Harmy's STAR WARS Despecialized Edition HD - V2.7 - MKV (Released) — Page 102

The new preview looks great, except for one thing: You raised the shadows and gave them a tint of cyan. I know the shadows are slightly blue-tinted in Mike's shot but it was the same with other shots he posted. It's simply because he hadn't color corrected them yet.

A couple comparisons with my render vs this preview:

Han's boot looks green instead of black now. And while the tweak looks better on the shot of Greedo, the cyan shadows are still there.

Try this approach instead: use curves and make a middle point (x127 y127) on green and blue and move them slightly to the left and find some balance. That will be able to make Greedo more green but leave shadows and whites intact.

You_Too said:

The new preview looks great, except for one thing: You raised the shadows and gave them a tint of cyan. I know the shadows are slightly blue-tinted in Mike's shot but it was the same with other shots he posted. It's simply because he hadn't color corrected them yet.

A couple comparisons with my render vs this preview:

Han's boot looks green instead of black now. And while the tweak looks better on the shot of Greedo, the cyan shadows are still there.

Try this approach instead: use curves and make a middle point (x127 y127) on green and blue and move them slightly to the left and find some balance. That will be able to make Greedo more green but leave shadows and whites intact.

Yeah, I noticed that the boot changes colors while watching the latest clip "greedo scene new".  At 0:25 it has a green tint, then at 0:32 it's black then at 0:37 green tint and then at 0:57 black again.

I appreciate the intent of the color correction but I am still wary of messing with it to much.

In the Greedo shot comparison You_Too posted, I think your version is too vibrant and bright. I can see some noise in it and his face looks very cartoon like.

I'd definitely stay with the old version instead of the masked one. In the second shot it's very visible that it was masked, and in both of them the blacks are pushed down too much.

The most neutral-looking shot in my opinion is the bottom-right in the 4 pic comparison there. That's probably the look you should go for in the rest of the scene if you want it to have a neutral look.

I'm with You_Too on this one personally. Harmy, the blacks and shadows in your shots have turned cyan. It's especially noticable with Han's boots and IMO looks kind of weird and out of place. When I started regrading the star wars original trilogy, the first thing I did was lock down the blacks as the base and modify the colours from there, so as not to tint the blacks.

In case you're at all interested, this clip below shows how i've regraded the scene with greedo in my own project (pretty much my final regrading settings for this scene). Sorry about the lack of subtitles for greedo, they'll be optional subtitles that i'll add later so the greedo subtitles can be in different languages without the original english subtitles always being there. I think you should do the same thing but your call of course.

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=NG06OO92

Harmy, i'm not seeing Han's red eyes on my screen to be honest. Maybe we're using different renderers? I've heard that that can sometimes cause changes in colours. I'm using the 'mpc video decoder' filter with 'video mixing renderer 9 (renderless)' output on media player classic. As for palette, mine is just exactly the same as the blu-ray, albeit with the blue tint removed, nothing more, nothing less.

Here are two screencaps using PrtSc on media player classic, one from the blu-ray itself and one from the video I posted just now, which is essentially the blu-ray stream regraded to remove the blue tint but leaving the rest of the image dynamics like brightness/gamma/contrast/saturation pretty much the same.

Blu-ray screencap:

http://img41.imageshack.us/img41/8315/hanblurayscreencap.jpg

Regraded screencap:

http://img444.imageshack.us/img444/4493/hanregradescreencap.jpg

And here's the screencap from my clip you posted before as it looks on my screen. Han's iris is slightly red if you look very closely but apart from that I don't see much red in his eyes to be honest:

http://img6.imageshack.us/img6/8463/hanregradedscreencap2.jpg

I personally see the cyan in the shadows and blacks of the screencaps you've posted up there on the right, especially on the boots. You_Too seems to see it too. Anyway, regardless on how you decide to proceed, you have my full support. This is your project and I'm really looking forward to seeing this finished, so don't mind me and my silly nitpicking! :)

I agree with Harmy about the scene being too red. Though I really think you should be careful with the low-reds, since Han's boot is probably supposed to be black/grey and not cyan/green. I know it's hard to balance colors, so no offense!

Anyway, what about the rest of the cantina scenes?

Han's boots are indeed black, check these two promo photos:

http://www.moviepicturedb.com/picture/d268f563?qid=1

http://www.moviepicturedb.com/picture/4ead767e?qid=1

I wear black leather dress shoes to work every day & as they start to get worn/scuffed they take on a distinctly blue tint until I get them shined. & even when freshly polished they have a somewhat blue tint if you look really close...

Just sayin...

canofhumdingers said:

I wear black leather dress

That's a big improvement, the blacks are much clearer/cleaner and that seems to equalise the greeny-blue of Greedo's head from shot to shot - instantly pleasing! I think the right side of his head has more dusty yellow paint on than the front and left side which makes him look more green at the start of his piece - well I say "his" lol. Nicely done.

I personally think that the darkish yellowy reddish brown in the clip I posted up looks fairly accurate to the lighting one would find in a bar like that with very few windows letting in natural light (the one we can see behind greedo is pretty far away), dark, smoke-filled and murky. I think it works because it makes the cantina seem more dark and dangerous, with shifty fellows hiding in the shadows. I think viewers are meant to be uncomfortable with the seemingly dark and sinister surroundings, much like Luke is himself, having had a sheltered upbringing and never been in place like that frequented by criminals and others of a less than savory nature. It's similar in my mind to when the the hobbits enter the prancing pony in FOTR and are totally out of their element in a murky, smokefilled inn and very strange people all around them.

Everybody has their preferences in colouring of course. Still, i'd be careful not to start changing the colour scheme too much to your personal liking. That's a slippery slope if ever there was one. The film could very quickly become unrecognisable IMHO.

If you don't mind me asking Harmy, what source/s are you using as a reference for what the colour grading 'should' be?

Harmy, I just had a look at your latest clip and it looks much better (the boots look really nice this time). That greenish tint kinda works I must admit. It's a little too bright for my taste as I explained before (details are easier to see without a doubt, making it easier on the eyes, but some of the dark atmosphere is lost as well IMO) but apart from that, very nice and consistent. Nice job! :)

Are you planning to use the same tint as well in the previous scene with Luke and Ben for the sake of colour continuety?

Harmy, the new clip is perfect. Stick with that color timing. It looks great! Much more neutral, and Han's boot is black now. :)

Great news! So you finally got that harddrive?