StarWarsLegacy.com - The Official Thread — Page 44

I would say 2-3 weeks per shot.  But I also do them 3 or 4 times - there are many ways to approach a given shot and sometimes you can't tell until the very end which was the best way.  Sometimes it all looks fantastic and then falls apart somehow in the grading, when dynamic range is maximized and colors pop.  And I really want to choose the best of the approaches to get the best results, so it takes time.  Plus, in cases where you just have a lot of rotomattes to build, etc., that's labor/time intensive.

I have one set of custom tools wrapped in a container called Beelzebub - those were developed by guys who were strictly against commercial enterprise; pure-research guys.  I have to honor that, plus keep asking every year if they've changed their minds yet. :)  But I have absolutely ZERO software snobbery - I will throw anything at the shot that works best, and sometimes it's surprising.  Sometimes some little plug-in in After Effects might handle a particular issue better than a $10k piece of software. On the commercial software front, I use Cinnafilm's Dark Energy Pro, DaVinci Resolve, The Pixel Farm's PFClean, Nuke, After Effects, Photoshop, and Imagineer's Mocha Pro among others. 

I have modules for registration, tracking, temporal sampling (stabilizes color, flickering), deblurring, color matching, "channel math" for using aspects of one part of an image to drive aspects of another part, and a couple others.

I've found time in between projects to work on it, though I've taken off the bulk of this year just to hone things, thanks to some sponsoring.

_Mike

EyeShotFirst said:

It is sad that they were so lazy with their restorations at Lucasfilm, when they have much better resources.

Well you also have to consider that restoration technology has come a long way since 1997 ;)

acemt said:

WOW!!!!  Amazing Stuff.  I have been following -1 and have downloaded several other fixes for the original including KK's and Harmy's.   Your videos show an incredible, almost 3D quality that I can't wait to see.  Hopefully, it will be availabe someday soon.

After reading through all of the pages, I cannot see anything that tells when this might be available, other than when it's done it's done.  Any updates as to when it may be available?  I would love to DONATE.  Amazing stuff my friend.  Just amazing!

I suggest a closer reading of the pages. If you did that, you would know that it is not going to be released in any form barring some deal with Disney.

In fact, perhaps Mike could edit the original post to explicitly state the principles underlying the project, so as to cut down on this sort of thing.

I couldn't release it if I wanted to, having been warned explicitly by the powers-that-be.  Nonetheless, I am and will continue do everything I possibly can to get that to happen, but until that's the case, the work still needs to be done - time is the enemy.  And I will continue to try and help other projects however I can. Believe me, this completely and totally and utterly and entirely bums the shit out of me, too.   But you know what? Life is crazy.  Let's just keep the faith and be patient, stay positive, let the Force do what it's gonna do.  Plenty of miles to go yet.

So when will the Fanboys-style break-in at Mverta's place happen? ;)

schorman13 said:

So when will the Fanboys-style break-in at Mverta's place happen? ;)

I think if someone was dying of cancer, he'd just let them in.

Yes I suppose I could just leave the back door open one day... :) 

I'll bring the Panasonic S-VHS camcorder.

:(

I miss that poor old thing. I wish it wasn't broken.

mverta said:

I couldn't release it if I wanted to, having been warned explicitly by the powers-that-be.  Nonetheless, I am and will continue do everything I possibly can to get that to happen, but until that's the case, the work still needs to be done - time is the enemy.  And I will continue to try and help other projects however I can. Believe me, this completely and totally and utterly and entirely bums the shit out of me, too.   But you know what? Life is crazy.  Let's just keep the faith and be patient, stay positive, let the Force do what it's gonna do.  Plenty of miles to go yet.

So Mike, would your contacts be aware of any plans to release a newly restored version officially, if such a project was under way at Disney?

A couple unfortunate things happened either around the time of, or because of, the sale to Disney: My LFL legal contacts moved on to greener pastures, and I no longer have dependable access to The Archives.  I don't know if a lot of people know this, but during the sale, the assets in the Archives were either sold, or loaned, or put under the control of (can't remember which) a 3rd party (a non-profit, if memory serves), so you can't just get in there like you used to if you had official business.  I've done a lot of work with licensees - Master Replicas, efx, Acme, for example - and it used to be that when we had a project, or were researching a project, or even CONSIDERING doing a project, we could get in there and get references, etc. and a couple of big projects that were well underway just had to stop until the dust settled and/or new rules were established to get access again.  To this day all I've heard is that the new controlling entity is still nervous or skittish or something about all that, and the projects remain in limbo.

My friends at Disney are not directly in-the-know about the Star Wars property, and were only able to tell me that a 4K restoration either had been or was being done; they couldn't find out it if was the OT or the Flaming-Shit-Storm version.  We can assume they were talking about Reliance's restoration, so on that front I know no more than anyone else.  

My hope is, of course, that Reliance has done a jaw-dropping restoration of the OT in 4K, which we will...get... in...4K...some...how?  On some future 4K medium?  I dunno.  But either way, that ain't happening soon for tons of reasons, so I decided to just press ahead!

mverta said:

A couple unfortunate things happened either around the time of, or because of, the sale to Disney: My LFL legal contacts moved on to greener pastures, and I no longer have dependable access to The Archives.  I don't know if a lot of people know this, but during the sale, the assets in the Archives were either sold, or loaned, or put under the control of (can't remember which) a 3rd party (a non-profit, if memory serves), so you can't just get in there like you used to if you had official business.  I've done a lot of work with licensees - Master Replicas, efx, Acme, for example - and it used to be that when we had a project, or were researching a project, or even CONSIDERING doing a project, we could get in there and get references, etc. and a couple of big projects that were well underway just had to stop until the dust settled and/or new rules were established to get access again.  To this day all I've heard is that the new controlling entity is still nervous or skittish or something about all that, and the projects remain in limbo.

My friends at Disney are not directly in-the-know about the Star Wars property, and were only able to tell me that a 4K restoration either had been or was being done; they couldn't find out it if was the OT or the Flaming-Shit-Storm version.  We can assume they were talking about Reliance's restoration, so on that front I know no more than anyone else.  

My hope is, of course, that Reliance has done a jaw-dropping restoration of the OT in 4K, which we will...get... in...4K...some...how?  On some future 4K medium?  I dunno.  But either way, that ain't happening soon for tons of reasons, so I decided to just press ahead!

Even if they do a 4K version of the OT, there are a dozen reasons that this project is more accurate/faithful/important.

Well as I understand it, there are a lot of complications regarding Fox's distribution rights to Star Wars, plus there just isn't a broad-base consumer delivery option for 4K... plus, I mean... we don't KNOW that there's any change-of-heart regarding allowing the OT to return, we just all hope that greed/profit/nostalgia/whatever has a chance, now that George isn't in sole control of the property.  

But also, as I've said many times, knowing what I have to do to get these kind images out of great prints and wonderful scans, then even with original elements it would require a restoration unlike any other. It would take more time, more people, more money than I've ever heard done to a commercial release... I mean, there's no way around it. Even with original elements, the hardest shots are shit-tons of work. I dunno... we have no reason not to stay hopeful and positive, but also no reason not to hedge our bets.

For sure.

Well, actually, this is why I'm afraid the restoration still may not be the OOT - 4K Star Wars in any form could be a powerful motor for early-adopters.

If they put out an original version, everybody would buy it.  Very few people would reject it simply because it didn't have the Special Edition crap in it.  But huge numbers of us WOULD reject it if it was SE.  The lack of offering of the OT has never been because it wouldn't sell.