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Puggo GRANDE - 16mm restoration (Released)

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This thread is devoted to the Puggo GRANDE.

What is the “Puggo GRANDE”? It is my telecine transfer and restoration of two 16mm prints of Star Wars. These films were borrowed from a source who wishes to remain temporarily anonymous, and who for now will go by the name Jaxxon. Both of the prints have the original crawl. One of the prints has Swedish subtitles and the original mono mix! I haven’t yet decided if I will grab the video from both prints, or just use the Swedish version as a source for the mono mix. As I review the quality of the frames, I’ll decide as I go along.

For the video capture, I will be using a 16mm Workprinter manufactured by Roger Evans of Moviestuff. For the optical audio tracks, I will use an EIKI Slimline 16mm projector. I will use a variety of tools to clean up the video and audio, including Virtualdub, CoolEdit, Ozone, and then Vegas Video to sync the tracks.

I have set up a website where I will post frame grabs and maintain the timeline of my progress, much the same as I did for the 8mm Puggo Edition project.  Both pages can be accessed from my new and improved (well, new anyways) Puggo website, shown in my .sig below.  I look forward to your suggestions and expert advice as Puggo GRANDE proceeds.  May the force be with me!

"Close the blast doors!"
Puggo’s website | Rescuing Star Wars

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First look:

There are two prints, which from now on I will refer to as the "main" print and the "Swedish" print.  The main print does not have subtitles.  The Swedish print has Swedish subtitles and supposedly the original mono mix.  I anticipate my primary focus to be grabbing the video from the main print, and the audio from the Swedish print.  Although I may find it useful to grab parts of the video from the Swedish print, too.

Despite my intent to concentrate on the audio from the Swedish mix, I have in fact already grabbed the audio from the main print.  I'm not sure what it's mix is - probably a mono collapse of the 35mm print ("close the blast doors" is absent).

The main print is on 3 reels, and is in excellent condition.  It has the original crawl.  Prepended on front of the print is a pristine copy of an SE trailer, which I will also go ahead and capture while I'm at it.  The presence of the original crawl was a surprise to Jaxxon, who assumed that it was an Ep.IV print because of the presence of the SE trailer.

There is about 10 seconds of sprocket hole damage on one of the reels, which I will be able to repair.  Reels 1 and 3 haven't faded at all.  Reel 2 is slightly red.  I will need to recapture the 10 second audio in the area of the sprocket hole damage, but I'll wait until I start capturing the video before I think about that.

I haven't yet reviewed the Swedish print.  My next task is to do that, and capture the audio from that print in the process.  Jaxxon claims that it also has the original crawl, and that it has the original mono mix.  I haven't confirmed that for myself yet.

Many thanks to Jaxxon for entrusting me with these wonderful prints.

"Close the blast doors!"
Puggo’s website | Rescuing Star Wars

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Wow sounds awesome.  I loved your super8mm digests transfers.

So 16mm will be a better source than the derann super8mm print?

A full movie on a workprinter must be labor intensive if you have to scan each individual frame, Still hopefully you can finish and distro before the X0 gets done.

“Always loved Vader’s wordless self sacrifice. Another shitty, clueless, revision like Greedo and young Anakin’s ghost. What a fucking shame.” -Simon Pegg.

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skyjedi2005 said:

So 16mm will be a better source than the derann super8mm print?

A full movie on a workprinter must be labor intensive if you have to scan each individual frame, Still hopefully you can finish and distro before the X0 gets done.


I don't know how the 16mm compares with the derann super8 prints.  However, I'm certain that the 16mm workprinter produces better telecines than the 8mm Workprinter-XP (the image is more steady).  The 16mm prints are anamorphic, just like the derann.  On the minus side, the derann is stereo (magnetic, right?), whereas 16mm is almost always optical mono.

Yes it's frame-by-frame, but at about 6 frames per second, that's not really all that bad.  The hardest part is resetting the camera's white balance and brightness for each scene... that's what really slows the process down.  This will certainly be more work than the Puggo Edition was.  But it was frame-by-frame too.

"Close the blast doors!"
Puggo’s website | Rescuing Star Wars

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Am I dreaming thinking this will look better than the gout?

Hell at least it will be anamorphic Standard Definition Dvd quality.

 

Your prints don't have the same bad fading and pinking that are notorious on the eastman 35mm prints?

“Always loved Vader’s wordless self sacrifice. Another shitty, clueless, revision like Greedo and young Anakin’s ghost. What a fucking shame.” -Simon Pegg.

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skyjedi2005 said:

Am I dreaming thinking this will look better than the gout?

Your prints don't have the same bad fading and pinking that are notorious on the eastman 35mm prints?

Don't expect it to look as good as the GOUT.  Despite the GOUT's flaws, it was scanned from a 35mm master using considerably better telecine equipment than I have.  Hopefully making mine anamorphic will render something with its own unique appeal, though, and the result should be comfortable viewing.

The first and third reels look great, no pinking at all and excellent color.  Reel 2 has some red shift that will require correcting.  I can't say just yet how bad it is. Haven't looked at the Swedish print yet.

"Close the blast doors!"
Puggo’s website | Rescuing Star Wars

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Sounds cool; this year alone we have 35mm & 16mm preservations!  Take that, George-o!

A Goon in a Gaggle of 'em

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So, these are widescreen prints?

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Mielr said:

So, these are widescreen prints?

They are anamorphic and would thus ordinarily require an anamorphic lens to project.  I will be "cheating" by capturing the anamorphic image as a normal frame and squishing it into 16:9 in post.  If anyone has any suggestions as to how to do this while retaining the best quality, I'm all ears.

"Close the blast doors!"
Puggo’s website | Rescuing Star Wars

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Wow, that's great! Can't wait to see it- good luck! :-)

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Awesome! Looking forward to it!

I used to be very active on this forum. I’m not really anymore. Sometimes, people still want to get in touch with me about something, and that is great! If that describes you, please email me at [my username]ATgmailDOTcom.

Hi everybody. You’re all awesome. Keep up the good work.

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This'll be fun to follow. I loved the 8mm transfers. They made some... interesting... editing decisions.

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Looking forward to seeing some screenshots.

Also, wondering if your projector's reproduction of the mono mix optical track will surpass the quality of Belbucus' restored audio from my TV broadcast/VHS source?

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Puggo - Jar Jar's Yoda said:
Mielr said:

So, these are widescreen prints?

They are anamorphic and would thus ordinarily require an anamorphic lens to project.  I will be "cheating" by capturing the anamorphic image as a normal frame and squishing it into 16:9 in post.  If anyone has any suggestions as to how to do this while retaining the best quality, I'm all ears.

 

 You'll have to capture it as a 4:3 and then change the aspect ratio to 16:9...and then add the extra lines of "black." 

No?

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Moth3r said:

Also, wondering if your projector's reproduction of the mono mix optical track will surpass the quality of Belbucus' restored audio from my TV broadcast/VHS source?

I'm wondering the same thing.  Perhaps someone could shoot me a copy of Belbucus' audio?

"Close the blast doors!"
Puggo’s website | Rescuing Star Wars

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I would but all I got is an mp3 encode of it which I muxed into an AVI encode of the GOUT. :(

"Right now the coffees are doing their final work." (Airi, Masked Rider Den-o episode 1)

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Someone uploaded the mono mix WAV to Rapidshare in 4 parts. Check the thread.

If you have no luck, send me a PM.

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This morning I reviewed the "Swedish" print, and transferred its audio track.  Reel 3 had about 2 meters of sprocket hole repair, which luckily had been done very well... that saved me a LOT of work. The image quality was fairly poor - heavy red shift and with Swedish subtitles.  This is unimportant, because the "main" print will be used for the video and it has very good image quality.  Of interest in the Swedish print was the audio.  So.....

The audio was the original mono mix.  The "other Beru", "close the blast doors", etc.  Condition is excellent, better than I expected.  The transfer was incredibly clean throughout, only 2 or 3 tiny blips which will repair easily.  I will need to review Belbacus' restoration more closely to see how this 16mm grab will compare.  My first impressions are that people will be quite pleased with what I got.

Now can begin the more arduous task of transferring the video from the main print.

"Close the blast doors!"
Puggo’s website | Rescuing Star Wars

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Eagerly awaiting work in Progress shots on your site, best of luck! In your Project.

“Always loved Vader’s wordless self sacrifice. Another shitty, clueless, revision like Greedo and young Anakin’s ghost. What a fucking shame.” -Simon Pegg.

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^Ditto.

A Goon in a Gaggle of 'em

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So am I to understand there will be a Swedish overdubbed audio option?

I can't wait to hear Vader in Swedish if that's the case! (or did it just have English audio and Swedish subtitles?)

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Bobocop said:

So am I to understand there will be a Swedish overdubbed audio option?


Sorry, it's English audio with Swedish subtitles.  Interestingly, Chewbacca's name appears to be "Tugg".  Hmm, now might be a good time to ask the question that the subtitles left me with --- what's a "misslycat"?

"Close the blast doors!"
Puggo’s website | Rescuing Star Wars