It was the pulldown frames as I said.
Can you make the image darker and not so blue? The image is too bright as it is, and you're making it brighter. It looks good in stills, but in practice we're losing highlight detail. I've asked for this several times before.
At any rate, this has taken so long that I'm done with the edit anyway. Not that I couldn't replace it if you came up with something great quickly.
Holger Leihe animated many of the Thief scenes, continuing the legacy of the late Ken Harris. Here he remembers The Thief flying shot ...
I remember referencing old b/w
footage of biplanes doing air acrobatics. One shot was
70 feet long. While I was working on it I was getting
worried that I was generating footage that was
destined to be edited. I remember making a joke about
it and Dick made holy promises not to cut it. Oh
well... but you're bringing it back. Dick also used
this sequence as an example why he was refusing to do
storyboards. While he felt it was hilarious to see the
Thief flying for so long, he would not have been able
to justify this sequence with storyboards. For the
last shot Dick wanted to use the BG strobing idea that
Roy had come up with for the chase sequence, so for
the BG layout I animated a hand closing and then made
lots of xeroxes of these animation drawings that I
pasted down, the spacing lining up with the increments
of the pan and slightly vibrating up and down. The
idea was that the hands are trying to grab him, as he
flies by. In the film you actually miss the effect, I
think, as you are focusing on the Thief. When I was
done I rolled the whole layout out. It reached almost
through the entire studio. Probably the longest BG in
the film.
A while back, Oscar Grillo sent me some beautiful material from the original film, The Amazing Nasruddin. This is the best glimpse I've ever seen into the original film that eventually became The Thief. A must-read, with beautiful artwork. Check it out.
http://orangecow.org/thief/nasrudin/Nasru_1.jpg
Poster and logo for the film. It appears that a prisoner is being brought before the King of Persia (proto-King Nod). Anwar the Grand Vizier is visible - proto-Zigzag, as are the proto-Goblet, and the other wise men.
If the plot is similar to the final film, the prisoner in chains could be the townsperson who caused Anwar the Grand Vizier to slip on a banana peel ... but perhaps not. My real guess would be that it is Nasruddin, but the colors aren't right. Since the "wise men" are there, this could be the introduction to the "bread scene," where Nasruddin is brought forth for trial as a heretic.
The text shows that Nasruddin's donkey had been named Thunderbolt. His wife, Kerima.
Princess Meemee's original name, here, is Princess Nura.
As we already know, Chief Roofless was Chief Boozdil, and the Mad Holy Old Witch was the Mad Holy Old Indian Witch of Benares, a "kind of fraudulent female Maharishi." The Thief is the "dopey, loveable Thief-who-always-gets-caught," which seems consistent with the "emerald scene" in the final film, and his encounter with Nanny early on ... both of which we know were Nasruddin scenes.
There are references to a terrible magician, "Zappo the Great," and the "roly-poly Grand Vizier of India, so devious he outwits even himself."
http://orangecow.org/thief/nasrudin/Nasru_2.jpg
A similar scene of The Persian Court can be seen here - except there is no prisoner in chains that I can see, and Nasruddin and his donkey are seen safely outside the palace, on the other side of the wall. Anwar and the King can still be seen in the same places, and the wise men seem to be there too, though in a different position and none of them look like Goblet.
The Mogul of India is not yet in One Eye like "sitting on a throne of women" mode ... He is simply chubby. Clearly when Nasruddin was removed, Williams relished removing references to real countries, so he could make the good guys good and the bad guys bad.
The mogul of India smokes a hookah, as did King Nod in early boards.
Note the upside-down perspective used at top left "In a Persian market." Very cool.
A VERY close look at this and I've spotted The Thief. Lower left of the picture, below Nasruddin's donkey.
The "Magic Garden" is where Nasruddin sees Princess Nura (Meemee) and her beastly lover.
An early Thief is visible in "Nasruddin Arrives." I just noticed that. A similar scene is seen in "The Caravan Departs" ... It looks like Nasruddin is posing as a wealthy nobleman as he sets out to visit either the mogul of India or the King of Persia. My guess? He poses as a nobleman in Persia, gets the call to be ambassador to India, sets out with great fanfare, but after encountering the brigands will arrive in India in tatters again.
We see some men on horses riding through a graveyard. In Clapperboard we also see Nasruddin running through the same graveyard, scared.
http://orangecow.org/thief/nasrudin/Nasru_3.jpg
http://orangecow.org/thief/nasrudin/Nasru_4.jpg
http://orangecow.org/thief/nasrudin/Nasru_5.jpg
http://orangecow.org/thief/nasrudin/Nasru_6.jpg
"If I'm right side up in this world, I want to be upside-down in the next ..."
http://orangecow.org/thief/nasrudin/Nasru_7.jpg
Picture at top left suggests that Kenneth Williams, who plays two lackeys in the final film, was the original choice to play the Vincent Price role. Strange. Richard was working with Kenneth a lot at this time - Kenneth narrated "Love Me, Love Me, Love Me," and the unfinished epic "Diary of a Madman," the soundtrack to which was more recently released as a radio play. Judging from his part as the proto-Goblet "wise man" seen in the documentary "The Creative Person" (1966), Kenneth was to have a larger part in Nasruddin, playing several roles. His role was fairly small in the final film.
It's also known that Anthony Quayle was not the original King, so ... who knows.
http://orangecow.org/thief/nasrudin/Nasru_8.jpg
The figure Ken Harris is animating seems to be the sidekick of "General Taboo," seen briefly in the 1972 Clapperboard documentaries.