Look, I have it on good authority from Imperial sources that the first prototype DS that we see in ROTS ,was ,like a lot of things in the prequels, a complete failure that misfired when first tested and collapsed in on itself. A Mr JJ Binks, who ,along with many other Gungans and senators was sadly killed in the accident during the ceremony to mark the station becoming full operational , perished believing they had been involved in the building the first giant "lighty brighty "portable planetary warmer for systems whose suns had mysteriously gone out all of sudden. A Mr D. Vader ,on behalf of the Empire, refused to comment pending a Health and Safety investigation by the head of the department Mr Snoke , who said that although the original design was quite good , it could do well do with several improvements that he intended to follow up on in the future.
Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (Pre-release)
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PHArchivist
Master Member
Sort of, yes...
Not the best shot ever, but this shows it, and it also gives a look at what I've mentioned above. This is roughly the same region we see in the trailer. If the original model had a scaled representation of the detail / variation in the cityscapes seen in this shot, you would be able to see them on the model. The cityscapes here would not be as consistently even in their pattern.
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Pretty sure it was intentional. As said prior, the opening crawl says "more powerful", but a lot of the ancillary material at the time used info they got from Lucasfilm for the descriptive stuff they put in magazines and such. The novelization says "twice the size" of the first Death Star, but that's a vague metric and doesn't really indicate diameter or volume or mass or what.
Going by the physical cues, such as -- mainly -- establishing the sizes of the hangars from people and known ships,working up to the sizes of the main equatorial trenches, and from those the sizes of the whole stations. Also, for the second one, comparisons between the size of the station and the size of the planet, assuming something approximately Earth-sized to account for gravity and atmospheric density.
Also, I was pulling a Mars Climate Orbiter in my recollections. The first Death Star was quoted as being "about a hundred miles across" by folks involved with the film at the time -- hence the 160km figure, and the visual evidence in the film supports that to within plus or minus 5km. The second one I had to check, and the quote there was five hundred miles in diameter. So oops on my part for getting my units mixed up. And, again, the visual evidence supports a size somewhere between 800 and 960 kilometers. The last published size seems to have stabilized at 900km, which is within that range, so... Yeah.
--Jonah
PHArchivist
Master Member
Still processing...
Clearly digital (as if there was any question), and so it is obvious the artists used the tools at their disposal to add greater detail than existed on the original model. However, I think as a result, there is TOO much detail to correctly align with the original.
Ralph McQuarie's original approach (and I'm extrapolating here) was a "salt & pepper" speckle pattern that - in my opinion - was used to represent surface variation (think Death Star laser cannon turrets), and light and shadow. With the exception of the line patterns and the solid grey areas between the cityscapes, the surface of the original model was almost entirely unbroken cityscapes with little or not significant perceptible variation in the speckling. The pattern was pretty much consistent across the board.
But the detail in the new digital model suggests stronger variations in the cityscapes that are large enough that they would be visible from a greater distance from the model (higher altitude in the fictional world) than we see in the trailer, which is a considerably low fictional altitude/close in. The variations in the digital cityscapes are significant to the point that, for instance, on my model I'd have to go in and add more visible details and variations to my own speckle pattern if I wanted to represent the new digital Death Star (DDS?)..
Is this all making sense, or am I losing myself in detail...?
Anyway,..
I like that there is more detail to see...
I don't like that it doesn't properly align with the original model.
Sorry for the long answer - you asked!
To demonstrate...
Though the areas in the green boxes are not on the same spot on the surface (they are different plots of cityscape), just go with me here...
On the original, you see how consistent the speckle pattern is. If the DDS (Digital Death Star) were to faithfully replicate this, then the entire cityscape in the green box in the trailer cap should (in my opinion) appear like the area in the red box.
Further, the areas (and details) in the yellow boxes are significant enough that they would appear (be visible) on the original model itself, (albeit in a simpler form, but visible nonetheless).
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PHArchivist
Master Member
Now for another thought...
For as cool as it is to see the dish being installed - really...? Would they really build it, ship it, and install it as separate component?
Here I go trying to rationalize fiction, which I sort of spoke against just a few posts back...
But it would seem far more - um, rational - that they would have built an underlying support structure and gradually build it out from there, bit by bit.
I can't help but to wonder if what we see in the film was informed by, inspired by, or is an homage to the condition of the original model as it was found, and in response to commentary on how the original model was assembled (Lorne Peterson, paraphrased from Sculpting A Galaxy, "We simply took the removed section of the dome, turned it around and re-installed it").
For as cool as it is to see the dish being installed - really...? Would they really build it, ship it, and install it as separate component?
Here I go trying to rationalize fiction, which I sort of spoke against just a few posts back...
But it would seem far more - um, rational - that they would have built an underlying support structure and gradually build it out from there, bit by bit.
I can't help but to wonder if what we see in the film was informed by, inspired by, or is an homage to the condition of the original model as it was found, and in response to commentary on how the original model was assembled (Lorne Peterson, paraphrased from Sculpting A Galaxy, "We simply took the removed section of the dome, turned it around and re-installed it").
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JD
Master Member
He quoted you - your name was right there in quote, that pretty much spelled it out for anyone not looking for a fight. Nothing passive-aggressive about it - he summed up his views quite nicely - it's a shame it's wasted on you.You didn't mention my name because you're a passive-aggressive POS. No offense.
I get it: any opinions that are odds with yours, and that are posted more than once, you consider a "rant". lol
It's not your necessarily your opinion, it's the way you present your opinion that makes it a "rant."
...and it's a damn shame you don't read your post and apply what you're suggesting much of what you're preaching about @Guy_Cowen and apply it to yourself.
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JD
Master Member
Gizmodo has an article discussing the Stormtrooper variants seen in the trailer.
I've also read some speculation that the end shot of the trailer is Jyn turning to see Vader - and that you can hear Vader's famous breathing at the 1:29 mark. I'm not sure if I'm buying that - there is something there that sounds vaguely like a Vader breath... but, it's a stretch.
I've also read some speculation that the end shot of the trailer is Jyn turning to see Vader - and that you can hear Vader's famous breathing at the 1:29 mark. I'm not sure if I'm buying that - there is something there that sounds vaguely like a Vader breath... but, it's a stretch.
Hi JD,
You're mistaken. Let me clear things up for you. @Guy_Cowen ranted about how the thread was being ruined for him by un-named individuals, to whom he offered a life prescription of taking long walks, spending more time with family, taking up another hobby, and taking a vacation from the internet. lol He did so in post #1810. I quoted him for the first time in post #1821, and then after some back-and-forth, in post #1826 he acknowledged he had never specifically named me as a target of his diatribe. To which I replied in #1828 by saying that he didn't because he's passive-aggressive.
Glad I could help you out, JD. If you're gonna take potshots, do try to keep your facts straight.
Better yet, why not knock off the potshots? You're making it very hard for me to live up to my New Year's resolution of not arguing with trolls.
The Wook
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JD
Master Member
Hi The Wook,
No, I'm not mistaken. Take a look at the posts.
I'm glad you're not arguing with yourself. I'm just pointing out a few facts for you.
Lighten up, buttercup.
The AT-AT scene ....
Honestly, I don't want it to be so. Each time characters' backstories are tied together the universe shrinks a little more. The prequels, as the ultimate example of this, made the universe minuscule. Rogue One is a big step that can expand the universe... don't blow it, Disney.
is that the battle on Jakku? That would fit in well with the theory that Jyn might be Rey's mom.
Wolfsburg
Master Member
Not sure how it could be because the Battle of Jakku was a year after ROTJ and RO takes place before ANH?
Well if it was mentioned in the novelization, that's good enough for me!
Pretty sure it was intentional. As said prior, the opening crawl says "more powerful", but a lot of the ancillary material at the time used info they got from Lucasfilm for the descriptive stuff they put in magazines and such. The novelization says "twice the size" of the first Death Star, but that's a vague metric and doesn't really indicate diameter or volume or mass or what.
Going by the physical cues, such as -- mainly -- establishing the sizes of the hangars from people and known ships,working up to the sizes of the main equatorial trenches, and from those the sizes of the whole stations. Also, for the second one, comparisons between the size of the station and the size of the planet, assuming something approximately Earth-sized to account for gravity and atmospheric density.
Also, I was pulling a Mars Climate Orbiter in my recollections. The first Death Star was quoted as being "about a hundred miles across" by folks involved with the film at the time -- hence the 160km figure, and the visual evidence in the film supports that to within plus or minus 5km. The second one I had to check, and the quote there was five hundred miles in diameter. So oops on my part for getting my units mixed up. And, again, the visual evidence supports a size somewhere between 800 and 960 kilometers. The last published size seems to have stabilized at 900km, which is within that range, so... Yeah.
--Jonah
Well if it was mentioned in the novelization, that's good enough for me!
JD
Master Member
Not sure if it's canon material, but Wookieepedia has some details about Jakku. Including...
"At some point during the Age of the Empire, the Galactic Empire established a secret weapons facility on the planet." Which could mean nothing... or everything.
They probably didn't put even as much thought in it as you have. They were hoping to give it lots of detail without studying the orginal over every millimeter.
I have always wondered, if real, or done in CG, at what point in distance are the cityscapes painted gray dots to then being more shapes in detail. I do think this shows it best it ever will.
I think a really cool shot, even if not in a movie, just to see it, would be to see the death star in the distance. The camera then starts zooming in. Closer and closer towards the city scape at one of the "lights", then close enough to see its a window up to someones face looking out.
PHArchivist
Master Member
More fun...
You can clearly see the efforts to - at a macro level - match the original. Very curious where and how the artists that created the new "DDS" got their reference, though I'm sure they have access to a treasure trove of material...
You can clearly see the efforts to - at a macro level - match the original. Very curious where and how the artists that created the new "DDS" got their reference, though I'm sure they have access to a treasure trove of material...
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PHArchivist
Master Member
And dammit all if "they" now don't have me second-guessing my work!
Note the differences in the circled areas. The DDS has a series of vertical lines in the open grey area, that my model does not have. So, now - is this artistic interpretation, or do they have access to better reference than I do and is this accurate to how the original model was "back in the day"...?
PHArchivist
Master Member
Another observation...
Not the center disc nor the second ring out from the center, bu the third seems to be too prominent; too robust. On the original, it wasn't even really more than a line/circle
Not the center disc nor the second ring out from the center, bu the third seems to be too prominent; too robust. On the original, it wasn't even really more than a line/circle
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PHArchivist
Master Member
One final comment then I'll leave it lay for the time being...
From the lighting of this digital model, it looks as if the cityscapes are meant to appear recessed into the surface. Interesting...
From the lighting of this digital model, it looks as if the cityscapes are meant to appear recessed into the surface. Interesting...
KrangPrime
Master Member
I don't think it was that way originally..
My guess is, that when they made the model, it looked too simplified just leaving the texture painted on, so they made them indented and made it look like a little city for more HD detail...
just my guess anyway. sometimes things don't always translate well from 2D to 3D so you need to change it up a bit.
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