Info: Toy Story on 35mm, and other early Pixar films for that matter... — Page 3

vexedmedia said:
The most shocking of the comparisons is the frame of Woody shining the flashlight upon the Baby-doll-spider in Sid’s room. The Viewfinder frame reminds me instantly of how terrifying I remember that scene being as a kid. It presents the horrific monster of Sid’s creation with stark contrast, the room being dark and the flashlight almost overblown. Imagine what this would look like in a dark theater.


However in the Bluray frame, the contrast is lost to an almost completely illuminated background with the flashlight not doing much to call attention to the Toy we can already see.

Wow, I’ve never seen the bluray of Toy Story, so this is really sad to see. You’re 100% right, the brightness of the bluray totally ruins the shot. So much for a reveal… I saw the movie in theaters once and watched the VHS a ton of times and definitely remember the movie looking more like these Viewmaster shots.

Found these 4x5 Toy Story transparencies of eBay. Think of it like a 35mm slide, but larger. I don’t have the Toy Story Bluray so maybe someone who does could find what these two scenes look like. Also, is the Laserdisc letterboxed wideescreen? If so, I think it would be the best way to restore the film by using the Lasrdisc and DD’s color matching tool to fix the BD (if the Laserdisc wasn’t brightened for home CRTs like so many home video releases were back in the day).

This is an interesting thread for me as a huge Pixar fan like myself.

First, I suggest you soften the image just a bit. Toy Story was originally rendered at a resolution of 1536x922, and this lower image size actually hid fuzzy textures that are seen in the 1080p version.

Second, I think I’ve got frames from the letterboxed Laserdisc version since some of the bonus features from that release (I think) made it into the DVD and Blu-ray releases. Here they are:
Image #1
Image #2
Image #3

Third, you can get answers from actual Pixar employees online. Craig Good, who worked for 30 years at the studio since its Lucasfilm division days, frequently answers questions about many topics through the site Quora, including ones about Pixar. I can’t guarantee a reply, but you might get an interesting answer from him. Just don’t be too pushy about it, he doesn’t take too kindly to troll/useless questions.

While the official digital transfers of the film are too bright, The ViewFinder slides seem off, too. The blacks are immensely crushed, the overall color temperature is too cool, and there’s a slight magenta tint.
Kind of reminds me of a certain Blu-Ray…

Avatar_Emil_Borg said:

I found a 35mm trailer for “A Bugs Life” on eBay: http://www.ebay.com/itm/35mm-A-BUGS-LIFE-trailer-Walt-Disney-Pixar-film-cells-/171709924684?hash=item27fab5854c:g:f6MAAOSwNSxU-yXq

Perfect. That’s a good one, but can’t you try to create a digital transfer of that trailer like Pixar did to the film?

Any progress?
or has this project been forgotten

I just stumbled across this thread, and it’s never dawned on me that the film master represented a unique version of the film. My only gripe previously was with the few changes made by the re-rendered version of the film in 2010. To which I will re-iterate: the worst part is the new Disney logo that clips out part of the original film. Then there’s little animation errors. One that I found on my own is that they swapped out the textures for Janie so her dress will randomly change colors in one scene (another example of color grading as well):


And it’s also a different experience when the models are in such crisp high resolution as they’ve never been before, but the textures are now noticeably low res. That one’s a little more of a nitpick, though.

Originally, I just wanted to see the original theatrical render of the film on Blu-Ray. The original resolution was just a touch more than DVD could handle, and we never got a Blu-Ray release of that original version before it was replaced by the re-render. If I’m correct, the Toy Story 10th Anniversary DVD from 2005 is the best presentation of the original render. Which is why I think it’d probably make the best basis of a complete color grading overhaul since it wouldn’t have those aforementioned issues with the re-render and it would be closer in resolution.

On a related note, the new-ish UHD release of Toy Story in 4K has a notably different grading. To my eyes, it looks closer to the film version, but that might just be me.
https://highdefdiscnews.com/2019/06/06/toy-story-4k-uhd-blu-ray-review/

well if it is to say.
toy story 4 got a 35mm release.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/274752634813?hash=item3ff8887fbd:g:w88AAOSwFxZgbzPo

also i found TOKYO MATER in 35mm!
https://www.ebay.com/itm/114782511695?hash=item1ab992224f:g:8eMAAOSwbmJgElHM

Hi, I’ve just found out that an original 35mm print of Toy Story has ended up in collector’s hands and is being sold on eBay:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/185700414684

Interesting for sure, but I wouldn’t know the first thing about scanning and restoring a film like this. I wonder if there’s enough interest in the community for such a project. The condition is generally good, except it seems to have shifted pink a little from the pictures.

I found a 35mm print of Toy Story on eBay. All 5 reels. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/185700414684

SlashMan said:

Hi, I’ve just found out that an original 35mm print of Toy Story has ended up in collector’s hands and is being sold on eBay:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/185700414684

Interesting for sure, but I wouldn’t know the first thing about scanning and restoring a film like this. I wonder if there’s enough interest in the community for such a project. The condition is generally good, except it seems to have shifted pink a little from the pictures.

It would be amazing if someone could get a 4K scan of this print because the original version of the film has been slightly altered over the years.
For example: There are a few shots in the original film that had motion blur in them, like shot of woody waking up and screaming after sid burning his head. Whereas as the version on Disney Plus doesn’t have any.

Not to shill my own post, but you guys will definitely want to see this: https://originaltrilogy.com/topic/Toy-Story-on-35mm-Exciting-news/id/103540

TristAndShout64 said:

Not to shill my own post, but you guys will definitely want to see this: https://originaltrilogy.com/topic/Toy-Story-on-35mm-Exciting-news/id/103540

Shilling is warranted. Congratulations and good luck with this.

SlashMan said:

I just stumbled across this thread, and it’s never dawned on me that the film master represented a unique version of the film. My only gripe previously was with the few changes made by the re-rendered version of the film in 2010. To which I will re-iterate: the worst part is the new Disney logo that clips out part of the original film. Then there’s little animation errors. One that I found on my own is that they swapped out the textures for Janie so her dress will randomly change colors in one scene (another example of color grading as well):

I know, 4 years late, but um… that error with the doll having different clothing can also be found on the 2000 Ultimate Toy Box Collector’s Edition DVD transfer, which pre-dates the re-render seen on the Blu-ray by 10 years
https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/1019804101682405386/1232759026501292143/Screenshot_20240424-1122592.png?ex=662b488f&is=6629f70f&hm=c64c08eafd05c93af3697263a0805cc33601fd0fda711aa4ea6986f4fa9057f9&

Yeah, the only place to find the correct render on disc is the 3D version.