skyjedi2005 said:

Is that Empire tape the pre cert one for Empire. Did russs ever preserve that tape?

Hopefully it is not a bad ntsc to pal standards conversion as the first issue empire uk laserdisc which also happens to be one of the worst rotters in history of the format next to the first issue star wars UK disc.

Basing this on info grinder gave me. As even though i have the discs i don't have a pal laserdisc player.

I bought an ex-rental of the first empire release in a charity shop, unfortunately it was snowy and crudded up the heads on the video recorder so i had to throw it away. My take was aside from being over brightened (for crt display?) it was a straight transfer of a relatively new print not a ntsc conversion. the blues and whites on hoth were really clean. I got one of the early return of the jedi pal vhs= the print was not as colourful (jedi is the only film i can remember seeing at the cinema and the vhs didnt do the original colours of jedi justice). My guess would be the first pal empire might be the best transfer out of the three films on vhs (of the u.k. releases). Russs15 has done a capture which i'd love to see some more stills from/or to see someone take some photos of the original playing on a tv screen to double check my impressions. anyone else have the original pre cert pal tape and a cameraphone? the laserdisc might not be as good as the vhs then (also it came out a year or so later?)- and i read u.k. laserdisc for star wars was an ntsc conversion also(??). the ntsc empire laserdisc as represented by negative1s capture screenshots looks like lucasfilm put some sort of processing on it distorting it, the pal vhs looked better to my eyes

puggo's forthcoming PSB will almost certainly blow it out of the water but it would still be worth preservation i feel

thanks due to russs15 for this comparison post:

http://originaltrilogy.com/forum/topic.cfm/Help-Im-new/post/582999/#TopicPost582999