Belbucus

I’ve hit a little small bump in the road and thought it wouldn’t hurt to post here to see if anyone could help get moving again.

I’ve finished patching and cleaning up the mono mix, begun synching it to the ‘93 mix, and I’ve come across a situation that I had not anticipated. There are a number of examples within sections that have been properly synched, where the dialogue has been positioned slightly differently. I was initially re-aligning them to the’93 as I went along – until I checked one such example against picture, and found that the mono version lined up with the lip movement significantly better than the ’93 (this does not come as a surprise, knowing the history and timeline of the two mixes). It’s clear at this point, that I DO need to come up with some way to have a video reference running in synch as I work, to verify when I should synch audio to audio or leave it alone.

So my question is this: Does anyone here have the means to easily convert just the video from the GOUT DVD to a Quicktime file (or multiple small files)? In this format, I can import it directly into ProTools as a visual reference. The resolution would need to high, as in most instances I am trying to synch to the mouths of the actors – occasionally in a long shot. But it could be divided into as many small files as would make it manageable.

(This somewhat out of my area of expertise, so if this is a huge undertaking, I apologize and - never mind!)

For what it’s worth, I had a chance to compare the DVD to the Laserdisc last night. To me, the video looked virtually identical with regards to everything except sharpness and noise. That said, it would seem that it would still benefit greatly from the treatments many have been applying to the Laserdisc sourced material. This admittedly being well out of my realm of knowledge, I’m curious as to whether much of the color/brightness/contrast correction efforts undertaken thus far can be “transposed”, substituting the DVD video as the source? If so, has anyone revamped their ongoing preservation projects with this approach in mind?

And finally, is there anyone out there who still sees the Laserdiscs as being a preferable video source for any reason?

This is a follow-up to a previous post -

http://www.originaltrilogy.com/forum/messageview.cfm?catid=9&threadid=5739

• for fun mostly, and perhaps of minor historical significance. Associated audiofiles posting now at alt.binaries.starwars. Many thanks to Moth3r for assistance in making this available.

What we have here is a comparison of the DC ’93 mix to the original 70mm 6-track.

In the left channel is an “in theater” recording of a 70mm engagement from 1977 at the Loews Astor Plaza in New York City, with occasional patching from another 70mm recording at the Loews Orpheum. The quality is not great and there is peak distortion due to the shortcomings of the cassette recorder used. The very beginning of the Fox fanfare and the end credits music are missing, but it is otherwise complete and 100% authentic.

In the right channel is a mono fold-down of the ’93 mix from the Definitive Collection/Faces laserdiscs.

The idea of this little exercise (for anyone who might care) is to demonstrate the documented similarity of the two, and to identify the additional material that was layed in at the ’93 mix session. I was quite surprised at how many more small details were added than I had previously noticed. I have noted “timecode” addresses for each. The sync is not perfect, but close enough for the intended purpose.

Minor note: There are two brief sections where the tracks do not line up. Both are due to modifications/repairs to the ’93.

The first is at 6:36 for about 2 seconds and includes 3PO’s line: “You’ll be deactivated for sure” where the audio in the ’93 goes mono and slightly “lo-fi”. I never noticed this before I “put this under the microscope”. I guess there was a problem with the main source and they opted to do a quick fix.

The second occurs at 1:09:53 involving a 3 second shot of the droids on the Death Star (featuring 3PO’s line: “That isn’t very reassuring.”). This was a problem with all previous video issues - both the picture and sound quality dropped noticeably, as if the shot had to be replaced from an inferior source. This was fixed for the ’93 version, and I’m guessing the sound was remixed but the placement of elements was positioned slightly differently.

Additions to the ’93 mix:

2:15…EXPLOSIONS

2:29…EXPLOSIONS

3:31…LOW RUMBLE *

6:49…LASER IMPACT

13:38…ELECTRICAL SPARKING

38:42…ARTOO VOCALIZATION *

45:16…CREATURE VOCALIZATION *

48:46…CHEWBACCA VOCALIZATION *

1:00:43 – 1:01:04…PLANET DEBRIS WHIZZING BY FALCON

1:01:14…TIE LASERFIRE

1:12:07…LASERFIRE

1:12:08 – 1:12:31…GLASS SHATTERS (8X)

1:16:18…LASERFIRE

1:16:22…LASERFIRE

1:17:31…POUNDING ON DOOR *

1:17:45…WATER NOISE *

1:18:19…POUNDING ON DOOR *

1:18:39…UNDERWATER MECHANICAL NOISE *

1:32:45…TIE LASERFIRE

1:32:53…TIE LASERFIRE

1:33:03…TIE LASERFIRE

1:47:15…TURRET LASERFIRE

1:51:12…TURRET LASERFIRE

1:53:15…EXPLOSION

• (Also common to the mono mix)

One last note: I found that the real-time counters on some media players (such as Windows Media Player) do not always track accurately when playing back mp3 files. If you do not seem to be successfully locating things at the addresses indicated, try opening the file with a different program.

Hi all,

First, I wanted to mention that I have in no way shelved the mono mix restoration I started some hundred years ago. It was postponed for a while to sort out the best transfer options and further derailed by an abundance of “real” work. However, I have been back at it over the past week and it is coming along nicely.

With this in mind, I would like to make an open query to anyone who might have knowledge of the following.

Referring to this thread:
http://www.originaltrilogy.com/forum/messageview.cfm?catid=9&threadid=5765&highlight_key=y

there is mention on page 2 by Vigo, that the earlier German language versions were based on the mono mix masters. Aside from the minor point of it being in a different language, this could prove to be a valuable resource, if as nothing more than a comparative reference.

If all of this holds true, what would be the best format on which this mix resides? Laserdisc (digital or analogue)? VHS HiFi?

If anyone has a good quality source for this, I’d be very interested in acquiring it.

Thanks in advance.

There have been various postings over time, commenting on the quality of the starfield backgrounds (or lack thereof) in the various official video releases. Those of us who saw it theatrically seem to recall something better. Many of the restorations here have taken steps to try to improve on this as well. Below is a frame from a 70mm print (courtesy of The Dented Helmut) that shows why they called it “STAR” Wars.

Full-Res

<span class=“Bold”>Please do not post images wider than 800px, thanks.
-Z</span>