (since the Fleet is no longer present in the Prologue). This also leads into the next scene, where Poe reveals the Sith Fleet to the rest of the Resistance.

Also of note: I’m trying to replace a lot of 3PO dialogue, in order to give him a more adventurous personality post-memory wipe. I think it’s more fun that way, and adds more significance to his wipe.

• New scenes - I’ve been cooking up some new scenes that I’m very excited about. I’m planning on sharing something within the next week once it’s ready, so keep an eye out!

• Progress updates - I’ve been looking over the changelist and seeing what’s left to do. The big things are:

• Editing - Kijimi sequence (rough cut started, but it’s unfinished) (VOICES STILL BEING ACCEPTED)
• Editing - Dagger Vision sequence
• Editing - Kylo “tracking” scene
• Audio FX - Rework droid audio FX (e.g. C-3PO) based on feedback on the thread. (Thank you!)
• Sound mixing - Additional sound design work is needed on several scenes, especially in the third act.
• VFX (HELP NEEDED) - Kylo on the Falcon (currently working on the background plates, but I’ll need help with some additional compositing)
• VFX (HELP NEEDED) - Death Star Lightning blast (when I was editing the scene, I noticed some issues with the original completed shot, and unfortunately it will have to be redone)
• VFX (HELP NEEDED) - Small paint out when Kylo is on the Death Star.

There might be other items that pop up that I’m missing - dialogue lines that need to be reworked, other shots I haven’t accounted for, etc. - but overall, we’re getting very close to the end! Unfortunately, these last few are rather “big ticket” items - the reason I saved them for the end is because I knew they would be a lot of work to complete. What I’m trying to say is, a huge amount has been accomplished, but there’s still a decent amount left to do.

In the meantime, if you’re interested in being a part of the edit, I’m still accepting voice clips for the Kijimi Protest sequence. And, most importantly, if there’s any way you can help me knock out those VFX shots, I would be so, so grateful! Please message me if you’re interested.

Thank you!

Oh shoot, Jar Jar is totally right!

It’s hard to make out the cane too much in the film, but I did find two shots: There’s this one, as they’re walking to Lando’s… er, RV? (Foolishly, I cut just before this shot from my demo above.) The cane is definitely in his right hand, in front of Poe. Then there’s this shot when he comes to console Poe; again, cane in the right hand.

There’s also this promotional picture, which has the cane in the right hand.

So like Jar Jar said, it might actually make more sense if we flip the first shot, and keep the cane in Lando’s right hand throughout.

I think I’m leaning towards flipping the shot too, so that’s three votes in favor. Thank you both!

I do have one tiny change that I wanted to put to a vote though: After the Pasaana Skype call, there’s a bit of surprisingly sloppy directing, where the screen direction of the scene flip flops back and forth: First Rey (on the right) is talking to Kylo (on the left). Rey then runs away, to the right - this makes sense; she’s running away from Kylo.

But then, J.J. loses the blocking entirely, and now everyone is running to the left - back to where Rey just ran away from to escape Kylo. Lo and behold, they encounter a stormtrooper (on the left).

Then Lando appears, and they follow him, screen right.

Left, right, left, right…

My potential fix is to just mirror the footage when they encounter the stormtrooper - this allows them to continue their rightward escape. Personally, I think it flows much better this way when you’re watching for the overall scene; however, the obvious flaw is that if viewers start to focus on the little details, they may notice that Rey’s and Poe’s costumes are now flipped.

Then again, this is a J.J. film; the whole point is to move fast enough that you can’t stop and consider the little details…

So, I figured I’d put it to a vote. Which version do you think is less distracting for general audiences, 1 or 2?

https://streamable.com/4tyytz

Hey everyone, just wanted to give a quick update.

Lately, I’ve been doing a lot of from-scratch audio work for some new scenes - adding foley, designing soundscapes… lots of detailed work basically, which is taking a little while.

I’ve also been chipping away at some of the pending VFX shots. That adds a lot of complexity, especially since I don’t really know what I’m doing… (Again, if you have VFX experience, please consider reaching out!)

So between those two aspects, tangible progress has slowed a bit. I will also say that the next few weeks are going to be very busy for me personally, so I won’t be able to do too much editing until mid-July.

But as always, rest assured that I still am hard at work, and that the project is still ongoing.

For Star Wars Day, I wanted to give you guys a big update. Like, truly monumental progress.

Let’s talk color grading.

I’ve been taking a look at the Tatooine scene lately, and I noticed that there are some minor discrepancies with the color tone. Some shots look more blue, especially in the sky, and others look more orange. (Yes, I know the sky will change color at sunset. Work with me a minute.) This isn’t so noticeable when you’re watching the film, and it’s cutting between different shots and angles; but I think it stands out more when you put the shots side by side.

Notice how the sky looks more blue in the first shot, becomes orange in the second shot, and then a bit more bluish for the final shot:

I’m working on cleaning it up a little, and there are two ways I could do that.

1. I could push certain shots more blue - this better matches the Theatrical color grading, as well as earlier shots in this sequence:
   

2. I could push things more orange, more closely matching the new Ascendant shot, and leading better into the final Sunset shot:
   

I’m kind of leaning towards orange myself - I think it makes sense that the scene gradually gets darker as the sun gets lower - but I also think it’s very easy to go too intense when doing this sort of color work, and I don’t want it to be distracting. So, I figured I’d post both options here and see if anyone has any opinions.

(Notice also, in the original Ascendant shot, that Rey’s clothes aren’t quite colored correctly - they’re too bright, and even seem to have some fuschia highlights. I’m adding some additional color masks to correct that, which can also be seen above.)

And here’s the scene in motion. Note also that Old Lady™ (one of my favorite Star Wars characters) will be removed from the final product; but I’ve left her here to better establish the color tones leading up to the final shots.

https://streamable.com/2vrxwp

Okay, point to Jar Jar about the TLJ deleted scene. I forgot the Jedi Texts were referenced there. That said, I think I’ll stick with keeping it more ambiguous here. Since Luke decoding the Texts was never established in the films, I think it’s fair for someone to assume he never read them (“Read them, have you?” “Well, I…” “Page turners, they were not. [i.e. Don’t worry, dude, you’re not missing out on anything.]”), and instead he cataloged his notes separately. However, Rey getting the Wayfinder information from the Texts is a totally valid reading of this Rey/Leia scene too.

(Plus, it’s kind of funny to think that the Luke was less concerned about the imagined importance of the texts, and more that he was just upset because Yoda ruined his research project.)

daveybjones999, thanks for the note on the “temple” line! I’ll try to futz about with it some more.

Thank you all for the feedback!

Hi everyone! As a special Easter treat, I have a new scene to share: Poe’s mission briefing. Tricky little scene - remember, one of my main goals in this edit is to delay the Palpatine reveal until it’s dramatically relevant, which isn’t going to be until much later in the film. So I had to come up with an alternative setup that would serve the same function, but without mentioning Palpatine, long-stewing plans of revenge, or “secrets only the Sith knew.” (Look at how much more meaningful the glances between Rey and Leia are, now that they’re in regards to Kylo instead of Palpatine.)

I also took advantage of the opportunity to exposit a bit more about Exegol - who are those people there, where did the ships come from, etc. It’s not super important, but 3PO does talk about it in the background; it should be enough to handwave those plotholes. I’ve also changed Exegol from “the world of the Sith” to “a temple to the Sith,” in order to maintain continuity with the larger Star Wars universe.

I also tweaked Rey’s dialogue slightly, removing “There are cyphers here I can’t read” - the line only draws attention to the fact that the filmmakers had no idea if Rey was reading the Ancient Jedi Texts (which Luke was implied not to have read), or Luke’s personal diary.

This is probably my most AI-dependent scene - there just wasn’t any other way to get the requisite dialogue without it. I spent a lot of time both wrestling with the AI model, and also adding several layers of audio effects in post, to try and blend the AI dialogue as seemlessly as possible with the surrounding lines. Personally, I’m very pleased with how it sounds; I hope you agree!

https://streamable.com/9fl9ns

As always, I’m still in the market for Kijimi lines, and for some VFX assistance. Please reach out if you can!

All of your ideas sound fantastic! (Weren’t you working on a new novelization a while back? Is that still a thing?)

But yeah, for this edit, we’ll have to think a little smaller. I’m not too worried about future movies though - kind of like how I’m handling Rey’s parents, I’m really just side-stepping the issue, rather than explicitly going against canon. If future movies want to give Finn Jedi training, it could be like how Ahsoka handled Sabine, making her a Jedi even though that wasn’t part of her story in Rebels.

I appreciate the feedback! Thank you!