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Dr. M's Reinventing The Wheel Edition (PAL to NTSC+) (Released) — Page 4

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Wow, I finally had it in my head that I'd compromise on the left/right borders and find the exact number of lines cut from each side. Then I could resize and recenter so that although smaller and with overscan, all subjects in the film would appear the same size as any other NTSC edition (with black borders added to only make up for cropped PAL lines).

Perusing the Official and Unofficial screenshot sites, and playing around with the images I made a discovery. It's completely inconsistent. Completely, oddly, insanely, and randomly inconsistent. In some cases they take 32-40 lines off the left and a few from the right, sometimes none from the left and a few from the right. I even found a scene where the right side has more image (by like 20 lines) than ANY NTSC edition. (Though where they got the extra image area from is beyond me.)

There is too much variablitiy from scene to scene to actually correct for this.
So my final answer is: a movie screen has no overscan region, neither will my DVD. If at a later date this becomes necessary to change, I'll do it, but I'm sure these discs will be obsolete by then. I'm still utilizing a few lines more than the original source PAL laserdisc so resolution loss isn't much of an issue. The only real negative is smaller overall image and that might be an issue for small dimension TVs.

Again, if there are enough people asking, I will release the overscaned version and keep the other for myself only, but as yet, I have heard from no-one actually interested in obtaining a copy who wishes there to be no borders.

Dr. M

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Originally posted by: Doctor M
Perusing the Official and Unofficial screenshot sites, and playing around with the images I made a discovery. It's completely inconsistent. Completely, oddly, insanely, and randomly inconsistent. In some cases they take 32-40 lines off the left and a few from the right, sometimes none from the left and a few from the right. I even found a scene where the right side has more image (by like 20 lines) than ANY NTSC edition. (Though where they got the extra image area from is beyond me.)

One reason for this is the fact that different capture cards have different clipping areas. Owning a few different models myself, I found that each card clipped the sides in different places. I was able to hack the settings of one card and remove all clipping, but this isn't something you can do with 99% of them.

I'm not sure on this, but clipping may be different between different LD versions as well -- i.e. the PAL LDs Moth3r used may be different than the US Definitives Dr. Gonzo used.

I realized this a while back when doing my own capturing and trying to figure out the correct aspect ratio. What I decided in the end was that no one is really going to care or notice if it's off a little bit as long as their screen is filled horizontally. What people will notice and possibly get annoyed at is the presence of black bars on the sides -- even moreso if they're not the same size. So I guess if you're going to keep the borders, at least make sure the image is centered.

If you took the Official DVDs as gospel and used them as the reference for the correct aspect ratio, what would the image size of the corresponding Moth3r clip be? What's stopping you from upsizing that to 720xX, since you were planning on resizing it anyway?

My Projects:
[Holiday Special Hybrid DVD v2]
[X0 Project]
[Backstroke of the West DVD]
[ROTS Theatrical DVD]

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What people will notice and possibly get annoyed at is the presence of black bars on the sides -- even more so if they're not the same size.
I guess this was a reference to me using different size bars. No, I chucked that, the plan (sorta) as it stands is the 32 lines to both the left and right.

The question I've put to the group a few times now (though phrased differently): does ANYONE watch these DVD's on a video device that does not have overscan? If the answer is 'no', then no-one would ever see the presence of black bars (to the sides anyway) unless their TV is misaligned.

You're right, it never crossed my mind that everyone's capture is going to be with different devices with different size capture windows. Though I was assuming the Official DVD was played in a PC not captured so would be closest to the complete frame width.

What's stopping you from upsizing that to 720xX, since you were planning on resizing it anyway?

Huh?

Dr. M

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Um, no still lost there I think.

The original PAL disc is by and large cropped to the left and right.
By adding black bars it prevents further loss of film width into the overscan region of a TV set.
The aspect ratio seems to already be correct therefore I am only resizing smaller and adding black bars to the left and right to ostensibly make up for missing frame.

Now I did go a little further than what was actually cropped since they probably cropped around 45 +/- lines total and I'm adding about 38 lines per side which is the approximate width of most overscan regions.

It's still possible that I might split the difference and only add borders to make up for actual missing lines (but evenly on both sides).

Dr. M

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I guess I should answer your initial question and say I watch my DVDs on my computer, which has no overscan obviously. You are correct though, watching these on a regular 4:3 television, one would not be able to see the side borders. The Dr. Gonzo set has borders on the sides like this, and I do find it a little annoying watching it. So I guess what I'm saying is the way I watch movies, overscan isn't an issue and I would opt for the larger picture image of a full 720 pixel width.

On the flip side, all people who watch movies on a television are subject to overscan. Personally, if I had to choose between lost information on the sides and a larger picture, I'd still choose a larger picture.

My Projects:
[Holiday Special Hybrid DVD v2]
[X0 Project]
[Backstroke of the West DVD]
[ROTS Theatrical DVD]

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Originally posted by: Doctor M
Perusing the Official and Unofficial screenshot sites, and playing around with the images I made a discovery. It's completely inconsistent. Completely, oddly, insanely, and randomly inconsistent. In some cases they take 32-40 lines off the left and a few from the right, sometimes none from the left and a few from the right. I even found a scene where the right side has more image (by like 20 lines) than ANY NTSC edition. (Though where they got the extra image area from is beyond me.)


They got it from the film. I guess relatively few of you know how film is shot and transferred. I don't know all the ins and outs, but I can tell you it's highly subjective. The image as shot has some slop to the top and bottom and left and right of the action -- this is intentional. Or at least deliberately accidental. There's a safe area that's protected for, and then there's an area around the safe area that may or may not be intended for projection. And in a lot of cases, the extreme edges just don't matter much (like fake cardboard cutouts of soldiers standing at attention). There has to be at least a small portion of the image as "padding" so that when the projectionist masks the film for the particular screen he's showing the film on, he'll never have any white or black areas showing. Film ain't like HD; it's analogue, baby! You'd be surprised at just how different each theatre's presentation of a film can be, and still be the "correct" aspect ratio.

The same thing is true during telecining. There's an area that's going to show up on the videotape, and that can be filled pretty creatively by the telecine operator. If for some reason he feels like zooming in just a bit, he can. He wants to crop the whole thing just a bit higher, no problem. So the guy who did the PAL session clearly cropped a bit tighter than the NTSC guy for the most part, except for a few places where he's left things wider than the NTSC guy did. Both are correct. PAL is not missing anything it shouldn't be. That's the nature of film.

Of course, you never notice this for just about any other movie, because just about any other movie only has one transfer you'd ever really see, and nobody really pays attention to 20 lines here or there except when it's Star Wars, the ultimate geek's ultimate obsession.

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Originally posted by: Karyudo
...the guy who did the PAL session clearly cropped a bit tighter than the NTSC guy...
This is I think the main reason why the starfields look so much better on the PAL version.

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Originally posted by: Moth3r
Originally posted by: Karyudo
...the guy who did the PAL session clearly cropped a bit tighter than the NTSC guy...
This is I think the main reason why the starfields look so much better on the PAL version.

I don't think the tighter cropping is the main reason the starfield looks better on the PAL LDs, the line removal on the NTSC LDs is to blame I feel - the line removal is one of the main reasons I bought the PAL LDs.

Besides, the scenes on the PAL LDs aren't always cropped tighter, just slightly different in some cases (slightly up or down compared to the definitive LDs)
http://www.haku.co.uk/pics/LukeCruise.gif http://www.haku.co.uk/pics/dontcare.gif
***Citizen's NTSC DVD/PAL DVD/XviD Info and Feedback Thread***
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Ok ok, my arm is well twisted.
My computer has been churning hard for a long long time and has spit out what will probably be my final version of ANH. 6-passes, PCM audio, etc, etc.

There are no black borders (beyond the few lines in Moth3r's original). You have the full 360 lines of picture that all other anamorphic transfers will have.
It looks pretty darn good. There are 80 chapter points (of questionable accuracy).

I will sit through the film this weekend to check for any serious encoding problems or audio sync errors.
While you all are waiting for me to do the dirty job. Here's some final post filter, post encoding screenies.
http://adventureclub.postrock.net/anh.jpg
http://adventureclub.postrock.net/anh2.jpg

I'll update the first post in the thread after that.
Then I can relax a few days while I finish grabbing ESB from MySpleen...
Btw, did I actually see bitrot in the original release?

Dr. M

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Dr. M,

Looking great! When and how will this be released?

You know of the rebellion against the Empire?

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I'm on the fence. I'd love to send out discs to people willing to do the heavy lifting (torrent sites, a.b.starwars, etc.) I would of course need volunteers.

Additionally, I haven't decided whether this is going to be on a per-movie basis or a complete set.
I should have ESB in a day or two ready to work with, but I do not yet have the audio track for ESB or RotJ.
Also RotJ hasn't been released from Moth3r yet so that's probably going to be the real bottle-neck to a complete set.

It just seems easier to send 3 discs at once to people rather than 1 at a time.

Dr. M

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Looking great Doctor M!

Also, just to put it out there, I'm more than willing to post this up on MySpleen for you whenever you're done.
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If you want to set up a "Pay It Forward" system, I'm willing to help.

You know of the rebellion against the Empire?

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There are no black borders (beyond the few lines in Moth3r's original). You have the full 360 lines of picture that all other anamorphic transfers will have.
It looks pretty darn good.

You're right. It does look pretty darn good.

Going back to what I said before though (and this is more of an FYI thing), your video resolution doesn't have to be 360 lines. Most of the other anamorphic transfers have more than that. The official DVD, for example, has a 720x365 viewable area. To keep the same aspect ratio you have in your screenshots, you could easily resize your video to 720x368 instead of 704x360. This would not only result in a little bit less quality loss from Moth3r's 432-line original, but would completely eliminate the side borders altogether. Just a thought...

My Projects:
[Holiday Special Hybrid DVD v2]
[X0 Project]
[Backstroke of the West DVD]
[ROTS Theatrical DVD]

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I could do 720x368, but then there would definitely be more lost into the overscan than Moth3r's original (and possibly the laserdisc depending on how his capture card worked).
Additionally that would only be true for ANH since for Empire and Jedi the left/right borders are 4 lines. So then you'd be talking a 4 horizontal line gain and having slight different resolutions for the movies.

If I re-encode to fix a few problems I saw, I'll consider it. But, how much can you really gain since the source laser disc had a lot less lines than I do now.

Dr. M

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It just seems easier to send 3 discs at once to people rather than 1 at a time.

Unless you put it place a "Pay-It-Forward" system with every release; i.e. - mark two/three people as originators on whichever release you have at the time and then just make sure you use this thread here to direct anyone else interested to them as distributers. Those 3 distributing 3 each to those could also "Pay-It-Forward" with three as well.
I could theoretically see your releases moving very quickly like that.

A thought.

<a href="http://www.bynkii.com/archives/2005/05/i_hates_lucas_i.html" title="www.bynkii.com/archives/2005/05/i_hates_lucas_i.html" target="_blank">.Truth.</a><br /><br />"Mmm....starcruiser crash!"

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Ok, major update now in first post (including some new thoughts on making a true/pure NTSC conversion of Moth3r's discs).

Where I stand? ANH: Finished! ESB: Finished(?)
I will sit through ESB in the next few days and make sure. ANH had a billion audio edit points to sync the audio, ESB had like 4 (THX audio swoosh noise (btw, ripped from my Fight Club dvd)), Leia welding was a separate audio file (again THANKS ARNIE.D), and one major (nasty) break that required ADDING audio *shudder*.

Same video filters were appropriate. I am VERY optimistic that I am done until Moth3r catches up with his RotJ.

Soooo, anyone interested, PM me.
Release I think will be a multipronged attack. Pay-it-forward is good for those that like that, a.b.star.wars newsgroup is fine, a torrent on MySpleen would be great (I'll help seed if someone can get it going). Anyone willing to do any or all of these please contact me and I'll get these out within about a week.

No I don't believe it either.

Dr. M

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Great cant wait to see this, I have been reading this thread from the start.
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This has been very quick indeed. It was only 3 weeks ago that I posted the sample vob file for you to have a look at.

In my experience, the fastest way to get this out is on a.b.sw. From there, you would then have multiple seeders for any torrent and also have people who could Pay It Forward to those without fast internet access.

4 - 5 - 3 - 1 - 6 - 2

Discuss…

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I need some input from you all.
As I've said I don't have a set up to do any real color correction, nor do I have any references to go from.

For Empire I checked the vector graphs to see where the colors were peaking. Everything is nicely saturated, but it seemed that the same 25% boost to the yellow and green spectrums used for New Hope wouldn't be out of place.

Actually watching the full movie last night I had a feeling that the yellows were too bright (compared to the rest of the colors).

Below is a screenshot from the end of ESB. Now there IS yellow lighting coming from in front of the subjects so you have yellow on a gold '3PO, but does this seem wrong to anyone else?

http://adventureclub.postrock.net/3po.jpg
Looking to the future... ^
http://adventureclub.postrock.net/3po2.jpg
3PO and Chewie share a quiet moment... ^

Dr. M

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I believe the color of 3PO was changed to be slightly more gold for ESB. That may be throwing you off. I can't remember where I read that, but it was maybe here or at the X0 website.

You know of the rebellion against the Empire?

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I believe the color of 3PO was changed to be slightly more gold for ESB.

Yeah, I do think that i've heard that elsewhere as well...
And after all it would make sense as Han was referring to a golden C-3PO when he said:

"Hurry up golden rod or your going to become a permanent resident!"

<a href="http://www.bynkii.com/archives/2005/05/i_hates_lucas_i.html" title="www.bynkii.com/archives/2005/05/i_hates_lucas_i.html" target="_blank">.Truth.</a><br /><br />"Mmm....starcruiser crash!"

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Sigh, I'm wishing I had an X0 Project frame from ESB to compare to.
I know every scene/frame has different color characteristics, but right now I'm looking for some global reference that's better than my best guess.

I anticipated a release early this week, but I'm still unsure if I want to back the 25% yellow off to 15% or not.
The thing is at 25% the opening crawl still looks drab-er than it probably should.

And now I'm noticing that boosting the Cyan brings out some very nice detail in Hoth's snowscapes previously lost in all white regions. It's very nice looking (especially the skys) and it doesn't turn white hallways blue like it would have if I boosted it in ANH. Again the Vectorscope shows that even boosted, Cyan peaks out around 50-60% so it's not unreasonable. But is it right?

Again, sigh, any advice anyone could give me at this point would be great 'cause I'm just spinning my wheels now. I don't want Smurf Wars or Goldie Wars or anything, but a little more color wouldn't be out of place. I just don't know what's right anymore.

Dr. M