Info: Recommended Editions of Disney Animated (and Partially Animated) Features — Page 51

Would this be updated at all? i know some movies listed have 35mm scans and whatnot unless youre going for official

Maleficent said:

I am interested in the topic, but unfortunately I know too little about it. What exactly does “35mm scan” mean? I assume that it means that an original camera negative is scanned and not just any copy of a copy of this negative? What are the advantages of a 35mm scan?

I have become very cautious after many bad purchases. About 16 years ago I read a review of the Cinderella DVD in a DVD magazine (which called itself a “professional magazine”). It praised the outstanding, restored picture, which was now free of dirt and offered beautiful colours due to the remastering.
I then bought this DVD without knowing what terrible things had been done to the picture …

basically someone took a film reel which is generally 35mm and scanned it using a scanner and its digitzied, they clean it up and release it, most the time, the colors are better and some instances include uncensored scenes or bits

[EDIT: Moiisty beat me with his nice and concise answer, but for those interest in a more blabby reply here it is 😃]

Maleficent said:

I am interested in the topic, but unfortunately I know too little about it. What exactly does “35mm scan” mean? I assume that it means that an original camera negative is scanned and not just any copy of a copy of this negative?

Incorrect (99.9% of the time). The following is simplified a bit; research if you want more solid/detailed info…

When ya see fans doing a 35mm scan, they are scanning one of the many prints that were out in the world showing at theaters back when that was the way the industry operated (pre-digital). There’s pretty much no way in h$## a fan is going to get the one-of-a-kind OCN for a film.

However a STUDIO making/releasing a BD quite likely WILL use OCN. DVD was a different ballgame. A good number of DVD’s did not go back to the OCN. They used prints a lot, which is why some people on this site and FanRestore.com cherish their special DVDs of certain films: they have the correct THEATRICAL color/contrast look of the film as seen in theaters. (Again, these are all broad strokes of example and explanation.)

There are some disadvantages to some fans when it comes to watching OCN scans (used for BD/UHD releases). “How could that be possible? That’s THE best image source, right?” The answer is that color (correction) work was done for releases after the OCN was put together. So… Well, my fave example is The Road Warrior/Mad Max 2. In theaters the (color-timed/changed) release prints had the post-apocalyptic setting looking dingy, dusty, brown-ish. However, the OCN — what the cameras captured — did NOT have brownish sky. The cameras captured nice blue sky (and sometimes nicely green plants), looked much more like a nice postcard than the release in theaters…because the filmmakers knew they didn’t have to spend all the time to shower every location with brown dust while filming. In post they could just brown-it-out a bit and wallah (and it DID work, the recoloring looks much more post-apocalyptic in the theater release prints than the scan of the OCN you can get on BD).

SO, a fan who scans a mere print of TRW/MM2 that showed in theaters will have a movie that reflects the post-apocalyptic haze that the filmmaker wanted, a re-coloring that helps the setting, helps the vision…whereas if you get a BD with the straight OCN scan, you’re getting something a little too pretty looking, which would also be the case if a fan somehow got the one-of-a-kind camera negative to scan. By getting/using a 35mm release print instead, they rather automatically get the color work that we all saw in theaters and don’t have to start from scratch re-doing the color of every shot in the film (to match an old LD or DVD they’d use as a reference).

Maleficent said:

That sounds interesting! But if these are prints that were used in cinemas, isn’t there a risk that the quality of these prints has deteriorated due to frequent use and/or their age and/or poor storage?

Yes, and this is why some of these fan scan projects take a long time to be released. Prints are beat up, faded, missing frames where some magic needs to be done to replace them, and other.

To try to be short-ish answering about OCN…
The select takes are all carefully spliced together (by a negative cutter) after the editor (somewhat to very likely with input from the director) finish all the editing decisions (which could take months [to edit a feature film]). The OCN and a 35mm release print will be identical in regards to the number of frames and those frames’ contents because “the OCN” of the movie is the raw camera footage turned into one long print that is now the movie. (I reiterate, this is all very general and not always the case. And I’ve never worked in a big film industry on these sides to see any of this in person, so…)

All the excess you’re talking about is “cutting room floor” stuff. Okay, that stuff is all also OCN, but that’s not usually what people are referring to when taking about THE OCN of a film. They’re talking about the final edit of all the carefully-picked takes that have been carefully edited down to the frame then assembled by a negative cutter. The excess ala alternate takes, bloopers, etc… I don’t want to pretend I really have good knowledge of what happened/happens to all that, but the general paths seems to be: a) thrown in the garbage b) stored on purpose/just in case c) weren’t intended to be around but somehow survived.

I obviously like talking about this stuff, 'tis fun for me 😃 but this thread is about Disney films so, Maleficent, I guess I recommend searching around for these kinds of answers on the 'net, in other threads, etc., so this thread can get back on track, eh? (If you really want to hear more of my blab specifically you can PM me, but again I’m not some super at-the-source fountain of this kind of knowledge.)

The new Cinderella master is supposedly mistakenly on D+ a little early for those who want to check it out.

I hope this team gets a chance to work on Sleeping Beauty!

JadedSkywalker said:

Anyone else excited for Snow White in 4k? After the Cinderella release i am looking forward to it. Its coming in October, and is reportedly a brand new scan off the original negative.

TheDigitalBits had a screenshot comparison, but always consider, they can ‘new scan’ all they want, it’s what they do to it afterwards that can be anything.

The same team that did the recent Cinderella 4k moved on to Snow White and the 4K version is coming to D+ October 16th. The physical release includes a mono mix (!), but I wouldn’t be shocked if it’s just a fold of the current 5.1

https://www.laughingplace.com/w/disney-entertainment/4k-blu-ray-review-walt-disneys-snow-white-and-the-seven-dwarfs-gets-new-restoration-for-disney100-celebration/

Am I correct that Snow White has a 1080p Blu-ray sourced from the same remaster as the 4k UHD?

Their ‘restored’ Darby O’Gill BD was garbage. The audio track on that was 1.0 mono and lossy at half the bitrate of the DVD (which to be fair was 2.0 mono).

Blu-ray.com’s review actually mentions some technical flaws in the original Snow White animation being present untouched. Maybe they missed some things, but it’s not like they’re adding dewbacks. Things that are really technical flaws aren’t intentional by anyone who worked on the film.

Random-ish question for those who already own Snow White: I’ve just about decided to purchase but I’m not sure about DMC v. retail. DMC has a three-format set (4k, Blu-ray, and DVD) and I’m wondering what they chose for packaging. Appreciate any feedback and opinions,

Tonight I noticed there are two different restorations of Who Framed Roger Rabbit on 'spleen.
One from a 4k master and one from the standard Bluray.
Even reading the details, I have no idea which is better. I see mention there are color timing differences, but of course restoring the censored bits takes talent.
Anyone know which is better, the pluses or minuses?