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Info: Droids and Ewoks, anybody ?

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 (Edited)

I’m just curious, if somebody preserved the old 80’s cartoons.

I know, that a few episodes of these serials were edited together  to appear like movies, and released on DVDs.

But that’s NOT what was shown on TV. The cartoon episodes, even when they’re piss poor, are an important part of the Star Wars universe and deserve to get a proper “preservation”.

I found online a few torrents. The Droids episodes are very bad DivX encodes, barely watchable. Ewoks are all damaged, none of the avi files I checked is complete, and “playable” .

Does anybody know where I can get full and undamaged versions of episodes of these cartoons ? It would be great to find somebody who taped them off TV

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Luckily, both series were released in full in England on VHS. These would provide superior sources to any off-air recording (and no station logos).

They would be in PAL, of course, but some enterprising OT-er could probably convert them.

I happen to have all the tapes (see signature), but am not prepared to put in the time to transfer them all. Maybe if I provided the raw captures, someone else would team up with me for the clean-up and authoring?

Anyone?

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There is/was one site selling Droids DVD(s?), in Canada if I remember correctly. I'm not sure what was the source for this but that's considered to be the best one out there. Too bad they won't ship to Europe. It also cost something like $30.

Anyways, I'd be interested in these. I liked Droids as a kid, I also have the original rental videos (which are subtitled) but they didn't release Mungo episodes or the Great Heep. I also recorded almost all of them from TV and they were dubbed, would be cool to get the audio from there (too bad it's not stereo) and add those to a proper video. Also, being a kid, I didn't understand to put a few minutes extra when recording them so almost all of them are missing a minute or two from the end. :(

And in the time of greatest despair, there shall come a savior, and he shall be known as the Son of the Suns.

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Video Collector said:

Luckily, both series were released in full in England on VHS. These would provide superior sources to any off-air recording (and no station logos).

They would be in PAL, of course, but some enterprising OT-er could probably convert them.

I happen to have all the tapes (see signature), but am not prepared to put in the time to transfer them all. Maybe if I provided the raw captures, someone else would team up with me for the clean-up and authoring?

Anyone?

Wow, were they really completely released ? So wikipedia is wrong ? (what a surprise :-) )

But I would definitely love to see some raw transfers, I have no problems with video cleanup

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Oh, I didn't notice that one, thanks. Hopefully this one WILL be finished :)

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 (Edited)

Here's the set I mentioned, anyone seen it?

LINK REMOVED

Edit: well, it seems the guy who made it put a watermark over the video so forget it. :P

And in the time of greatest despair, there shall come a savior, and he shall be known as the Son of the Suns.

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pittrek said:

Wow, were they really completely released ? So wikipedia is wrong ? (what a surprise :-) )

But I would definitely love to see some raw transfers, I have no problems with video cleanup

Well, I never actually compared the contents of the tapes to any episode guide, but I believe they're all there, Droids and Ewoks.

Would you be interested in getting PAL DVD captures for further refinement? They'd just be the raw, unedited contents of each tape, recorded to single layer DVD on my standalone recorder. You'd have to do the editing, sorting of the episodes, mastering etc.

What the guy on the other thread is attempting seems to be very ambitious, this would only be a simple dump of the PAL tapes.

I need a new project like I need a new appendix, but if there's any interest from the board members I'd happily take one for the team.

Visit my *NEW* Star Wars on Video Collection site:

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I'd be DEFINITELY interested :-) I live in a PAL land, so PAL is great for me

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OK, a small update.

I've been contacted by Video Collector and the good news is, that we'll work on this together. Check this space in a few weeks :-)

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Cool!

And in the time of greatest despair, there shall come a savior, and he shall be known as the Son of the Suns.

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I'm doing a DVD-ROM supplement for this. Does anyone have anything on the animated Droids or Ewoks they could contribute?

I have scanned an excellent interview with series story editor Paul Dini from Starlog Yearbook Vol.3 and an episode guide for both shows appearing in the same issue. It will be on the DVDs.

I also have the Youtube Ewok toy commercial linked to in the other thread.

Looking for:

Scans of interviews with the creators of the shows.

Covers of VHS and DVD releases worldwide.

Images from the shows.

Trailers or any video material for the shows or their merchandise.

Scans of the comics, maybe?

Anything and everything.

 

Visit my *NEW* Star Wars on Video Collection site:

http://www.swonvideo.com

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Just remembered... I think the UK videos have the episodes combined together which means they're missing recaps and only have one opening and one ending credits, am I right? So there should be another source for at least the recaps, I guess the credits also differ from episode to episode?

And in the time of greatest despair, there shall come a savior, and he shall be known as the Son of the Suns.

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 (Edited)

LexX said:

Just remembered... I think the UK videos have the episodes combined together which means they're missing recaps and only have one opening and one ending credits, am I right? So there should be another source for at least the recaps, I guess the credits also differ from episode to episode?

Yes, Indeed they do, so the credits and recaps will be MIA.

AFAIK, the beginning and end credits were identical within seasons. Of, course, when they switched format to the combined Ewoks/Droids adventure hour they were different again. And we're not trying to replicate that combo so specific credits for either Ewoks or Droids don't exist for those.

LexX, are the credits there on your Finnish Ewok tapes? I have yet to cjeck my Norwegian tapes (and I believe at least one of them has Macrovision).

Visit my *NEW* Star Wars on Video Collection site:

http://www.swonvideo.com

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I checked those Droids DivX files I mentioned earlier, and some of them DO have the opening song, and/or the closing credits, some of them even "recaps".Which means that in the case we won't find any better source, these avis can be used for some episodes. But I of course want to keep it for the worst possible case only :-)

The same goes for the Ewok series

 

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Video Collector said:

LexX said:

Just remembered... I think the UK videos have the episodes combined together which means they're missing recaps and only have one opening and one ending credits, am I right? So there should be another source for at least the recaps, I guess the credits also differ from episode to episode?

Yes, Indeed they do, so the credits and recaps will be MIA.

AFAIK, the beginning and end credits were identical within seasons. Of, course, when they switched format to the combined Ewoks/Droids adventure hour they were different again. And we're not trying to replicate that combo so specific credits for either Ewoks or Droids don't exist for those.

LexX, are the credits there on your Finnish Ewok tapes? I have yet to cjeck my Norwegian tapes (and I believe at least one of them has Macrovision).

When preserving these then you can use the same opening and credits in every episode, hopefully pittrek will do this. :) And the restoring the recaps. Maybe you can get a hint for a source from the other thread? So the credits are the same? I was just thinking if the cast changed during episodes, not sure...

Also, maybe getting the best quality out of these is actually using the footage from the official DVD and then just splice all cut material back in and of course the original soundtrack? What do you think? Beats the VHS!

Just checked my Ewoks, yes they have the credits at the very end. There's just subtitles that tell the company that subtitled the video for a few seconds on screen. And here's a little extra info: Droids & Ewoks were released here as rental in the late 80s as subtitled, then they were shown on TV dubbed in 1995-1996. Too bad they only released two videos from both, from Droids the White Witch arc and the pirates arc, not Mungo. And from Ewoks a little this and a little that, never liked them that much, LOL. Luckily I have almost all of the Droids episodes recorded. :)

And in the time of greatest despair, there shall come a savior, and he shall be known as the Son of the Suns.

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Hey LexX, since you claim to have it recorded, could you transfer at least the opening/recaps/ending for each episode you have ? It would be some help :-)

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Remember that those are the dubbed ones... :( I'm not sure if it would help you since you'd still need to replace the audio. You can get the opening from the UK tapes hopefully. And like I said, I was kid back then so only maybe two episodes have the credits because the recording usually ended before the show. Plus it's a pretty hard thing to transfer there as the only place to do it is far away and I'll always need to call a favor for doing it... I really should start checking out getting a system for doing it myself, I guess.

And in the time of greatest despair, there shall come a savior, and he shall be known as the Son of the Suns.

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 (Edited)

I have the 4 Droids and 6 Ewoks UK VHS tapes, they are in a bad state though...

They don't have all the episodes either.

Droids is missing "Coby and the Starhunters"

Ewoks is missing "The Three Lessons" and "Prow Beaten / Baga's Rival"

Another problem is Ewoks uses the season 2 theme music for season 1.

 

 

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LeoneNut said:

I have the 4 Droids and 6 Ewoks UK VHS tapes, they are in a bad state though...

They don't have all the episodes either.

Droids is missing "Coby and the Starhunters"

Ewoks is missing "The Three Lessons" and "Prow Beaten / Baga's Rival"

Another problem is Ewoks uses the season 2 theme music for season 1.

 

 

Okay, then we've confirmed we're not gonna get a complete set using just the UK tapes. Still, we're charging ahead with this "preservation" of them.

I have "Coby and the Starhunters" on VCD from a Scl-Fi channel showing, still slightly better than a DivX. That would be the last episode in the "Mon Julpa" cycle. Strange they left that out?

"Three Lessons" is from season 1 of Ewoks, "Prow beaten/Baga's rival" is from season 2. Anyone know if these were ever released elsewhere?

Now, to find those remaining episodes.

Visit my *NEW* Star Wars on Video Collection site:

http://www.swonvideo.com

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pittrek said:

Wow, were they really completely released ? So wikipedia is wrong ? (what a surprise :-) )

Dangit! Guess Wikipedia WAS right :-)

Visit my *NEW* Star Wars on Video Collection site:

http://www.swonvideo.com

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Video Collector said:

Looking for:

Scans of interviews with the creators of the shows.

Covers of VHS and DVD releases worldwide.

Images from the shows.

Trailers or any video material for the shows or their merchandise.

Scans of the comics, maybe?

Anything and everything.

 

In Jambe's great Kenner DVD there's one Droids toy commercial.

I think there's too much comics to put, not sure how many but didn't they have an entire series?

I will scan my Finnish covers in some point, maybe closer to the release, so I could make DVD covers based on them. It's hard to have collection in one place and live in another, otherwise I could do it right now, LOL.

And in the time of greatest despair, there shall come a savior, and he shall be known as the Son of the Suns.

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LexX said:

I think there's too much comics to put, not sure how many but didn't they have an entire series?

It looks like it's already been done. I found a place selling scans of the entire run on CD-ROM, bootleg of course. That put me off including such a thing with this release.

There's a lot of good stuff on the ewoks/droids already online. It would be pointless to pilfer any of that for these DVDs. I'm scanning an article on the animation house Nelvana from the insider and putting it on there. Along with the Starlog stuff, that should give everyone a sufficient overview of the series and their creation.

I'm including Hi-rez scans of the UK and Norwegian VHS covers, and would very much like to include your Finnish ones as well, LexX. The Nordic countries rule!

Visit my *NEW* Star Wars on Video Collection site:

http://www.swonvideo.com