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…(so that I can use some scenes in my almost finished theatrical HD restoration)
Was finished?
“The ability to speak does not make you intelligent.”
Star Wars I - The Phantom Menace - ZigZig's Laserdisc Preservation (Released) — Page 2
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This is a great digital presenatation of the laserdisc which I owned many years ago. The Dolby Digital EX soundtrack is one of the best from the laserdisc years. The pod race and Darth Maul duel still sound incredible. Thanks!
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It looks great but why has this version lost so much detail in the shadows? Below is a screencap from a 4.44GB TPM LD file that I have. Someone here on the forums was kind enough to share a link with me and I was finally able to download it. When comparing it with ZigZig’s preservation I immeditalely noticed the loss of much of the shadow detail on the jedi robes, Qui-Gonn’s in particular. Could this be avoided considering the software tools that were used in the process of making the new preservaton?
My copy:
http://www.image-share.com/ijpg-4088-123.html
ZigZig’s preservation:
http://www.image-share.com/ijpg-4088-124.html
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Hi Vladimon,
Could you please point exactly where you notice a loss of the shadow detail in the jedi robes ?
I just see more noise in your copy (which seems to be Althor’s one), but no loss of details. But maybe I don’t look at the right place of your screenshot.
Thanks!
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Yeah, I’m actually seeing less detail in your copy versus Zig’s. Look at Obi-Wan’s furrowed brow - you can see the creases between his eyebrows clearly in Zig’s screencap, but it’s a blur in yours. I’m also not seeing any loss of detail in shadows.
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Really? I think it is pretty obvious right away, but it may be my monitor’s brightness and colors making it that much more obvious. I know the noise kinda makes it look like there’s more detail but it’s not just the noise alone - still the wrinkles in the robes are much more prominent, better defined, not so much smoothed out (Qui-Gonn’s chest area, especially on the sides and all along where his arms meet the torso, the transition between them). You can see the wrinkles are better defined and I can see their full length while in the bottom picture they seem to have almost vanished into the same shade of the color of Qui-Gonn’s robe.
Don’t get me wrong, your preservation looks great. This is not a smartass picking on your work. It is just something that immediately caught my attention as I started watching the film and I was curious if any smoothing options settings could have made it less obvious. Either way, thanks for all the great work you do as you’re giving us hope of seeing the real TPM (theatrical cut and colors) again and in the best available way right now.
“The ability to speak does not make you intelligent.”
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Yeah, I’m actually seeing less detail in your copy versus Zig’s. Look at Obi-Wan’s furrowed brow - you can see the creases between his eyebrows clearly in Zig’s screencap, but it’s a blur in yours. I’m also not seeing any loss of detail in shadows.
Yes, definitely looks sharper. That’s pretty obvious. I am talking about the dark areas and the shapes, lines hidden within, the definition of the transitions between the folds, wrinkles in Qui-Gonn’s robes in particular as defined by a greater amount of shades between the darkest and the brighter areas on the surface of his robe. On sharpness alone, Zigzig’s one wins big time, but I definitely see more going on on Qui-Gonn’s robe. It looks less like a big area of almost compeltely the same color.
*not an expert on the terminology
“The ability to speak does not make you intelligent.”
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I think it might be the settings on whatever you’re viewing the rips with? I’m doing an A-B and the first cap isn’t just noisier, it’s blurrier and darker, too. Granted, it’s Laserdisc - there’s only so much detail to be found, but I don’t think the dynamic range of the image is lacking. The Phantom Menace is a pretty contrasty disc, and I’ve seen it on some monitors/TVs where the shadow detail DOES get lost and crushed. But in this case, if that’s happening, it looks like it’d be more likely to happen in Cap A than in Cap B.
For example, take a look at the difference between the shadows playing across Qui-Gon’s eyes and brow. In Cap A, they’re not only darker, but there are wrinkles under the eyes and at the corner of his mouth that get lost completely in the shadows being cast. In Cap B, you can see, even in the shadows, those wrinkles.
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I think it might be the settings on whatever you’re viewing the rips with? I’m doing an A-B and the first cap isn’t just noisier, it’s blurrier and darker, too. Granted, it’s Laserdisc - there’s only so much detail to be found, but I don’t think the dynamic range of the image is lacking. The Phantom Menace is a pretty contrasty disc, and I’ve seen it on some monitors/TVs where the shadow detail DOES get lost and crushed. But in this case, if that’s happening, it looks like it’d be more likely to happen in Cap A than in Cap B.
For example, take a look at the difference between the shadows playing across Qui-Gon’s eyes and brow. In Cap A, they’re not only darker, but there are wrinkles under the eyes and at the corner of his mouth that get lost completely in the shadows being cast. In Cap B, you can see, even in the shadows, those wrinkles.
This
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Guys, I see what you mean. It seems there’s little difference when viewed on my OLED screens but a rather big difference when viewed on my SONY laptop monitor. The display is definitely making the difference very obvious, whatever it is. The player settings / video card settings don’t play a role here, I’m pretty sure of that.
Just an interesting thing to note - I can only enjoy certain BD releases such as Godzilla on this laptop’s screen as I can clearly see all the action in the night scenes on that blu-ray (without changing any video settings) while pretty much everyone I know and their sisters complain about it being super dark. Trying to fix the image through video brightness, gamma, black point and other settings then negatively affects the daytime scenes for them. I don’t need to do that on this screen and both daytime and nighttime scenes look fine. It’s also only this monitor where I always immediately notice the not-yet-so-great encoding done by hevc h265 in most darker areas of image or in the picture’s bokeh areas as well where lots of little detail and fine transitions between shadowy areas vanish into a uniform mud of the same color tone with h265. Sometimes I will even watch sth like a bad mp4 with tons of artifacts on this screen rather than my own bad h265 rip because of this one reason (for my rips using RipBot on default settings only). Again, always super obvious on this laptop’s monitor. I really do see more and longer creases and better defined detail (by slightly higher variation in the dark color tones of the shadowy areas) on Qui-Gon’s robe in cap A even though in terms of sharpness detail the cap is definitely blurrier overall.
Either way, a great preservation and the little problem that I am seeing is not something 99% of people will see or care about. Wish you could see what I’m seeing though.
“The ability to speak does not make you intelligent.”
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Hi Vladimon,
I really don’t get what you see.
Here is a comparison of the same frame : http://www.framecompare.com/image-compare/screenshotcomparison/7KG7GNNX
1 - Althor’s preservation (your copy)
2 - My preservation
3 - the HDTV broadcast (reduced to 480p)
(Please note that I had to slightly stretch Althor’s preservation to fit the right ratio.)
IMHO, there is the same level of details and nuances in the shadows of Qui-Gon’s robe between my preservation and the HDTV broadcast (taking into account that the HDTV broadcast has a huge issue with colors and contrasts), and there is less details and nuances in Althor’s preservation, but more noise. Maybe there is an issue with your monitor.
Since I used a HLD-XO player and an ADV-7842 comb filter (while Althor used a CLD-HF9G [CLD-99] and the comb filter of the Diamond Theater750HD PCI-E capture card), it is just not possible that there are more nuances in his preservation.
Also, IIRC, the Diamond Theater750HD that Althor used has an auto-level issue (which perhaps explains why you see more contrast in its version, when it is in fact less faithful), and its comb filter is less accurate than the ADV-7842.
That said, blessed be Althor for the incredible preservation work he did on all of SW’s laserdiscs, and which today sets the gold standard. It’s just that for TPM, there was a way to do a little better with newer hardware.
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I’m seeing a lot less noise and there might be a miniscule amount of detail loss on Qui-Gon’s chest by the crooks of his elbows, but I’m also seeing significantly more detail near his armpits and pretty much everywhere else in the image. I’m also pretty sure the perceived extra detail around the crooks of the elbows in Althor’s capture is just noise and not actually more detail, but even if it is a slight loss in detail it’s worth it for the immensely improved amount of detail practically everywhere else in the frame, especially in faces which I’d argue is much more important than some wrinkles on their plain brown robes.
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Well, this is what I’m seeing. I’m sure it’s not completely just the noise although it does play a role here. The only thing I did is I turned up the monitor’s brightness to make my point clearly visible.
https://www66.zippyshare.com/v/WKX5pqyH/file.html
It’s not the best monitor ever, obviously, but it always shows me more detail in dark areas in any movie I watch on it (eg Godzilla BD, The Dark Knight Rises BD which are infamous for their problematic blacks).
Anyway, like I said: a great preservation and a one that I’ll be watching on most occasions. It seems that this loss of detail isn’t significantly noticeable on any other display I have and you guys aren’t seeing anything at all, so it doesn’t matter. Probably just this monitor thing.
Edit: …is it the contrast and the colors doing this??
“The ability to speak does not make you intelligent.”
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Hi Vladimon,
There is obviously an issue with your monitor (or with its settings). The dark areas that you don’t see on your screen (as shown on you short video) ARE yet definitely present and visible on my preservation (even they are not visible on your screen).
So yes, it seems that your contrast and colors settings are doing this.
Althor made his preservation with a Diamond Theater750HD PCI-E capture card, which is known to apply automatic levels that denature the image.
So if your monitor is not correctly calibrated, maybe you won’t see the slight “shadows” on my preservation, but you’ll see them on Althor’s one, because his capture card overdid the contrasts and levels.
As a general rule, a properly calibrated monitor is needed to compare finely colors, saturation, hue, contrasts and levels.
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Just wanted to drop in and say I only discovered your various Episode I projects a few months ago, but I’m so excited to see someone doing this. I really never thought I’d see a theatrical Phantom Menace again.
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The Dolby Digital EX track is fantastic. I’m watching this it is pretty incredible. Great job on the preservation.
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Spectacular quality! Well preserved! Looks better than the output on my player. 😃
Until I got my Laserdisc copy I have not seen the theatrical cut since it was in theatres. Thankfully someone preserved it!
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I remember buying the Japanese laserdisc when it came out as it was rumoured to have an extra scene in it back before forums could confirm. Didn’t see anything new but the quality was superb. I’ll be coming by with a DM for a link once I’ve become a regular here. Great site, great community.
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the quality for this laserdisc-rip is remarkable
many grateful thanks ZigZig for your work
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I sent you a PM about this project. Please take a look at it.
UncutIsSuperior
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Would it be possible to get a download link for this? I don’t have a MySpleen account. Trying to find a good rip of the laserdisc for some project research. Thanks!
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Hi Broom Kid,
Thank you for your interest in this preservation!
very curious to have a look at this!
The screenshots as posted seem stretched to 16x9, however. I’m guessing that’s inaccurate to what the rip itself looks like?
The rip was stretched to 177:160, according to the SMPTE RP 187 which was applied on this LD. With the proper DAR (display aspect ratio) set to 4:3, the picture has exactly the same proportions as the HDTV.
But the screenshots were not made with the proper 4:3 DAR (even if the mkv file is correctly set to this ratio).
So yes, the screenshots are inaccurate to what the rip itself looks like.IIRC, this laserdisc was also mastered to a lower IRE level, leading to the blacks looking crushed unless brightness/contrast were adjusted on the display itself - something to do with the difference between the Japanese and North American markets? I’m not completely sure on this, and could be wrong (someone please correct me if I am), but I know from personal experience with the disc that it definitely looks a lot more contrasty and crushed than other late-era laserdiscs.
Indeed, this LD uses a Japanese IRE (black to 0 instead of 7.5). Since the capture was made with a Japanese player (HLD-X0) which is conformed to the Japanese IRE, the colors and contrasts are 100% accurate.
Thanks so much for doing this, and posting it. The amount of work is tremendous!
Yes, it took me a couple of months… But I love to do this 😃
Amazing work my friend
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Any chance of getting a BD from you that has the 4:3 movie frame cropped at the top and bottom to fill The 16x9 hd format?
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This is a great digital presenatation of the laserdisc which I owned many years ago. The Dolby Digital EX soundtrack is one of the best from the laserdisc years. The pod race and Darth Maul duel still sound incredible. Thanks!
Is there any way I can get just the the Dolby Digital EX track so that I can mux it into my copy of the movie?
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This is a great digital presenatation of the laserdisc which I owned many years ago. The Dolby Digital EX soundtrack is one of the best from the laserdisc years. The pod race and Darth Maul duel still sound incredible. Thanks!
Is there any way I can get just the the Dolby Digital EX track so that I can mux it into my copy of the movie?
Is there any to get any preservation