The source of the Widescreen Pre-ANH SW provides us with details of the tapes history:
Following the U-Matic search line, leads to a familiar place:
http://www.starwars.com/fans/rocks/20090619.html
When director Duncan Jones first saw Star Wars, his passion for sci-fi, robots and filmmaking ignited -- all thanks to a pair of Sony U-matic tapes, courtesy of his father -- music legend and Labyrinth actor David Bowie.
Now that I have made a film, I feel kind of guilty about this, but bare in mind I was about 7 years old at the time. When I was a kid, we had this huge behemoth of a machine called a SONY U-matic. It was one of the very first video tape players. My dad had managed to wrangle us a copy of Star Wars: Episode IV on tape to Switzerland where we were living. The one film resided on a huge pair of Sony U-matic tapes, and I and my school chums would watch the film again and again on a huge TV in the front room. There would always be a dramatic pause half way through the film as we were forced to change tapes due to the limitations of the ancient technology. I never did get to see Episode IV at a theatre, but those days were perfect just as they were. I was crowned Prince of the Nerds, and those Star Wars tapes were my scepter.
Sounds like possibly the same tape as Moth3r's source.
Aluminum Falcon wrote: The one that really caught my eye is an ROTJ workprint/screener.
I think this is a misconception. There were bogus scammers on usenet offering up versions of ESB an RotJ calling them workprints which supposedly had missing scenes around the SE time. Technology brought the price down so VHS bootlegs were decent enough to convince people that maybe they were a workprint/screener. But don't think those terms were used back in the 80s outside of movie production people.
Origin story of a US sourced ESB:
http://blog.modernmechanix.com/2008/07/17/portable-vcrs/#comment-1058349
Another anecdote. We used to line up a half-dozen of the VCRs and copy tapes. Just plop ‘em on an unused desk, cable ‘em all up, and push all the buttons. This was bad enough, but then Steve Wozniak wanted a tape of the newly-released “The Empire Strikes Back.” He bribed a San Diego projectionist to “borrow” the print from the cinema and drive it to Los Angeles in the dead of night. After several hours in a transfer facility, he had a 3/4″ U-Matic professional copy of the film print, and the projectionist high-tailed it back to the cinema to return the print. That tape also made its way into the copying chain. We were perhaps the first half-dozen people with videotape copies of the film. (I discarded my heavily-letterboxed copy years ago…)
Woz later mentioned that the 4000-foot film reels wouldn’t fit the 3000-foot tables on the transfer machine, so they spent extra time cutting the print into sections that would fit, then spliced it back into its original form. Film companies, however, are very cautious that nobody steals frames from a film, lest they be printed into illegal still photos. The prints were examined to detect frame-stealing. Woz never asked whether the splices got the projectionist into any trouble; an occasional splice could be due to a film break, but not several at regular intervals.
Makes me wonder if Lucas knew of this and that affected the negotiations of the Pixar deal, Jobs might have been embarressed about his colleague's past actions... ok probably not.
SW lead sounds similar to the MeBeJedi/Starkiller.
http://lauren.vortex.com/archive/000528.html
Watching a videotaped copy of Star Wars about ten generations down is quite an experience. Drifting sync causes the image to bobble around like a ship pitching on stormy seas. Audio buzz and background noise "breathing" could be awesome to behold. But everyone still got a kick out of watching such things, quality be damned.
thnxs: mMat Hab:
http://www.finalcolor.com/history4colorists.htm
mentions some of the Telecine machines from back then:
1975 Rank Cintel Ltd launches Mk III flying spot telecine. Revolutionary benefits include 525 and 625 line operation and 16mm and 35mm film on the same continuous motion transport.
1978 Rank Cintel Ltd introduces TOPSY, a remote control programming system the Mk III telecine.
1980 VTA develop the Wiz color corrector, which became da Vinci Classic
1983 Amigo, a highly sophisticated controller and pre-programmer for the Mk III is launched
1983 Sony Betacam vtr launched