Info: Theatrical AOTC Discussion Thread

Currently the sources that exist for AOTC are as follows:

-Centropy VCD theatrical bootleg

-Official DVD

-schorman’s HDTV preservation

-Official Blu-ray

-Theatrical DTS CD-ROM

Gentlemen (and gentle ladies), is it possible to recreate the theatrical version based on what we have available to us? Even if it’s only DVD9 caliber, too.

towne32 said:

No.

We need another source, such as 35mm scans, of at least two parts as far as I'm aware:

The speeder shot where Obiwan catches the lightsaber (to reinstate deleted speeders)

Anakin's mechahand not doing anything before the pan up during his wedding.

 That's what I was afraid of. I'm guessing we don't have any 35mm prints lying around here either yet.

towne32 said:

clutchins said:

towne32 said:

No.

We need another source, such as 35mm scans, of at least two parts as far as I'm aware:

The speeder shot where Obiwan catches the lightsaber (to reinstate deleted speeders)

Anakin's mechahand not doing anything before the pan up during his wedding.

 That's what I was afraid of. I'm guessing we don't have any 35mm prints lying around here either yet.

 I believe a potential sale was mentioned of the prequels on AmpsDeux. I may be misremembering, but Team Negative might also have access to a print for scanning down the road when their schedule is freed. 

Though, unless I'm mistaken, it's really only those two quick shots we need to get a hold of.

Yeah I think you're right. Thankfully it's only those two visual changes that need scanning. I don't suppose the film needs any major color regrading, does it?

towne32 said:

 I don't think it's as big a disaster as TPM and the OT (haven't watched the blu-ray all the way through). But it's a bit blue, right? I believe the HDTV/DVD version had good color.

 I'd like to see a comparison of the HDTV, Blu-ray, and kk650's regrade to kind of see where it is.

Also, we don't really have a central framecount for the theatrical version like the '97 SE does, so that puts us in a pickle.

Don't forget that the Tattooine garage scene had some added shots.  The shots before and after were trimmed as well, so they would need to be replaced as well.

Those two shots are available on the second disc of the DVD release (I don't remember exactly which video), but they were cropped to 16:9.  Those are the only shots that should affect the run time of the theatrical version.

btw, I would love to work on this if Team Negative1 has a scan lying around :)

Are you talking about the scene when Padme says to be angry is to be human?

Yep

Yeah the wipe would need to be recreated or scanned in there. I forgot there was a wipe at all until I went back to Centropy to look at it.

I don't think it was a wipe.  I'm pretty sure it was a regular hard cut.  It's just missing 30 or 40 frames around the transition.

Am i the only one that feels PT film transfers should be prioritized higher before they begin to deteriorate?

I thought only TPM was even done on film?

AOTC was filmed digitally but released on both DLP and 35mm projectors. Some people here suggested that the CGI was rendered at a higher resolution than 2002 DLPs could display (which is 1280x1024 with a 1.9:1 anamorphic lens). Note that the filmed elements were filmed at 1980x1080 with a 1:1 pixel aspect ratio and 3:1:1 subsampling (horizontal luma subsampling of 1440 pixels and horizontal chroma of 480 pixels). Essentially that's 1440x1080, and that was then cropped to 1440x800. But the release resolution for DLPs was 1280x1080.

Yes I remember the effect where Padme rolls out of the container in the droid factory looking pretty bad (and it still does), and when the clones are fighting the Jedi in the dust cloud it looked shocking (and that shot looks improved now on DVD/HDTV/BD).

The majority of the original effects could potentially been rendered in at least HD res, however this was for a 2002 release and so possibly some scenes could have been rendered at a higher resolution than others. Toy Story 1 was originally rendered at 1536 x 922, but in 2009 it was re-rendered at a higher resolution for re-release (at least 2K), including being rendered in 3D.

The Star Wars effects are obviously much more detailed than the "plastic" Toy Story effects, but I imagine it's a similar process that's probably even more streamlined, to re-render the film at a higher output resolution. While I can only speculate, I would think that the film transfer was done at a higher res than the DLP one, however some of the shots at least were probably not at the full resolution used by the majority of the 35mm version. I guess the only way to tell for certain is to get a release print and examine it!

I think I found his article: https://web.archive.org/web/20020604000533/http://www.suntimes.com/output/eb-feature/cst-ftr-ebert14.html

Sunday I was able to see the digital version, and Lucas is right: "Star Wars: Episode II--Attack of the Clones" is sharper, crisper, brighter and punchier on digital than on film.

This will come as melancholy news, I suppose, to the vast majority of fans destined to see the movie through a standard film projector. Although an accurate count is hard to come by, there are apparently about 20 screens in America showing "Episode II" via digital projector, and about 3,000 showing it on film. Lucas is so eager to promote his vision of the digital future that he is willing to penalize his audience, just to prove a point.

[...]

My feeling is that movies shot on digital video look better projected on video, and that movies shot on film look better projected on film. Of course every theater, every print and every projector is different, so results may vary.

What I dislike about Lucas' approach is that he wants to change the entire world of film to suit his convenience. Because his movies are created largely on computers, it suits him to project them digitally.

It seems he didn't necessarily say that Lucas made the film version deliberately bad, though.