sidshady12

Video: https://youtu.be/MJe7e7rVVO8

This is the first Star Wars related thing I’ve edited and I don’t intend on doing a full-movie edit, but I thought I’d still share. I took the 2011 Blu-ray footage of Boba’s death and made it faster paced & have more of Temuera Morrison’s voice - it’s probably not perfect, but if anyone wants to use this in their edit or get inspired to take a similar approach, be my guest! All resources are linked in the YouTube clip description.

Changes:

• Removed a fraction of a second as Boba Fett lands from his jetpack, to make it seem like less of an awkward pause
• Boba Fett reacts to shoot Luke with his fibercord whip quicker, again, to make it seem like there’s less of a pause
• Boba Fett starts to slowly get back up after only 3 seconds, as opposed to 7 seconds, to make it seem less like he was just laying there ‘knocked out’
• Added (subtle) Boba Fett grunts/sounds when he:
  -Lands
  -Gets stunned
  -Falls down
  -Collects himself on the ground
  -Stands back up
  -Flies into Jabba’s barge
  -Hits the sand & rolls down
• Added Boba Fett dialogue:
  -Says “what the?” when he gets hit by Han
  -New scream when he goes flying

chrisvilla said:

Watched this. It’s much better than the released trilogy, which bloated full of junk IMO. Love the fact that it’s much tighter to the book, and the pace is much better now. This is the only Hobbit I need now, will probably give the trilogy away to someone. Superb, well done.

Thank you! This means a lot, glad you enjoyed. The blu-ray version will be coming this month, with final tweaks, full menus and everything.

It is an interesting thing to think about - how far did they go on their first light speed jump? And would it make sense with the whole chances of running into a star or other debris?

The speed of light is 299,792,458 m / s

Being generous, I’m assuming he was going light speed for 3 seconds, but it might be 3.2 or something. Multiplied by 3 and converted to miles, you only get 558,847.

EDIT: nvm ships go WAY faster than the speed of light in star wars pretty sure

https://www.tor.com/2014/12/08/star-wars-how-fast-is-the-millennium-falcon/#:~:text=The Millennium Falcon’s top speed,So there we have it.

With this guys research and anaylsis, which I’m inclined to believe because for the star wars lore/movies to make sense with the distances and speeds seen then going hyper speed would be extremely faster than just normal light speed, so even 3 seconds is by no means a ‘quick/close jump.’ Did some calculations with the times this guy theorized and the falcon likely would’ve gone a couple trillion miles in just a few seconds

NOTE: Edited this comment to reflect current opinions and improve my phrasing, should anyone come across this

IMO there is no definitive edit, every edit has something good going for it and deserves a spotlight. It’s so subjective, there are also completely different “genres” of Hobbit edits so it’s hard to compare of them, I’d say they could be divided into two categories:

1: The trilogy/duology format is the first category. This includes the Arkenstone edit as you said, the Chris Hartwell edit which came out this year, and a great many others. I haven’t seen any of them so I wouldn’t know much about these, but in summary, they embrace PJ’s additions and just try to make them better movies. It allows for less ambitious editing, which can make things more “seamless”, but at the cost of less book accuracy or less narrative focus. I would say the best two are the previous ones I mentioned. There is also the ‘original 2 film structure’ edit which is a bit shorter than the two above I mentioned, worth checking out. If you like most of the originals but just want a bit less, these are definitive for you.

2: The second category is the 3 in 1 edits. First, to get this out of the way - edits that turn the trilogy into a single less than 3 hour movie IMO aren’t able to really be a definitive type edit simply just because they remove so much that either technical quality is scarified or narrative/character depth is scarified. Basically, while it is possible to pull off a 2.5 hour edit and they can be decent, it’s hard to compare them to longer edits which retain many more of the “good” scenes. I think most most viewers would probably prefer to have a more complete experience. Therefore, I think 3.5-4.5 hours is sweet spot, it also fits in with the LOTR extended runtimes.

Obviously my edit falls into my favorite category (the 3-in-1 four hour format), and if you’re interested you can read my thread, but in general I think that the reason this format works so well is twofold: you both get that book accuracy (Tolkien knows how to make a good story) but you also have enough runtime to play around with embellishments and keeping new stuff that might not be in the book but still “fits” the general themes/plot/world, such as additional character moments, comedy, extended scenes, more action, more drama/tension, etc. without going overboard and including an hour+ of made up stuff.

My Favorite Edits

1. M4 Edit (obviously bias)
2. Maple Edit/Bilbo Edition (tied)
3. Arkenstone Edition / Chris Hartwell edit / Original 2-film structure edit (These 3 are the longer category 1 edits, and it’s hard for me to rank as I’m no expert but they are all really good)
4. Spence Edit

Honorable mention: NameLessEditor’s version, just needed to be more technically refined but it was so ambitious in its book accuracy, and a huge inspiration.

As for LOTR, the definitive edits… are PJ’s extended edits in my opinion. Yes there’s minor things I might change, and if someone were to make a very careful and conservative edit, it could be better, but LOTR reached an amazing balance of book accuracy + creative liberties, so any edit that aims for “even more book accuracy” might be a little too much, now I could be wrong, I havent seen those edits, maybe they are relatively conservative, but as a huge Middle Earth fan, a 4 hour fan edit of the hobbit + the 3.5-4 hour official extended LOTR movies are my go to in a marathon. I will say I would trust Hal9000 with a revised LOTR edit made in 2020 for slightly more book accuracy and small fixes here and there, I think he had a project like that but it’s really old and unfinished, he should pick it back up though. But both hal’s and kerr’s old projects, as of right now, are pretty much the only LOTR edits worth watching for a full experience of the entire trilogy (I believe there are some fun ones that just follow certain characters but it misses the main story). But I wouldn’t call them definitive, because I’m sure they’d change or improve a ton of their old work if they started again today.

VLC isn’t a format it’s just a program that opens videos for you, so when you opened it, the icon probably updated to the VLC cone.

To convert it so your program can read it, you can do the video and audio separately it doesn’t really matter, because we have the power of video editing. Simply convert your video, drag it in, looks like you’ve already done this. Then convert your audio by dropping the original .avi onto an audio program like audacity, then export each channel as 24 bit wav files, and load those into your video editor. Then just make sure video/audio are lined up with eachother.

If it’s 5.1 audio then you’ll need to look up how to set that up in your video editor, you will see 6 channels pop up in audacity, right click the first one - hit “split as mono”, and export each of the 6 as a mono track in order from top to bottom, L R C LFE sL sR.

In the works for over a year & an early version was released this summer, but now the final version is out. Download is available on my website with built in togglable English subtitles, chapter markers, and a DTS HD High-Resolution audio track.

The Hobbit (Extended Edition)
-4 hour runtime
-A re-edit that is extremely book accurate
-Much closer to the tone and universe established in the LOTR trilogy, specifically in relation to the action scenes/combat.
-Made sure to keep some of the movie lighthearted, specifically the parts that pay homage to the text, this isn’t a LOTR epic, but it isn’t a childish joke of a story either

Hey everyone, I know a lot about working with 5.1, but not so much with 7.1. I use ffmpeg, audacity, and Premiere - I basically want to edit this audio in Premiere in a 5.1 24 bit wav set up, but the problem is the source audio is 7.1.

My question is how do I go about dealing with the rear channels so I can go from 7.1 -> 5.1?

For example, when I load the 7.1 audio into audacity only 6 channels show up, not 8. I’ve heard that it’s because the 4 rear channels are matrix encoded into just 2. Can I just export the respective mono rear left/rear right and they’ll act as the rear left/right in 5.1, with correct volumes and all the audio data? All I care about is maintaining the accurate sound but presenting it in a 5.1 format, as this film makes heavy use of surround sound. Any help would be appreciated.

LeperMessiah117 said:

I think this works alot better, nice!

Thanks! Just touched it up a bit more yesterday from what you see in the YouTube version, but it flows nice. Since I got some feedback (including yours) definitely gonna go with it.

LeperMessiah117 said:

To be clear regarding the river barrel riding sequence, the visual transition isn’t an issue for me. In fact, it was only something I thought of after thinking back on it and generally dismissed it in that such a transition would and could be found in any official studio edit. The only issue I have here is the audio transition with the fading score.

Just did a little test for an alternate transition

Version 1
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ilqoro4rv9w

Version 2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FQEDFJPCcdc

Both identical except for one shot, I mentioned it in the description of version 2

LeperMessiah117 said:

Hmmmm, could be I do have an outdated version, though I obtained it the day the final update turned green… The part I’m referring to is the part right after Bilbo puts on the ring to escape the fighting in Dale transitioning to Thranduil and Dain fighting orcs upon their respective mounts.

Also, I’m not ruling out the possibility that some of these transitions I am only finding abrupt because I have watched the originals.

What I mean is that I deleted the version you have so the only version of the edit I have is the one in my editing software, which has different timestamps (I added like 30 seconds of footage back into the edit not exactly sure the exact length).

So it’s not your fault at all, you definitely got the right one that I posted, I just like to save space on my PC and remove the exported versions if I have done any changes.

But yeah, I just checked it out, that’s really weird, for some reason the audio clip was -5dB lol so I just fixed that. You’re the first person to catch that, so now the volume is back to normal & a bit louder. Should be fine. Thanks for finding that!

LeperMessiah117 said:

I have finally got around to viewing your fanedit. Excellent overall, however, I have some minor notes for you to consider if you ever wish to update again.

For Out of the Frying Pan and Into the Fire, you attempted to remove the orcs, but then decided not to hide them. My only suggestion here is if you are no longer hiding the orcs, maybe 1 or 2 addition orc closeups are warranted? One whom may have viewed this edit without reviewing your updates may assume that you meant to remove to orcs entirely but accidentally left in a few seconds of orc footage by mistake. Dispersing a couple more orc shots throughout the scene would leave little doubt.

I can’t recall how it was exactly in the official version, but in Mirkwood the transition between the company’s battle with the spiders and being ambushed by the elves was quite abrupt. I was actually momentarily distracted during that cut having looked off screen for about 5 seconds, going from the fight to the ambush struck me oddly and kinda caught me off balance, lol. If you could manage to maybe throw in an additional shot of the company fleeing the spider’s den the flow of the cut would become alot smoother.

The transition between Barrels Out of Bond and A Warm Welcome lends itself a bit to the obviousness of cut footage. Partially in the somewhat quick cut from the company trying to keep afloat on raging waters to drifting on calm in the next shot. Not much can be done about that I imagine, given you can only work with so much footage available to you. But the thing I noticed most of all is the music transition with the orchestral track seeming to ramp up into something, yet fading away as the next chapter begins. You probably been over this yourself, but again, if you can find a way to smooth this transition, the editing seam here might be made invisible to those who may have never seen the originals.

The battle sequence around the 3:27:10-25 mark is oddly quiet. Quiet as in, there is a huge battle raging in the scene, yet the only sound we hear is of things in the shots that are obvious. This may be how the sound was in the official version, but the shots feel off because of this. I feel that these shots (and maybe a few others shots in the chapter overall, to a lesser degree) would benefit having additional battle sounds (the clang of steel, orc shrieks, etc) added to the sound mix to add to the fullness of the battle.

To restate, I thought the edit was overall excellent. If you somehow patched up some of these seams (some of which you may have already attempted to do previously) I would say that this edit could conceivable be found in an official studio home video release. Also overall, I to prefer this edit to the previous Hobbit edit I have seen, so great work!

Thank you so much for watching and giving feedback. That means a ton. I’m just gonna go through it and reply, might as well:

-Out of the frying pan:
Yes! I 100% agree. I updated this and must have done it after you downloaded haha. I thought to myself that, since the Warg pack is re-occuring at the start of part 2, and Thorin calls it an “Orc pack”, then I shouldnt actually remove every single Orc and try to hide them. Sure in the books it was only wolves, but it’s perfectly acceptable in a PJ adaptation to throw a few Orcs in, maybe they are just “herding” the wargs. So if you download the update, there are a few more shots of Orcs, and one main close-up reaction shot of an Orc’s face when they start the fire

-Mirkwood:
In the original film, the Dwarves were fighting, then it cut to Bilbo fighting a baby spider and going rage-mode (because he dropped the ring next to it), then we cut back to Thorin saying “it’s clear” and get this Legolas stunt https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k_sVsU0m0IQ So yeah mine is trimmed down to remove the Bilbo part because it’s out of character and trying too hard to be like lotr, but there’s nothing else that goes there showing the Dwarves. I think if you didnt get distracted it wouldve flowed fine, because you see Kili killing off a spider, then we cut to Thorin with a few other Dwarves, who say “we’re clear” because they got rid of their spiders, and so it works fine IMO, because the audience can assume just as Kili stabbed that spider it was one of the last ones, then suddenly the hidden elves pop and boom the rest plays out.

-Barrels Out of Bond:
Yeah I agree I’m not as happy with this transition as it could be (musically speaking).
Its supposed to be a “a lot of time has passed we now went from harsh fast waters to soft calm river” type cut but the soundtrack makes it difficult. I’ll try to revamp it if I can.

-The battle sequence:
I’ve actually updated mine with minor things so the time stamp you have is not what I have on my screen, could you let me know visually which part it is? Is it after the dwarves charge out? Is it the “sad montage” (because I didnt touch that part’s audio, I can sorta see what you mean where theres not a ton of sound, I think its a stylistic choice)?

Thanks again for watching!

1- MKV does not work with many editors, as you know. MKV is a container, like a “folder” in very simple terms. Inside this “folder” is an h264 AVC video track most likely, which is very common, and fits in MP4s too, which DO work in editors. You need to either use ffmpeg to convert the mkv to mp4 (which will be quick and will not lose quality), or re-encode it while also switching the container (like using handbrake) but this will take longer and can slightly reduce quality.

Look up how to use ffmpeg on a mac, put your movie in the folder, and use this command

ffmpeg -i title.mkv -codec copy title.mp4

This will copy over everything into an mp4. BUT, the audio might not work, as you’ve said.

Regardless, you can still do the easy way with handbrake, just make sure to go to the audio tab and delete every audio channel except the one you want (usually the best quality one), set it to AC3 and make sure it’s all maxed out for quality etc

Or, here’s what I do without having to convert things and re-encode.

2- If we go back in time, before you do the mkv->mp4, we can work with it to extract the audio first. The audio is most likely DTS, or some other type used in blu-ray releases. You should convert to it to 24 bit 48kz wav so that you can work with it.

There’s a couple options. First off, it’d just be MUCH easier if you didnt need them attached. You can have the movie & audio tracks be seperate, you just load them in, and then make sure they both start at 00:00 and are lined up.

Youll want to find a program that will let you remove ALL the audio tracks except the main English 5.1 audio. If you load it into handbrake… it should show you them and you can X them all out, or you can use ffmpeg.

Im on windows, but my method is:
-Rip blu ray, I have mkv
-Remove all random audio tracks/subtitles using MKVToolNix (Idk if its on mac)
-Or, you can use MediaInfo (view->text) to see all audio tracks and see which ones you need to remove, and then use ffmpeg to remove audio tracks, youll need to google how
-I now have an mkv with 1 audio and 1 video
-I convert the mkv to mp4 using ffmpeg, so it can be loaded into programs, the audio can be lost here, idc
-Then I load that mkv into Audacity and it’ll automatically load in the 6 mono channels of audio and obviously ignore the video since its an audio program, I then export each as mono wavs, and then I set up 5.1 in my editing program manually

To do things perfectly, it’s gonna be a couple hour process, but I assure you everything can be done to get it work

Fated-Dualist said:

I’m not a fan of the film, but those covers and disc labels look great. Really official looking and always a fan of ‘book effect’ covers 😃

Thank you very much! I was really trying to make sure they look good enough to be “official” looking.

I modelled the cover after Bilbo’s book seen in-universe, and I’m not sure if this is what you mean but yes it also does have a double meaning and represent that my edit is a “book accurate edit”, I never even thought about it that way!

Blu-ray cover: https://imgur.com/a/MZYV1Y1

Discs: https://i.imgur.com/9HSBP8I.png

It matches with my LOTR blu-ray set (in terms of the borders on the front, the title locations, the discs, etc.) but instead follows the aesthetic of Bilbo’s red book while the discs are reminiscent of a map

Hello, about 4 months ago I finished this edit, which I worked on for about a year. I’ve been constantly updating it and working it with new feedback, but now I think I am done [edit: 2 years later].

Now you’re probably thinking what makes this edit special, why did I do this, there’s already so many edits, well, the simple answer is: There are actually very few one-movie book themed edits. The large majority of edits remove silliness, but keep the made-up sideplots and characters, even if inaccurate. This usually results in cutting 3 movies into 2, usually around 5-6 hours total, or even keeping the 3 film structure. Then there’s the opposite end, I have seen numerous edits that reduce the entire trilogy into just one regular length 2-3.5 hour film, often cutting out book material or keeping moments that weren’t pivotal to exploring Bilbo’s adventure (i.e. losing out on Beorn, keeping Dol Guldur, or an type of combination that wasn’t quite matching the structure of the text).

Instead, I really enjoy the middle ground, which is keeping it long enough to tell the full story of Bilbo, but not too long, and not too short. I have been able to turn the extended editions of the Hobbit trilogy into one long, accurate & enjoyable Middle Earth film that sits better with the LOTR Extended Editions.

Now of course, there are probably two or three other solid fan edits that have taken this same middle ground approach, so I’m not saying mine is the first of its kind - but rather, it’s still an approach that has plenty of room for more interpretation. Personally, none of the other edits I saw were quite what I was envisioning, either trying to be too accurate (skip the entire end of the battle, missing out on character moments) or too inaccurate (missing out on extended Beorn, Mirkwood, an accurate portrayal of Smaug, etc.), so I set out to make my own. The final runtime ended up being 4 hours (excluding credits), so when compared to the extended LOTR trilogy, it fits in pretty well:

The Hobbit – 255 Mins
Fellowship of the Ring – 228 Mins
Two Towers – 235 Mins
Return of the King – 263 Mins

Goals & philosophy when editing:

1. Be more faithful to The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien while still being under Peter Jackson’s vision. Includes making the story focus on the main quest & also decreasing the numerous references to LOTR, allowing both stories to stand on their own.

2. Consistent tone as the story progresses from its lighthearted beginning to serious ending. With this, a convincing atmosphere displaying more realistic combat and physics is present throughout.

3. Maintain professional film editing techniques, specifically with making smooth audio transitions, maintaining a surround sound mix with new edits, and good pacing.

4. Stay in Middle Earth as long as possible with our beloved characters, never cut anything “good” or from the book purely for the sake of runtime.

5. Appeal to all Middle Earth & movie fans, regardless of what their prior knowledge is with any of the books or original films.

With these goals in mind, you can see it’s not just about strict book accuracy, but also making sure the movie is still “good” and works as an enjoyable fantasy adventure film.

Summary of Changes:

• First off I want to address the “big transition” between AUJ into DoS. I decided to make my edit 2 parts with a split right at the end of AUJ with an intermission right after. This gives the audience a break until moving into part 2 where there has been a small timejump into the start of DoS. The digital version is one movie file while the disc version is actually two separate files. There are now 4 Middle Earth movies with 2 discs each if you watch the Blu-ray ISO version. I really like having AUJ be part 1 and then DoS/BotFA all together in part 2, both for pacing and tonal reasons, in addition to the transition I needed to cover up.

• The color grading has been adjusted to look a little more real and closer to LOTR. Less saturation, no green tint, and a slight 35mm film grain added.

• Extended Editions were used as a base. Also, this is just a summary, I have done too many changes to list on this thread so definitely feel free to message me if you want me to send you the full cutlist!

• There are many new professionally created digital effects made by eric1894, including turning gold-Smaug into looking normal/red, removing arrows from barrels sitting in the background as there was no fight, adding premade Orc tunnels as wereworms were removed, and more!

An Unexpected Party

• The movie begins like the book with the hole in the ground dialogue, and we skip the huge prologue. This sequence is not needed, because leaving the audience in the shadow allows for them to learn and discover more about the story as we progress, it also makes it even more special when we finally see the lonely mountain/Erebor. The special features included on the disc version actually do include this flashback, along with 2 others, as three “history shorts” which you can read more about on my website.

• New 2 minute opening with old Bilbo as he introduces himself and his story. Frodo cameo reduced to 30 seconds, no dialogue.

• After this quick intro of Old Bilbo, we move into the past and the main story. The whole Shire sequence is the same as the original except for a few minor trims for tone.

• Blunt the Knives song is kept because it was in the book! But I have removed one stanza and all of the ridiculous plate tricks, so we still get to enjoy Tolkien’s song, while watching Dwarves clean up and toss plates instead of doing a circus act

• We are out of Bag End in 30 minutes as compared to the original 45

Roast Mutton

• Removed Moria flashback, there is no Azog sideplot/overarching villain. Each sequence of the movie is its own threat and adventure, like the book. Azog shows up marching to the lonely Mountain at the same time as Gandalf warning the others about Orcs. It is explained that they just want to take over the mountain, like the other armies. Azog is still their leader, but is unnamed (so we can assume he’s Bolg), similar to the role of Gothmog or Lurtz, they are all just the “bad guys” that our heroes needs to kill to win. So until that final act, there are no references, hints, or mentions to Azog at all in my edit.

• Removed Radagast, in fact, he’s gone from the entire movie along with Dol Guldur.

• Toned down some of the Troll silliness. I also removed a few parts of the fight, including Ori using a slingshot. I might as well say, any future instance of Dwarves doing idiotic tricks or moves, dodging arrows with a sword, spinning tricks, hitting Orcs without seeing them, etc. are all removed throughout the entire edit.

• Dwarves do not disagree with Bilbo saying they are infected, to delay the Trolls, so the company appears a little smarter now. Throughout this project I have tried to portray the Dwarves as just a little more competent even though they are still comedic sometimes and in the books they were silly too.

• The Dwarves explore the Troll cave and then we naturally transition to a new hiking montage of them entering Rivendell, without a warg chase

A Short Rest

• Removed some excessive silliness, including the dancing on top of the table at dinner and the Dwarves swimming in the fountain

• Removed all of the White Council and references to them, instead, Elrond and Gandalf discuss the quest, Thorin overhears them and gets upset, so he takes the company out of Rivendell first thing in the morning.

Over Hill and Under Hill

• No more rock giants, because these were overdone. Instead, the company faces a dangerous thunderstorm and avalanche, so they go inside the cave

• Goblin caves color corrected to appear less bright & orange.

• Kept the song, like the book, but removed all cringey footage of the Goblin King, so the song is also a tad bit shorter

• I still have the Dwarf escape fight later, because the audience needs some more action by now, but as I have said earlier, I’ve removed all silly Dwarf fighting tricks. Overall the escape is much more quicker, skipping the worst parts, down from 4 minutes of fighting to just 1.

Riddles in the Dark

• Scene is slightly darker

• Bilbo doesn’t see Gollum drop the ring, instead, he just finds the ring on the ground

• The audience doesn’t see Gollum’s face close up until he drops in front of Bilbo

• The ring falls on Bilbo’s hand like what happened with Frodo in FotR, and it doesn’t spin around so long on his finger

Out of the Frying-Pan into the Fire

• Scene is slightly darker

• Other than the moments around Bilbo picking up the ring, and the moment we transition from Hobbit to FotR, there are no excessive LOTR music cues, hints, petting the ring, making him angrier because of the ring, etc. like killing the baby spiders. In The Hobbit the ring didn’t really have it’s full power/effect so it wasn’t doing much to Bilbo. No one knows, not even Gandalf, that the ring is extremely dangerous. It is only in FotR when Gandalf/the audience discovers the true power of it, and it starts effecting Bilbo’s personality more.

• Wargs and some Orcs come to chase them down, but Azog is not present, as I have described earlier, he only shows up in the final battle. This means no Thorin charge, no Bilbo saving the day, etc. They escape by Eagle, and have a rest on Carrock. Just like the book.

Intermission/insert next disc

Queer Lodgings

• Time jump, it is now nighttime and they have progressed a little. But by now, the wargs have almost caught up to them, and Bilbo discovers Beorn. With no choice, Gandalf leads the company out of the forest into Beorn’s house. No random shots of the running across a plain.

• Removed all of the Sauron/Azog related talk that starts with Beorn/Gandalf and continues throughout. We are still focused on the company & Bilbo.

• Gandalf leaves to investigate the marking he found at the entrance of Mirkwood, and it is explained later that he discovers an Orc army marching towards the mountain. That means there is no more need for the huge Dol Guldur sideplot.

Flies and Spiders

• Removed Bilbo going crazy on the baby spider

• Removed the Legolas stunt, reduced his character to 60 second cameo. Tauriel has about 60 seconds of screentime as well.

• Removed Gimli reference, too on the nose.

Barrels Out of Bond

• Follows the book very close, they escape, and we cut the entire river battle with a nice transition

A Warm Welcome

• Alfrid reduced to background character with only 1 line. Master removed, except for his part in the town square with Thorin

• Removed Bard sideplot, instead, there is just a conflict between him and the master on whether or not the Dwarves should go. No crazy spies, no prophecy, no climbing through toilets, etc. Follows the book here.

• All Dwarves leave together to the mountain, no one left behind

On the Doorstep

• Dwarves do not give up instantly when it hits night, Bilbo (visually) discovers that there’s still a chance, and luckily, the company didn’t leave so they all gaze upon the key hole and enter together.

Inside Information/Not at Home

• Dwarves never enter Erebor, until Smaug leaves

• Restructured some of the dialogue with Bilbo/Smaug so it basically mirrors the book (This was really neat)

• Smaug breaks out of Erebor, jump cut to the Dwarves hearing a loud crashing sound (That my friend, was a dragon), then we cut to the people of laketown starting to panic because they heard it too, then we cut back to Smaug flying, NO COVERED IN GOLD PART

Fire and Water

• Bard doesn’t have to escape jail, he just grabs his bow and gets ready to kill the dragon

• Bard kills the dragon without the help of his son

• Removed the Master trying to sneak away with all the gold

The Gathering of the Clouds

• So many minor cuts, but it flows really well, just like the book, in terms of Bard/Thorin’s dialogue, the aftermath of Laketown, etc. As always, still removing Alfrid/Dol Guldur/Azog

• As the Elves, Men, and Dwarves are preparing for battle, we get a brief introduction to the Orcs also coming to attack, they have heard about Smaug’s death (Balin: Word will spread, soon everyone in Middle Earth will know, the dragon is dead - foreshadowing)

A Thief in the Night

• Shortened extended scene with Thranduil and Gandalf to appear less harsh towards attacking the Dwarves

• As always, removed Alfrid

The Clouds Burst

• The dialogue/scene outside the front gate is just like the book, or as close as possible, there’s no references to selling the Arkenstone to Gondor, or Thorin crazily yelling he’ll kill everyone. Dragon sickness is removed in my edit, it’s just a metaphorical thing, relating to greed, mentioned once.

• Thorin deals with excessive greed and pride, which he overcomes later. By toning down his craziness/sickness, we don’t have to explain it as a literal “dragon sickness” that runs in his family, because the audience will buy it that he hit his lows but came around in the end.

• Here we cut to the Theatrical version of Dain’s arrival, right before they start fighting, they hear a horn sound off, and suddenly Orcs are charging out of tunnels in the mountain and Azog announces his presence.

• The BOTFA is extremely restructured, it would be way too much to write about here, in summary/off the top of my head: No goats, no legolas/alfrid/dragon sickness craze/troll catapults. They fight, start losing, Thorin charges out, Bilbo gets knocked out, Thorin/Fili/Kili try to kill the orc leader, but all end up dying, Bilbo wakes up, and we move on.

The Return Journey

• Thorin’s funeral has the deleted Gandalf speech perfectly re-inserted

The Last Stage

• Removed Bilbo lying to Gandalf about the ring, they part ways as good friends

• Redid credits to reflect my edit, any characters reduced from starring list/removed entirely. New music that fits well. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P8ymgFyzbDo

Video: h264, high bitrate
Audio: 5.1 DTS
Subtitles: Many different languages

This post was all just a summary as I said earlier, so for full project specs, the download, and the cutlist, feel free to message me or comment below!

TLDR: Mine is similar to the Maple Edit for those of you who don’t want to read the whole thing, but what makes my edit stand out is that I have an entirely different vision with new techniques start to finish never done before, even if our goals were similar. My edit takes an approach with minimal Azog, even more accurate to the book (No river battle, we spend more time in Mirkwood, more faithful Smaug sequence), subtle character changes (I don’t have dragon sickness/Bilbo lying to Gandalf/Bilbo’s personality changing from ring), I have my own way of transitioning from movie 1 -> movie 2, instead of cutting from Troll caves -> to Rivendell I now have a natural hiking montage in between, I’ve reduced master/Alfrid even more, I removed Bard’s son helping him kill Smaug, and definitely many more big & small choices that I’ve done to create the best version of The Hobbit that I could for myself. While a lot of people edit under the theme of being a “book edit,” it still leaves so much room for our unique interpretation, opinions, and techniques - which is great, meaning there will never be an “definitive” Hobbit edit; so mine is yet another to the list, with enough of my own creative decisions that I felt like sharing it.

Hal 9000 said:

I didn’t realize that it was your work. Well, I don’t mean to say that it’s without any merit just because I have a shorthand way to quickly inspect one thing, nor that my litmus test is conclusive. I just speak from a place of comfort with an edit I’d seen a few times before and has a few unique things about it that sell it for me over others.

I don’t mean to sound dismissive, just that I am not able to thoroughly check out a Hobbit edit I come across at this point. Like I said, though, it’s the Second best version of that sequence that I have seen, and pulls off such a transition best that I’ve come across. i’m sure it would be worthwhile to check the edit out more thoroughly and meant no insult.

That’s fine, you are under no obligation to check out hobbit edits or mine at all. I know you meant no insult, I just got a little frustrated, sorry. But yeah making the hobbit like the book is an extremely tricky edit to accomplish, I guess it also disappoints me that people like me who missed the hobbit edit hype from 2015~ give or take, and released in the past year, will never really have a chance of getting the same recognition because people stick with edits they know and have had. It’s kind of an ‘eye roll’ at this point when someone releases yet another hobbit edit, despite putting in the same/or more work than the initial wave of edits. I could be wrong though. Anyways, I look forward to your final product of star wars and any future middle earth stuff you do.

Hal 9000 said:

Just glanced at it. It fails my litmus test, at about 2hr13m. Oh, well.

Well, M4 here, I think this is a pretty poor outlook to be honest, I would not share a critical opinion over an edit if all I did was glance at one transition.

In terms of technical quality, the edit was still a WIP at this stage so that’s something to keep in mind, the transition has been improved. In terms of editing decisions, mine is a “book edit” (as advertised) so including the river battle would be the actual failure, I don’t know why you’d expect anything different or apply this test to my version.

Secondly, you cite Maple as being the best edit, which contains more than just a few small problems. An edit could pass your “litmus test” but still have blaring issues in other parts of the film including jarring transitions and moments that bog down the story.

The argument for the need to keep action with the barrel sequence is shaky at best, this is not a war movie. I agree a film should ebb and flow with a mixture of slow and fast paced moments but it does not equate to needing lots of sword fighting. Captured by spiders, fighting spiders, captured by Elves, escaping Elves, captured by Men, opening the secret door/arriving to the Mountain after all this time, etc are all very exciting or faster paced moments that happen in this section of the film in between the slower dialogue moments. I think one would be better off making an argument for keeping barrel action in the original–more longer–movies.

You can get to a point where if you’re adding action just for the sake of ‘well we need action’ that it starts actively detracting from your film. There’s no consequences, no one dies. It doesn’t effect the plot either. It’s just there, and in the Maple edit’s case he retains Kili being shot by an arrow which, yeah, gives you your exciting action that you asked for, but then Kili magically heals and his wound is never mentioned again, creating a jarring hole in the story. That would fail my litmus test for what makes a good edit.

Just finished watching. I’ve made fan edits before so I like to watch with a close ear and eye and give any feedback if I can! Overall very good, huge improvement, I like that you didn’t go overboard in the editing, like you said, it’s a rebalanced version, not entirely redone. No complaints at all with the story.

Although, there were only a few minor audio things I noticed (Like I said I’ve made fan edits, so I completely understand how it works when there’s a minor flaw you can’t fix but it’s better than the alternative, which is leaving it unedited):

-4:41 I think heard a very very faint sound of a voice for a split sechond(Obi won?), this is because you cut some of the dialogue from the center channel but maybe there was a bit leftover that you missed
-8:15 I might just be delusional but I swear it sounds like a millisecond of his voice is cut off when Count dooku says “please” at the end, could be wrong
-The music when it goes from Grevious escaping and the ship crashing to the inside of the cockpit seems to kinda just stop, around 14 and a half minutes in, this one is not really an issue just rather something I noticed and felt like it went different in the original movie, I believe because you cut him talking to himself in the escape pod which is good, although somewhat noticable

Also I just had to point out, I love the cut from them getting captured by the security droids in the elevator shaft. Makes perfect sense.

Now for my personal opinion.

-I would have added the dialogue of Qui-Gon Jinn that Hal9000 added (from the clone wars) when Yoda is reflecting, to give more of an explanation. Preformed by Liam, so I don’t really see a reason not to.
-I would redub the “for reasons we cannot explain” when Padme is dying, I guess it’s assumed Palpatine is killing her with the force? If not, how could professional medical droids not understand why she is dying. Seems weird. Again, could be the force though.
-I know you cut the “you were the chosen one” part on mustafar but I never really had a huge issue with that. The only thing I noticed was when it cuts to Obi won’s face he has a sudden change of expression, because it’s the shot from after he said something like ‘it was said that you would destroy the sith not join them’ (Which I think you cut so there was none of this diaolgue), so he went from looking normal to very distraught then back to normal. All im trying to say was that 1-2 second shot of his face looked like he had just yelled something/was about to yell something but he didn’t

And that’s all! Well done, I think this edit is perfect for fans who like RotS but want to trim some of the dumb stuff while not overdoing it and making things seem ‘obviously fan-edited’

I’ll take a link too. Thanks

Just watched the Mustafar cut and I haven’t read a ton of discussion so I’m a pretty neutral first time viewer.

This is very minor and all the pacing, colors, and sound was great. I just had one underlying reason for disliking the video game footage, and that is: it looks like it’ll be a normal invasion fight scene, but then it cuts right to a slow motion epic music fighting scene. I think the battle could be more consistent without the video game footage. Show your establishing shots, then boom, go to the normal fight from the movie. You could even add a second establishing forest shot if you want I liked that close up when someone posted earlier.

That said, I was analyzing it closely knowing it’s a fan edit. Show it to a true clueless viewer and they might not notice what I was thinking.