I bet you never expected this thread to come back :P
I have received a response from Scholastic
from: Black, Eric <EBlack@scholastic.com> to: "danfun***@*****.com" <danfun***@*****.com> date: Wed, Jan 7, 2015 at 12:54 PM subject: FW: The Production of Magic School Bus [Email: 141218-000278] [<AX3816841>] mailed-by: scholastic.com Hi Dan,I"m assuming Dan is your name from your email address. Sorry if that is inaccurate! My name is Eric Black. I am the Director of Production and Technical Operations for Scholastic Media, so your question has been forwarded on to me.Thanks for your questions! It's great to see people excited about our shows and curious about the production and post production process. Some of your questions are tricky to answer, because the show originated in 1994, few of the people involved in the production are available and the paperwork (literally on paper) is either gone or in deep storage. But I'll do my best!The show originated on 35MM film, but from what I can gather, the film was then transferred to video and the editing all happened with video. I assume that video was mastered as NTSC, since the production was North American. The PAL versions would then have been conversions from the NTSC masters.I have actually been investigating the possibility of full HD remastering from the source film, but it would be a very expensive process, and I'm not sure it would pay for itself, let alone make a profit. Past up converts to HD that we made from the SD video masters actually look decent and the stretch to 16:9 isn't horrible with animation, but I've had samples made with newer technology makes a really nice 16:9. We could potentially use that technology and color correction and other enhancements to digitally remaster without going back to the original film.Thanks again for your interest! Feel free to ask any follow up questions you may have.Best,Eric---------------------------------------------------------------
Eric Black
Director, Production & Technical Operations
Scholastic Media
524 Broadway, 5th Floor
New York, NY 10012
phone: 212-389-3868
I'm not sure what to make of this response. What do you think?