The theatrical colors of the Star Wars trilogy — Page 9

NeverarGreat said:

The frames I have include some of the Death Star Walls, which look as green as the ones you have. In my discussion with Mike Verta, he said that the green cast was not really accurate. It certainly wasn’t that green on set. His version was much more of a blue-green, but it’s a tricky thing to get right. My version makes the walls almost gray in the brighter areas, falling off into a greenish blue (slightly more green than blue) in the shadows, as Technicolor tends to do.

I now have some 1,500 frames with another 500 underway. Most of the Deathstar wall shots do tend towards blue in the frames I have, but some of the darker ones like this one seem more neutral tending towards green depending on the lighting conditions. The exact colors are difficult to assess without a calibrated color reference. Given the project I’m working on, whether the colors were different on set is not really very relevant for me. I’m trying to establish/reproduce the technicolor print colors. I first want to establish and record the unadjusted print colors, unencumbered by interpretation, personal taste, etc. I’m also still hoping, I will be able to attend a technicolor print screening in the next few months to make some comparisons.

yotsuya said:

Looking forward to some calibrated scans. Any time estimate for the first ones?

It may take a little while as I’m looking for an affordable scanner. I have the color reference slide, so that’s one important thing on my list checked off. 😉

It’s interesting to note, that the 1977 bootleg recording shows a very similar color palette to the photo of the frame I have in my possession:

DrDre said:

It’s interesting to note, that the 1977 bootleg recording shows a very similar color palette to the photo of the frame I have in my possession:

For comparison, here’s how that same shot looks on V2.6:

And here’s the photo of the frame you posted before:

The technicolor print frame in the photo is certainly very green like Swazzy said, turning the walls green and leaving no space for the blues.

It’ll be very interesting to see how this frame in particular looks colourwise when you get it scanned, finding out how the fleshtones look and the colour of the walls, how much blue and green are in this shot and which colour is more predominant.

Williarob said:

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

Looking forward to some calibrated scans. Any time estimate for the first ones?

It may take a little while as I’m looking for an affordable scanner. I have the color reference slide, so that’s one important thing on my list checked off. 😉

If you have a paypal link, perhaps a few of us could donate some funds to help you get a good scanner, not just an affordable one?

That might actually be a good idea. It would certainly speed things up.

Swazzy said:

Just finished my own interpretation of the Mos Eisley shot in question:

Although I like the idea of the blue sky, it introduces some undesired side effects. For example, the GNK droid and many of the shadows on the stormtrooper’s armor are blue tinted.

I’ve decided to follow williarob’s advice, and created a paypal link to accept donations in order to obtain something similar to the following:

My goal is to buy a good quality 35mm film scanner, that can scan slides and film strips. I now have technicolor reference frames for roughly 20% of the shots of a technicolor print of Star Wars. I also have purchased a 35mm color calibration slide, that will ensure an accurate color representation of the scanned frames:

Using the scanner and the color calibration slide, I will be able to provide accurate digital color references for a large number of shots of a technicolor print of Star Wars, that I will share with you all through a dedicated thread, where all the scans will be collected. These will naturally be useful for any color correction project for Star Wars in the future. As far as I know no such project has yet been undertaken, and these will thus be the first color references, that will accurately represent the hue, contrast, and saturation of a technicolor print of Star Wars, by using calibrated scans rather than correcting a complete scan of a print by using the projected print as a visual reference.

So, if you’re interested in supporting this endeavour with a donation (any amount will be helpful), or if you simply want to support the color matching/correction projects I’ve been working on, and will be working on in the future, please send me a PM, and I will provide you with a link. Thanks in advance for your support!

DrDre said:

Using the scanner and the color calibration slide, I will be able to provide accurate digital color references for a large number of shots of a technicolor print of Star Wars, that I will share with you all through a dedicated thread, where all the scans will be collected. These will naturally be useful for any color correction project for Star Wars in the future. As far as I know no such project has yet been undertaken, and these will thus be the first color references, that will accurately represent the hue, contrast, and saturation of a technicolor print of Star Wars, by using calibrated scans rather than correcting a complete scan of a print by using the projected print as a visual reference.

Is that how a color-reference slide works?

In audio, when you get a tape, there are tones either before or after the progam material that will help you calibrate your equipment for that tape, but the calibration is only for that tape.

I assume film works the same way, in that you’d have a color reference on the same piece of film you’re attempting to color-time. If it works like that, having an outside reference color slide doesn’t seem to be of much value here.

Or am I missing the point of the slide?

If he puts the slide in before the film, he can correct to the one slide to remove any casts the camera creates and therefore, accurate colors to the print.

Though, I’d assume the slide would need to be of the same film stock, right? Wouldn’t the camera create different casts to different stocks?

The color reference slide is to calibrate the scanner so you know that the colors you get in the final image are true to the original. Film stock is irrelevant. Once calibrated, you can scan anything the scanner can handle (in this case a dedicated film scanner for 35 mm film prints and slides). Then you can adjust for projector bulb variations if you so desire. But I believe the intent is to archive the accurate colors from a technicolor print - the closest we are going to get to the O-neg.

Photographers often use something similar to get accurate color prints. But in the case of a projector ready film, that has already been done and the case before us is how to get those colors from film to digital.

So the reference slide is being scanned, then the resulting digital image (assuming a properly calibrated monitor) is compared to the slide to make sure that what is seen in the monitor matches the slide perfectly? After this is dialed in, we can assume that anything going through the scanning process is accurate, too. I think I have it.

Thanks for the explanation!

Joel said:

So the reference slide is being scanned, then the resulting digital image (assuming a properly calibrated monitor) is compared to the slide to make sure that what is seen in the monitor matches the slide perfectly? After this is dialed in, we can assume that anything going through the scanning process is accurate, too. I think I have it.

Thanks for the explanation!

Almost exactly! The color calibration slide has a digital counterpart, so you can directly compare the scan to the digital version, and calibrate algorithmically. So, there’s no need for a calibrated monitor.

DrDre,

just a comment about the film/slide scanner you are looking at above. Looking at the reviews it seems that it has a plastic cover that starts to get micro scratches after a few hundred scans, so either be aware of that and have lots of replacement covers on hand, or consider that when comparing to other models.

I have no experience, but saw that repeated review when looking at the product and wanted to make sure you were aware of it.

dahmage said:

DrDre,

just a comment about the film/slide scanner you are looking at above. Looking at the reviews it seems that it has a plastic cover that starts to get micro scratches after a few hundred scans, so either be aware of that and have lots of replacement covers on hand, or consider that when comparing to other models.

I have no experience, but saw that repeated review when looking at the product and wanted to make sure you were aware of it.

Thanks for the advice. I have a similar one from Fuji, but I will keep an eye out.

Just to wet the appetites and hopefully get your support, here are a few more photos of some of the shots, that can serve as a color reference, once they’ve been scanned:

IMO Star Wars never looked better…

How anyone could cut up a beautiful tech print like that is beyond me, but I can’t wait to see what the scans look like.

Darth Lucas said:

How anyone could cut up a beautiful tech print like that is beyond me, but I can’t wait to see what the scans look like.

I agree it’s a terrible shame, but at least they will be put to good use…

Wow, they’re punchier than I would have though!
Looking forward to seeing the scans! 😃

Very nice Dre! It is a shame that someone just cut the movie up like this, but Dre. will put these Technicolor film samples to good use, and get this project matched to how it looked in the theaters in 1977, and soon we’ll all be able to have it in our collection. I can hardly wait.