J.J. Abrams On The Force Awakens' Broadsaber, Practical Effects, And More

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The Force Awakens director J.J. Abrams talked to Collider at the Visual Effects Society Awards, where he accepted the Visionary Award. Abrams discussed the infamous broadsaber, IMAX, practical versus digital effects, and the next two sequels.

Here are a few choice quotes, on fan reaction to the broadsaber and the role of digital effects:

"It was a number of conversations [that led to the design]. It was a sketch that became a whole thing and, you know, this was not done without a lot of conversation and it’s fun to see people have the conversation that we had, but in reverse."

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"There are obviously an enormous amount of CG effects in the film, and I can't wait for you to see the combination. But it was very important that we build as many sets as we could and that the film have a tangible, sort of authentic quality that you believed that these things were actually happening in a real space with real sunlight, if it was an exterior scene, or if we could build a big portion of a scene and not have anything be blue screen, do it where we could. It was a very important piece of work."

Abrams also said he hadn't seen a first cut of the film, as it was still being edited.

You can watch the full interview below.

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