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A plan: Despecialization. We know it can be done. Now the question is... Can Molly do it?

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Warning: This may yet end in failure. These kinds of things happen all the time.

This is why I’ve been watching for Poita’s SE project and for 4K77. 😉

I made my first attempts at despecialization right when the DVDs came out, but at the time I knew nothing about video editing and all I had to work with was Virtual Dub. I’ve got a lot more resources at my disposal now, and I’ve started to wonder if I could pull it off now.

While I have tackled similar projects before with my current toolset (and they were larger in scope though simpler in nature; for example, I’ve done rollbacks of Pokémon) I haven’t gone back to do Star Wars. I think when we have a full scan of the 1997 edition, I’m going to do just that.

So let’s see, what would this entail sourcing?

  • Obviously, the BluRays.
  • An HD TS of the DVD master (2004). I don’t know what the best source of this is. I might even have access to at least one although if it’s Spike it might be cropped and thus less usable?
  • Scans of the 97SE. Waiting on this.
  • Scans of the OUT. In ANH’s case, I think I’ll wait for 4K77, but we do have the SSE too.

This would be a slightly different approach, I think, and will produce different results. I’m not trying to compete with Harmy, just take care of some unfinished business.

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

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Sorry but I don’t understand what you’re trying to do here.

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IIRC, Harmy didn’t use any 97 sources. There may be places where doing so could be an improvement (e.g., ESB’s Emperor scene).

As having wanted to despecialize Star Wars myself I don’t see a conflict with there being 2 different versions in the future (and if I release such a thing it’ll be called “Rolled Back” rather than “Despecialized”, so there’s not going to be any name confusion). I don’t think my approach will be the same as his, so the results could be better, worse, or both. I’m mainly doing it for practice.

I haven’t seen any version of Despecialized - I pretty much stayed with straight GOUT until the SSE came out.

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

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I don’t see anything wrong with Molly trying their own hand at undoing the SE.

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I don’t either, I just couldn’t tell what she was trying to do based on the OP.

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Don’t mind, I speak jumbly already. XD The idea was to take the BD version, then roll it back to the 04, then roll it back to the 97SE, then roll it back to the OTVs - a progressive despecialization using everything available.

For example in ESB I would probably use 97SE footage of the Emperor, and I’d use some 97SE footage of the end of ROTJ, if enough of it survived to blend in with Yub Nub. And if 97 footage is higher quality, also, so be it.

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

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I’m happy to provide you anything for this, and to help if required.

Donations welcome: paypal.me/poit
bitcoin:13QDjXjt7w7BFiQc4Q7wpRGPtYKYchnm8x
Help get The Original Trilogy preserved!

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 (Edited)

Thanks, poita. 😃 And since I know you’re working on the 97SE of ANH, I’ll take you up on that - it might be the first we see of the 97SE in HD. (This is the version I saw in cinema, so it does hold some special place for me even though I prefer the pre-SE.)

I’m actually considering whether it would be worth working at full BD resolution for this one. I think that’s about 1920x820. That’s all I’d probably need - but I’ll probably take a little at a time, and keep the rest stored elsewhere (my friend has much more disk space than I do).

I think the next thing I need to do is get the actual BD (the latest version I have legit is the 06 DVD for ANH and 04 for all; for now, I’m using WOWOW rips, and can plug in the BD later).

I’m in no rush - kinda waiting on 4K77 to be my source for original unmodified footage anyway.

ETA: Most likely I’ll work in short bits, scene by scene, and first learn my enemy by putting the different versions side by side. Then when I’ve decided what to do, I’ll write it into the final code. With the flip of a switch I might be able to create a full despecialization or a 97SE despecialization.

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

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😃

I’ve honed my skills working on Detective Conan, where it’s frequent for an old episode to be aired remastered, but with a few scenes cut and the theme songs replaced with the current ones, or where occasionally it will be necessary to mix sources to work around news flashes and such on the TV rips. A lot of the same stuff goes into it that would go into despecializing Star Wars, so I figured I’d give it a new whack now that I have some actual experience.

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

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I didn’t… but I did release a laserdisc rip some time ago.

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

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Given that my laserdisc rip is made with poor quality equipment, I think I’d rather hold out for a better source than that before trying to despecialize Mewtwo Strikes Back… as big as the difference would be between a 1080p and 372i source, that would be exacerbated by a cheap laserdisc player and a bottom-of-the-line DVD recorder. 😦

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

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 (Edited)

Molly said:

Given that my laserdisc rip is made with poor quality equipment, I think I’d rather hold out for a better source than that before trying to despecialize Mewtwo Strikes Back… as big as the difference would be between a 1080p and 372i source, that would be exacerbated by a cheap laserdisc player and a bottom-of-the-line DVD recorder. 😦

Completely off topic for this thread as a whole but there are some really good avisynth scripts for upscaling specifically anime, which is a totally different beast from upscaling live action footage and can actually have worthwhile results.

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The best filter I’m aware of is nnedi3_rpow2…

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

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I wouldn’t say any one filter.

http://www.l33tmeatwad.com/scripts/anime-upscale

Ive only used it on anime that was already DVD quality but just wanted it to look better on a bigger screen. My general experience is that it will make it look as good as a DVD will on a crt except on a much larger hdtv screen. (Meaning no extra detail or anything magic like that but also no jaggies, no pixelation, little rainbow and no blocky lines or edges like you would get if you just played the DVD on a large hdtv screen)

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Oh, it just uses Spline36Resize and AWarpSharp.

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

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Requirements:
aWarpSharp2
ColorMatrix (AviSynth)
Flash3kyuu Deband
Hysteria
Mask Tools 2 (AviSynth)
MVTools2
RgTools (AviSynth)

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I read the script before commenting 😉

The bulk of it’s just Spline36Resize and AWarpSharp2… and I already use debanding filters on everything I encode, and ColorMatrix on everything I upscale, and a function to simplify the use of MDegrain2 is part of my arsenal (in fact I used it on an mp4 encode of the SSE of Star Wars, as well as on my DBZ encodes).

The current filter chain I seem to prefer for upscaling anime is a variant of nnedi3_rpow2(2).ColorMatrix(mode="Rec.601->Rec.709").Spline36Resize(1280,720).AWarpSharp2(depth=10)

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

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So you use something very similar already just a little more customized and some of the things the script did you just do outside of the script. Sort of.

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Basically, yeah. RPow2 is the only thing it doesn’t do, and that’s specifically an upscaling filter.

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