As the December release of The Force Awakens draws ever-closer, director J.J. Abrams keeps right on dropping hints about what we can expect from the finished product.

Over the weekend, he did a panel with fellow sci-fi nerd Stephen Colbert at the Montclair Film Festival, and he revealed an interesting detail: the signature Abrams lens flare will be kept to a minimum in the Star Wars universe.

The lens flare has been a reliable part of Abrams’ cinematic tool kit for years, hitting its peak in the Star Trek and Super 8 era, to the point where he’s often mocked for his sheer overuse of it.

Per Vulture, however, he’s well aware of this, and promises to ease back this time:

“As you’ll see in the Star Wars movie, I’ve allowed lens flares to take a very backseat [role] … We’re making sure it looks photo-realistic, [because] every time there could be a flare, I said, ‘This is not the movie. These are not the flares you’re looking for.'”

At the same panel, he said that his goal for the movie was to make it look and feel as “real” as possible, in tribute to the original trilogy and the designs of Ralph McQuarrie.

Per The AV Club, who were also present, Abrams said that he’s glad to be done with the whole Star Wars business, likening his director role to “living with the greatest roommate in history for too long.”

Abrams added that, even though “it’s been great”, he’s ready to “get his own place” and “meet other people”, cinematically-speaking.

Meanwhile, over the weekend, the director popped up on Saturday Night Live in one of the show’s recurring ‘auditions’ bits, in which the likes of Jon Hamm and Emma Stone read for parts in the film, alongside some of the actual cast:

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