The Vaultbreakers Collection - Disney Preservations — Page 7

skyjedi2005 said:

What i find damn near impossible is to find all the open matte versions of the studio ghibli films released on vhs or dvd worldwide is getting very difficult.

I think howl's moving castle may be the only movie of miyazaki's only available matted in wisdescreen and no pan and scan or open matte release.

The only full frame release of nausicaa was the badly butchered warriors of the wind.

The only Ghibli movies I know of being released in 4:3 are Princess Mononoke, Kiki's Delivery Service and My Neighbor Totoro. And that was only in the US with only Totoro getting a 4:3 dvd release. I think even the Japanese vhs Hi-vision transfers were letterboxed. Even the 2003 US vhs releases of Laputa and Spirited Away are letterboxed.

Both Kiki and Laputa were dubbed by Disney in 1998. But only Kiki was released on a dubbed 4:3 vhs and a special letterboxed version with original Japanese and English subtitles. (Even though there was a preview trailer for Castle in the Sky on the Kiki tape.) In 2003, both movies were released to dvd and vhs. Rather than spend money on 2 different transfers, the Castle in the Sky vhs was letterboxed using (I assume) the same (crappy edge enhanced) widescreen master as the dvd. I would think this was to avoid spending money on pan & scan. I would think they would have made the vhs 4:3 if all it required was removing the mattes. I'm also pretty sure Kiki also got a vhs rerelease in '03 but I don't know if that was still 4:3 or widescreen like the dvd.

Someone could compare the 1998 4:3 Kiki vhs to the '98 letterbox to the '03 dvd. This only has dvd comparisons.

Kiki: http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film/dvdcompare/kikisdelivery.htm

Or better yet, I have the book The Art of Kiki's Delivery Service. It includes many still pictures of frames and most appear to be 1.85:1 ratio. Some are different but those are either backgrounds or cel art. (Some of the backgrounds would be used to track across or up/down.) Watching the R1 dvd (on a computer with no overscan), in many scenes, the dvd frame was cropped compared to the cel art on all 4 sides. The last frame on the dvd beaver comparison can be seen on page 146 without credits. Interestingly, in the cel art, I can see the older woman's face while each dvd frame cuts her off. The cel art also shows more on both sides but the R3 dvd has more on the bottom.

Viz media also has released art books for Totoro, Howl's Moving Castle and Porco Rosso.

The US video trailer for Castle in the Sky is 4:3, you could always compare those parts. Does anybody know where that music is from? I've also heard it on ESPN promos for golf tournaments.

The only comparison with a 4:3 example I could find was for Totoro. Additional comparison of the opening and closing credits may be of interest since those are letterboxed on the fox release.

Totoro: http://www.bulletsnbabesdvd.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=2498

Mononoke: http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film/DVDCompare7/princessmono5.htm

Nausicaa: http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film/DVDCompare9/nausica.htm

And because it's my favorite, Whisper of the Heart: http://www.bulletsnbabesdvd.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=3822

Current Beauty & the Beast rip torrent is dead.  Anyone care to seed?  Or is there still a v2 in the works I should wait for?

I think my friend who was putting the DVD together just got distracted with everything else...

I see.  Does this mean a version 2 is not happening, or just delayed?

Prolly just delayed as I know he wants to do it as much as I do.

I decided to try to take the v2 upon myself as drf's having computer problems (though I need to get 4 vobs off him of stuff I plan to include as bonus material).

I'm not sure how I'm going to arrange it.  Currently it looks like this:

1. Main feature, 4 Sing-Along Songs, music video, theatrical trailer

2. Workprint, Making Of featurette, additional WIP material from the laserdiscs

But I'm considering the possibility of this layout too:

1. Main feature

2. Workprint, additional WIP material from the laserdiscs

3. Making Of featurette, 4 Sing-Along Songs, music video, theatrical trailer

I only do DVD5 so perhaps I'll go with the 3-disc layout.

I'm not good with menus as you saw, but I'll try to get everything together I can, or if someone else would like to help with menus, or with cleanup on the movie proper, it would be appreciated.  I plan to provide subtitles as well, at least for the main feature.  (I have them for the trailer also, MIGHT have them for the making-of.)

The video is scaled to 672x480 after cropping, and padded to 720x480.  This odd resolution is more justified when you keep in mind that this is intended to be an Anamorphic release and 672x480 scales up roughly to 800x480 (or about 1.66:1, the original aspect ratio).  This is also true of Disney's own 1.66:1 DVDs.

Workprint sounds awesome.  Is this just selected scenes?

Something similar to the workprint is on the R2.  A complete workprint was issued officially on LD; it was actually screened in this format, at about 80% completion, at the New York Film Festival in 1991.

Wow.  Sounds like something I'll have to check out.

here is a cover I put together for Beauty and the Beast if anyone is interested:

EDIT EDIT:  fixed cover art available HERE

anyone interested in the v1 of Beauty and the Beast, I've upped it to RS.  you can either check tehparadox or PM me about it.

The first post needs to be updated to keep a running list of 'needs to be fixed' and releases so people can keep score.

AFAIK:

Little Mermaid: Fixed by me.

Aladdin: Fixed by ADM

Beauty and the Beast: Molly (Could someone PM me, I'm still unclear what's been changed in this movie.)

Song of the South: Released by Mentor and Br'er Preservation Group

Did I miss anything?

I think wasting time fixing OAR/Open matte is silly. Some of these films were meant for wider, some were cropped after the fact, some were re-opened for full height of cells, some re-opened for 16x9.

The fact most of animated features are created as 1.66:1 no matter what was intended during production or finally matted for theatrically. Cells are squarish. Anything else is open to debate.

It would take a lot of time a research to find out the 'original intent' on these and at the end of the day it doesn't matter much.

I know there's been talk about stuff like Little Mermaid's color. While it might be different from a prior release, it is pleasing to the eye, and the changes were made under supervision of the original animators.

I don't think they intend to damage the film when they make these decisions. When you take into account the age of the films, and possible changes introduced by color timing, it's hard to tell what the original intent was at this point. If it looks good, save your time. I'll take slightly skewed color on a good looking DVD over the best laserdisc/VHS preservation any day.

What's more important is deliberate censorship. I think that pisses more people off than anything else and our time is best spent there.

My top list for fixes includes Saludos Amigos, and (as far as I can tell) the undiscussed changes to Fantasia.

I also understand Make Mine Music and Melody Time have been censored... but don't ask me what.

Does anyone know if Three Caballeros has had any changes? I saw someone mention that they thought it might have been censored as well.

Finally... IS the PAL release of Saludos Amigos complete? I see it's active on a notorious bittorrent site. (see edit2 below.)

Edit:

And that's without mentioning the following which are banned outright...

Hell's Bells
Trader Mickey
Mickey In Arabia
Mickey's Man Friday
Education For Death
Reason And Emotion
Commando Duck
Der Fueher's Face
Mickey's Mellerdrammer
Cannibal Capers

Edit2:

My googling turns up that R2 and R4 are censored for Saludos Amigos as well. Anyone know of a clean source for this movie?

I didnt do beauty and the beast.  Thats Molly along with someone else.  I just made a cover art for it.

Post edited to reflect change.  (I still don't know what the change was on BatB.)

Didn't someone do Lion King as well?

I did, but I don't think I released it apart from an irc-only avi format... could stand to do an iso though

BatB's changes are similar to Lion King's - the "OTV" on that DVD is merely a reconstruction made from the SE, most of the SE changes are present, e.g., no stuttering beast, different title card, can't remember everything.

Regarding Saludos Amigos I can carefully go through my R2 DVD and see if it actually made it there or not.

Pretty sure I found the cut on the R2 I've got.

Anyway, the reason I really haven't released DVDs is I suck at authoring them :/, and my friend has consistently failed to get around to doing so.

@Molly - While I've gotten good at re-authoring an edited movie back into it's original menu system, I personally have no problem with movie-only DVDs.

Maybe it's from growing up with VHS tapes.  Besides, unless you have extras, a menu is just another hoop to jump through before you watch what you came for.

Well, in some cases we do have extras.  Lots of 'em for Lion King, and a couple for BatB.  I just think a no-menu DVD looks almost as amateur as a shoddy menu.

Saludos Amigos isn't widescreen AFAIK, so even a VHS rip might work for the missing scene.

Anyone know if the old tape release is intact?  I might be able to get my hands on that.

So then, as soon as a menu gets done, I can see BatB v2 and Lion King?

Yeah, but that might take awhile in and of itself, as I'm not good at it and drf can't motivate himself to do it. :(