The Terminator - Color Regrade [No Longer Available] — Page 8

I’ve just seen this on 35mm, and I can tell you the 2013 MGM Bluray looks faithful and much, much closer than your regrade. Visuals of course are only one thing, the original mono mix is obviously nothing like the bluray - but the sound on the print is absolutely thumping.

I’ll post some examples (regrade on top, 2013 MGM Bluray on bottom):

This is how it actually looks on a 35mm print:

The re-grade is too dark and has turned the background navy blue where the backgrounds are often cyan or green.

One of the scenes in the film where the background is very obviously green and not blue or cyan is when Sarah is driving through the tunnel, I just checked the bluray and sure enough it looks correct:

That’s exactly how it looks on release prints, and the road looks green as well as it does on the bluray.

Griffith Observatory:

The colour cast has been removed in the regrade, but this looks moreorless accurate:

Furthermore I don’t remember seeing a single night scene where the background looked so neutrally grey.

Rear-screen projection future war:

These scenes looked really amazing, and felt very intense.

The bluray looks fairly accurate. While it’s impossible for me to say for certain for every scene, what I can say is that most scenes like this had at least some cyan in them and did not look as blue as the regrade. It was also quite easy to tell this is a back-screen effect on film from the way the background is out of focus - nevertheless it still looked great.

Terminator enters police station:

Once again the regrade looks, to my eye, off. The only thing wrong about the bluray is that I’m pretty sure in that shot you could not see through the sunglass lens on the print (but you can in other shots). This is because prints don’t have much detail in the blacks.

Terminator in front of sugar glass:

The regrade is wrong. The bluray looks faithful. There are no scenes in the present (1984) that look as blue as the regrade, the only one that may have looked more blue are future war scenes, although I hasten to add many if not most of them had cyans or greens in them. The colour timing on the print was pretty consistent.

This is all largely in-line with what kaosjm reported in 2017. The future war scenes, some of them were “more blue” than the present, but virtually all of them had teal, cyan, or green in them. The scenes that were the most blue were the rear-projection scenes, but even they were not as blue as the regrade.

Visually speaking the bluray is remarkably faithful. Sound is another matter since it doesn’t have the original mono mix.

I’m aware that my regrade is not totally accurate, which is why I’m actually working on a new regrade from scratch that will hopefully be more in-depth than my previous single LUT efforts.

But, to say the Blu-ray is accurate is somewhat incorrect IMO. Just to clarify, the print you saw was an original one and not a 2001 re-issue? If what you saw lined up with kaosjm’s description and it had the mono I would assume it was original, but I’d rather be certain.

The big issue I have with what you say about the Blu-ray’s accuracy is that there is evidence that the Blu-ray’s color biases in some scenes are not always consistent with the original prints. The Blu-ray is more accurate than I used to think it is, and my regrade is certainly less accurate in many instances, but the Blu-ray still has some idiosyncrasies.

35mm Frames

The latter two frames in particular are very different.

http://www.framecompare.com/screenshotcomparison/Y6LNNN8X
http://www.framecompare.com/screenshotcomparison/Y67NNN8X
http://www.framecompare.com/screenshotcomparison/DW6ZGNNX

Of course the Technoir frame was scanned too dark, but a better picture was taken later.

I find it hard to believe that the print you saw had a yellow/green push in the highlights like the Blu-ray does, but I haven’t had the opportunity to see a print in person, so I can’t say anything from experience.

Also, the shot of Sarah driving in the tunnel you posted is still green in my regrade, though the shot is darker. The walls in the whole scene are green, though the road is cyan or blue in many shots in my regrade.

Anyway, I’m glad you weighed in here. By the way, what did you think of my old regrade?

That was the latest update I had made when kaosjm posted about the print he saw and said that I was spot on for most of the film. He did note that the beginning and future war stuff was sometimes very cyan and teal, which I acknowledged, but I never ended up implementing any changes like that because until now I was set on doing a single global adjustment for the majority of the movie. That’s why the shots in those comparisons have inaccuracies, too.

Just to clarify, the print you saw was an original one and not a 2001 re-issue?

Yes completely original, I can confirm it did not have the Donna Smith or Harlan Ellison credits.

The big issue I have with what you say about the Blu-ray’s accuracy is that there is evidence that the Blu-ray’s color biases in some scenes are not always consistent with the original prints.

None of those scans look anything like projection. Just taking the second one as an example - Reece was nowhere near that dark, he was clearly visible in that scene.

Anyway, I’m glad you weighed in here. By the way, what did you think of my old regrade?

It was better, but I can’t say it’s an improvement on the bluray. The bluray looked spot-on. I don’t think it is completely spot-on mind you, but it’s very faithful.

That was the latest update I had made when kaosjm posted about the print he saw and said that I was spot on for most of the film. He did note that the beginning and future war stuff was sometimes very cyan and teal, which I acknowledged, but I never ended up implementing any changes like that because until now I was set on doing a single global adjustment for the majority of the movie. That’s why the shots in those comparisons have inaccuracies, too.

There is less colour in those scenes which is why they look more blue, besides that they have the same teal/cyan/green hue as the rest of the film’s night scenes.

I find it hard to believe that the print you saw had a yellow/green push in the highlights like the Blu-ray does, but I haven’t had the opportunity to see a print in person, so I can’t say anything from experience.

I’m sorry to hear that I hope you do get to see it sometime! Last year I saw T2 on 35mm. 😃 The really funny thing was when I was leaving the cinema, literally in the company of just two strangers, they were talking amongst themselves about how it was interesting they saw a print rather than a digital projection.

RU.08 said:

The big issue I have with what you say about the Blu-ray’s accuracy is that there is evidence that the Blu-ray’s color biases in some scenes are not always consistent with the original prints.

None of those scans look anything like projection. Just taking the second one as an example - Reece was nowhere near that dark, he was clearly visible in that scene.

I mentioned that the second frame was scanned too dark, but the others clearly weren’t since their brightness isn’t too far off from the Blu-ray.

Anyway, would you say the projection was accurate to the old German DVD, the one that was transferred from a print? That transfer has a lot more green and teal than most others besides the Blu-ray.

Given your experience watching the film, that DVD release, and the general accuracy of the Blu-ray to the projection you saw, with those frame scans having different colors present, there might have actually been some fluctuation from print to print regarding the blues/cyans/teals and such. It’s hard to say until we get at least one print in somebodies hands to scan the whole film.

Anyway, would you say the projection was accurate to the old German DVD, the one that was transferred from a print?

No. The colours in that version are washed out, and it was not transferred digitally it was very obviously done by telecine which never produces a projection-accurate result regardless of whether you’re using a release print, a TV print, or whatever. I do not think it was even transferred for DVD - it looks like they used a broadcast tape literally transferred in the 1980’s for that release. It’s a full-screen transfer, outside of the US no one did full-screen transfers for DVD, even in 1997. And when they did the first digital restoration, and broadcast it, it was in widescreen.

RU.08 said:

Anyway, would you say the projection was accurate to the old German DVD, the one that was transferred from a print?

No. The colours in that version are washed out, and it was not transferred digitally it was very obviously done by telecine which never produces a projection-accurate result regardless of whether you’re using a release print, a TV print, or whatever. I do not think it was even transferred for DVD - it looks like they used a broadcast tape literally transferred in the 1980’s for that release. It’s a full-screen transfer, outside of the US no one did full-screen transfers for DVD, even in 1997. And when they did the first digital restoration, and broadcast it, it was in widescreen.

The colors are definitely washed out, but the general color biases are what I’m referring to. I think that skin tones are too frequently pinkish, and some scenes seem very dark, but most of the scenes I’ve compared look somewhat similar to the Blu-ray, and match your description of the print you saw pretty well.

I posted in the fanres thread that I think it seems to be the most accurate (I meant generally, though I didn’t really specify what I thought was accurate about it in that post), and that it matches the dozens of 35mm frames posted online rather closely, so I would think that the biases introduced by the telecine were subtle. With the washed out contrast it wouldn’t be projection accurate of course, but a subtle regrade of the BD on a shot by shot basis to try and match the color consistency of the DVD seems like a worthy effort to me.

I think I’m going to try doing that with my updated regrade, and maybe those of us who are not quite satisfied with the BD will be happy with an alternative that isn’t far off from it. I’m curious, for everyone who has my regrade and enjoys it over the BD, would you guys be interested in something that stays closer to the BD and just makes subtle shot to shot changes?

Reese said:

Dek Rollins said:

RU.08 said:

Anyway, would you say the projection was accurate to the old German DVD, the one that was transferred from a print?

No. The colours in that version are washed out, and it was not transferred digitally it was very obviously done by telecine which never produces a projection-accurate result regardless of whether you’re using a release print, a TV print, or whatever. I do not think it was even transferred for DVD - it looks like they used a broadcast tape literally transferred in the 1980’s for that release. It’s a full-screen transfer, outside of the US no one did full-screen transfers for DVD, even in 1997. And when they did the first digital restoration, and broadcast it, it was in widescreen.

The colors are definitely washed out, but the general color biases are what I’m referring to. I think that skin tones are too frequently pinkish, and some scenes seem very dark, but most of the scenes I’ve compared look somewhat similar to the Blu-ray, and match your description of the print you saw pretty well.

I posted in the fanres thread that I think it seems to be the most accurate (I meant generally, though I didn’t really specify what I thought was accurate about it in that post), and that it matches the dozens of 35mm frames posted online rather closely, so I would think that the biases introduced by the telecine were subtle. With the washed out contrast it wouldn’t be projection accurate of course, but a subtle regrade of the BD on a shot by shot basis to try and match the color consistency of the DVD seems like a worthy effort to me.

I think I’m going to try doing that with my updated regrade, and maybe those of us who are not quite satisfied with the BD will be happy with an alternative that isn’t far off from it. I’m curious, for everyone who has my regrade and enjoys it over the BD, would you guys be interested in something that stays closer to the BD and just makes subtle shot to shot changes?

Possibly. Depends on the final look I suppose.
I am curious though, in case you or someone else knows, is there a version which incorporates deleted scenes?

I think Stamper made an extended version on fanres.

Dek Rollins said:

The colors are definitely washed out, but the general color biases are what I’m referring to. I think that skin tones are too frequently pinkish, and some scenes seem very dark, but most of the scenes I’ve compared look somewhat similar to the Blu-ray, and match your description of the print you saw pretty well.

The skin tones, like most 35mm on the era, are frequently yellowish in the daylight scenes.

I posted in the fanres thread that I think it seems to be the most accurate (I meant generally, though I didn’t really specify what I thought was accurate about it in that post), and that it matches the dozens of 35mm frames posted online rather closely, so I would think that the biases introduced by the telecine were subtle. With the washed out contrast it wouldn’t be projection accurate of course, but a subtle regrade of the BD on a shot by shot basis to try and match the color consistency of the DVD seems like a worthy effort to me.

The bias introduced by the telecine is anything but “subtle”. I’m very sorry to disagree.

I think I’m going to try doing that with my updated regrade, and maybe those of us who are not quite satisfied with the BD will be happy with an alternative that isn’t far off from it. I’m curious, for everyone who has my regrade and enjoys it over the BD, would you guys be interested in something that stays closer to the BD and just makes subtle shot to shot changes?

I think this film is well worth doing a scan from a print, you’ll see the colours on the BD are faithful but there’s some subtle differences here and there. I mean no disrespect, but re-grading is a fool’s errand unless you’ve seen it projected yourself.

RU.08 said:

Dek Rollins said:

The colors are definitely washed out, but the general color biases are what I’m referring to. I think that skin tones are too frequently pinkish, and some scenes seem very dark, but most of the scenes I’ve compared look somewhat similar to the Blu-ray, and match your description of the print you saw pretty well.

The skin tones, like most 35mm on the era, are frequently yellowish in the daylight scenes.

That’s what I’ve gleamed from 35mm photos in the past.

I posted in the fanres thread that I think it seems to be the most accurate (I meant generally, though I didn’t really specify what I thought was accurate about it in that post), and that it matches the dozens of 35mm frames posted online rather closely, so I would think that the biases introduced by the telecine were subtle. With the washed out contrast it wouldn’t be projection accurate of course, but a subtle regrade of the BD on a shot by shot basis to try and match the color consistency of the DVD seems like a worthy effort to me.

The bias introduced by the telecine is anything but “subtle”. I’m very sorry to disagree.

The bias introduced by the telecine most likely includes the strong red push in the brights, but that’s also one of the idiosyncrasies I mentioned it having. Besides that and the pinkish skin tones, many scenes that I’ve directly compared look remarkably similar to the Blu-ray, and it is frequently also similar to 35mm frames that we have images of.

The only part of the film that I think is entirely wrong is the first half of the second-to-last reel. It’s incredibly green for some reason when the immediate previous scenes in the same location were much more natural looking, so I think that must have been an error of some sort. It could’ve even been a lab mistake on the print they used for the transfer even.

I think I’m going to try doing that with my updated regrade, and maybe those of us who are not quite satisfied with the BD will be happy with an alternative that isn’t far off from it. I’m curious, for everyone who has my regrade and enjoys it over the BD, would you guys be interested in something that stays closer to the BD and just makes subtle shot to shot changes?

I think this film is well worth doing a scan from a print, you’ll see the colours on the BD are faithful but there’s some subtle differences here and there. I mean no disrespect, but re-grading is a fool’s errand unless you’ve seen it projected yourself.

No disrespect taken. I don’t disagree that my lack of personal firsthand experience seeing a projection makes any of my attempts more speculative, but I do have sources for my interpretation of what a projection looks like. You’re description of the print you saw is comparable the 35mm frames we have, with those being good reference material IMO, along with most of the German transfer, taking into account that there is sometimes more green than needs to be there.

I agree that a print scan would be great. I would much rather watch that than even a new regrade of the Blu-ray.
Really, I’d love to see Arrow do a release of this as well.

By the way, when you mentioned the credits being original, what did they actually look like? was there no Donna Smith credit at all, or did it scroll up at the beginning of the credits during the fade-out like in the German DVD print?

Anyway, I would love to here feedback from yourself and anyone else that has seen it projected once I finish my new regrade, and maybe that will help determine the accuracy of what I’m able to cook up.

Charles Threepio said:

Ah, would it be possible to send me a raw file of the German DVD version, that I might be able to upscale the original closing credits with nnedi3_rpow2 for a possible restoration of my own? Thanks!

It has pretty bad image quality. I’m not sure what all could be pulled out of an upscale. Send me a PM if you want it.

Dek Rollins said:

By the way, when you mentioned the credits being original, what did they actually look like? was there no Donna Smith credit at all, or did it scroll up at the beginning of the credits during the fade-out like in the German DVD print?

Yes the credits started scrolling up over the picture like that before it faded out completely. I meant there was no static credit, it was probably the first credit scrolling up as seen in your screenshot.

The only thing that looks noticeably off in the BD is the text at the start of the film (the future war text and the credits) - that’s all much softer on 35mm.

RU.08 said:

Dek Rollins said:

By the way, when you mentioned the credits being original, what did they actually look like? was there no Donna Smith credit at all, or did it scroll up at the beginning of the credits during the fade-out like in the German DVD print?

Yes the credits started scrolling up over the picture like that before it faded out completely. I meant there was no static credit, it was probably the first credit scrolling up as seen in your screenshot.

Thanks for the info. I might take a crack at recreating the theatrical credit placement, but I might be too lazy. 😛

The only thing that looks noticeably off in the BD is the text at the start of the film (the future war text and the credits) - that’s all much softer on 35mm.

That’s to be expected.

TylerDurden389 said:

Not sure if this contributes to the conversation but I’m gonna throw it to the air. I still have the terminator on vhs (recorded to dvd and then digital) and I noticed in the fullscreen version that the aspect ratio has a lot more headroom. When the “T” and “R” in “Terminator” cross at the beginning of the opening credits, you can actually see the top of the letters slide across each other, and THAT’S why you hear that metal scrapping noise. Not sure if the entire presentation has that extra headroom though, as it might just be only that part.

I’ve been made aware of the origin of the sound effect before, and I find it interesting that they framed it to be cut off like that. I would assume that the whole film is open matte, though it’s definitely possible that some of the optical effects shots were hardmatted. I actually have an old HBO Video VHS that I watched once, but I don’t remember what the framing looked like.

Someone said that the German FSK 18 LD of Terminator looks a bit better than the DVD. IIRC, it was said that the colors are a bit lesser washed out. But I might be wrong remembering…

Did anyone ever capture that?