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kk650's Regraded Raiders of the Lost Ark (blanket yellow tint removed from blu-ray) (Released) — Page 3

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Synnöve said:

Out of curiosity, are any of you using monitors calibrated via 3DLUT in a light controlled room? If so, what are you monitoring your video feeds with and how do you know what you’re looking at is accurate?

Also, with regards to the Blu vs the HDTV cap: from what I can see on caps-a-holic, it doesn’t seem that the Blu-Ray capture is generally lacking in detail (barring some shots) insomuch as it simply has had the grain removed and the contrast lessened (contrast effects perceived “detail”). Additionally, the HDTV capture’s grain is larger and has horrid compression artifacts. I’d wager that, if the blu was re-grained and regraded properly, it’d look better than the HDTV capture or print-scan.

Well, working in the field of image processing I can tell you, that you cannot remove grain without also removing detail. That sadly is a mathematical certainty. So, regraining is not going to bring back detail that was lost. The bluray is less compressed for sure, but overall the grain free look will result in a softer look to a film, that originally was quite grainy.

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Maths major here. I understand the concepts at work in regards to removing grain. Some detail is lost when grain is removed… it’s just whether or not it’s something that can be perceived by the human visual system. Removing most of the grain is a very common practice in post houses when it comes to grading film footage; as long as it’s done correctly and the grain is reinserted after grading is completed, the viewer won’t notice a reduction of detail. This is all beside the fact that what we perceive to be detail is contingent on many factors beyond the presence of actual detail.

Anyway, as mentioned, according to what I see on caps-a-holic, most of the blu-ray shots aren’t lacking in detail insomuch as they are lacking in grain and contrast; in the shot where Indy is holding an anachronistic rocket launcher, you can easily discern a detail as fine as the fringes of the flags in both transfers. Also notice that, in the HDTV cap, the flags have a very harsh border in the form of a black outline.

Also worth considering that the limited bit-rate of the HDTV capture will result in loss of detail to a further extent than the Blu (especially if some of those bits have to go to representing the grain).

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Synnöve said:

Also worth considering that the limited bit-rate of the HDTV capture will result in loss of detail to a further extent than the Blu (especially if some of those bits have to go to representing the grain).

That would certainly have been the case, if the DNR on the bluray had not been so heavy. The example I posted earlier makes this very clear:

WOWOW matched to DVD:

Bluray matched to DVD:

The amount of detail lost in the water is quite stunning.

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The BD has some horribly blown out whites. This is particularly noticeable in the opening of the ark sequence. A lot of detail has been irretrievably lost. The WOWOW makes for a far better source in my view.

George creates Star Wars.
Star Wars creates fans.
George destroys Star Wars.
Fans destroy George.
Fans create Star Wars.

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Turisu said:

The BD has some horribly blown out whites. This is particularly noticeable in the opening of the ark sequence. A lot of detail has been irretrievably lost. The WOWOW makes for a far better source in my view.

Depends on what you consider more important. Neither source is perfect, both have their strengths and weaknesses. When considering what source to use for one of my regrades, how natural the grain looks and how filmic the transfer looks overall is what is most important to me, blown highlights/crushed blacks/softness in certain shots are very much secondary issues by comparison.

I love the look of natural film grain so the grain looking as natural as possible is one of the things I consider most important when choosing a source. For that reason I have no plans to do a regraded release of the latest 4k remastered release of Terminator 2 to remove the blanket teal tint for instance because the source has been massively DNRed and has very little grain left, even though technically you could say that it has more overall detail than previous blu-ray releases.

The 4k remastered blu-ray of Raiders of the Lost Ark has much more natural looking grain and looks much more filmic in comparison to the more blocky digital looking WOWOW release so it makes for a far better source for me.

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KK, after watching your amazing V3 of Raiders I really need to ask: any plans for The Temple of Doom + The Last Crusade? 😛

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bromeo said:

KK, after watching your amazing V3 of Raiders I really need to ask: any plans for The Temple of Doom + The Last Crusade? 😛

Glad you enjoyed it bromeo! 😃

As for the Temple of Doom and The Last Crusade, i’ve always felt that the blu-ray transfers were pretty solid in terms of colour and image dynamics, but I do have plans to look into them when I get the chance, see if there is any margin to improve the colours and justify creating regrades for the second and third film.

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kk650, I’m convinced that you don’t use scopes when creating your regrades… Or maybe you’re just using a monitor that isn’t color accurate? The last several regrades of yours that I’ve seen all have a crazy obvious magenta cast. It’s super distracting. Personally, I just don’t see how adding a bunch of magenta to an image makes it look better.

Instead of just adding magenta, it would be good to learn how to perform an actual color balance, using the parade scope as a mathematic reference. Here’s an example of a proper color balance with one of the frames you provided above, along with the parade for each version.

Blu-ray Untouched

kk650 Regrade

44rh1n True Color Balance

You can clearly see in the scopes that your regrade is pushing the red highlights too far, and the blue highlights WAY too far, thus producing an extreme magenta cast. In fact, your grade is so extreme that it’s actually clipping both chrominance and luminance detail (the blue highlights go past 1023 IRE). A more proper balance would be to place the highlights/midtones/shadows of the red/green/blue channels all in a similar spot on the parade (like I did with my true color balance).

Just thought I’d give you some friendly advice. 😃 This post is not meant to incite confrontation, I just wanted to show you, using the scopes, that you’re not actually “removing a blanket yellow tint” but are in fact just replacing it with a purple tint.

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TiddySprinklesPimpBillion said:

I’d rather have the 44rh1n True Color Balance on a BD25 instead of the kk650, please

I didn’t actually create a full grade of the film, sorry. I only graded the reference frame.
Personally, I actually don’t mind the look of the official Raiders Blu-ray. The warmer look matches the tone of the film, which takes place in a desert and in archaeological conditions that have brownish hues already. It looks good. Does it match the old 35mm prints? No. So I can understand why someone would want to make it look like those. But what I don’t understand is why someone would want to make every shot look pink for no gosh-darn reason. ¯_(ツ)_/¯