It’s ok, I am able to remux the official MKV now without any loss of picture quality so will get started on Empire and Jedi soon.
As for the Star Wars set, I would like to add Harmy’s recent BBC interview as one final feature, then will upload over this weekend.
All audio and subtitles are listed in the menus, but the ‘non button’ items are listed on a seperate page with instructions to access via remote. I agree that an insert card would be a good addition though.
I don’t consider the 50GB to be redundant at all. It includes the bonus commentaries, which are indeed accessible via the menu, and has all the special features on the one disk, which is a great advantage to many people. For those who do not want the extras, you are welcome to download the movie only version.
The 8 track restriction is enforced by Encore, but through use of multiAVCHD, I was able to add 32 audio tracks to the disk. 8 are accessible through the menus (via menu buttons), and the others are accessible via the ‘audio’ button on your bluray remote.
Same goes for subtitles. the first 16 are accessible via the menu, and the remaining 16 are accessible via the subtitles button on your bluray remote.
EDIT: please see my updated post, which might help clarify for you exactly what is on each disk, then you can decide which one you think you want to download. I know a lot of people are looking forward to the 50GB, so I’m not sure why you are upset about it. The goal of the project was always to try and create the definitive Star Wars bluray disk, and for me, that is the one with everything on it. It’s certainly the one I’ll have on my shelf!
I agree with you that there is great merit in the 25GB versions, but they were purely created for this community, as I am all about the 50GB version. And it’s looking great 😃
ok, great news. I have successfully built and burned both the 25GB and 50GB version for Star Wars. As promised, here is the list of features for the Star Wars set,
Each film will be released over 4 seperate bluray disks.
STAR WARS
SUBTITLES: (All subtitles are .sup files from Project Threepio v9.2)
English, English SDH, Arabic, Bulgarian, Chinese, Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hindu, Hungarian, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Malay, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, Spanish, Swedish, Thai, Turkish, Ukrainian, Vietnamese
As always, you must own the source material to download these disks. Therefore, if you do not already own them, please purchase the robot chicken and family guy star wars specials, as well as the bonus commentaries, which cost a couple of dollars each.
I will update with more info on availability shortly. Upload speeds where I live are very slow, so it may be a few days.
Thanks to everyone on the boards for your ideas and encouragement with this project. I look forward to sharing it with you all soon.
Yes, I have the 9.2 versions of Project Threepio subtitles, and have included the .sup files on the disk.
Hi guys, thanks for the ongoing feedback and ideas. I’ve become a maniac on this project, working several hours on it every night, trying my best to make a definitive bluray set that I, and all fans of SW, will love.
The Star Wars set is almost ready to unveil. I’m just putting the final touches on the special features, then will list them all in detail. I have loved learning what multiAVCHD can do, in combination with Adobe Encore, and as such, am very happy with the end result.
In short, there will be 4 disks released for each film.
Initially, I wanted the Documentaries on the same 50GB disk, but as I collected special features, there were just too many gems to let go, so I stretched it to another disk. There are also 8 motion menus, featuring scenes from the films, including sub menus for chapters, audio, subtitles, deleted scenes, trailers and tv spots, cast interviews, and my personal favourite section, cultural influence and reviews. Can’t wait to share it all with you soon 😃
You could always get software like Powerdvd to play the blurays, and perhaps plug in to a tv via HDMI? I also know that portable bluray burners for laptops are much more affordable these days.
I have no plans to convert these to AVCHD or DVD at this stage. It’s already an enormous amount of work to create 3 versions of each film (25gb movie disk, 25gb special features disk, 50gb movie+features disk), and beyond the amount of work entailed to create 9 blurays, this project is about preserving the Despecialized Edition in the best quality possible, which is on bluray.
Hang tight, new and improved versions are on the way.
I think the current ones are up as “njvc presents Harmy etc”, so this will be the same, but with BD50 in the title.
Good point.
My thinking with option 2 is for people who don’t mind giving up multiple language audio options in exchange for a host of special features. But if option 2 just becomes a dedicated special features disk, it can include much more great content, and then the 50gb can be the best of both worlds. I think that’s the way to go.
I like this idea the best. Seems like the best of both worlds. Thanks for your awesome work.
You’re very welcome. I’ll report back when the 50gb Disk is ready 😃
Good point.
My thinking with option 2 is for people who don’t mind giving up multiple language audio options in exchange for a host of special features. But if option 2 just becomes a dedicated special features disk, it can include much more great content, and then the 50gb can be the best of both worlds. I think that’s the way to go.
So with these new found powers, my current thinking is this. I’ll release 3 versions of each film.
Ok, so great news.
Thank you SO much to those of you who suggested using multiAVCHD. I’ve had a play around with the program, and was able to remux my blurays, replacing the video stream with Harmy’s original .h264 video, and the DTS audio tracks which Encore would not let me import.
What’s even better is that I’ve been able to add 32 subtitle tracks, and additional audio tracks as well. The menus will still only be able to link directly to 8 audio tracks (thanks for Encore’s limitations), but there will be more included on the disk, which I will index in a document to be released with the next version of the bluray set.
I am extremely grateful to the community for all the positive feedback and helpful advice. Version 2 of this set will be available as soon as possible, I’ll keep you updated.
No, I’d just committed to learning how to use multiAVCHD in the hope of swapping in the DTS. Much to learn, I still have.
And at this stage i still favor film and extras on one epic 50gb disk. I can’t include all the audio and subtitles from the MKV as that would not work with Encore’s structure so this will always be a companion to the official MKV. Thus, there should be plenty of room for special features on my 50gb disk.
But as others have said, video and audio quality of the films is the priority here.
Great suggestions, I’ll give this some serious thought. At this stage, I only have access to the lossless video and audio for SW, but am hoping Harmy may be willing to share the equivalent for ESB and RotJ as well. If that happens, all of this may be doable as you suggested. It would be a significant amount of work, but is worth considering.
Nice idea.
Yes. I should be able to add subtitles using multiAVCHD too. I’m thinking I’ll keep the audio options ‘official’ for the 50gb version, which would be:
English DTS 5.1 (1977 70mm mix)
English DTS 2.0 (1977 35mm mix)
English DD 2.0 (1993 Laserdisc mix)
1993 Laserdisc Audio Commentary
2004 DVD Audio Commentary
2004 starwars.com Audio Commentary
2011 Blu-ray Audio Commentary
Music-only Audio Track DD 2.0
I personally like the comedic/fan/podcast commentaries, but they will still exist on the 25gb release.
Thanks to towne32, I have been supplied with the lossless video file for v2.7 so will be building a 50gb version of the SW-D Bluray. It will also include the DTS 5.1 and 2.0 track (once I work out how to use multi AVCHD), and the 1.0 and Music only track. Encore will allow up to 8 audio tracks, so suggestions for the other 4 tracks are welcome.
Options include laserdisk mixes, official commentaries, fan/podcast commentaries, comedy commentaries.
I will also be making a few other additions to the 50gb version, and will update as the project progresses.
Double post sorry
Is anyone here capable of this bait and switch method using multiAVCHD? I’m not familiar with how to swap out the video while maintaining the current BD menu structure, chapters and features.
Yes, that must be the issue, because standard h264’s are supposed to work.
Gimpy, there is barely room to fit the features I already did on the disk, let alone Jamie’s amazing docs. Maybe I’ll do a 50gb version at some point, full to the brim with all that stuff too, but this will have to do for now…
Adobe Encore, for those familiar, is an unbelievably temperamental and frustrating program. By all means, the .h264 files SHOULD be bluray compliant, but Encore wouldn’t accept them. I tried troubleshooting a variety of options (it may be something as simple as the file was created on a Mac and I use a PC), but in the end I had to convert them using Premiere Pro to get Encore to accept the file. As I mentioned, I kept the bitrate as high as possible, and the resulting picture quality is high, but not having to convert would obviously be preferable.
If anyone on the boards is proficient with Adobe Encore and could assist me with solving this, I would be grateful. Perhaps I can solve this for the v3.0 sets.
I’m in contact with Harmy to discuss this for the next release.
Probably not possible to swap out as far as i know, but ill put the isolated score on the 3.0 disk once it’s done
The 3 disks are BD25s. The video stream from Harmy’s MKVs was converted to a 720p bluray compliant format that Adobe Encore could understand, but bitrate for the film was kept as high as possible.
The special features and commentaries were chosen by me. They are lower-res, to fit on the disks, but still very watchable. For more official commentaries, you can listen via the MKV release.
All commentary tracks were recut to fit the theatrical editions.