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Alien/Aliens Color Regrade (a WIP) — Page 10

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TylerDurden389 said:

Just finished watching it. The colors definitely stand out. The one part that was jarring color-wise was the very end when Ripley shoots the alien outta the shuttle. The shots of Ripley had blue and yellow flashing while the shots of the alien (both in the doorway and then out in space) were very gray. I don’t know the exact colors of the film print itself so I’m guessing that was intentional.

The '95 dolby audio was also a new way to hear the film, as there were sound effects I never heard before, as well as more than a few audio cuts where one ended and another began (usually when shots would change to other areas with other members of the crew). Though to be fair, I’ve always remembered the sound of this film being a little weird to say the least. Like how when Parker and Lambert encounter the alien, Parker is clearly screaming, but the only sound is music. And Lambert’s final screams echoing throughout the corridors sounds like Ms. Cartwright did 7 takes and the sound editor used them all and layered them all over each other lol.

Anyway, I appreciate your efforts and can’t wait for Aliens next!!

Yeah that color changing was on the LD. If you go back to page 4 of this thread you can read my post discussing the red/orange coloring on Ripley. The BD has it in some shots but missing it in others. The alien on the BD is green toned but on the LD more gray like you said. The BD being more muted makes it less jarring against the alien shots but its oddly inconstant. Also of intest that change of tone does appear on other masters.

The LD really pushes the colors anytime someone is illuminated by control panels, like on the bridge for example. I actually toned down one shot since I thought people would complain too much.

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Beber said:

I just finished it, too. It looks pretty good, though I noticed something weird at 32:19 - 32:20. The purplish tone switches suddenly to tealish. Also, in the first dinner/kitchen scene, some skin tones look as if the crew suffered from liver failure. And finally, a couple shots seamed almost monochromatic or black and white, like Ash running to get warmer or the outside shot of the [i]Nostromo[/i] taking off. Maybe all that is supposed to be that way, it’s just some stuff I noticed while watching it.

I’ve watched it with the “new” rare 5.1 audio track. Sounds pretty cool. Some lines were missing when they investigate the alien ship. I noticed that because it was subtitled anyway. And the line “Kane’s son” is barely audible.

All in all, thanks. It was nice to see it that way.

The blues in the LD range from a light powder blue (Nostromo taking off) to a deep purplish blue (detonation of the ship) and it can vary between the two like the egg scene. So that is right or at least consistent to the LD. Particular to the Nostromo taking off, the BD oddly hides in darkness almost all the model shots whereas the LD looks, like you said monochromatic blue (oxymoron I know).

As for the skins tone they are warmer/yellower then the BD (see the first couple pages in this thread before I was set on the LD), that is also consistent with the LD and actually one of the reasons I was happy to grade to it since the BD skin tones are too pale.

It basically a choice between the paler/cooler BD vs this saturated/warmer regrade

There is also a bit of discussion here too:

http://forum.fanres.com/thread-19.html?highlight=alien

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So this sudden switch from purple to teal during the same shot (no cut) is not a mistake?

http://img15.hostingpics.net/pics/665902Alien1979regradedtotheFoxTHXLaserdisc1080pv16mkvsnapshot00321920160630203608.jpg

http://img15.hostingpics.net/pics/160147Alien1979regradedtotheFoxTHXLaserdisc1080pv16mkvsnapshot00321920160630203629.jpg

I thought that maybe something went wrong when applying your settings and that it didn’t cover the shot until the end and that the Blu-ray colors popped-up.

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You are right on that one that is a mistake. Sigh. It pulled the lut from the previous shot.

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OK, so I guess a v1.7 will be on its way… 2 quick questions: why remix the 4.1 track into 5.1 if the surround remains mono? And why is your first chapter named Chapter 00?

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Yeah but no time soon. Got another Alien project id rather work on first. Odd that error wasn’t in 1.5 when people tested it.

To answer your other questions. 4.1 has some compatability issues on older receivers and some software even though it’s in the Dolby spec.

That’s why older ac3 track on lds and DVDs that weren’t pure 5.1(or 2.0) were still wrapped in 5.1 container with dupped or dead silence channels.

Also since in theaters a 70mm mono surround track would come from multiple speakers it should be fine to do as long as there is no cancellation

As for the chapters that’s a pure copy over from the BD and it just defaults the names like that. I can change it in the future

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Are there titles for the chapters somewhere perhaps? I have always gone into MKVToolNix to change the titles of the chapters for Star Wars so it feels just that more “complete”.

Also, is that other Alien project maybe Aliens regraded?

she/her
mwah

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PDB said:
I’m kind of surprised that everyone favors the laserdisc regrade. Is it because of the skin tones?

I hope I’m not too late to chime in on this. 😃

I’ve found that most any re-imagined coloring can be slipped in without protests if the skin color remains recognizable. As a quick proof-of-concept, I bumped up the Red color-wheel saturation of the original Blu-ray (and nudged up a bit the surrounding Yellow and Magneta for a smoother blend into the rest of the spectrum).

[TOP ROW shows the original BD compared to the BD-regraded-to-LD]
[BOTTOM ROW shows the original BD with extra Red saturation compared again to the BD-regraded-to-LD]

It’s interesting that both bottom row pictures now look perfectly good, and the extra-Red even gives the original Blu-ray a more “up to date”-tech feel.
(Maybe I should go work for Peter Jackson, Ridley Scott, George Lucas, et al ?)

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Spaced Ranger said:

PDB said:
I’m kind of surprised that everyone favors the laserdisc regrade. Is it because of the skin tones?

I hope I’m not too late to chime in on this. 😃

I’ve found that most any re-imagined coloring can be slipped in without protests if the skin color remains recognizable. As a quick proof-of-concept, I bumped up the Red color-wheel saturation of the original Blu-ray (and nudged up a bit the surrounding Yellow and Magneta for a smoother blend into the rest of the spectrum).

[TOP ROW shows the original BD compared to the BD-regraded-to-LD]
[BOTTOM ROW shows the original BD with extra Red saturation compared again to the BD-regraded-to-LD]

It’s interesting that both bottom row pictures now look perfectly good, and the extra-Red even gives the original Blu-ray a more “up to date”-tech feel.
(Maybe I should go work for Peter Jackson, Ridley Scott, George Lucas, et al ?)

Actually you are right on time. I have been back working on this for a few months after starting over from scratch. I was originally looking for more 35mm sources but ultimately decided to use the 1995 LD, like I did with Alien. The reason being there was enough evidence to suggest that like Alien, the 95 Aliens LD was color timed to be pretty close to a theatrical print. Many 35mm pics that I could find matched the disc. This wasfurther backed up by dvdmike who saw a 70mm print and compared it to the 95 LD that he had.

I did alter my orginal LD capture based on advice from SpoRv/Andrea, who reminded me that the LDs sometimes have the saturation boosted for the older CRTs. So I reduced the cap’s saturation 15% to get it around the same levels as the BD/DVD/etc.

I forget how to post pics now but here is that shot, color corrected in my new regrade:
http://imgur.com/a/f0PMn

and here are more pics from the regrade (BD-Top/Regrade-Bottom):
http://imgur.com/a/jGl3i
http://imgur.com/a/wKY6z

I’m starting with re-creating the TV cut in HD and regraded to the LD and then maybe the theatrical cut.

Maybe you should work for them. Stop them from changing the colors in every release.

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Whats this listed as on the Spleen? I couldnt find it.
Edit: I found it. Had to look a little closer to find it. Cant wait to give it a look see.

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From another thread:

alexp120 said:

There is that 1999 DVD release of Alien (1979) that has the production audio in one of the audio tracks, but the audio is not complete, as that track also has a few alternate music score cues. That feature has not been carried over to the 2003 DVD release nor the blu ray release.

Can somebody please sync this to the regraded Blu-ray and post it to the spleen? Also, are there any other bonus audio tracks like this for Alien or Aliens?

she/her
mwah

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Watched this last night and loved it. My only concern, not a complaint, is the audio. My system is far from the best, but still a damn decent setup. Some of the early scenes were so bass heavy that they seemed to be be recorded with way too much gain resulting in clipping. It honestly was overbearing and muddy sounding. Again, not that big of a deal, just wondering what some of yalls opinions are.

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Can anyone explain why the 70mm track has been downmixed to a 4.1 mix? Didn’t even know there was such thing as 4.1.

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Since that film was released in the 1970’s, that was the standard surround sound configuration at that time–left(1), center(2), right(3), and 2 mono surround channels.

You can read more about here:
Dolby Digital 4.1 Surround - Alien Anthology

Edit:
I meant to say that the 4th channel is used for surround and that signal would have been sent to what ever number of rear speakers that auditorium had.

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BobaJett said:

Watched this last night and loved it. My only concern, not a complaint, is the audio. My system is far from the best, but still a damn decent setup. Some of the early scenes were so bass heavy that they seemed to be be recorded with way too much gain resulting in clipping. It honestly was overbearing and muddy sounding. Again, not that big of a deal, just wondering what some of yalls opinions are.

I assume you are talking about the first track? That is an one for one copy of the laserdisc soundtrack. The reason why it is interesting and so bass heavy is because it was the track that was going to be used for a Sensurround release before Fox switch Alien over to Dolby SVA/70mm.

The rumor (from Disclord-RIP) goes that when Fox was remastering Alien in '95, it was the first time the movie would come with a AC-3/5.1 soundtrack on home video. After looking through the archives they found this track. Unfortunately or fortunately the track was a early test for the Sensurround format. So not only was it an early track with many small dialogue and sound effect changes but it was also super bass heavy for the Sensurround (I’m simplify this a bit). The track was so bass heavy that when the '99 DVD rolled around many people and reviews were disappoint in the lack of bass (the 99 track is another story).

So it is meant to be very, very bass heavy. The other two tracks should have more normal levels of bass and are closer to what was heard in the theaters with all the final sound refinements.

Shalashaska said:

Can anyone explain why the 70mm track has been downmixed to a 4.1 mix? Didn’t even know there was such thing as 4.1.

Alex is right. The 70mm configuration at the time would be 3 front channels, two subs (aka Baby Booms) and one surround channel (most likely coming off multiple speakers). This would be a 4.2 in modern parlance, so the closest you could do is a 4.1 in a home theater environment. Later they dumped one of the subs and stereo-ized the surrounds getting us the modern 5.1.

Your surround system should duplicate the mono surround into 2 mono surrounds for a 5.1 setup. I just took the rear channel and duplicated it to the left and right so it becomes a 5.1 but still with mono surround.

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PDB said:

BobaJett said:

Watched this last night and loved it. My only concern, not a complaint, is the audio. My system is far from the best, but still a damn decent setup. Some of the early scenes were so bass heavy that they seemed to be be recorded with way too much gain resulting in clipping. It honestly was overbearing and muddy sounding. Again, not that big of a deal, just wondering what some of yalls opinions are.

I assume you are talking about the first track? That is one for one copy of the laserdisc soundtrack. The reason why it is interesting and so bass heavy is because it was the track that was going to be used for a Sensurround release before Fox switch Alien over to Dolby SVA/70mm.

The rumor (from Disclord-RIP) goes that when Fox was remastering Alien in '95, it was the first time the movie would come with a AC-3/5.1 soundtrack on home video. After looking through the archives they found this track. Unfortunately or fortunately the track was a early test for the Sensurround format. So not only was it an early track with many small dialogue and sound effect changes but it was also super bass heavy for the Sensurround (I’m simplify this a bit). The track was so bass heavy that when the '99 DVD rolled around many people and reviews were disappoint in the lack of bass (the 99 track is another story).

So it is meant to be very, very bass heavy. The other two tracks should have more normal levels of bass and closer to what was heard in the theaters with all the final sound refinements.

Thanks for that info PDB!

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Has anyone bought the new 30th BD yet? How is it?

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tommodore64 said:

“Anne Hurd: It’s a funny thing. Back then, Jim didn’t have color correction in his contract. When the first VHS [of Aliens] was made, the color timer decided it should be warm! We had dinner with [Rupert] Murdoch and they deep-sixed 250,000 VHS copies so Jim could color correct it.”

Whoa! Nice find!

Could this mean that the first release (VHS only?) was definitely Cameron’s only “original vision” color-correction (as opposed to more, later revised, color-corrections)? It also begs the question … did any of those 1st, wrong VHS’s leak out into the market?

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BobaJett said:

Has anyone bought the new 30th BD yet? How is it?

The only worthy thing about it is a new half hour documentary/featurette THE INSPIRATION AND DESIGN OF ALIENS. Which can be watched ONLY online and only 10 times (!?). The problem is almost no one can access it for some reason.

I urge anyone here who can actually access the documentary, to download it and put it on DVD before it’s gone for good. Kindly sharing it is greatly appreciated. Fox can delete it whenever it wants. Welcome to the world of digital home video.

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Spaced Ranger said:

Whoa! Nice find!

Could this mean that the first release (VHS only?) was definitely Cameron’s only “original vision” color-correction (as opposed to more, later revised, color-corrections)? It also begs the question … did any of those 1st, wrong VHS’s leak out into the market?

There is another great article from 1996 issue of ‘Widescreen Review’ on the subject of Aliens grain and color correction (JC forcing calibration on his own personal TV set). From all I’ve read on the subject so far it seems to me that we should be pretty happy with Blu-ray version. No one really remembers the quality of 35mm prints at the time of release and I doubt they were all the same. It’s like remembering how good VHS was until the DVD came along.

http://www.highdefdigest.com/blog/aliens-dnr-paranoia/

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tommodore64 said:

Spaced Ranger said:

Whoa! Nice find!

Could this mean that the first release (VHS only?) was definitely Cameron’s only “original vision” color-correction (as opposed to more, later revised, color-corrections)? It also begs the question … did any of those 1st, wrong VHS’s leak out into the market?

There is another great article from 1996 issue of ‘Widescreen Review’ on the subject of Aliens grain and color correction (JC forcing calibration on his own personal TV set). From all I’ve read on the subject so far it seems to me that we should be pretty happy with Blu-ray version. No one really remembers the quality of 35mm prints at the time of release and I doubt they were all the same. It’s like remembering how good VHS was until the DVD came along.

http://www.highdefdigest.com/blog/aliens-dnr-paranoia/

I saw a 70mm print this year, it did not look anything like the BD at all.

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tommodore64 said:
From all I’ve read on the subject so far it seems to me that we should be pretty happy with Blu-ray version.

Oh really?

Aliens

Aliens DVD BR

Aliens DVD BR 2

“Logic is the battlefield of adulthood.”

  • Howard Berk
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JayArgonaut said:

tommodore64 said:
From all I’ve read on the subject so far it seems to me that we should be pretty happy with Blu-ray version.

Oh really?

Aliens

Aliens DVD BR

Aliens DVD BR 2

The DVD isn’t correct either, but it’s closer
Also that first pic, I took that ages ago and it gets everywhere

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JayArgonaut it’s hard to get into mind of James Cameron. At different times and on different formats he seems to prefer a different color scale. BD looks amazing but there is too much blue/orange complementary color there for my taste (but again that was a popular choice in the 80s even though he chose it in 00s). I have Aliens on pretty much all formats and DVD color is pretty much close to what I get used to the most. The best option would be to have “original” (whichever it is) color version and optional new color regrade as an option on blu-ray.