Raiders of the Lost Ark - 35 mm regrade (a WIP) — Page 6

Here is the second Raiders of the Lost Ark trailer in good quality.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XkkzKHCx154

Comparisons with the latest bluray color regrade will follow…

Here are three more comparisons for the 35 mm trailer, the bluray, and the latest color regrade for the bar fight scene.

Trailer:

Bluray:

Regrade:

Trailer:

Bluray:

Regrade:

Trailer:

Bluray:

Regrade:

I couldn't say whether those are exactly right or not in terms of small details, since the screening I went to was several years ago, but those are definitely on the right track overall.  Seeing them feels very familiar to me.

More video samples coming soon…

The difference is so subtle compared to the Blu-ray that I don't really see the point anymore. Unless you compare the 2 at the same time, you'll see it's a bit different, otherwise, you'll just feel like watching the Blu-ray. Where is your will to match the 35mm in this?

Beber said:

The difference is so subtle compared to the Blu-ray that I don't really see the point anymore. Unless you compare the 2 at the same time, you'll see it's a bit different, otherwise, you'll just feel like watching the Blu-ray. Where is your will to match the 35mm in this?

 I'm sorry to say this, but the differences in color are pretty obvious, even if you don't compare them directly, but for those that need direct comparisons, here are a few:

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/147986/

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/147992/

The 35 mm frames themselves are simply too saturated for viewing on a tv screen. In fact they are too saturated to view on a movie screen.  

I agree they are obvious in the bar scene, but the rest... I mean, your 12-minute video preview looked promising, but now I'm not sure what to think about all this.

Beber said:

I agree they are obvious in the bar scene, but the rest... I mean, your 12-minute video preview looked promising, but now I'm not sure what to think about all this.

 Seems a bit odd, considering that the current regrade is very similar to the one used to create the last video sample:

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/147997/

However, I agree that the slightly warmer tone of the last video sample is more appealing.

Having directly compared the regrade used to create the latest video to the latest update, I think I may have overdone it with respect to the blues in the latest updates of the regrade, as kk650 noted earlier. The regrade used for the last video sample is close to the 35 mm frames, but also slightly warmer, more balanced, and has more natural skin tones. So, aside from the altered color scheme of the bar fight in the bluray, I think I will go back to the regrade used to create the video.

35 mm:

Bluray:

WOWOW:

Regrade:

35 mm:

Bluray:

WOWOW:

Regrade:

35 mm:

Bluray:

WOWOW:

Regrade:

I found a better quality version of the 35 mm trailer from 1983.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jFQhhu4sSc0

Here are a few comparisons:

Trailer:

Bluray:

Regrade:

Trailer:

Bluray:

Regrade:

Trailer:

Bluray:

Regrade:

Trailer:

Bluray:

Regrade:

Trailer:

Bluray:

Regrade:

I think these indeed look much better. Consistent with the trailer, and definitely more appealing.

I don't know. I'm all confused now. I guess I'll just have to wait and see the whole thing in motion.

Beber said:

I don't know. I'm all confused now. I guess I'll just have to wait and see the whole thing in motion.

 I will prepare two five minute video samples. One for the bar scene, and one for another scene. 

The video sample for the bar fight should be ready soon.

Here are a number of comparisons for the upcoming bar fight video sample (bluray top, regrade bottom).

Really liking the latest regrade colours there. 😃

This is really odd. The trailer for the 2013 releases of the Indiana Jones series on individual blurays looks nothing like the bluray as we know it. Most surprisingly, there is no red shift in the bar fight scene…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HqOSLZl9GUo

I remember that being brought up before, people said the trailer footage looked more like the previous transfers than the actual Blu-Ray.

Correct me if I’n wrong, but wasn’t the Blu-Ray release delayed at one point? Could this be what they were going to look like, and the regrade came later? And wasn’t there a new 35mm around 2010-11 that looked sort of like the BD in some ways, but with better color or something?

That fits with what I was saying earlier: the IMAX version I saw in the theater pretty much looked like that trailer. Like the old 35mm print, it did not have a red tint in the bar scene.

Before I saw the Bluray, I’d been under the impression that it would look the same as the IMAX, but clearly the Bluray had its own colour changes made that did not appear in the theatrical re-release (or at least, not the one I saw).

With all these myriad versions out there, it’s getting kind of confusing to keep track of where each one comes from, and why it looks the way it does. I’ve heard several times recently about DCP’s of various films that don’t look the same as their home video counterparts. Shortly after that IMAX screening, I saw a DCP of Raiders at a different theater that looked a lot more like the DVD colours, complete with heavy red tint in the bar. Its sound mix was also identical to the DVD, while the IMAX version seemed to be somewhat different. (I couldn’t tell if the IMAX mix was the same as the Bluray, since that place rather inexcusably didn’t have subwoofers running, and the LFE channel is the most obvious difference between the two. It probably was the same mix as the Bluray, though.)

Apparently home video transfers are done by entirely different people in different departments, and don’t necessarily have anything to do with what might end up showing in a theater. Even though they may come from the same transfer, they might end up looking entirely different. Which version’s colours were approved by Steven Spielberg—the IMAX, or the Bluray? Which one is overall closer to the film’s original appearance? Who knows . . .

There also appears to be two different HDTV versions as well. The BBC HDTV version and the WOWOW HDTV version - both have differences in colour.

I could have sworn the IMAX version I saw looked like the Blu-Ray. Maybe it really didn’t, I dunno…

There was a huge screenshot comparison thread over at the avsforum which compared the differences between the HDTV versions and it looked like they came from different sources. Sadly, I don’t think the screenshots work in that thread anymore (last time I tried to view it), as it was some time ago.

Here is the video sample for the bar fight:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B8_LYKyZDiajYWF1Si00djF4b28/view?usp=sharing

Although it fixes certain issues, there are also some things I’m not happy with. This scene, and perhaps the whole film, should be regraded on a scene by scene basis, preferably using the WOWOW, since that has the most detail. I’ve been thinking, it might be an idea to do the regrading based on the 1984 Laserdisc release of the film, since that’s probably closer to the original theatrical release, but sadly that’s not available in a digital format.

Turns out the segments from Raiders in the trailer are from the master used for the WOWOW broadcast, which to my surprise does not have as much of a red shift.

Bluray:

WOWOW:

Here’s what I get if I white balance one of the frames I used as a reference.

35 mm:

35 mm (white balanced):

Bluray:

WOWOW:

What to make of this?

The opening of the earliest laserdisc release of Raiders of the Lost Ark from 1984 can be seen on youtube:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DpCSFKF_9as

Although there’s no way to be sure that this release is accurate in terms of color, they did at least have access to unfaded sources, so it’s interesting to compare this release to the more recent high def transfers.

Bluray:

WOWOW:

Laserdisc:

WOWOW matched to laserdisc (with color matching software):