Harmy's THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK Despecialized Edition HD - V2.0 - MKV & AVCHD (Released) — Page 73

@ Harmy

I have to do a 25fps -> 23,976fps conversion (which I did a few years ago) but your German audio track from ROTJ v1.0 seems to have a higher pitch than my version. However, the pitch of Laserschwert's German audio track for SW v2.5 (taken from GOUT) is identical to mine (though his version is more complete, more stable and overall better).

@ hairy_hen, Laserschwert & Harmy

I have to agree that h_h invested most work but it's also his project that is most closely tied to Harmy's release, so the sync can be done before the release while the foreign PAL-synced tracks would have to be synced later by less-experienced peoble (which may cause even more confusion).

A third idea is to cut out only 1 frame of the picture to achieve a compromise for all PAL and NTSC tracks. Would a sync error of 1 frame still be noticeable, considering that the GOUT tracks go in and out of sync all the time?

I also am watching this in VLC on a Mac, so it's difficult to freeze-frame it accurately, but eventually I was able to find the exact frame numbers to be removed: 150,206 and 150,207.

Assuming there hasn't been some sort of error, that should correct the synch issue.  Unfortunately, as Laserschwert pointed out, PAL-sourced audio tracks may now lose synch at this spot, and would be delayed from the video by a corresponding amount.  The delay likely won't be as much of a problem as being ahead of the picture, since sound travels slower than light and we're already used to experiencing that in real life, but nonetheless solving one problem does create another in this case.  However, since PAL audio would have to be slowed down to synch with 23.976 fps video anyway, this provides an opportunity to correct for the synch error as an additional step at the same time as the conversion process.

In any event, being able to use the same audio tracks for multiple video projects simplifies the matter greatly, rather than having to make additional versions.

It occurs to me that I don't have a GOUT-synched copy of the 1980 stereo mix, so now that the synch issue has been decided, I guess I'll just go ahead and make one myself.  Thank goodness for schorman13's laserdisc audio archive!

hairy_hen said:

Editing the video is by far the easiest solution.  I can edit some of the audio to match the PAL video instead if need be, but for reasons of compatibility and the potential confusion this could cause, it may not be the best choice to do so.

In my experience, it's difficult to insert a new section of audio and get the waveforms to line up seamlessly, even if you're copying from another part in the source material. I say cut the two frames of video, then cut that same amount of audio from the PAL soundtracks to match (which will be easy since the audio will change with the scene change and provide a nice break point). We're only talking about 1/12th of a second, and I'm all in favor of minimizing confusion. You'll still see Luke stand back up before the scene cuts. :)

Harmy said:

How about cutting one frame from the end of one shot and the other from the beginning of the next - that should minimize the damage.

That's what I would recommend anyway but how about the 1 frame idea? But only you (and h_h) can judge if one would still notice that.

Harmy said:

Well, I personally don't even notice the two frame difference, even knowing that it's there but I know some people are more sensitive to it.

Yeah, same with me. In the end, it's a decision between accuracy and simplification.

Harmy said:

Like I already said, the v2.1 AVCHD could be out next week and the v2.5 could follow in a month or two. Neither would have the rounded corners. And then the v3.0 would come out probably after some of the 35mm projects come out - or possibly never, if Disney releases the originals on BD in good quality.

I have to say I'm indifferent about the version numbers. It's your project, so use a numbering convention that makes sense to you and helps you keep your projects organized. We're just grateful that you're willing to share the finished product with the rest of us, and we will follow your posts to keep track of which release is the most recent.

Harmy said:

How about cutting one frame from the end of one shot and the other from the beginning of the next - that should minimize the damage.

Since you're cutting video to match the audio track, I would suggest using the audio as your point of reference. I don't have a copy of the scene in front of me to review, but I think all you have to deal with is ambient noise. There should be a noticeable change from the sounds of the carbon freeze chamber to the inside of the tunnel, so you could cut the frames to make sure the video changes with the sound, regardless if which scene(s) the two frames come from. From that point, the sync should be maintained for the rest of the film (in theory, that is).

CatBus said:

Differences that small are only really noticeable with lip sync (and barely noticeable at that).

Don't forget that the foreign language dubs contain more than just the voices... sound effects and music will still get out-of-sync ;) And I guess a 2 frame offset of a lightsaber hit sound might be noticable.

Anyway, for Empire DeEd I'm editing the German audio anyway (to add missing stuff and/or convert from lossless PCM to AC3), so I'll remove those 2 frames accordingly.

Just a quick question: will the MKV be like Star Wars DE or Star Wars RE? Essentially, will it just be the frame or will it be 16x9 for easy burning to blu?

Harmy said:

With this I will definitely stick with a BD compatible stream, just like I did with SW but I may also make a cropped 4-5GB MKV version - a version like this of SW v2.5 is circulating on torrent sites, so since it's inevitably going to get made for ESB as well, it's probably better if I do it myself with HQ encoding settings and from the original lossless files.

Slightly off topic (not really) but would I be correct to assume that a Respecialized Edition of Empire should be made available fairly quickly after v2.5 of Despecialized?  Since (off the top of my head) there aren't any changes you would need to wait for Project Blu's '97 version to be released (like Jabba in ANH), given that all changes for the '97 edition were carried over in '04 and blu ray releases.  Or are you not planning on doing respecialized editions of Empire and Jedi?

Ah.  Well I wish I could help there, but audio is not my expertise.  Either way, thank you for the speedy response, Harmy.  =)

Harmy said:

I may also make a cropped 4-5GB MKV version

If you keep the cropped MKV version under 4.37GB it can be burned to a single layer DVD. This is the cheapest & easiest way for some of us to distribute to others.