I'll try to keep this thread positive in tone, and will probably remove it in a few weeks, because it's mostly OT, and negativity spreads on the Web all too much.
I was sorely disappointed at George Lucas' idea of a conclusion to the Star Wars 'saga'; the dialog was forced and largely subserviant to the action, the FX (usually ground-breakers with IL&M) have already been done, and done better in such releases as Sky Captain, The Incredibles, and I, Robot, and the story was unevenly paced--rushed at times, and painfully drawn out in others. I expected a satisfying tale of how Ahniken became Darth, and all George could do is hint at a sketchy, undeveloped turn of Ahniken to the Dark Side of The Force.
"Get positive, Gare..." :
? The popcorn at the cineplex was fresh and not too salty,
? The floors were clean, bereft of gum or spilled soft drinks.
? The seats were comfortable
? The lighting and use of color in the movie were excellent
? I learned the proper occasion upon which to use After Effects' "window pane' screen transitions.
? It was good to see Chewie and Jar-Jar again, despite the brevity of these cameos.
? Master Yoda is doing better as a CG than he did as a Muppet; he's more animated, he can now duel w/ a light sabre, and I'm glad they kept Frank Oz as his voice.
? James Earl Jones' voice of Vader is still spine-chilling, even though he had only 3 or 4 lines.
? Sam Jackson died a noble death. He mentioned in an interview on The Comedy Network about three years ago, that he'd die in this episode, but forced his agent to write into his contract that it's be while doing something heroic--he said he didn't want to pass the character Mace Windu on by him slipping on a bar of soap in the shower...
? The theater had free parking.
Trivia: John Knoll is presently the Special Effects Director for Industrial Light & Magic. His much earlier claim to fame, is that he and his brother Tom wanted a viewing and manipulation system for graphics files on their Macs, which had not really been developed much back in 1986. So they wrote what they dubbed BarneyScan F/X and then unsuccessfully tried to market it to a now long-defunct scanner manufacturer.
Adobe Systems, which owned Illustrator (rumored to have been acquired by John Warnock for his wife, an artist), was tiny at the time, but leapt at the chance to distribute BarneyScan. Version 1 came out for the Mac in around 1987, and it wasn't until 1992 or so that Adobe felt the pressure from Aldus' Windows program, ImageStyler, that they released Photoshop 2.5 for the Mac and Windows (the point version was the bi-platform release, and the two versions weren't binary-compatible until release 3.0).
Today, Tom Knoll still write for Adobe from his house in Wisconson, and that's why Adobe established a field office in Wisc.!
...must be nice, working from home
May The Force be with you all.
My Best,
Gare
I was sorely disappointed at George Lucas' idea of a conclusion to the Star Wars 'saga'; the dialog was forced and largely subserviant to the action, the FX (usually ground-breakers with IL&M) have already been done, and done better in such releases as Sky Captain, The Incredibles, and I, Robot, and the story was unevenly paced--rushed at times, and painfully drawn out in others. I expected a satisfying tale of how Ahniken became Darth, and all George could do is hint at a sketchy, undeveloped turn of Ahniken to the Dark Side of The Force.
"Get positive, Gare..." :
? The popcorn at the cineplex was fresh and not too salty,
? The floors were clean, bereft of gum or spilled soft drinks.
? The seats were comfortable
? The lighting and use of color in the movie were excellent
? I learned the proper occasion upon which to use After Effects' "window pane' screen transitions.
? It was good to see Chewie and Jar-Jar again, despite the brevity of these cameos.
? Master Yoda is doing better as a CG than he did as a Muppet; he's more animated, he can now duel w/ a light sabre, and I'm glad they kept Frank Oz as his voice.
? James Earl Jones' voice of Vader is still spine-chilling, even though he had only 3 or 4 lines.
? Sam Jackson died a noble death. He mentioned in an interview on The Comedy Network about three years ago, that he'd die in this episode, but forced his agent to write into his contract that it's be while doing something heroic--he said he didn't want to pass the character Mace Windu on by him slipping on a bar of soap in the shower...
? The theater had free parking.
Trivia: John Knoll is presently the Special Effects Director for Industrial Light & Magic. His much earlier claim to fame, is that he and his brother Tom wanted a viewing and manipulation system for graphics files on their Macs, which had not really been developed much back in 1986. So they wrote what they dubbed BarneyScan F/X and then unsuccessfully tried to market it to a now long-defunct scanner manufacturer.
Adobe Systems, which owned Illustrator (rumored to have been acquired by John Warnock for his wife, an artist), was tiny at the time, but leapt at the chance to distribute BarneyScan. Version 1 came out for the Mac in around 1987, and it wasn't until 1992 or so that Adobe felt the pressure from Aldus' Windows program, ImageStyler, that they released Photoshop 2.5 for the Mac and Windows (the point version was the bi-platform release, and the two versions weren't binary-compatible until release 3.0).
Today, Tom Knoll still write for Adobe from his house in Wisconson, and that's why Adobe established a field office in Wisc.!
...must be nice, working from home
May The Force be with you all.
My Best,
Gare
