There were 5 edits to the movie between the 16 mm US release (the main source for Puggo Grand) and Moth3r bootleg and the fresh print used for the Definitive Edition/Faces/2006 GOUT. The obvious one is the opening credits.
It’s actually not unusual for minor edits to credits to be made for home release and/or broadcast.
But 3 FX shots were also changed as were the end credits.
Also not unusual if, for example you tweak a shot for a commercial break. By the way which are the three FX shots you mean?
Now, I’ll ignore the changed opening sequence because we all know when and why it was changed. So far, all the 35 mm prints that this community has found and used, be they optical transfers or Technicolor prints, are have the other 4 changes. The key to understanding when those 4 changes were made lies in the release sequence after the initial release (which was 35 and 70 mm with only the Dolby encoded stereo track and the 70 mm 6 track). Both Puggo Grand and Moth3r have a stereo mixdown mono track instead of the real mono track created later in the year. By the time they made the international release, they had the mono track done and the edits had been made. Not one international version has been found without the 4 changes. However, all the US/UK (as in English) home video releases between the Moth3r bootleg and the Definitive Edition are missing the 3 FX changes.
Again, the home releases would not have been made from theatrical prints. They’re made from special prints struck from the negative specifically for telecine and used for no other purpose (broadcast versions would be from 16mm prints for telecine shipped around the world).
Also, being an avid movie fan, I have encountred troubled telecines in the past.
Right, and why do you think that is? It’s often because they didn’t have a proper telecine print to transfer and had to use a release print or an IP or some other non-ideal film material for the transfer.
The transfer for one of Hao Miyazaki’s films carried a bad orangy tint. They quickly did a corrected version and blamed it on the source being an interpostive print that wasn’t fully corrected. The information I’ve found on the Definitive Edition LD release indices it was done from a new interpositive print. The color is off on the DE/Faces/GOUT US/UK version in a manner that is consistent with an interpositive print (slightly orange and low contrast).
Off compared to what though? Compared to the previous telecine print that was transferred. You aren’t comparing to a theatrical print. This is what poita said:
A telecine master was created twice that I know of (and would have been done more times I’m sure), but nearly every home release comes from one of those two masters. I can assure you the LD and VHS masters were corrected on the fly, as there was no other option at the time. However the source film was already colour timed, and was done so quite differently to the release prints.
A “telecine master” is a 35mm or 16mm print struck for telecine. It’s a print used for no other purpose. It doesn’t have to look any good projected, so they usually had low-contrast to give the telecine operators more room to adjust the picture. They also have their own colour timing. Even if you have found consistency in the telecine prints it doesn’t mean that the theatrical prints looked that way.
Poita is only talking about the home releases, there would have been several more struck for broadcast. Broadcast video tape in the 80’s was much more expensive than film, TV stations would transfer movies from the 16mm telecine prints when they were needed for broadcast, and then erase the tape and use it for other broadcasts, then when it came time to show the film again they would transfer it again. So if one station played the film a dozen times throughout the 80’s they probably transferred it anew from their 16mm telecine print each and every time. That’s why there were several of these prints, it wouldn’t have been economical to keep sending them back and forth between the TV station and the distributor, the TV stations were usually sent their own copy so they could keep using it.
Also, being a lover of old movies, all of the old Technicolor movies that saw relseases on home video (tape, LD, and DVD) were telecined from release prints, so telecine operators are obviously familiar with using many types of sources and can work with what they are given.
No they weren’t. Some may have been, especially as home video was in its infancy and so films in the 70’s or older never had telecine masters for home release - but those films did have TV telecine masters and it’s much more likely a home release would have been made from one of those than from a release print.
Which brings me back to some of the scenes from the technicolor prints that bother me. Particularly that scene where Ben and Luke are talking in the canyon. There is little color to recover in that scene and yet so many of the transfers show a nicely blue sky behind Ben. That scene and those like it (which seem to be mostly on Tatooine) are timed very differently between the Technicolor version and all the other versions. To me that indicates that when they created the 3 color master that starts the Technicolor process, they did not get the timing settings right. And they didn’t get it right in an oddly consistent way. Plus there is the green tint that we already know about. If they screwed up the timing in one place, maybe they did on the whole thing. That is why I say careless. Once the master is made, it is hard to screw up the rest of the process unless you fail to get the dyes the correct colors. But as a result of what I have seen from Mike Verta’s samples, DrDre’s samples, the 4k77 no-DNR version (which sticks to the Techncolor asthetic), and the samples of raw scans of both 4k77 and SSE, I don’t trust the colors on the Technicolor prints. And I bet if you could project one side by side with an optical print you would see the same odd timing. I don’t see how a telecine operator could pull that much color if it wasn’t already there. And it wouldn’t be just one. By my count, ANH has had more than 13 separate telecines from around the world. The scene of Ben and Luke and the canyon looks nothing like the Technicolor in any of them. That is way too many different telecine operators making the exact same (and nearly impossible) correction.
The telecine operator can pull that much colour because telecine prints were low contrast. A fact I’ve pointed out that you’ve completely ignored.
The problem I have with your assessment of the Technicolor process is that you have absolutely zero evidence to support the process being flawed or “screwed up”. The only thing you can point to is your subjective opinion that a certain shot should look a certain way. I’ve seen a lot of films on 35mm, and 70mm, and sometimes a film has consistent grading throughout, sometimes they have a few odd shots not graded right, and sometimes they’re all over the place. From what poita has consistently said - Star Wars was a mess, the grading is all over the place. It has nothing to do with a flawed printing process, they simply didn’t have the resources to do a completely polished grade to the IP, GL cut corners and prioritised other things.
points to very little tweaking during the telecine process.
With respect, you’re simply wrong about that. There is a lot of operator tweaking during the telecine process. To claim that they put a print through and do little to no tweaking is just not factual.
It is a flaw in the Technicolor print.
This claim you keep making is not supported by any evidence. Did the Tech prints and Kodak prints look different to each other? Yes. Is one right and the other wrong - no.
But if you have the last movie to get Technicolor prints and someone didn’t do things right, then you can end up with a superior process producing inferior prints. I think that is the case. Everything I’ve found points to that.
That’s just speculation, you’ve got no evidence. The Technicolor process can indeed go wrong, and it is known to have done so in the past, but there is no evidence at all that there was any flaws in the printing process for Star Wars.