The audio is recorded fairly low and there seems to be a lack of bass (compared to other LD rips).
I will watch parts of it again this week, as I only checked out the first 30 minutes or so. I *thought* I noticed the audio was slightly and I mean SLIGHTLY off at times too.
Now, the video is the best I have seen. Incredible transfer and there is much more detail compared to other transfers. I just wish the audio was from a LD instead of VHS.
That REALLY matters since I am watching this via a 720p projector and 119" screen.
Originally posted by: DarkGruson I just wish the audio was from a LD instead of VHS.
My PAL transfer set will use the audio from the Definitive LD's, putting PCM audio & a Pro-LogicII 5.1 upmix tracks on the DVDs.
I tried checking the audio between the definitive LD's and Moth3r's ESB at the same time, apart from the playbacks speed I can't tell the difference between the two, going to have to try getting a sample of each and bunging them into an audio editer on my PC to do a better test. I've looked into timestretching the audio for PAL DVD but none of the programs I tried could do it with any competance, speech sounded fine but certain notes in orchestral type music didn't sound right which would ruin some of the SW music. ***Citizen's NTSC DVD/PAL DVD/XviD Info and Feedback Thread***
Yes, CoolEdit was the first program I tried to do timestretching whilst preserving pitch, from what I can tell it does it by breaking up the audio into small pieces and overlaps them, certain notes 'warble' due to the frequency of the overlapping pieces. It's not something you immediately notice but once you do the music is ruined, my first try doing pitch preservation was on a Blade Runner LD rip, ruining Vangelis' music in this way is a no no in my books. ***Citizen's NTSC DVD/PAL DVD/XviD Info and Feedback Thread***
Originally posted by: DarkGruson metal, check your PM please
I sent you an answer exactly after you sent me your question. You did not receive it, probably because you have PMs turned off. I hope that until now you have figured out a way to download Moth3r's ESB... And now, for your feature presentation: The Classic Re-re-re-release of Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back. In this version the word "WOOKIE" has been changed to "HAIR CHALLENGED ANIMAL" and the entire cast has been digitally replaced by Ewoks.
Guys, guys, guys...PROTOOLS is what you absolutely NEED to be using for audio. It's the best audio editing software out there. Period. All proffesional musicians use it these days. Except no substitutes.
Originally posted by: Observer Guys, guys, guys...PROTOOLS is what you absolutely NEED to be using for audio. It's the best audio editing software out there. Period. All proffesional musicians use it these days. Except no substitutes.
Protools isn't needed for these kind of preservation projects. All you need to process the audio is a decent tool to upsample the 44.1 kHz to 48 kHz. Because you can extract the audio digitaly (lossless) from the newer Laserdisc releases of Star Wars.
A new release of Star Wars is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you're gonna get.
I like to think I am being both complimentary and complementary....
For everyone else reading, my project is a PAL capture of all the supplementary material from the PAL Executor VHS boxset. Pinnacle DV500 capture card, Adobe Premiere, After Effects and Encore.
Star Wars is pretty much finished, Empire well under way and Jedi in planning.
Anyway, without wishing to hijack this thread as this is kind of off topic, here are a couple of small samples from the Star Wars DVD (mainly for Moth3r's benefit):
R2D2 from "The Making of Star Wars":
I don't know if you have a copy of RowMan's NTSC material available, and I haven't yet grabbed any screens from my copy, but this is much, much sharper. Bear in mind this is a JPEG of a PowerDVD screengrab.
Also a link to one of the DVD menu transitions (about 1mb, DivX encoded AVI):
Sounds good m8. I have the bonus discs that Rowman made and although the material is fun to watch, the quality is well dodgy at times. It´s got the blurries and shakies like you wouldn´t believe. Me being from a PAL country (Iceland) I would very much like better quality versions of those classic documentaries. I´ve heard the laserdisc versions that Rikter has are pretty good. Have you seen those Goose? If so, how does the sharpness compare? peace,
Thanks Rebelscum- I haven't seen the other versions that Rikter has. I believe that only Star Wars and SPFX: The Making of Empire were released on laserdisc in the US? Rikter, if you read this, perhaps you could let us know.
I know that there are Japanese laserdisc versions of the main documentaries, although again, I haven't seen these. I don't know what other content is included with regards to trailers, short features etc. There was some discussion in the (now defunct) Executor boxset thread, as I recall.
In any case, I suspect that the limiting factor is the source material, rather than the format, so I don't think you would see much difference between laserdisc and VHS in this case. The picture from my PAL VHS tapes is pretty good (they have hardly been watched since I bought them). I know that there has been a lot of PAL vs NTSC discussion and debate in these forums, and I don't really wish to turn Moth3r's thread into another rendition of that I will however be interested to see how my versions stand up against some of the other versions out there.
By the way, the AVI linked to in my earlier post has audio- don't want to startle anyone who may have their speakers up unintentionally..... I'm sorry, I hate it when it does that.....
Can anyone help me find/provide/whatever a clip of moth3r's version? I'd like to get a look at it, but don't want do grab the whole thing for bandwidth reasons.
I posted 50MB sample VOBs for both ANH and TESB to a.b.sw before posting the full disc. (Actually, the samples weren't real VOBs, just renamed RAR files - but they work in most media players.)
I don't mind reposting if required.
If Metallaxis uploads TESB to Myspleen, it would be a good idea to include the sample so those who want to check the quality before downloading can set their torrent clients to download the sample only.
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If Metallaxis uploads TESB to Myspleen, it would be a good idea to include the sample so those who want to check the quality before downloading can set their torrent clients to download the sample only.
Fingers crossed that Metallaxis does upload it to MySpleen.
Yesterday I was doing some extensive studying on the transfers I've got (Isomix, Farsight, EditDroid, TR47 and Dr. Gonzo). And after doing that saw the Moth3r-ANH download was finished. So popped that one in, and it blew me right off of my chair! I really didn't expect NTSC to be that inferior to PAL. Especially when you've been watching the other ones for over an hour the difference is amazing. Although it already was past twelve in the evening I just had to fetch a bag of chips, pop open a beer and watch it entirely. I have quite some experience in VHS>DVD transfers, and have found that with a good VCR the image can be near DVD quality, VERY near. But the thing always giving away the source is the considerable amount of hiss in the sound. Therefore I expected the VHS sound to have ruined this otherwise awesome transfer, until I watched it. I always crank the volume up quite a bit when I'm watching a movie, but I didn't notice any difference with the other transfers. When you really start comparing I have no doubt you'll find the LD sound is better, but when you just watch it you really don't notice it. I did notice an occasional line drop-out and the two color shifts, at first I thought "huh, how could he have missed those?" but I just read the entire thread and found out you had, but didn't fix them (why?). The only remark I have is the noisyness. Very noticeable on the walls in the Tantive sequence and the first couple of Tatooine scenes. One of the reasons Dr. Gonzo had been my favorite up until now, is the smoothness (not softness!). Of course Dr. Gonzo is also pretty soft besides being smooth, but there is one transfer which is smooth AND sharp: EditDroid. But then, it also has a lot of moire (often referred to as dotcrawl) and some filter really ruined some of the Tatooine scenes. Can this be a result of the smoothening? This is a very important question to my opinion: if you could smoothen it up keeping the sharpness (EditDroid-style) but keep the moire out, there's a fair chance it will look as good, or even better than X0. Conclusion: Best transfer so far, first one to nuke Dr. Gonzo. I expect it to be better than Cowclops v2, has anyone done a comparison (I haven't got it yet)?
P.S. Can't wait to see ESB uploaded on a.b.starwars or MySpleen
I have the bonus discs that Rowman made and although the material is fun to watch, the quality is well dodgy at times. It´s got the blurries and shakies like you wouldn´t believe. Me being from a PAL country (Iceland) I would very much like better quality versions of those classic documentaries. I´ve heard the laserdisc versions that Rikter has are pretty good. Have you seen those Goose? If so, how does the sharpness compare? 
