Star Wars saga - Extra Extended Edition (1080p) (* unfinished project / WIP *) — Page 5

benduwan, thanks for the help, you are our “deleted scene” guru here! 😄

MWilson, you surely will take good care of the color reference; hope you could achieve good results.

Also, I can announce that MWilson is our official audio editor! Another little step toward the goal of this project!

I’m stuck with the color grading affaire… which one should I use? Take in account also that I discovered that EP 4 WOWOW has a different color grading than BD (more info here: http://originaltrilogy.com/topic/Star-Wars-color-grading-thoughts/id/52432/page/1#1019458)

^…^ said:

SPECIAL THANKS:

• benduwan - general “deleted scene” guru, his help is incredible!
• MWilson - our audio editor; he’s trying to colorize the b&w scenes as well
• pittrek - deleted scene provider, as well as guidelines to put them in the right place
• darth_ender - for guidelines and ideas for reinsert deleted scene back in the movies
• DoomBot - provided NTSC deleted scenes and DVD menus
• adiwan - made the EP 7 IMAX scene and kindly provided it
• ADigitalMan - EP 1 2 3 extended editions; used as guidelines and inspiration
• russian anonymous - EP 4 5 6 7 extended editions; used as guidelines and inspiration
• have I forgot someone, or something?!?

The “Russian anonymous” is called “martokc”, and can you please add me there? I gave you the info on the Russian Extended Editions. Also, you misspelled Adywan’s name.

Also, martokc recently made an updated Extended Edition for The Empire Strikes Back.

And there are two Russian extended editions both made by martokc for Star Wars and The Empire Strikes Back, one based on the 2011 Blu-ray and one based on the Despecialized Editions. He may also make an update for Return of the Jedi since it’s the only one on the entire saga which he never made a BDRip (720p) version of but only an HDRip (480p) version and he never gave it a Despecialized Extended Edition like the other movies in the Original Trilogy.

And he may also update The Force Awakens with the new deleted scenes on the 3D version.

So always keep an eye out.

I think you should copy martokc and do two versions of your Extended Editions (at least the Original Trilogy), one based on the original unaltered versions and one based on the 2011 Blu-rays.

benduwan said:
i think Jambe Davdar aka Jamie Benning would be a great help with this.
maybe he is the biggest fan with incredible knowledge of star wars.

Do you think he could be interested in this project? If so, please contact him.

that sounds good…😃
but i´m only a help with the OT (thats always the best parts) 😃.

Always a precious help. Indeed, it seems (almost) nobody loves the prequels, but hey, we are on OriginalTrilogy after all! 😄

Swift S. Lawliet said:
The “Russian anonymous” is called “martokc”, and can you please add me there? I gave you the info on the Russian Extended Editions. Also, you misspelled Adywan’s name.

Added and corrected, thanks!

About his versions: they are just one of the many “options” I have received for the OT - the others from benduwan, pittrek, darth_ender - so I have to study them all (literally) and decide where to put a certain scene; for example, in one a given scene is put here, in another there… which is the “right” one? I must admit it’s a question much easier to answer IMHO than “which is the right color grading?” 😄

For other episodes: I have watched EP 7 just once (shame on me!) but I HAVE to watch it again (and again); for now, I’m using martokc’s version for guidelines; for EP 1 2 3, I’m following ADigitalMan, but I have to decide where to put further scenes/shots - in particular, there are A LOT of small shots found on trailers to put back in the movies…

About OT two versions: I thought also of this possibility; but, as I wrote before, I thought to use BD as main version, and replace most offending scenes with GOUT ones, because, I think, there are some nice corrections made during the years, in 1997SE, 2004 and 2011 - but not many others; to make a “proper” version is beyond the mission of this project. The fact that there will be different versions of this project is still uncertain, but plausible.

A question for everybody: what do you think about the idea of using RaiTre color grading as reference for the OT version? http://originaltrilogy.com/topic/Star-Wars-color-grading-thoughts/id/52432#1018988
Final version will have better colors, less dull and more vibrant, and improved contrast and brightness; as alternative, I thought about GOUT, slightly corrected. For EP 1 2 3, just a slight correction to get rid of pink blanket; for EP 7, I thought to reduce teal&orange.

Opinions?

Color grading preliminary test - top HDTV regraded using RaiTre as reference, bottom HDTV untouched:

(Blu-ray will look like almost the same, by the way)

Good lord, that looks brilliant!

Further comparisons:

I used just the first part of EP5, because the rest should still be put in sync; color wise, difference of the regraded and the original varies usually from null to small; this is due to the fact RaiTre AR is around 2.0:1, so the automatic color matching script can’t be always 100% accurate; but it does a pretty good job, IMHO.

If there is some interest, I could manage to make a test clip - who knows, maybe also a new project with just color regrading… 😉

Even if nobody seems to be interested, I’ve just finished the fist test clip: https://fs03n4.sendspace.com/dl/0f3336501c02f18110e0bddda175a881/58556961332a536b/rfeeww/HDTV_Vs_RAITRE.mkv
Watched on my PDP, it seems to have just little bit of dithering problems, but I’m pretty sure it’s the display inherent nature; so, I need someone with an LCD (LED, OLED, or a superior PDP) that would watch and see if the problem is real; further test clip is in progress right now.

Some random considerations:

• RaiTre 1997 SE broadcast recording, albeit low quality, partially cropped and missing few frames, is among the only few DVB recordings that actually exist (G’kar and TB versions available for the whole OT, while Flunk and Reivax just for EP4) and the only with a different color grading; right or wrong, I don’t know, but to me, it should be investigated
• EP7 has an active image of 1920x800, hence a 2.40:1 aspect ratio; on IMDB, the theatrical AR is 2.35:1 (as it “should” be AFAIK for a 35mm anamorphic film); I tried to upscale it to 1920x816 (should be 817, but I wanted a mod4 vertical height, and just a simple rounded +2% size increase should preserve better quality during upscale process); it seems to be OK, as the untouched film, I should add… must it be “corrected” to have the same active image size of the previous episodes?
• EP2 and 3 were shot in digital, 1920x1080, then cropped to 1920x816; I wonder if there are somewhere the uncropped, open matter version - even I’m quite sure it is not possible, because probably the CGI effects, which are almost ubiquitous in both films, “should” be availabe just in 2.35:1 form.

Another test clip - this time is 100MB! https://fs11n4.sendspace.com/dl/b15b9cb51a9a18560339bea08d80c31e/585594b51adc219e/bk4uqp/HDTV_Vs_RAITRE_2.mkv

You could note that there are color “jumps” around some shot changes; this is due to the fact the two sources are not perfectly aligned temporally, so disregard this fact.

Not too much blue, at least! 😄
So, if the “too much yellow or pink” will be corrected, do you like them, or not?

This sound like a very interesting project, really looking forward to it. That ESB regrad looks alot better then KK650’s.

Ronster, please post the settings you have used, thanks!

Thanks Ronster! I’m aware there is still something to correct, but as a preliminary color test, I think it shows the great potential of this particular version, color wise. Of course, any help is appreciated! But, if someone would chime in with some AviSynth script, I’ll be more than happy to make some tests.

Meanwhile, I invite everyone to read this short article about Rai Tre and something more… you will find some interesting info there!
http://blog.sporv.com/the-strange-case-of-star-wars-rai-tre-broadcast

Waiting for your feedbacks!