Anyway I did the only thing that was left as an option. I blew the dust off my Laserdisc set (Incredible Shrinking Aspect Ratio set) which I always felt to have pretty good colors. Wired it up and did a half dozen captures.
Wellll (yup with 4 'L's'), I learned some interesting things. Of course every scene is different as we knew. Hues could tilt left then right SIGNIFICANTLY from one scene to the next, as did intensities of every single color.
But there were 2 constants for all captures:
1) Moth3r's (and assumingly the PAL laserdisc source) had significantly smaller dynamic range to the colors. A specific color spike that looks like an 'I' on the vectorscope frequently looked more like a 'V' on my set. This is the real source of the washed out look of this set. I don't have the tools or knowledge on how to fix that if it is even possible.
2) Every single strong yellow frame needed a boost from 25-33% to match my LD set.
The capture on the previous page of this thread, showing 3PO with R2, peaks to the same level (when boosted) BUT looks slightly orange because the hue is tilted more red. Since it is not an intensity problem and there is no consistency to the hue changes, that won't be altered.
The only thing left (and I'm going to sleep on it) is an odd undersaturation of the opening crawl. I mean we're talking a need for a 75% boost!
No this isn't the only part that's less accurate, but it is something I may fix because it gives me brain itch. More likely I'll learn to live with it.
WHICH MEANS...
DVD's will be burned tomorrow... woohoo.
I'm very satisfied with what I've produced and they will have a place of honor in my DVD collection... at least for then next few months until Citizen gets his edition out and kicks my ass.
Now I can start working on L.A. Story Extended Edition. :-) Or sleep... Maybe the beach, I'm getting sort of pale working on this project.