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Info Wanted: a Pre-ANH edit of Ep IV?

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Hello all,

I’m new to this wonderful world of preserving the OOT as best as possible and am immersing myself in it as much as possible. One of the things I’ve been aware of for a long time is the existence of differences between the initial theatrical version of SW and subsequent releases, most of them lying in the soundtrack. My plan was to re-edit the original opening crawl of the film into a rip of one of the sets floating around (either Dr Gonzo’s or TR47’s set) and replace the soundtrack with the one I am going to rip from a VHS of a tecline transfer of the original theatrical SW. It has recently come to my attention that other people (MagnoliaFan, for instance) may be doing something exactly like this and I just want to know if I should stop and let the more experienced do their thing or try my hand at this.

-Alex

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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Yes according to Ritker's "edits" thread, Mag. Fan was planning something similar. I've no idea what stage that little project is at, so don't let it stop you having a go yourself.

I'm interested in the soundtrack changes, what's the quality like of the mono mix like on your VHS?

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There are several people, like myself and Magnoliafan, who are bouncing ideas and concepts off of each other, to try to come up with the best "original" version possible. We are also trying to set up an FTP site to display some of this stuff for you guys.

If you have anything you feel would be worth contributing, please PM one of us and let us know.

(Just out of curiosity, is your version of the original crawl from the VHS copy of the telecine, or is it one you've made on your own?)

<span class=“Italics”>MeBeJedi: Sadly, I believe the prequels are beyond repair.
<span class=“Bold”>JediRandy: They’re certainly beyond any repair you’re capable of making.</span></span>

<span class=“Italics”>MeBeJedi: You aren’t one of us.
<span class=“Bold”>Go-Mer-Tonic: I can’t say I find that very disappointing.</span></span>

<span class=“Italics”>JediRandy: I won’t suck as much as a fan edit.</span>

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There's already a version of the pre-ANH version of Star Wars on DVD. Was made a few years ago I believe.

I've got it, it's lovely.


The pre-ANH crawl is reproduced, transfer is from one of the laserdiscs, and you can shuttle back and forth between two versions of the 70mm soundtrack and the mono soundtrack.

Clips from this version appeared in my documentary Deleted Magic.
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Well, there's another version in the works.

<span class=“Italics”>MeBeJedi: Sadly, I believe the prequels are beyond repair.
<span class=“Bold”>JediRandy: They’re certainly beyond any repair you’re capable of making.</span></span>

<span class=“Italics”>MeBeJedi: You aren’t one of us.
<span class=“Bold”>Go-Mer-Tonic: I can’t say I find that very disappointing.</span></span>

<span class=“Italics”>JediRandy: I won’t suck as much as a fan edit.</span>

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MagnoliaFan did a PRE-ANH DVD version - The one that I have is a PROTO-TYPE and is not the final version (I've had this almost half a year now) - It's really cool as it has a restored title crawl.

I know that this was only a tester disc and a few members here have copies of it. LAST I heard and discussed with MagnoliaFan he was planning a DUAL-LAYER seemless branched version... We'll just have to wait and see

“My skill are no longer as Mad as the once were” RiK

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Rikter, did you get my crawl?

<span class=“Italics”>MeBeJedi: Sadly, I believe the prequels are beyond repair.
<span class=“Bold”>JediRandy: They’re certainly beyond any repair you’re capable of making.</span></span>

<span class=“Italics”>MeBeJedi: You aren’t one of us.
<span class=“Bold”>Go-Mer-Tonic: I can’t say I find that very disappointing.</span></span>

<span class=“Italics”>JediRandy: I won’t suck as much as a fan edit.</span>

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I really haven't read my email as I have family over - I'll be getting to my email tonight and responding in a day or so.

“My skill are no longer as Mad as the once were” RiK

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I would be editing the crawl from the Empire of Dreams documentary. Whatever little footage from it isn't available there, I'll reproduce or take from the VHS.

ocpmovie - I'm very interested in the disc you're referring to. Can you give any more info on it?

-Alex

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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Originally posted by: ReverendBeastly

ocpmovie - I'm very interested in the disc you're referring to. Can you give any more info on it?


more info on it?

Don't you wish one of the "elites" would break protocol and torrent this for the masses ?
Shirley surely the "statute of limitations" has expired by now....

However, in practice you must take into account the “fuckwit factor”. Just talk to Darth Mallwalker…
-Moth3r

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Maybe if you stopped calling them "Shirley"?

<span class=“Italics”>MeBeJedi: Sadly, I believe the prequels are beyond repair.
<span class=“Bold”>JediRandy: They’re certainly beyond any repair you’re capable of making.</span></span>

<span class=“Italics”>MeBeJedi: You aren’t one of us.
<span class=“Bold”>Go-Mer-Tonic: I can’t say I find that very disappointing.</span></span>

<span class=“Italics”>JediRandy: I won’t suck as much as a fan edit.</span>

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Originally posted by: ocpmovie
...you can shuttle back and forth between two versions of the 70mm soundtrack...
???
AFAIK there was only ever one version of the original 70mm soundtrack, and I would be very surprised if the creators of this DVD were able to get their hands on an original 70mm print, extract the 6 tracks (which I believe were in "4.2" surround format) and remaster to 5.1 AC-3.

More likely the tracks are from the original Dolby Surround from the 35mm prints (used in the first laserdisc transfers), the digitally remastered mix from 1985 or the THX certified mix from the 1993. The latter two I think used parts of the 70mm 6-track mix.

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Originally posted by: Darth Mallwalker
Originally posted by: ReverendBeastly

ocpmovie - I'm very interested in the disc you're referring to. Can you give any more info on it?


more info on it?

Don't you wish one of the "elites" would break protocol and torrent this for the masses ?
Shirley surely the "statute of limitations" has expired by now....



Thanks, but I'm well aware of the Deleted Magic project and I'm really looking forward to its final release. I was talking about the DVD of the pre-ANH version of Star Wars he was referring to.

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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Excuse my ignorance, but who are the elites and what do you want them to torrent?
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MagnoliaFan's PRE-ANH DVD version is an experience to watch - a very enjoyable one at that.

There is sometihng eerie about seeing the crawl come up minus the 'Episode IV'...

A little patience goes a long way on this old-school Rebel base. If you are having issues finding what you are looking for, these will be of some help…

Welcome to the OriginalTrilogy.com | Introduce yourself in here | Useful info within : About : Help : Site Rules : Fan Project Rules : Announcements
‘How do I do this?’ on the OriginalTrilogy.com; some info & answers + FAQs - includes info on how to search for projects and threads on the OT•com

A Project Index for Star Wars Preservations (Harmy’s Despecialized & 4K77/80/83 etc) : A Project Index for Star Wars Fan Edits (adywan & Hal 9000 etc)

… and take your time to look around this site before posting - to get a feel for this place. Don’t just lazily make yet another thread asking for projects.

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Originally posted by: Laserman

... what do you want them to torrent?

Originally posted by: ReverendBeastly

Thanks, but I'm well aware of the Deleted Magic project and I'm really looking forward to its final release. I was talking about the DVD of the pre-ANH version of Star Wars he was referring to.


I'm not talking about the Deleted Magic project.
I'm talking about the pre-ANH crawl Star Wars version which ocpmovie mentioned earlier in this thread,
and which tygerbug (a.k.a. ocpmovie) mentioned in the hyperlink I posted above.
Apparently that version had some restrictions placed on its distribution.
In the hyperlink tygerbug wrote "... that it wouldn't be spread around everywhere, or widely copied."

I'd like to see it spread around everywhere, and widely copied.

In addition to SW, I also collect Grateful Dead and Frank Zappa.
For the most part, Deadheads seem very willing to share their collections.
By contrast, the freaks & mothers who collect FZ all too often hoard their stuff, and won't share it.
Of course there are exceptions in both camps.
When I spoke of the "elites" I meant those who would keep it for themselves (or amongst their cliques)
rather than spread it far and wide via torrents, usenet, p2p, etc. That sort of attitude bothers me anytime I see it.
Sort of like "I have xyz, but YOU can't have it, else our pissing contest might end in a draw." Piss on them.
I'm just venting my frustration. Of course no one is obligated to torrent anything,
and I'm not entitled to a copy just because I'd like to have one.

I applaud the members of this forum including ocpmovie who are willing to share their preservation efforts with the rest of us.
To the author of the aforementioned pre-ANH who doesn't want it shared, I'm blowing raspberries.

Now, won't you all join me in that trippy hippie deadhead dance. Shake them bones baby !

However, in practice you must take into account the “fuckwit factor”. Just talk to Darth Mallwalker…
-Moth3r

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Among the Seramyu (Sailor Moon musicals / stage shows) community the same attitude of elitism is common. This stuff is only marketed and sold in Japan, and it's rather expensive for some people, but until recently, only clips circulated around the Internet. I torrented a handful of them (and released one with subtitles), with the intention of breaking this stranglehold.

I think it's worked. When I released a subtitle of one complete musical, about 1550 people downloaded it off BitTorrent.

Moll.

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

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I'll have to ask Jedisluggo (@ aol) about the pre-ANH version of Star Wars I've got - he's the one who sent it to me. I'm not sure offhand who did it actually!

Quite well done, though.

It was something some people on the Swcutscenes list did, with the caveat that they would only send it to a few people and it wouldn't be widely copied.
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Well we here on the boards would like it and If I can get my hands on it it will become a torrent - THERE is NO reason to be all stash ass with Star Wars

“My skill are no longer as Mad as the once were” RiK

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"LAST I heard and discussed with MagnoliaFan he was planning a DUAL-LAYER seemless branched version..." (Rik)

Just to remind everyone of old news, seamless branching is not something that can be easily done at home. In fact there doubt as to whether it can be done at all. Yes it's not so complicated that you can't back-up DVD-9 seamless branching discs onto DVD-R, but from what I've heard it's so complicated and difficult to do that it is simply not worth the effort. The 3.5" floppy disks today has not changed in more than a decade. Despite this Microsoft's format has not changed. Yes you can format it in Fat-16 as apposed to Fat-12 which was possible some years past, however Microsoft simply does not do the best it can with its format. There were various other formatting tools available for DOS which would actually allow you to format your disc so that the end of each track aligned better with the start of the next one, meaning that when it spun and was read, the read-rate was the same but the idle-time was significantly shortened, which then in-turn created a disc that would appear to read more than 50% faster than a standard floppy.

I believe some people confused this old concept with the idea the same thing would have to apply to branching (that at the end of the "track" should be logically aligned to the next possible branching places) - however I don't think that is the case. The problem doesn't seem to be accessing the next information fast enough, the problem seems to be in the MPEG format which was never originally designed for branching. Yes it can be done, but no the DVD format wasn't specifically designed to allow for it. The floppy disk wasn't specifically designed to simply "slide" to the next track efficiently, yet under the right formatting parameters it is possible (just not with Microsoft's format). And it may not make much difference today, but you think about all the software that used to come on half a dozen, or more, floppy disks - that they ALL could have loaded more than 50% faster if IBM had designed the floppy disk to take advantage of known hardware capabilities, and the position of the head when it reaches the end of a track. See the problem was the standard thing to do was to start the next track the same way as the previous one:

1_2_3_4_5_6_7_8...18 (first track)
1_2_3_4_5_6_7_8...18 (second track)

Now the first track ends pretty much where it started, the head then moves down to the second track. But hold on, the second track already started. Because the disk is already spinning it's missed some sectors, let's say it misses the first 3 sectors and starts at 4 - that means it has to make a complete rotation back to 1 to begin reading the second track. Alternatively it could have been formatted to take full advantage of the hardware by starting with the last 3 sectors... and number 1 where number 4 would have been. That way when the head moves across to the next sector it's on number 1 right away and doesn't need to waste time rotating.

Such:
1__2__3__4_5_6_7_8...18
16_17_18_1_2_3_4_5...15

Yes this does not cover the full scope of how a disk is physically made up, but in simple terms that's how it works. Like I said the format ALLOWS for it, but it wasn't DESIGNED to cater for it.
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Originally posted by: DanielB


Just to remind everyone of old news, seamless branching is not something that can be easily done at home. In fact there doubt as to whether it can be done at all.


What about MF's edits have led anybody to believe he's doing this on home equipment?
I am fluent in over six million forms of procrastination.
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LaserMan will tell you that just 5 years you couldn't even remove the NTSC pulldown on a home computer. Yes there have been developments, but the software for branching is not in the public domain, heck even MGM doesn't have and can't produce high quality branched DVD's. what you have to understand here is you need more than just an encoder - you need a tool that actually exploits the DVD specification. That can write MPEG files that branch onto different ones. This isn't software that freeware developers are going to have an easy time writing.

Encoding DVD material is all very well and good until you have to encode a continuous stream that branches. It has to be able to remove a chunk AND have the MPEG stream follow seamlessly. Yes you might think "keyframe, doh" - but it's not that simple. As I've said, you can re-encode branched titles and painstakingly re-build the branching. That would be impossible if it was the stream itself that had to remain intact. Anyhow I'm way out of my league here, I'll let someone more qualified explain it if they choose to.
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Well that's all well and good, DanielB, but still:

Originally posted by: ADigitalMan

What about MF's edits have led anybody to believe he's doing this on home equipment?


So why don't we just ask him? He's still on the boards, right?

Hey, MagnoliaFan, can you do seemless branching?
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<span class=“Italics”>MeBeJedi: Sadly, I believe the prequels are beyond repair.
<span class=“Bold”>JediRandy: They’re certainly beyond any repair you’re capable of making.</span></span>

<span class=“Italics”>MeBeJedi: You aren’t one of us.
<span class=“Bold”>Go-Mer-Tonic: I can’t say I find that very disappointing.</span></span>

<span class=“Italics”>JediRandy: I won’t suck as much as a fan edit.</span>

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I think you've got the wrong end of the stick DanielB.

The DVD format does cater quite nicely for seamless branching, unfortunately not all drives support it (some have a bit of trouble if they only have a small memory cache, similar to early drives having a pause at the layer change.)

Also, you can do it at home on a PC or Mac. Programs like TFDVDEdit 3 with DVD SP2 do it at the home level pricing, and Scenarist has supported it forever and it works fine.

It does take a bit of forward planning and knowledge, but it really is not a problem to implement.