So let's discuss what's OK and what's not OK to remove in a restoration.

(1) Gate weave: Digital stabilization improves the accuracy of most automatic dirt/dust removal algorithms.

I'd vote "YES, remove!" for everything except the crawl and credits, as people are more likely to notice text that's rocking back and forth.

(2) Brightness/contrast fluctuation: Locking the brightness/contrast of a shot to the brightness/contrast of the first frame in the shot tends to improve the accuracy and effectiveness of most dirt/dust removal algorithms.

I'd vote "YES, remove!", but only on a intra-shot basis. Inter-shot brightness/contrast fluctuation reduction is not very useful anyway.

(3) Non-dirt/dust anomalies (e.g., hairs): These are typically very difficult to remove. Also, some people (e.g., myself) have fond memories of certain instances of print damage, such as the "Tantive Orange Errors".

I'd vote "NO, keep!" for non-dirt/dust anomalies that are also present in a second source, such as the GOUT.

I couldn't come to a conclusion for the next two, so...

(4) Burned-in subtitles: If they're sufficiently different from the original 35mm theatrical subtitles, then something will have to be done.

(5) Alternate crawls/credits: ...

Hi Poita, WOW! The ROTJ Death Star attack was incredible.  I can’t believe 8mm looks that good.  I hope you’ll transfer the rest. I’d love to have a copy.  

Also, this is waay off topic, but I followed your advice to AntcuFaalb and downloaded Davinci Lite for my Mac. I’ve only dipped my toes into the program, but this is exactly what I was looking for. Thank you!

Keep up the great work. =D

poita said:

I personally wouldn't remove any gate weave. I'd track it, stabilise the footage to do any cleanup etc. and then put the gate weave back at the end using the tracking data.

My only issue with retaining the gate weave is: How do we know what's ["original" gate weave] vs. [gate weave resulting from Derann's equipment]?

poita said:

It doesn't really matter, there would have been different gate weave on every projector that ever showed Star Wars, once gate weave is removed, it looks dead/non-film to me, but it is a personal preference thing.

Amen.

As for dust and dirt removal, how do you decide what to keep and what to remove? IMO you either keep it all or you remove it all for consistency, I think it's preferable to make two versions - one that is cleaned up and one that is not.

In the case of old special effects films with a lot of opticals like SW, the issue get even more tricky, as there's tons of dirt and scratches built into every optical. Heck even the opening Fox logo had picked up a hair in one of its searchlights in the '70's. In a true preservation things like that should stay. That's what was so beautiful with photochemical restorations in the past, when you didn't have computers cleaning every frame. The average person expect to see sterile clean looking images without grain these days, they have basically forgotten how films look. The only thing they care about is resolution.

msycamore: My plan is to keep all large/easy-to-spot anomalies (tantive orange errors, hair, etc.) in.

I intend to check each frame against another source (e.g., Technidisc SWE) in order to determine which anomalies stay and which don't.

As with any restoration using **Clean, each frame will have to undergo evaluation before getting the proverbial SealOfApproval(TM).

Trust me, I'm not one to half-ass something like this.

msycamore said:

As for dust and dirt removal, how do you decide what to keep and what to remove?

 After seeing some of the videos, it looks like the wet gate takes care of prettymuch any dirt worth removing.

Right, but a lot of people might consider that "good enough".

AntcuFaalb said:

msycamore: My plan is to keep all large/easy-to-spot anomalies (tantive orange errors, hair, etc.) in.

I intend to check each frame against another source (e.g., Technidisc SWE) in order to determine which anomalies stay and which don't.

As with any restoration using **Clean, each frame will have to undergo evaluation before getting the proverbial SealOfApproval(TM).

Trust me, I'm not one to half-ass something like this.

I definitely trust your judgement, I only thought I responded to a question on restoration in general, your post looked that way to me.

Looking forward to this, your samples look excellent, Poita.

The more I see the more I like.   Is there anyway some one can repost the first link to star wars?  The old one is not working for me.   Thanks.

Oh man thanks a lot.

 That was great!--- Tony the Tiger.