Info Wanted: Best source for the Mos Eisley speeder pass-by shot? — Page 3

ChainsawAsh said:

Holy shit, where do I sign up?

PM -1 ;)

FrederikOlsen said:

Yeah, at this point, it's awfully clear that all the talk about the original "not looking good" is just a bunch of corporate bullshit.

Well, he wasn't lying to us, that speeder shot does look awfully grainy. However, I'd wager that those first few R2/3PO shots in the desert are equally bad, and have seen nowhere near the amount of cleanup (pre-SE).

FrederikOlsen said:

True, it does, but I'd take that level of grain over DNR any day. 

As far as I can tell, you're also right about the level of grain in the first desert shots, but I'll leave any image posting to negative1.

well, if you check the color timing thread,

i'm sure you'll see all kinds of neat things!

----------------------------------------------------

http://originaltrilogy.com/forum/topic.cfm/Star-Wars-Colortiming-Cinematography-was-What-changes-was-done-to-STAR-WARS-in-93/topic/9805/

later

-1

here's some more shots overlaid with the 

'safe' cropping parameters.. which is

reasonable..

===========================

later

-1

here we go..

frame 1 of the entry

to the cantina..

-------------------------------

ok,

 all the frames are like this,

very very grainy..

here's the scene at 720p

--------------------------

http://img6.imageshack.us/img6/9206/ep04r344201720p.jpg

later

-1

here's the first 10 frames,

with a little better aspect ratio:

========================

later

-1

Cool.

That reel seems to be in fantastic condition! please leave the optical dirt alone, I know that I'm in minority in this thinking but if you're going to clean up footage that is in this good condition you may as well get rid of the orange blob under the speeder.

Well, not necessarily. I think what DE did there is just about perfect, because it gets it much closer to what it would have probably looked like on an earlier generation print.

Harmy said:

Well, not necessarily. I think what DE did there is just about perfect, because it gets it much closer to what it would have probably looked like on an earlier generation print.

No, the built-in dirt was very much seen even on brand new '77 prints, I just hope -1 doesn't clean it up.

Chicken Boo said:

Wasn't that supposed to be the point of "the project we must not speak of"? So that anyone could do whatever modifications they wanted individually?

msycamore said:

That reel seems to be in fantastic condition! please leave the optical dirt alone, I know that I'm in minority in this thinking but if you're going to clean up footage that is in this good condition you may as well get rid of the orange blob under the speeder.

well, there will be some creative decisions..

and like harmy said.. i agree.. i like the slightly

cleaned up version.. but there *MIGHT* be a

raw untouched version, and *POSSIBLY* a

grindhouse version from the red ones.. we'll see.

obviously post questions on the blog...

but if it is not a dirt spot, or something on the film..

like the black spots, it will be taken out..

otherwise, if it was on the print, it will be left in..

these are raw shots, so yeah, there will be

some mild grain reduction, but when you see it

motion. even the dirty stuff is fine when watching it.

it's all over the movie.. so if a scene looks too clean,

it might look out of place... we've talked a lot about

what to do with this in the past. and i'm sure we'll

talk about it more in the future.

later

-1

negative1 said:

again, a few more samples ..

still working on it...

-------------------

here's our version 2, with a slightly different method..

still, these are the untouched colors.

*NOTE: my aspect ratio is off...

----------

later

-1

msycamore said:

Harmy said:

Well, not necessarily. I think what DE did there is just about perfect, because it gets it much closer to what it would have probably looked like on an earlier generation print.

No, the built-in dirt was very much seen even on brand new '77 prints, I just hope -1 doesn't clean it up.

Do we have a Verta reference for comparison?  While I'd agree it's just a dirty bad-looking shot and it should continue to look dirty and bad in a 35mm preservation, is the AMOUNT of dirt variable depending on print generation and other factors?  DE's shot looks cleaner (and more importantly to me, sharper) than I think this shot SHOULD look, but I imagine his method could still be used for a more restrained cleanup, if we see evidence that cleaner prints existed.  Also, for merging into a preservation that's already using cleaned-up sources like Harmy's, the clean look of DE's shot would blend better, although the sharpness still looks too much even for me.

Well, it wouldn't kill me if it's slightly cleaned up, like I said I think I'm in minority here, it's just that I have a hard time to see what's so bad about these frames -1 posted other than its soft quality, the condition on it seems to be great. This was a film made in the 70's by humans, this crude optical effects footage didn't look as crisp as its surrounding footage with its extra layers of grain, the various black splotches seen in this sequence were on the original prints, a modern video transfer on Blu-ray would obviously don't leave such things in, I was just saying that I hope -1 leave it alone.

Darth Editous said:

After a bit of Avisynth magic:



DE

While that still does look good, you don't want to overdo it. It should basically look like it was done on 16mm as opposed to 35mm, because of the comp'ing done to it (and because that's how it always looked until the layers were digitally cleaned of film grain before being digitally composited for the SE).

They removed a lot more than just the "offsensive" vaseline blob.

negative1 said:

again, a few more samples ..

still working on it...

Why do all these shots have dirt in different spots?

Some of the dirt in the V2 is new, some of it is only in the V1.

Asaki said:

negative1 said:

again, a few more samples ..

still working on it...

Why do all these shots have dirt in different spots?

Some of the dirt in the V2 is new, some of it is only in the V1.

 depending on how we processed it.

the camera, capture software, lighting, etc.

all impact the final result. some lenses remove

scratches before capture. some dust and dirt

is more prominent with other lighting etc.

so we don't always get the same results.

in the end, the software will take out most of

the major dirt/spots.

later

-1

I guess it's only natural that most people wants this pass by shot to have the same grain quality and sharpness as the surrounding footage. That's why most optical effects were digitally recomposited for the SE in the first place. But the extra layer of grain is part of the effects technology of the time, many optical effects were even done to look as good as possible with this extra layer of grain in mind. If you remove it you're just doing the effect a disservice, removing the environment this effect were meant to occupy, the softer and grainier look helps mask any shortcomings. If you're ok with that, why not remove the matte-lines as well?