Original trilogy: Special Edition 1997 restoration — Page 6

Roobyoo said:

What’s the next release date? 2026?

what do you mean?

Roobyoo said:

Director said:

Roobyoo said:

What’s the next release date? 2026?

what do you mean?

You said the release date would be the 17th September 2025…

and it was? I am already sharing links.

Roobyoo said:

Then somebody here can surely give a review about your projects.

for sure.

To anyone potentially wondering: it is unlikely I will publish a new version during 2026. it would make more sense to publish one in January 2027. don’t expect newer versions to arrive soon unless explicitly announced, this year I will focus more on fan edits whenever I have the time to do so.

Roobyoo said:

You are correct. Maybe OP has another definition of “soon”, regarding he is using it since September 2024…

I must add to this that:
whenever I say “soon”, I truly mean that I intend to release something soon. delays happen. I also DID give a sample reel already in September 2024, but I deleted it later after the 2024 version of the restoration was released.

I’ve been trying to think of a way to be positive about these edits, but I’m not sure I can. I don’t understand the reason behind making a re-Specialized GOUT, and the final product jumps around in quality so much that it’s distracting. Every SE shot re-inserted does not blend in in the slightest. There’s nothing this edit does that couldn’t just be met by watching any of the existing preservations of the 1997 Laserdisc.

I mean, if you’re doing this as an exercise to learn how to edit, good for you. But you don’t need to set release dates for this or try to build hype. You can share them if you want, but this project might work best as a personal project for you.

@director, What '97 VHS or Laserdisc couldn’t you find? Maybe us helping you locate it will be better for you…

That guy with no name said:

@director, What '97 VHS or Laserdisc couldn’t you find? Maybe us helping you locate it will be better for you…

the wide screen version. I used to own a copy years ago but it got lost by accident, and since then I have been searching for a digital file containing them. no one seems to give away video files of them online, and I am not going to spend a thousand hours digging to the deep web just for a version of 3 films.

doubleofive said:

I’ve been trying to think of a way to be positive about these edits, but I’m not sure I can. I don’t understand the reason behind making a re-Specialized GOUT, and the final product jumps around in quality so much that it’s distracting. Every SE shot re-inserted does not blend in in the slightest. There’s nothing this edit does that couldn’t just be met by watching any of the existing preservations of the 1997 Laserdisc.

I mean, if you’re doing this as an exercise to learn how to edit, good for you. But you don’t need to set release dates for this or try to build hype. You can share them if you want, but this project might work best as a personal project for you.

I don’t do this for any of the reasons you potentially wondered. even I myself realised that the master I used is not from an original reel only AFTER the restorations were finished, and by that point, delaying the restorations with months again would have just caused more debates and controversy. I consider the new restorations an unfortunate mistake caused by unclear sources on the master’s part. in the future I will resort to actual direct reels, and using 4k97 projects more is an option, although hard to accomplish, after I have been banned from the forums they are in and the colours in those restorations are really hard to fix to match the actual release.

Bobson Dugnutt said:

Director said:

To anyone potentially wondering: it is unlikely I will publish a new version during 2026.

if you came to this thread just to attempt to make a laugh out of a simple decision, I strongly urge you not to do so in the future. how would you feel if you made some projects and every time you made a declaration, I mocked it?

Director said:

doubleofive said:

I’ve been trying to think of a way to be positive about these edits, but I’m not sure I can. I don’t understand the reason behind making a re-Specialized GOUT, and the final product jumps around in quality so much that it’s distracting. Every SE shot re-inserted does not blend in in the slightest. There’s nothing this edit does that couldn’t just be met by watching any of the existing preservations of the 1997 Laserdisc.

I mean, if you’re doing this as an exercise to learn how to edit, good for you. But you don’t need to set release dates for this or try to build hype. You can share them if you want, but this project might work best as a personal project for you.

I don’t do this for any of the reasons you potentially wondered. even I myself realised that the master I used is not from an original reel only AFTER the restorations were finished, and by that point, delaying the restorations with months again would have just caused more debates and controversy. I consider the new restorations an unfortunate mistake caused by unclear sources on the master’s part. in the future I will resort to actual direct reels, and using 4k97 projects more is an option, although hard to accomplish, after I have been banned from the forums they are in and the colours in those restorations are really hard to fix to match the actual release.

So now the goal is to take 4K77 and reinsert the (hundreds of) changed shots from 4K97, then present it at 480p? Personally, I would just color correct 4K97 or the Laserdisc to my liking, as the inserts are always going to be rough and even following my gallery would still miss changes. If this is just a matter of not having a Laserdisc preservation, I can get you the Laserdisc.

doubleofive said:

Director said:

doubleofive said:

I’ve been trying to think of a way to be positive about these edits, but I’m not sure I can. I don’t understand the reason behind making a re-Specialized GOUT, and the final product jumps around in quality so much that it’s distracting. Every SE shot re-inserted does not blend in in the slightest. There’s nothing this edit does that couldn’t just be met by watching any of the existing preservations of the 1997 Laserdisc.

I mean, if you’re doing this as an exercise to learn how to edit, good for you. But you don’t need to set release dates for this or try to build hype. You can share them if you want, but this project might work best as a personal project for you.

I don’t do this for any of the reasons you potentially wondered. even I myself realised that the master I used is not from an original reel only AFTER the restorations were finished, and by that point, delaying the restorations with months again would have just caused more debates and controversy. I consider the new restorations an unfortunate mistake caused by unclear sources on the master’s part. in the future I will resort to actual direct reels, and using 4k97 projects more is an option, although hard to accomplish, after I have been banned from the forums they are in and the colours in those restorations are really hard to fix to match the actual release.

So now the goal is to take 4K77 and reinsert the (hundreds of) changed shots from 4K97, then present it at 480p? Personally, I would just color correct 4K97 or the Laserdisc to my liking, as the inserts are always going to be rough and even following my gallery would still miss changes. If this is just a matter of not having a Laserdisc preservation, I can get you the Laserdisc.

I would appreciate digital videos of the films ripped from the widescreen LaserDiscs! Also my goal with 4k97 would have been to use solely it and maybe aim for some enhancements in colour etc.

So, now that this project is effectively discontinued as it has been in the past, I’ll give a clearer and final explanation on all the versions of this.

The background is that I had been looking for 1997 versions for years passively, and actively around 2022-2023.
I struggled to find any widescreen laserdisc / vhs rips of these versions, since they are really hard to find online unless you purchase a player and the films, which are usually in some way broken. So I decided to do a restoration myself.

the first restoration, completed somewhere near the end of November of 2023, was done after I gathered all available scans and uploads I could find of the 1997 release. I originally planned to use 4k97 for most of it, but then came the colour correction issues, because 4k97’s colours are not 100% accurate, and I back then was terrible at manual colour correction, as I am fairly new to film restoration myself. SW and ROTJ went fine, but there were issues with Empire, so this restoration was left undone.

the second restoration, completed 28 August 2024, was the first restoration I ever shared to users here. it was not a full film restoration, but also not a reconstruction, but a hybrid. I preferred scans, but had to reconstruct shots myself using different releases whenever a clean 1997 film scan did not exist. Empire had the most reconstructed parts in this hybrid. SW and ROTJ’s versions in this hybrid were effectively derived from the first restoration, degrading the quality slightly, but not really noticeably. the colours again were not possible to correct here with my skills of that time.

then came the third restoration, completed either on 17 or 18 September 2024, which was essentially a fixed version of the second restoration, further degrading the quality. the fixes were mainly in colours, particularly in Empire. Empire was largely reconstructed again from scratch, but the other films were left fairly untouched. this is the restoration everyone who got these versions between 19 September 2024 and 1 June 2025, saw.

and then I did the fourth restoration, finished 12 September 2025. I finally got rid of all use of 4k97, because they were unusable in this restoration, and most work was done from scratch. this is the last hybrid I will ever make in this project.

the fourth restoration was based on a digital fanmade version from around 2012 that I ended up calling a scan, yes, that was false, because back then I wasn’t really familiar with film restoration terminology, my apologies. I thought this fanmade version was based on a 1997 scan, but it’s likely a reconstruction, which is why I am never using it again, and it is too late to fix it, because I have no need to do a fifth restoration from scratch, or repair an 8-month-old one which would degrade the quality further.

the other 1997 version clips I used for the restorations were mainly online uploads.

because back in 2024, I did not give all this information, I myself am not even sure why I did that, it landed me in controversy, got me banned in the star wars trilogy forums, and earned me a name of a troll to some people.
later, I can say my old vagueness and promises were the cause of my own immaturity, as I was not a film restoration expert.
it is likely most who argued with me over this project have either forgotten or forgiven me for it, but I still apologise to everyone.

I will probably get back to this project in 2027 or later this year as I said in January, but with different sources and more openness. I take full responsibility of my mistakes during this project. I hope I must never argue over them again.

Just be more exact on what sources you’re using and what the goal of your edit is. We have a lot of resources around that can help.

doubleofive said:

Just be more exact on what sources you’re using and what the goal of your edit is. We have a lot of resources around that can help.

of course. not doing that in 2024-2025 was likely the biggest mistake I did.