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Babylon 5 Project - The Film Series

coolfilm

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Hey there, I am a major B5 fan and have the DVDs and done my own editing. I can't do fancy cgi or make new stuff up but just the usual with avidemux. I started off with merging the two versions of The Gathering into one. Season 1 was basically speeding up all the space fights scenes as they were painfully slow and now all good and realistic. Also rearranged some scenes in important story arc episodes. I used the, approach by Sinclair to the Minbari warship, in The Beginning cgi as they are the same as in And The Sky Full Of Stars but massively improved cgi.

Some changes in Season two and 3. Franklin's annoying stabbing scenes in between the first major battle against the Shadows in Shadow Dancing were removed thus allowing almost 10 minutes of battle without interruption.

What Zathras continuity error are you thinking off. I can't remember any.
Keep Catherine Sakai as her scenes is important as the Walkers are one of the First Ones ancient races and G'Kar excellent philosophical lines at the end. Also G'Kar got involved because of Sinclair thus Sakai link to Sinclair is important.
Adira can be removed as flashbacks is already included in Interlude and Examinations.
Most season 1 can be removed as many are independent episodes. However each eps do have some wonderful humour between Londo, Vir and G'kar and some wonderful lines. Extract and keep them.
Franklins perving after patients can be removed.

If you want any clips of space fights, let me know. I could upload an example of original and modified for comparison on Youtube if you want.
 

subjectzero

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I'd love to see what you did with the space battles! I've finished and submitted the first 2 films already so maybe a v2.

BTW, if you haven't seen these, you gotta check them out. Re-rendered CGI from the series in high def!


Haven't gotten to Shadow Dancing yet but I might borrow your idea.

  • Zathras mentions he gave The One his time stabilizer and has none and will die. Those shots don't make it to WWE. Also, a computer mentions something about a temporal atmosphere and I removed the shot of Delenn placing her hand on Sinclair's shoulder.
  • Catherine Sakai is in the Walkers storyline, it's just her relationship to Sinclair has been removed. G'Kar mentions he did it because it seemed like a good idea at the time. Still works.
  • I'm hoping to remove as many flashbacks as possible. Adira's story has been truncated quite a bit.
Most of season 1 and season 2 has actually been jettisoned. You lose a lot of good scenes but gain a more cohessive ride to Sleeping in the Light. If you'd like a preview copy of the 1st 3 movies, just send a PM!
 

coolfilm

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subjectzero said:
I'd love to see what you did with the space battles! I've finished and submitted the first 2 films already so maybe a v2.

BTW, if you haven't seen these, you gotta check them out. Re-rendered CGI from the series in high def!


Haven't gotten to Shadow Dancing yet but I might borrow your idea.

  • Zathras mentions he gave The One his time stabilizer and has none and will die. Those shots don't make it to WWE. Also, a computer mentions something about a temporal atmosphere and I removed the shot of Delenn placing her hand on Sinclair's shoulder.
  • Catherine Sakai is in the Walkers storyline, it's just her relationship to Sinclair has been removed. G'Kar mentions he did it because it seemed like a good idea at the time. Still works.
  • I'm hoping to remove as many flashbacks as possible. Adira's story has been truncated quite a bit.
Most of season 1 and season 2 has actually been jettisoned. You lose a lot of good scenes but gain a more cohessive ride to Sleeping in the Light. If you'd like a preview copy of the 1st 3 movies, just send a PM!
Did you do the re-rendering?

check this out.
 

coolfilm

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I have been doing some experiments. Doing all episodes would be time consuming and most are boring. With your idea I could do it for each movie. To improve the quality, I have extracted the frames as image and then improve on it using gigapixel and reshade. Take a look.

Extract to 4096x2304
xsW0jX8l.jpg


Apply gigapixel
PuHnqDIl.jpg


apply reshade
qUBF5jol.jpg


apply reshade again back to original 1024x576 video
pAaw1fKl.png


Notice the texture improvement where details are clearer and stars are noticeable.

Another one for final edit. Reduce noise, artefacts to make the bottom half of the station clearer.
C8jUaTsl.jpg
 

subjectzero

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No, I they aren't my re-renders, but they look phenomenal! I've seen that fan remake of Gorash VII but I feel it's a bit too video-gamey for me. I'd love to see someone redo B5 at the level of quality that BSG or The Expanse!

Oh man, I love seeing cleaned up B5! Warms the cockles of my heart!

Someone has redone B5 at 1080p using similar (or possibly the same) tools! Files are available online with the exception of two episodes:

4x12 - Conflicts of Interest
4x15 - No Surrender, No Retreat


I'll PM you about the episodes I've finished but the film series won't be that much shorter in terms of length. I estimate I'm roughly eliminating 33% to 40% but that's still like 42+ hours. It's still quite a commitment!
 

coolfilm

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subjectzero said:
No, I they aren't my re-renders, but they look phenomenal! I've seen that fan remake of Gorash VII but I feel it's a bit too video-gamey for me. I'd love to see someone redo B5 at the level of quality that BSG or The Expanse!

Not my skill set unfortunately.
Oh man, I love seeing cleaned up B5! Warms the cockles of my heart!

Someone has redone B5 at 1080p using similar (or possibly the same) tools! Files are available online with the exception of two episodes:

4x12 - Conflicts of Interest
4x15 - No Surrender, No Retreat

I know but not as good as mine above. Using video software to improve quality is hit and miss. You will see why in my next post.
I am using ffmpeg to extract all the frames and using photo based software to improve quality then put the images back together as video.

I'll PM you about the episodes I've finished but the film series won't be that much shorter in terms of length. I estimate I'm roughly eliminating 33% to 40% but that's still like 42+ hours. It's still quite a commitment!

Why don't you type a list of clips per episode you want to keep, just keep it brief as I will be able to work out what you mean. I then can go through it and collaborate. Take your time per season, there's no rush.
 

coolfilm

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Now for the characters. Rendering space and ships has its own settings and are not suitable for rendering characters. Hence rendering will be split into two groups, one for space and ships, and another for characters.

Extracted frame
x0qC3SXl.jpg


Rendered frame
VHgWJI8l.jpg


Don't you like it?

I am going to do the first part, approx 5 minutes, to see what the video would look like. Will let you know later.
 

subjectzero

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Babylon 5 Project V: The Long, Twilight Struggle is ready for preview! PM me for the file!

53lHSHn.pnghttp:


This one was pretty tough to put together since there isn't as much of a throughline that could be constructed. I also reversed the order of the major episodes it's based on which wreaked some havoc and there are a couple of minor inconsistencies just hanging out. It's constructed like a nested doll so the beginning and end deal with the Narn-Centauri war while the Markab storyline is smack in the middle. 

Mostly, B5 Project V is setting up a lot of stuff that gets paid off in the coming films. I toyed with getting rid of the Markab storyline but it does set up the jump gate trick Sheridan pulls and it gives a real start to Franklin's stim addiction.
 

Zarius

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Sorry it's taken me so long to get back to these, lots of projects to keep me busy. Let me know if you've made any further progress on these, I'm still up for viewing them. Hope you haven't lost interest in this place.
 

subjectzero

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Zarius said:
Sorry it's taken me so long to get back to these, lots of projects to keep me busy. Let me know if you've made any further progress on these, I'm still up for viewing them. Hope you haven't lost interest in this place.

Hey! I haven't lost interest, just in the final throws of editing a novel and finishing the first draft of its sequel. I put this on the back burner for a bit but I'm still committed to finishing them! Just not sure when!
 

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subjectzero said:
Zarius said:
Sorry it's taken me so long to get back to these, lots of projects to keep me busy. Let me know if you've made any further progress on these, I'm still up for viewing them. Hope you haven't lost interest in this place.

Hey! I haven't lost interest, just in the final throws of editing a novel and finishing the first draft of its sequel. I put this on the back burner for a bit but I'm still committed to finishing them! Just not sure when!

That's good to hear. That's awesome that you've been working on novels. I finished up an original story just a couple of days ago, it can be found on Archive of our Own
 

subjectzero

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Surprise! Back with an update!

Just putting some of the finishing touches on Babylon 5 Project VII: Point of No Return and getting it ready for beta viewers. It covers about the first third of season 3, splicing pieces from episodes 2 to 7. Kind of a calm before the storm film.

It's been a while since I got back to this so apologies for that but it'll mean I'm 1/3 the way through the movie series. B5 Project VIII: Severed Dreams will be a much easier cut than a lot of what came before since nothing is being cut out or reorganized. In fact, a good chunk of upcoming films will basically be three episodes strung together with minor edits. In fact, I think about half of the remaining edits will be done that way. Hopefully that will make for quicker turnaround!
 

subjectzero

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Just finished and exported TWO Babylon 5 Project films, ready to be beta viewed! PM me for details!

Babylon 5 Project VII: Point of No Return was cut last week but I really didn't get a chance to export it until this week. To bring you all up to speed, Babylon 5 Project VI: The Fall of Night covered the fall of Narn to the season 3 premiere Matters of Honor. Film VII covers season 3 episodes 2 to 7 and is mostly built around G'Kar being asked to go back to Narn, Ivanova and Marcus searching fo first ones, and Bester returns to look for dust. Little bits from other episodes are used to further some storylines such as the monks showing up, Lyta's return, and Marcus being told a package is en route to B5.

Babylon 5 Project VIII: Severed Dreams is the one I've been dying to get to! It covers Messages from Earth, Point of No Return, and (of course) Severed Dreams. I'll be honest, I thought I wouldn't be cutting anything out of these except for the commercial break fades but I found a couple places to trim. Having said that, it's a pretty straight forward edit with very minor changes.

So what's next? Well, we have the rest of season 3 coming up with B5 Project IX: Interludes and Examinations that kicks off the Shadows fighting out in the open. After that it will be the shortest film in the series with B5 Project X: War Without End that sees the flip side of the Babylon 4 story. I'll probably be editing some footage from Babylon Squared back in. Then we end it off with B5 Project XI: In the Shadow of Z'ha'dum which takes us right up to the season 3 finale. Weirdly, this will be the first time I'll end a film on the season finale. The assembly cut has this pegged at 2 hours and 44 minutes making it the second longes assembly cut I have!

Because season 4 is so jam packed with arc storytelling, it'll have the least cut out and be made of six films. What gets dropped is Intersections in Real Time with Sheridan's torture which is a personal fave of mine. However, in terms of telling the arc story of B5 it can be dropped and you won't miss it. The Deconstruction of Falling Stars also gets nixed but I will use a small portion of it showing the group arrive on Babylon 5 in season 5. I'm also cutting out Delenn is a child of Valen because it never crops back up again even though it's an interesting wrinkle along with she was the deciding vote.

Season 5 was an interesting problem! It was really slow to get going and I remember it the least, having watched these episodes the least. Three episodes are cut out, whole cloth: "A View from the Gallery", "Day of the Dead", and "The Corps is Mother, the Corps is Father" bringing us down to 19 episodes to choose from. The telepath arc is 10 episodes long with "Gallery" cut out but I've managed to get it down to 2 hours and 46 minutes in my assembly cut which is the equivalent of four episodes of B5. That makes it the longest film in the series but I wanted to get the entire arc down to a single film. From there, we get two films to really cover the fall of Centauri Prime. Then we wrap it up with B5 Project XXI: Sleeping in the Light which sees a few things taken out: no urn for Sheridan and Delenn's son and Lennier doesn't turn as neither adds to the arc story.
 

Zarius

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Severed Dreams is my favourite episode of the series, it has no equal (although there is strong competition amidst other episodes in seasons three and four), and it's great to see it serve as the concluding act of what is a very strong range of high-stake episodes that conclude the back end of storylines set up a season ago, thanks for giving me these. I didn't notice too many problems on the SD edit (I hope you don't mind me watching that one first)
 

subjectzero

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Those three episodes in sequence are some of my favorite television ever! They actually were partial inspiration for editing the whole series as films since I realized those three would be the length of a feature film. That made me realize JMS tended to group a bunch of arc heavy episodes together in 3 to 6 episode sequences so I just went about figuring out how to get from one grouping to the next.
 

subjectzero

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UPDATE: I have found some backups for my originally assembly cuts. Still a bunch of files missing but I may be able to rebuild everything.

Bad news: my harddrive crapped out and I've lost almost all of my files. It'll be a while before I'll know what can be recovered and what can't but I'll keep you all posted. There might be a chance I can save the edits but I'm feeling pretty down right now.
 

lapis molari

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subjectzero said:
UPDATE: I have found some backups for my originally assembly cuts. Still a bunch of files missing but I may be able to rebuild everything.

Bad news: my harddrive crapped out and I've lost almost all of my files. It'll be a while before I'll know what can be recovered and what can't but I'll keep you all posted. There might be a chance I can save the edits but I'm feeling pretty down right now.

Oh $#@%! My sympathies, fellow B5 fan. I regrettably know the feeling.

In hindsight, I could've saved myself time rebuilding fanedits if I'd written down more of my edit decisions when it was still fresh in my mind. Once I got around to revisiting several projects, I had to re-decide many cuts and changes rather than merely having to re-execute previously made decisions. If at all applicable, I recommend you jot down those thoughts.
 

subjectzero

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Not a feeling I want anyone else to share, for sure! As it stands, I may have backed up JUUUUST enough that all of my previous decisions may still be intact. I hope that to be the case!
lapis molari said:
subjectzero said:
UPDATE: I have found some backups for my originally assembly cuts. Still a bunch of files missing but I may be able to rebuild everything.

Bad news: my harddrive crapped out and I've lost almost all of my files. It'll be a while before I'll know what can be recovered and what can't but I'll keep you all posted. There might be a chance I can save the edits but I'm feeling pretty down right now.

Oh $#@%! My sympathies, fellow B5 fan. I regrettably know the feeling.

In hindsight, I could've saved myself time rebuilding fanedits if I'd written down more of my edit decisions when it was still fresh in my mind. Once I got around to revisiting several projects, I had to re-decide many cuts and changes rather than merely having to re-execute previously made decisions. If at all applicable, I recommend you jot down those thoughts.
 

TM2YC

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Bloody hell, that's bad news. My commiserations :cry: .

I'm about 30mins into watching your first edit and I'm enjoying it a lot so far :) . You did a great job with the prologue. At least you've got that one backed up and can drop it into a new timeline and use it as a guide to replicate the cuts fairly easily. I've had to do that myself before and it takes less time than you'd expect.
 

subjectzero

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Good news! 

It looks like I have all the edited files and timelines backed up but I've lost most of the video renderings. What that means is that, unfortunately, I have to re-render the video files. However, a quick experiment reveals that I can just relink the video with the timeline rather than having to recut everything. It's not perfect but I think the whole thing is salvageable and most of my work has been saved!
 
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