I don’t think it’s “finished” Wazzles.
I mean, you’re probably right, but he has at least claimed to have finished it. I’m trying to be a little careful though, since Mike is a controversial figure round these parts.
A controversial figure? How so?
Let’s not, please.
This is not based directly on a 70mm print. AFAIK nobody has a complete 70mm print, but certainly we’d be interested if one turned up, particularly for Star Wars (mostly for the audio) and Empire (for the audio and video). What we do have is in-theatre recordings (mono) of the 70mm mix, which tells us what the content differences are, and the fact that the Dolby surround encoded stereo mixes are closely related to the same four-track master used to create the 70mm mix. The 70mm mix was a 4.2 mix, which doesn’t quite align with the 5.1 home video standard, but it’s what we have, and 5.1 represents it well IMO.
So with a little audio archaeology, a little technical whiz-bangery, and quite a lot of audio skill, hairy_hen put this together, which is a reconstruction of the 70mm mix, but not literally the 70mm mix itself. But knowing the care that went into it, I trust it’s pretty close, and it’s my favorite audio track for Star Wars.
Similarly, the 5.1 mixes for Empire and Jedi are based on the same surround encoded stereo mixes being related to the four-track master used for the theatrical six-channel mixes. The difference being that we have no references for the 70mm audio mix for Jedi, and the 70mm mix for Empire requires the 70mm video (it would not sync with the 35mm video, and has unique audio we’d only be able to get from a print), so the six-channel audio we have is much closer to the stereo tracks in terms of content. These are more of tasteful upmixes than reconstructions, although hairy_hen did put some serious effort into improving the LFE channel, so they’re not simple upmixes either.
My SE knowledge is limited, but IIRC the 97 mixes are pretty good, but they introduced a bunch of crap in 2004. Some of those things, like the swapped surrounds, were later fixed. But a lot of the crap remains, and no SE mixes have measured up to the 97 mixes since.
On the other end of the quality spectrum, the Persian dubs are now as complete as I can get them. They’ll require an update to Project Threepio to cover the extensive sections that remain undubbed.
Not here that I know of. More likely there’s something lie that on thestarwarstrilogy.com
I rarely get feedback – none on the Swedish yet for sure. There are a few contributors here who’d like feedback, but most people just want subs and then run when they have them. Unfortunately I think the quality of subs found online is pretty low, so people have low expectations and don’t have anything to say unless they’re really bad.
I’ve synced the 2011 Czech Blu-ray dubs, to replace the early nineties dubs in my collection. These turned out really well and are the nicest despecialized audio tracks I’ve done yet.
I’ve also synced the Farsi dub for ROTJ, and I’m now dreading having no other audio projects to do except the Farsi dub for Empire. These pirate dubs are really not great, and are woefully incomplete. I swear Empire is half in English, just from the scenes they didn’t dub. But it’s the only Farsi audio we have, so I’ll do what I can.
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Yes, you can create an MKV from a Blu-ray. If you mount the ISO, you can add the big M2TS file into MakeMKV and it’ll convert it to an MKV. IIRC you lose chapter data, but video and audio should both come through.
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When you’re color-correcting, usually you’re aiming at some sort of reference. So if you agree with the target, you generally agree with the correction aiming at that target.
Not sure what the thinking for each version was exactly, but I believe 1.3 targets previous home video releases. So if you’re trying to rekindle the glory days of Star Wars on home video, that’ll scratch that itch.
I believe from what others have said here that 1.4 targets low-fade prints. Those collector’s prints that have better colors than home video (more so for Jedi, Star Wars and Empire prints faded like crazy). So if you’re targeting what a rare private 35mm showing may have seen decades after the film originally screened, 1.4 is for you.
1.6 uses color theory, math, and a little subjective fine-tuning to approximate what an opening day print may have looked like. Not low-fade, but no-fade, but you have to trust that the math works. If you’re targeting a 1983 theatrical showing, 1.6 is for you. The flat colors were a subjective attempt to re-create what some believed were Jedi’s theatrical appearance, but it’s that part I don’t like much.
I’ve hated the colors of Star Wars on home video since before there were special editions to hate, so that’s why 1.3 leaves me cold. I prefer 1.6, then Despecialized, then 1.4, and 1.3 isn’t even in the running. None are perfect. But color isn’t everything – I usually opt for Despecialized anyway for the extra fine detail, but again, different priorities will yield different preferred versions.
Question about versions and color preferences. What do you think about version 1.3? I see you prefer 1.4 or 1.6 respectively in recent posts, so I sought those out. For whatever reason, to my eye, 1.3 looks better to me than those two. 1.6 looks a bit muted, and 1.4 to me looks a bit “all over the place”. With side by side comparisons, some scenes are incredibly blue tinted, some are really yellow, higher brightness and saturation overall it looks like in 1.4. In 1.6, it looks subdued and like there’s a sepia tone filter on it or something (in my layman’s take on it).
1.3 to me (by looking at the video in MPC-HC on my TV via my computer) looks really pleasing. Skin tones, colors, brightness etc, it all just looks great. I find 1.3 does look a bit “cool” and reminds me of the laserdiscs, which I think I like for this film. Though my TV is set to the medium “normal” color temp. I found a thread where DrDre’s work is compared to Sanjuro’s work, and in those screen comparisons Sanjuro’s look really dark and a bit subdued color wise. But they don’t look that way in my player with my TV settings etc. And all three of these are being compared on the same screen for me. So I’m a little confused, but overall, just curious to hear your thoughts on what makes you not rank 1.3 so much etc. Thanks.
(And naturally, all three would make fine viewing, just trying to articulate my take on comparing. Kudos to all involved)
If your displays aren’t specifically calibrated, they are almost certainly distorting the colors they receive. So 1.3 on one uncalibrated display will look completely different than 1.3 on another uncalibrated display. In other words, if your displays aren’t calibrated, nobody can even begin to say what will look good on them, so we can’t make recommendations. Once you calibrate them, then you can do some fair comparisons. The other trick is, if 1.3 looks good on your current display, but then later you need to get another display, only calibration will make sure it still looks the same on both displays. Ultimately it will save you time and frustration, but it is an upfront cost. A professional calibration makes a big difference. Even settings ripped off from rtings can get you most of the way there, sometimes. The default settings for TVs are usually (but not always) way too bright & way too saturated, sort of a lurid showroom mode designed to attract attention in the Costco aisle, not to look good in a living room.
I think 1.6 represents the original “opening day” color grade best, but I agree DrDre went a little too flat & drab with it for my tastes. 1.4 is more vibrant, but I feel it represents the feel of older “low-fade” filmstock from that era that had already lost a lot of its yellow. 1.3, eh, I really don’t care for it at all. But like I said, throw it through the randomizing effects of an uncalibrated display and maybe it’s better that way.
The 4K projects have caused some confusion in this regard – i.e. if you want one sort of color correction, you go with 1.4, but if you want another sort of color correction, go with 1.6, and so on. All of the 4Kxx “versions” are at least potentially active branches.
Despecialized uses version numbers in the more traditional sense. You pretty much never want the older ones, because the only active branch is the latest one. If you’re just interested in a changelog, you might have to dig through the discussion threads. Otherwise, it’s always “Problems in the previous versions were found and fixed”.
Harmy’s even joked before that his latest revisions are “the films as he originally intended to make them, and he has no interest in making older versions available”, ironically echoing a certain someone.
You can use the Ultimate Introductory Guide in the first post of the discussion threads to get the current ones.
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Regarding color, the latest version of Despecialized is version 2.7, which I believe was released in 2016. Its main goal was to tone down some of the extreme Tech IB greenish yellow, so it might be right up your alley.
Current versions are: SW2.7, ESB2.0, ROTJ2.5. ESB and ROTJ are both very solid. SW sadly still has some pretty big issues, but Despecialized is still my go-to version.
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Lots of preservations typically include only a portion of Project Threepio – the SRT files, because they’re considerably smaller. I sent you a PM with a link to the complete current project.
Again thanks to ArdaYcln, we now have Persian/Farsi dubs. These are apparently unauthorized pirate dubs, in the style of the original Turkish dubs, where instead of voicing over the English soundtrack, they replace the English dialogue and filled in the background music and SFX to match. In this case, they did a much better job of blending with the rest of the film… some of the time. In fact, I really wonder if they really did somehow use a voices-free soundtrack for some parts of the films, but then use really out of place and mismatched audio for other parts. It’s a weird mix, at least in terms of technical execution.
The sync was pretty haphazard but it’s much improved in the despecialized versions, and unfortunately there are missing sections, patched in with English. Those will be covered with Persian titles-only subtitles in the next version of Project Threepio.
At the moment, only Star Wars is synced, and available in the usual places. The other films are being worked on.
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I export everything in rec709. To be honest, all this hdr stuff is giving me headaches. Not just for Star Wars but at work too - there, at least, we have a dedicated support team for this stuff. 😀
For what it’s worth, it’s possible use Rec. 2020 without any HDR. There is a benefit to it, albeit small. Some commercial discs do it, and (UHD) player compatibility is not an issue.
The downside is that you’ll be inviting questions like “Why didn’t you do HDR?”. But to be honest, those questions are going to happen regardless!
Thanks to ArdaYlcn, I’ve got another Turkish dub, and this one will replace the one in my current collection.
The old despecialized dub was great, except for one issue. The Emperor scene in Empire Strikes Back was missing, so initially it was filled with English, then eventually I filled it with a different pre-SE dub. But Vader’s voice in that scene still didn’t match the rest of the film at all, and the overall quality difference between the two sources was obvious and annoying.
The new dub is the 2015 iTunes dub (despecialized, of course), and it’s complete (finally!). And unlike some other Turkish dubs, it’s not missing the score, and Chewbacca isn’t dubbed, so it’s pretty faithful to the films in that respect. What I notice most about this dub is the voice matching. For the most part, they found actors who sounded very much like the original actors. So many dubs get Leia very wrong, but not this one. And in some moments I thought “Billy Dee Williams speaks fluent Turkish? Wow!” Luke is cast a little younger than most dubs. This makes it easy to distinguish between him & Han (which can be an issue on some dubs), and the younger voice really goes well with the young Mark Hamill in Star Wars. But it doesn’t quite work as well in Jedi IMO.
I’ve asked ArdaYlcn to do some quality checks on this first, and then it will be available soon afterward.
EDIT: Also, this new dub will require new “titles” subtitles, which will be included in the next Project Threepio release.