Star Wars coming to Blu Ray (UPDATE: August 30 2011, No! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!) — Page 328

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Puggo - Jar Jar's Yoda said:

I'm hoping that now that Harmy's edition 2 is out, it will gradually go "viral".  That could change everyting.

At this point I just want the OOT so I can stop reading the Mike O and GeneralFrevious posts.

Also, "everything." :p

In the volley of rather good blu-ray releases of minor movies it's easy to forget Star Wars isn't the only film to get screwed up (and it's an overpriced DVD too) :-(

the voices have been dubbed with milder accents

That's ridiculous.

Note that the 32mm scan will be cropped slightly. (in the release version, not the raws)

Anyway right now the print is in hands of 3 people. Which is stil isn't enough to prevent Lucas from surpressing it, so as long as we can keep them out of here till its "released" and more than 3 people have it, I'd like to keep stuff low key.

I recently watched TPM blu-ray and thought I would register and ask you guys about the DNR issue. I noticed the film was grainless and looked soft but for the most part it looked great to my eyes. Now I always remember the film looking soft overall which is what makes me think made the DVD look terrible. Out of curiosity, I wondered if they used the source for the 1999 digital projection (an IP, same source as the DVD) and found this:

http://legend3d.com/sites/default/files/articles/fxguide%20Online%205%208%2012.pdf

Which is about the 3d release and it has this interesting piece of info:

There needed to be two new color timing parts to the show and Knoll used this opportunity to upgrade all the material, since when Episode I was originally finished, it was done on a per shot basis – “done sort of old style, final a shot, film out a shot, look at a print of that negative and that’s what we would final”. It went through a conventional negative cut. An optical timed IP was generated from that and then then master printing negatives were made from that timed IP. So everything audiences saw in the theater was two generations down from the original.

 

“When the original DVD was released,” Knoll says, “it came from scanning in the timed IP because it was the simplest thing to do. But when it came time to do [the conversion], we were going to take the movie and cut it up into 2,000 separate pieces, work on them and re-assemble it, we had an opportunity to go back to the original material. We could go back to the original film-out tapes that are a couple of generations better than what had been seen. So we figured let’s do that. We made a concerted effort to collect all the bits, re-create all the dissolves and pre-wipes. So that was all pre-graded material, so we had to do all new color timing, just to have the new Blu-ray master. Then there is a device-dependent color timing that’s done to compensate for the light loss that comes from stereo.”

TPM (like the first LOTR:FOTR blu-ray) did not use a DI but almost the entire film was scanned at 2k to apply visual effects. This footage was then output to an internegative which went through a traditional negative editing process including what sounds like optical wipes. An interpositive was created from this and both the digital and DVD versions were sourced from this IP.

For the blu-ray, they went back to the film-out tapes. The only scene that was not digitally manipulated was a quick shot of a gas vent in the beginning. That scene would have been scanned and the film re-assembled from the film-out footage, and he is saying the re-did the dissolves and wipes digitally. This means, by the way, that the blu-ray even without the alterations is different from the original theatrical release.

A close-up of Qui-Gon made the rounds last year as an example of bad DNR. But that particular scene (along with the scene where Anakin's blood is analyzed) were filmed digitally on a Sony HDC-750 as a test for the other prequels being filmed digitally. From what I can dig up, the HDC-750 has a CCD resolution of 1920x1035 and stores to the older HDCAM format which is 1440x1080 (1080i, it's interlaced) interpolated horizontally to 1920x1080 on output. So it looks like crap because it was filmed on a crap prototype digital camera.

When I watched the film, I noticed that it looked soft in some scenes and sharper in others. According to the technical info on imdb, some scenes were shot on Vista Vision cameras. I don't think during shooting George intended to digitally alter 98% of the film (which would require nearly the entire film to be scanned which then would have been 2k). The Vista Vision footage would appear sharper.

If it is badly DNR'd, is it badly DNR'd enough to destroy the extra detail (and then some) that it received from being 2 generations closer to the source? Or are people comparing the clean footage to the grainy IP-sourced footage and their eyes are fooling them into confusing the grain for detail? Most reviewers who reviewed the set claimed that TPM should look better than the prequels because it was sourced from film. If 98% of it was scanned in at 2k for effects work, that's not true. Not without re-rendering the CG and re-compositing the whole film. That they didn't do it for the 3d version (which probably would have helped, they say they don't use that software anymore) means TPM is like any other film made in the last 10 years with a 2k DI. Stuck there for a long time, if not forever.

I can't find any detailed shots to compare except for comparing it to the DVD (which of course it looks better than). It's been DNR'd but not with a detail-destroying filter. It went through the Lowry de-graining process. (which would help the 3d conversion too). So I'm wondering, is there really additional detail in the HD version floating around, or is the eyes playing tricks on the viewer from confusing grain with detail?

Harmy said:

The problem is that the other HD version is crap as well only in other respects (it's the same master as the 2001 DVD, only not downscaled), so it's hardly a good comparison. I saw somewhere on this forum some really nice HD screenshots from TPM, which seemed to be from a completely different source (or possibly the same source as the BD only prior to all the additional meddling) and those looked beautiful.

I'll check out the archives for the high quality screenshots if they're still around. That link I posted earlier with the info about re-assembling the film digitally has a section on grain in the conversion process being an issue since it's 'mono' and a true stereo image would have independent grain structures. Sucks if they DNR'd it for 3d and used that version for the blu. Saw some internet comments claiming the film was not DNR'd in 3d and there was grain, but that's probably random digital grain and their eyes are deceiving them. I guess it would also 'help' the compression process. Oh well...

Atilla the Hut said:

 

A close-up of Qui-Gon made the rounds last year as an example of bad DNR. But that particular scene (along with the scene where Anakin's blood is analyzed) were filmed digitally on a Sony HDC-750 as a test for the other prequels being filmed digitally. From what I can dig up, the HDC-750 has a CCD resolution of 1920x1035 and stores to the older HDCAM format which is 1440x1080 (1080i, it's interlaced) interpolated horizontally to 1920x1080 on output. So it looks like crap because it was filmed on a crap prototype digital camera.

I saw a screenshot comparison somewhere (can't remember if it was here or at AVS Forum) using that shot of Qui-Gon, but I seem to remember the hdtv screenshot having more detail.

Wish I could find it.

EDIT: Nevermind, found it:

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/78496/

It's too hard to say for sure whether that's more detail we're seeing in the old transfer or if it's simply IP grain.

Atilla, how sure are you that the nighttime Jedi Council scene was shot digitally?? I've read the story about Anakin's blood test scene having been shot that way, but where'd you read about the other one?

I ask because there are other shots in the blu-ray transfer that've been just as badly dnr'd as that Qui-Gon shot. There's a shot of Palpatine from the meeting with Amidala that's quite waxified, for example.

Harmy said:

Wow, that's ugly - both in their unique way. I wonder if that BD shot is actually from the BD or from some rip, because look at the background to the left of Qui-Gon - that is seriously horrible.

Whether that's from a rip or straight from the disc, that's how it looks on the actual disc. Here's the same shot from doblu's review:

http://www.doblu.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/starwarsmenace13430.jpg

and here's the only other screenshot they took from that scene:

http://www.doblu.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/starwarsmenace13315.jpg

By the way, here's that shot of Palpatine I was talking about:

http://www.doblu.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/starwarsmenace12404.jpg

Oh, and while I'm here, shots like THIS ....

http://www.doblu.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/starwarsmenace934.jpg

.... are why I wish George hadn't gone digital for Clones and Sith. That shot looks beautiful and has a look you can only get from using anamorphic lenses and 35mm film.

Well I finally sent my DVD special editions and PT to the charity shops and have now the PT on blu-ray.

I'm still trying to get the lowest possible price for the OT:SE:2011 set.

I know I probably should have got the complete saga set but I just couldn't with that awful cover and it works out cheaper getting them individually.

I'm only getting them so I can wave them around should anyone accuse any of the projects on here of being piracy. I doubt if I will ever watch them. if I want to watch these films screwed around with I will watch Frink's versions.

The jokes are less bizarre.

I've got to reduce the amount of stuff I have for the eventual relocation of Chateau Bingowings. So they had to go.

I'm having to make some hard decisions about VHS tapes too.

Some I've replaced with optical discs which are lighter and take up less space, some are just going to have to go and I'm not even sure if the charity shops want them anymore.

Bingowings said:

I doubt if I will ever watch them. if I want to watch these films screwed around with I will watch Frink's versions.

The jokes are less bizarre.

 Glad to hear it and thank you, I think. ;-)

Don’t know if this has ever been noticed before (if so I was never aware), but I’ve just discovered a visual change on the blu-ray for ROTS: added moss on the roof of Yoda and co.'s platform on Kashyyyk. I just happened to notice this so my guess is there are probably a few more small alterations like this.

Also, I think the DVD is cropped ever so slightly. But I bet that’s been noticed already.

Somebody, sometime, on a thread somewhere on this site was using something to run two versions of the movies and this thing, whatever it was, pointed out visual differences between them. It showed up as different colours and it looked quite odd.

I remember that the changes to the roofs were pointed out there, along with a few other tiny alterations - an explosion or something had been tinkered with.

I really don’t remember this very well but I swear I didn’t dream this…

It’s so weird that it was changed. I mean, I get why, that roof looked like shit before. But that’s hardly the only CG object in the film that looks like shit. How did they decide what to fix? Was it just that George randomly pointed that out?