Star Wars Colortiming & Cinematography (was What changes was done to STAR WARS in '93?) — Page 3

Thanks for posting!

Very interesting, I think that's clear evidence of how the binary sunset really looked in the cinema back in '97, no surprise that the colortiming of that scene somehow felt familiar to me when I first saw that photo. Some good pictures there, you can even see the stars clearly in some of the Falcon caps;)

Would you mind posting a little bigger picture of the binary sunset, if it's possible and the close up of the two suns if it isn't too much trouble? that's also a shot that's been very inconsistent in color between various video releases.

msycamore said:

Would you mind posting a little bigger picture of the binary sunset, if it's possible and the close up of the two suns if it isn't too much trouble? that's also a shot that's been very inconsistent in color between various video releases.

Sorry, can't do it. It's just a catalog where you could order image #X and then LFL would send the images. They are only thumbnails. I'd love to get a hold on the real image files!

And like I said, maybe 75% of them have really off colors. Almost all Tatooine shots except a few.

Ah, ok. Thanks anyway, the pictures you posted answered some of my thoughts I had.

Do the broadcast versions of the SEs have the color issues of the home video releases?

I think captainsolo means the '97 SE not the '04, I'm not entirely sure but I would be surprised if they didn't have the same colors, they should be from the same problematic telecine. But the binary sunset scene looking to much different to be just a video telecine screwup.

msycamore said:

I think captainsolo means the '97 SE not the '04, I'm not entirely sure but I would be surprised if they didn't have the same colors, they should be from the same problematic telecine.

I'm not sure about that, the broadcast versions are anamorphic and the quality seems to be too good to be from the same transfer the 1997 laserdiscs and VHS used but I don't know.

Also I dug out a back up of my old STAR WARS VHS, which is definitely a pre-1993 transfer. There are a few funny things about it:

1) The first the first scene is squished to fit the roll.

2) The saturation is not low at all, on the conrary the image is totaly oversaturated.

3) It is a dubbed version and in the Greedo scene the English subs are kept and Greedo is dubbed so he doesn't speak an alien language at all.

4) The dubbing is pretty funny. When Luke ask 3PO to tell him about the rebelion, 3PO says something like: "I'm not very good at telling stories, I don't know how to put them, I'm not Spielberg."

Here are pictures of it:

Click to enlarge.

Lord__Vader said:

I'm not sure about that, the broadcast versions are anamorphic and the quality seems to be too good to be from the same transfer the 1997 laserdiscs and VHS used but I don't know.

 Ok, didn't know they were anamorphic, maybe worth tracking down.

Lord__Vader said:

The dubbing is pretty funny. When Luke ask 3PO to tell him about the rebelion, 3PO says something like: "I'm not very good at telling stories, I don't know how to put them, I'm not Spielberg."

Are you serious! If you are, that is priceless! :) What language do they speak? It needs to be preserved just for that line. :) Thanks for posting.

From now on I think I'm gonna start using that quote. ;)

Yeah, I meant things like the G'kar and TB broadcast versions (how are these?). I went back and took a look at the Reivax version which is the best source I have for the 97 SE ANH. ANH largely has all of the pink tint gone in this version. It's actually strange to see the updated Mos Eisley sequence without it.

The binary sunset is still really dark.

msycamore said:

Lord__Vader said:

The dubbing is pretty funny. When Luke ask 3PO to tell him about the rebelion, 3PO says something like: "I'm not very good at telling stories, I don't know how to put them, I'm not Spielberg."

Are you serious! If you are, that is priceless! :)

LOL!

I also have the SEs recorded on VHS, I haven't watched them in a long time, though. Too bad we didn't have a hard drive digibox at that time, the subtitles weren't burnt in and they were anamorphic of course so they might have been helpful. But I did record them on VHS through digibox so they're better than analog... It was five years ago and now the rights have changed to a different channel and they are the crappy editions, too bad.

Yeah, I'm totally serious, it's dubbed in Czech, I could post a clip of it later but my CPU is totaly occupied reeincoding my HD ESB Partly Despecialized at the moment.

Edit: I added a link to the clip to my signature.

captainsolo said:

Yeah, I meant things like the G'kar and TB broadcast versions (how are these?). I went back and took a look at the Reivax version which is the best source I have for the 97 SE ANH. ANH largely has all of the pink tint gone in this version. It's actually strange to see the updated Mos Eisley sequence without it.

Ok, I had a look at the Reivax version and to my eyes it has the same dull colors and contrast issues as every other video version of the '97SE I've seen. The video actually looked quite good in some scenes when I changed the brightness and contrast etc. on my setup. Even though I hate the SE, I was quite pleased to see it in true anamorphic for the first time but unfortunately it was in Pal format and the picture was slightly streched and had some very bad motion smearing in some places, even with these flaws it looked imo. much better than the '04 DVD version will ever look.

I haven't seen the "G'kar" and "TB" broadcast versions, but if you take a look at Max Reebo's preservation thread they seems to be from the same master and the "Flunk" seems to have the best overall picture quality.

These broadcasted versions of the SE may also be a very good source for a potential fan-restoration of the original films.

Harmy said:

Yeah, I'm totally serious, it's dubbed in Czech, I could post a clip of it later but my CPU is totaly occupied reeincoding my HD ESB Partly Despecialized at the moment.

Edit: I added a link to the clip to my signature.

 :) Hilarious!

Another disturbing screw-up in the '93 telecine (Gout) of Empire.

The whole sequence has yellow TIE lasers... my PAL '95 VHS have also blue TIE lasers in the following scenes.

Thanks for posting those caps, Red5!

That whole binary sunset scene have looked different on every video source I've seen, the colortiming even differ between shots in the various sources, from the close up of the suns to the close up of Luke, sometimes red/orange and sometimes blue/purple. It makes me mad!

The Gout isn't just darker, the sky is also tinted blue. In the Senator Theater cap it actually looks like he gazes at a twin sunset and not two moons or planets that the later video incarnations and especially the SE/'04 will make us believe. I don't know how reliable that photo really is but IMO. it should be that bright and it looks right to me. I really hope more references of that scene appear in the future.

It looks like they got it right in the Canyon scenes then, if you just take out the small red tint in the Gout it should look right.

Here's a few more sunset comparisons...

Bootleg Telecine (updated and corrected with the original source)

Japanese Special Collection LD

THX LD/"GOUT"

Bootleg Telecine (updated and corrected with the original source)

Japanese Special Collection LD

THX LD/"GOUT"

In this last picture, you can clearly see how altered the colortiming of the sunset in '93 was, the original colortiming of this shot is definitely supposed to be red in tone, it's red in the bootleg telecine, JSC LD and also in Puggo's 16mm restoration. I think they tried to make it more consistent with the previous 2 shots of Luke in '93, the original colortiming is in fact quite inconsistent, it have Luke standing against a bright soft pink sky but is suddely deep red in the close-up of the suns, then pink again in the second close-up of luke, but the whole scene ended up too dark and purple/blue in '93 to look any good imo. but that was also taken to extremes in the SE transfers.

Puggo's 16mm restoration

Well, from those screen captures I think it's pretty safe to say that the sun shot should be reddish and GOUT is perhaps "corrected" to what we see with Luke? Then the Luke shots are pretty much everywhere but I guess they should be more pinkish/reddish than blueish?

Yes, the close-up of the suns is even red in the '97SE when the contrast is corrected and also in the rare footage that appear in the documentary magic & the mystery, so I'm pretty sure of it right now.

I have to admit that I pumped up the brightness a little on those 16mm caps to better match the Technicolor ref. photo, the same brightness setting on all three though, and I was a little surprised and delighted how close it came the in theather one.

Here's how they look untouched.