<P> In July 2014, filming took place over three days at Skellig Michael, an island off the coast of County Kerry, Ireland, with a cast including Mark Hamill and Daisy Ridley . Landscape shots for the planet Takodana were shot in July in the Lake District in the north west of England . Production was halted for two weeks in early August 2014 so Abrams could rework shooting in Ford's absence and resumed with a fully healed Ford during mid-August . In September 2014, the former RAF Greenham Common military base in Berkshire was used and featured set constructions of several spaceships from the Star Wars Universe . Puzzlewood in the Forest of Dean was used for forest scenes . Principal photography ended on November 3, 2014 . </P> <P> Cinematographer Daniel Mindel stated that The Force Awakens would use real locations and scale models over computer - generated imagery to make it aesthetically similar to the original Star Wars trilogy . Rian Johnson, director of The Last Jedi, reiterated that Abrams would use little CGI and more practical, traditional special effects, saying: "I think people are coming back around to (practical effects). It feels like there is sort of that gravity pulling us back toward it . I think that more and more people are hitting kind of a critical mass in terms of the CG - driven action scene lending itself to a very specific type of action scene, where physics go out the window and it becomes so big so quick ." Abrams' intention in prioritizing practical special effects was to recreate the visual realism and authenticity of the original Star Wars . To that end, the droid BB - 8 was a physical prop that was developed by Disney Research, created by special effects artist Neal Scanlan and operated live on set with the actors . </P> <P> In February 2014, Industrial Light & Magic (ILM) announced plans to open a facility in London, citing Disney's Star Wars films as a catalyst for the expansion . ILM's Vancouver branch also worked on the special effects for the film . </P> <P> Abrams supervised post-production and editing of the film at Bad Robot Productions' headquarters in Santa Monica . In August 2015, Abrams gave the estimated running time of the film as 124--125 minutes . Abrams made changes to the film's plot in the editing process to simplify the film, by removing some sequences shown in trailers: "At one point, Maz used to continue along with the characters back to the Resistance base, but we realised that she really had nothing to do there of value, except to be sitting around ." The film was converted to 3D in post-production . </P>

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