1) Sue me if you want but I like the original version of Blade Runner better, and among other things also because the original FX look far more interesting because they have matte lines and stuff.

2) I definitely wasn't trying to be hostile. When I said I cringe while reading your posts, I wasn't trying to be an ass, I was entirely literally serious. It reminds me of you other thread - When people think that recompositing VFX constitutes restoration (especially people on this site, which is all about film preservation) it actually makes me fell depressed. Seriously, it saddens me, it doesn't make me angry, it just makes me sad.

S_Matt said:

I respect all the arguments for and against but you misunderstood my car analogy. If you're restoring a car, even if you put every single part back that was originally used, you still have to dismantle it first to repair and clean the components. 

 You do this with film too, though--without changing things (i.e. recomps, etc.). In some cases you have to disassemble the negative in order to cut in duplicate pieces from other sources, for sections that are damaged beyond repair. This happened to Star Wars. With older Technicolor negatives you have to go back to the original dye strips and re-assemble the final negative (with a scan nowadays). Sometimes for Kodak negatives you have to disassemble the colour layers and clean each one individually for dirt sandwiched in between the layers that can't be removed any other way. Etc.

A film is not a car, but if your analogy is to have any relevance it would be in the above. Doing digital recomps is, as was stated, like putting power windows in an old car, or replacing parts with ones that never existed like modern fuel injectors and turbo charging the engine. Or whatever. It'll perform better--but the point of a classic restoration is to bring it to its original state, not improve on that original state. Otherwise you haven't restored anything, you've gone beyond the restoration and enhanced it. For car enthusiasts, a lot of them are fine with that, because performance is usually the bottom line--but in film it isn't about performance, unless you want to acknowledge that its an enhanced version. Blade Runner Final Cut is about performance, about getting the slickest, best possible version of the film, and that's why its "Final Cut," because it's not the original, not a restoration, it's an enhancement that never existed quite like this but is technically superior to the original version in terms of technology (while being respectful of aesthetics, etc. of the original).

If the 1977-1983 versions were released, but without all of the sound tracks and with digital recomposits...

How many of you would still be signing petitions and crying foul?  I know it's not what you'd prefer.  But would you still fight the good (?) fight?

That's one of the tricky things about Star Wars...there have been so many audio and visual changes right since the very beginning.  What would the actual OOT consist of?

xhonzi said:

If the 1977-1983 versions were released, but without all of the sound tracks and with digital recomposits...

How many of you would still be signing petitions and crying foul?  I know it's not what you'd prefer.  But would you still fight the good (?) fight?

Yes. Definitely. It would still constitute a special edition.

ALL of the sound mixes?  How would that even be possible?

All 3 oriinal mixes...

I would settle for any one of te oriinal mixes. Recompositin is a no-no.

I would be disappointed to no end if they released what they'd call the "original" versions and there were recomposited shots in it, maybe even more than them not being released at all actually. It may actually make me weep a little. The recompositing for me may be the main (yet far not the only) thing that pisses me off about the SEs. I just can't wait to  be able to admire the original FX shots (just as they were created in 77, 80 and 83) in HD and recompositing totally ruins that.

I'm not much of an audiophile, so I wouldn't really mind if all the original mixes weren't included, but I'd of course prefer if they were.

Outsource it to someone else who cares about the oot which is not currently Lucasfilm.  It does not even have to be funded by Lucas just license it to whomever.

Have the restoration done by Bob Harris.

Have restoration prints run in the cinemas, then have a blu ray/DVD release simultaneously afterward.

Lucas and Lucasfilm would still benefit in terms of royalty profits, let someone like Fox pay for the restoration, they apparently paid 20 million to restore star wars trilogy in 1997 which was ultimately changed and not restored.

Gaffer Tape said:

I would settle for any one of te oriinal mixes. Recompositin is a no-no.

Are you drunk, Gaff? ;-)

With all respect to your views Zombie,

I have no problem with them removing eyesores like garbage mattes and changing nothing else.  They never were supposed to be visible in the first place.

The Lowry botch job is going to make them very visible at blu ray resolution.

xhonzi said:

If the 1977-1983 versions were released, but without all of the sound tracks and with digital recomposits...

How many of you would still be signing petitions and crying foul?  I know it's not what you'd prefer.  But would you still fight the good (?) fight?

The soundtracks don't really matter to me as much as the visual. We already have the majority of the soundtracks anyway, albeit in less than ideal quality.

But I think it would be weird for Lucasfilm to release a recomposited version of the originals. That would require effort and would make the OOT much more pleasing to the average viewer, which goes against everything Lucas has been doing since the late 90s.

It's much more likely they'd do a straight transfer from a print and just dump it on the disc. Which is all we would really need to do our own OT.com magic.

Erikstormtrooper said:

xhonzi said:

If the 1977-1983 versions were released, but without all of the sound tracks and with digital recomposits...

How many of you would still be signing petitions and crying foul?  I know it's not what you'd prefer.  But would you still fight the good (?) fight?

The soundtracks don't really matter to me as much as the visual. We already have the majority of the soundtracks anyway, albeit in less than ideal quality.

But I think it would be weird for Lucasfilm to release a recomposited version of the originals. That would require effort and would make the OOT much more pleasing to the average viewer, which goes against everything Lucas has been doing since the late 90s.

It's much more likely they'd do a straight transfer from a print and just dump it on the disc. Which is all we would really need to do our own OT.com magic.

If Star Wars was destroyed  by time and no good copies exist anymore, then where did they get a source for the gout, and how did they print up those 70mm film cels ?  I have been asking this for years. 

That along with Lucas statement on the anatomy of a dewback video part 2 make me call bullshit on the official story. Altered and conformed negative for the 1997 special edition absolutely, no source for the originals, absolutely false.  Seperation masters exist.  It would be a generation less than the original negative but more than good enough to splice in from a scan with the oneg for the rest of the footage.

The problem that the o-neg represents is it is the raw camera footage no color timing exists on it.  So in 1997 they had to do a new color pass, and again in 2004.

And Zombie never said anything about garbage mattes, we're talking about matte lines, which are something completely different. Garbage mattes weren't (reportedly) visible in cinemas and as such shouldn't be present in a proper restoration (well shouldn't be visible that is, in a really good transfer, they should be invisible but should show up if you unnaturally increased the brightness, just like they would on a print).

zombie84 said:

Do not alter the film or its aesthetic. Just restore it.

Removing grain and fixing matte lines is altering the aesthetic of the film and fixing matte lines is altering both the aesthetic and content of the film. Dirt and scratches are instances of foreign objects attaching themselves to the film and damage to the film, and therefore should be removed.

The three original audio soundtracks of 1977 should be included, as they are all equally unique and as much a part of the film as it's original image is.

That's all I would want. No DNR, no updates of the special effects, no new mixes, no nothing. Just a classical restoration.

Exactly. This. This is it.

This should be our mission statement.

I've never seen it stated better.

They got rid of artifacts in Indiana Jones trilogy that nobody complained about.  There is no original indiana jones trilogy dotcom site.

For some Reason when Bob Z did the release for Back to the Future on DVD and blu ray however he refused to have the noticeable things like wires holding up marty mcly painted out.  These things hurt willful suspension of disbelief.  I was recently watching superman II or III cannot remember which and the wires were so noticeable because of the cleanup job they did on the DVD, the fact that a fan with some off the shelf software could do it makes the studios lazyness pretty transparent.

They could offer 2 versions of the movies one with things like matte lines and garbage mattes, wires removed, and no story content changed or major changes done, something i don't care about, i did not return my Indiana jones set for being false advertising because the snake reflection was gone in the well of souls.

As for me i don't care if nothing else is touched but i don't want to see big black boxes around the tie fighters in star wars, in the gunport sequence.  Even on a properly calibrated tv on the 2004 they are embarrassingly noticeable at 480P just wait until they hit in 1080P, the bitchfest will commence i can almost guarantee it, unless Lucas convinces them its a part of his original vision, or a deliberate creative decision.

I have to say that i can clearly remember seeing the matte boxes in the cinemas back in '77. Back then i knew nothing about special effects and the way they were done so we all thought that they were the ships shields. I remember they were more noticeable during the Falcons escape from the Death Star. I use to do a lot of drawings back when i was  kid and from '77  they were mainly Star Wars related. I actually drew the TIE fighters with these boxes around them many times because that's how i thought they were supposed to look.

As for the restoration i don't think they should use digital compositing for any of the effects shots. Everything should look as it did when the films were released. The effects in Star Wars were ground-breaking and this is part of cinematic history and thus should be preserved accurately. Generations should be able to see how these effects were achieved and how they attempted to overcome the limitations faced at this time ( transparent ships etc). Recomposing any effects using todays digital technology would not be a true preservation and i would be totally against it.

I hear it so many times from people who are new to the saga saying how amazed some of the effects look for a 1970's movie, but they are actually talking about some of the CG/ re-composited effects thanks to the Special editions. This is NOT what we should be allowing new generations to believe. Clean up the films - yes. digitally remove all the dirt and scratches - yes, because these faults were not part of the original movie but down to the passage of time/ useage. But change anything else like removing the matte boxes / matte lines - hell no.

If you saw garbage mattes, it might have been because the projection bulbs were too bright. Most theatre owners dim them down so that they last longer, but I guess some projections could be too bright. But under ideal settings my understanding is that garbage mattes should be not very visible (I guess not necessarily invisible--juts not like they were on older videos).