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Star Wars: A New Hope [OUT ruLes 2.0] - AVCHD & BD RELEASED!

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 (Edited)

_,,,^..^,,,_ presents the [OUT ruLes] project

Original Unaltered Trilogy restored using Laserdisc editions


Project mission: restore the Original Unaltered Trilogy using audio and video from various Laserdisc editions.

Video sources: analog video captured directly from Laserdiscs; other analog sources are admitted (VHS, CED, VHD, Beta etc.) only if the material is not present on the Laserdisc format.

Audio sources: analog audio and uncompressed PCM captured directly from Laserdiscs; other analog sources are admitted (like VHS, vynil etc.) only if the material is not present on the Laserdisc format.

Subtitles sources: literal subtitles for all languages.

Project prohibition: use DVD, BD, HDTV or other audio or video from any digital sources.


Episode IV - Star Wars: A New Hope [OUT ruLes 2.0] (improved version of OUT 1.0)

 

Source Material

Video: THX PAL laserdiscs

 

Audio: THX PAL laserdiscs

 

  • Star Wars - Guerre Stellari - VHS HiFi Stereo - Italian

 

Subtitles: Project THREEPIO for english, AMANUENSES project for literal subtitles in italian, french, german and spanish - more languages may come in the future.

 

Captures and setup info

Hardware:

  • Pioneer CLD-D925 PAL/NTSC laserdisc player; S-Video out (composite out tested but the video card own comb filter is not better than the laserdisc player)
  • PC Sony Vaio Core 2 Duo e6300 dual core 1.86GHz, 3GB RAM, 1TB external HD only for Star Wars; video card AverMedia A16C with Philips SAA713x chipset
  • Panasonic S-VHS recorder NV-FS88B
  • Sony MiniDisc recorder MDS-J520E

 

Software:

  • VirtualDub as capture software
  • VirtualDub and AviSynth for video manipulation
  • TsMuxeR for muxing audio, video and subtitles
  • AviSynth+SoundOut for audio manipulation

 

Settings:

  • video captured at video capture card native resolution 720x576, YUV, HuffYUV lossless compression
  • digital audio from Laserdisc via S/PDIF bit-to-bit perfect 16bit 44,1KHz 1441kbps PCM stereo
  • analog audio from VHS converted with the MiniDisc A/D converter 20bit Sigma-Delta modulation and then via S/PDIF perfect 16bit 44,1KHz 1441kbps PCM stereo to PC

 

Project Status: RELEASED

Captures: all done

After many tests, I decided to use only the Pioneer CLD-D925 as its video quality (resolution, noise, drop outs) is better than the others; the connection used is S-Video, as the laserdisc player comb filter is better than the capture card's.

 

Video treatment: all laserdisc video captures were time and space aligned, then with AviSynth median and average scripts were overlayed to eliminate some noise and put out unwanted video parts (as burned subtitles); little noise reduction and sharpen; NO COLOR CORRECTION at all! Upconversion from PAL 720x576 4:3 to 1280x720 16:9.

Video tracks:

  • the original video format is 720x576@25fps 2.35:1 letterbox PAL, with a video resolution of visible image around 700x340, captured using the HuffYUV lossless codec; video is upconverted to 1280x544@23.976fps 2.35:1 as source, inside a 1280x720pixel 16:9 frame, using x264 codec and compressed at 7000kbps.

 

Audio treatment: all digital and analog audio captured are converted from PCM 2.0 1441kbps 44KHz to Dolby Digital AC3 2.0 Dolby Surround encoded 384kbps 48KHz; 70mm and mono soundtracks are left untouched, apart some cuts to be in sync with the video.

AVCHD audio tracks:

  • english soundtrack from french PAL THX laserdisc, AC3 2.0 Dolby Surround Encoded 384kbps 48KHz
  • german soundtrack from german PAL THX laserdisc, AC3 2.0 Dolby Surround Encoded 384kbps 48KHz
  • spanish soundtrack from spanish PAL THX laserdisc, AC3 2.0 Dolby Surround Encoded 384kbps 48KHz
  • french soundtrack from PAL "pyramid" laserdisc, AC3 2.0 Dolby Surround Encoded(?) 384kbps 48KHz
  • italian soundtrack from italian PAL VHS HiFi Stereo, AC3 2.0 Dolby Surround Encoded 384kbps 48KHz

 

BD audio tracks:

  • Hairy_Hen 70mm english soundtrack recreation, AC3 5.1 448kbps 48KHz
  • Belbucus mono english soundtrack recreation, AC3 1.0 192kbps 48KHz
  • english soundtrack from french PAL THX laserdisc, AC3 2.0 Dolby Surround Encoded 384kbps 48KHz
  • german soundtrack from german PAL THX laserdisc, AC3 2.0 Dolby Surround Encoded 384kbps 48KHz
  • spanish soundtrack from spanish PAL THX laserdisc, AC3 2.0 Dolby Surround Encoded 384kbps 48KHz
  • french soundtrack from PAL "pyramid" laserdisc, AC3 2.0 Dolby Surround Encoded(?) 384kbps 48KHz
  • italian soundtrack from italian PAL VHS HiFi Stereo, AC3 2.0 Dolby Surround Encoded 384kbps 48KHz

 

Subtitles: all done; english was taken from Project Threepio, the others were based on GOUT DVD subs and then corrected to be literal.

Subtitles tracks:

  • english full 100% literal - from threepio project
  • english forced 100% literal - from threepio project
  • french full 100% literal - translated by marvins
  • french forced 100% literal - translated by marvins
  • german full 100% literal - translated by spielt mit
  • german forced 100% literal - translated by spielt mit
  • italian full 100% literal - adapted by me from the italian script
  • italian forced 100% literal - adapted by me from the italian script
  • spanish full 30% literal - transcription attempted by me
  • spanish forced - actually from threepio project

 

Conversion from 25p to 23.976p: done with TsMuxeR

Final formats:

  • AVCHD folder, 720p/23.976fps with five audio tracks and ten subtitles (five forced and five full)
  • BD folder, 720p/23.976fps with seven audio tracks and ten subtitles (five forced and five full)

 

Actually AVCHD and BD are both available on myspleen.

ATTENTION: to view the AVCHD version of SW:ANH [OUT ruLes 2.0] correctly, it should be burned onto a DVD9 or BD-R, and played on a stand-alone BD player or a Playstation 3! - To view the BD version of SW:ANH [SET ruLes 1.0] correctly, it should be burned onto a BD-R, and played on a stand-alone BD player or a Playstation 3! 

 

Jobs to do for the next version:

  • finish and correct spanish literal subtitles
  • adding eventual subtitles in other languages
  • adding commentary track in english from DC LD
  • adding commentary track in japanese from DC LD
  • correct eventual video, audio, subs errors

 

To do later:

  • make the AVCHD/BD/DVD discs (menus, audio and sub tracks etc.)
  • do more captures using different players

 

IMPROVEMENTS OVER Star Wars: A New Hope [OUT ruLes 1.0]:

  • a bit more saturation than OUT 1.0 - NO color correction was applied
  • the new sharpen/denoise script is less aggressive than the old one
  • a proper color matrix is used this time for the final release (TV.709)
  • proper levels used; PC -> TV, from captures to release
  • a re-recorded italian soundtrack - with proper hi-fi quality
  • completely redone sountracks, 2.0 Dolby Surround encoded @384kbps
  • Hairy_Hen 70mm 5.1 soundtrack @448kbps
  • Belbucus Mono soundtrack @192kbps
  • french soundtrack taken from "pyramid" laserdisc
  • 100% literal french and german subtitles, 30% literal spanish subtitles
  • 8 half-dark frames between reels change restored
  • proper file size of the AVCHD folder to fit into a DVD9

 

CREDITS:

  • Hairy_Hen for his 70mm soundtrack recreation
  • Belbucu for his mono soundtrack recreation
  • CapableMetal for help in synchronization of the previous soundtracks
  • marvins for french literal subtitles
  • spielt mit for german literal subtitles
  • AntcuuFaalb, ilovewaterslides, Capable Metal, msycamore, You_Too, g-force for their support, comments, hints and technical help
  • Harmy, Moth3r, Zion & laserman & MeBeJedi @ X0project, and all the other restoration projects founders and members, to have inspired me to start my own Star Wars restoration projects!
  • ...if I forgot someone, please let me know!

 

Self comments: I know there are many better quality projects around, but all are made using digital altered trilogies, "despecialized"... kudos to all the project maker, for their really good job and long hard work!

I'm not so good as they are, and also my spare time is limited; also, the overall video quality of my project is lower than all the HD projects; but there are some positive things: more image quality coherence (because the video sources are all the same); better colors than GOUT - despite the fact I made NO COLOR CORRECTION (and I'd like to leave it as is, to not lose further quality); better audio quality than GOUT; a certain video "analogness" - read: poor quality ;-)

I decided to start a new thread as I think there are many improvements, some deep, that set OUT 2.0 apart from its predecessor.

Sadly my projects are lost due to an HDD crash… 😦 | [Fundamental Collection] thread | blog.spoRv.com | fan preservation forum: fanres.com

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Would you post some screenshots of this one?

I'm actually a bit low on space right now so I'm gonna wait with grabbing it.

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Of course! Here you are some random screenshots - click on the picture to open the frame in a new window at original resolution.

frame 004470:

frame 008845:

frame 052880:

frame 061505:

frame 082839:

frame 100864:

frame 115746:

frame 168450:

 

If there is need to see specific frames, just ask the frame number (frame 689 = STAR WARS)

Sadly my projects are lost due to an HDD crash… 😦 | [Fundamental Collection] thread | blog.spoRv.com | fan preservation forum: fanres.com

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Looks pretty good for a Laserdisc project!

I think "How long have you had these droids?" looks a bit watercolor-ish though. Maybe that scene didn't align perfectly between the sources?

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You_Too said:

Looks pretty good for a Laserdisc project!

Thank you very much! We are on the same wavelenght... (^^',)

I think "How long have you had these droids?" looks a bit watercolor-ish though. Maybe that scene didn't align perfectly between the sources?

I carefully checked all the alignment of the whole movie for the four laserdisc captures, at least three times, so I'm quite sure the alignment is right... those scene colors are the same also in the original, single laserdisc captures, so it could be a master problem - it looks similar also in SET

vs OUT:

yes, I know SET is still pinkish in comparison with OUT, but seen alone it doesn't seem so bad!

Sadly my projects are lost due to an HDD crash… 😦 | [Fundamental Collection] thread | blog.spoRv.com | fan preservation forum: fanres.com

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Yeah, SET looks good too, but OUT is less cropped. They were from different sources, right?

Anyway, comparing those shots I can see why I think there is some misalignment in OUT. And I think it's horizontal.

Check this upscaled closeup of one of those "poles" in the background, SET on left and OUT on right:

See how the contours are sharp in SET and are like "doubled" and blurry in OUT?

And this is not criticizm by the way, I'm only trying to help!

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You_Too said:

Yeah, SET looks good too, but OUT is less cropped. They were from different sources, right?

Yes, I know SET is like a "zoomed" version of OUT...

Anyway, comparing those shots I can see why I think there is some misalignment in OUT. And I think it's horizontal.

Check this upscaled closeup of one of those "poles" in the background, SET on left and OUT on right:

See how the contours are sharp in SET and are like "doubled" and blurry in OUT?

Maybe you are right, I must check the alignment of this scene.

Or maybe is due to the higher resolution/quality of the original SET?

And this is not criticizm by the way, I'm only trying to help!

Your help is very welcome! An experienced user could notice things (like this) that a novice like me could not.

 

 

Sadly my projects are lost due to an HDD crash… 😦 | [Fundamental Collection] thread | blog.spoRv.com | fan preservation forum: fanres.com

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WARNING! to everyone who's downloading OUT 2.0:

I have uploaded the BD version instead AVCHD... so, if you will try to burn it onto a DVD9, IT WON'T FIT!!!

Solutions:

when downloaded, demux the 00000.m2ts file with TSMuxeR and remux the resulting tracks without two audio soundtracks, to fit a DVD9

or

burn it on a BD-R

 

Sorry, it was the rush to release it before Easter...

Sadly my projects are lost due to an HDD crash… 😦 | [Fundamental Collection] thread | blog.spoRv.com | fan preservation forum: fanres.com

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Now the correct AVCHD .torrent is available on myspleen.

Sadly my projects are lost due to an HDD crash… 😦 | [Fundamental Collection] thread | blog.spoRv.com | fan preservation forum: fanres.com

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_,,,^..^,,,_ said:

If there is need to see specific frames, just ask the frame number (frame 689 = STAR WARS)
144053 ;-)

However, in practice you must take into account the “fuckwit factor”. Just talk to Darth Mallwalker…
-Moth3r

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Darth Mallwalker said:

 

144053 ;-)


 

@Yoo_Too: you were right, that scene is out of alignment... (XX/) hope it will be the only one!

Thanks, now I must release OUT 2.1 soon... (^^,)

Sadly my projects are lost due to an HDD crash… 😦 | [Fundamental Collection] thread | blog.spoRv.com | fan preservation forum: fanres.com

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To whom it may concern: both SET and OUT are on usenet.

Any feedback (both good and bad) is really appreciated.

Sadly my projects are lost due to an HDD crash… 😦 | [Fundamental Collection] thread | blog.spoRv.com | fan preservation forum: fanres.com

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Meow! :)

We want you to be aware that we have no plans—now or in the future—to restore the earlier versions. 

Sincerely, Lynne Hale publicity@lucasfilm.com

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Andrea, I recently acquired your BD 2.0.  It looks very good better than I expected, given that the sources were LDs.  Great work!

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Thanks a lot! It's really appreciated.

I ask you a favour, if possible: to seed it for a while, as my (restricted) band is used to seed The Matrix.

Sadly my projects are lost due to an HDD crash… 😦 | [Fundamental Collection] thread | blog.spoRv.com | fan preservation forum: fanres.com

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Andrea, do you mind if you can clear your inbox? I am trying to send you a PM about your SET ruLes 1 AVCHD.

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oops... too many interesting messages to keep... but yes, I deleted some, so you can PM me now.

Sadly my projects are lost due to an HDD crash… 😦 | [Fundamental Collection] thread | blog.spoRv.com | fan preservation forum: fanres.com

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How about a "Definitive Collection" of your SET and OUT all wrapped into one BD?

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There are so many better SW related projects, and so few interest in mine, than it will be hard I'll decide to do more episodes... I'm focusing on different projects for now; I'll see in the future if continue these OUT & SET projects or not.

Sadly my projects are lost due to an HDD crash… 😦 | [Fundamental Collection] thread | blog.spoRv.com | fan preservation forum: fanres.com

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I would like you to continue this project and SET as well! I need my nostalgia fix, because I grew up with the 1997 SE VHS tapes that I still own, and this is higher quality than those! Please consider advancing the two projects... Others would really appreciate it!

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Where's the SET ruLes thread, Andrea? Me no can find it anymore!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! So frustrating!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! If only we had a forum search implemented...

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This looks excellent. Very nicely done.

I'd love to see the Technidisc (DVNR) transferred using your gear / methods.