CatBus

TV's Frink said:

CatBus said:

Hal 9000 said:

TV's Frink said:

I think we need a parroty thread in off topic.

 May the cracker be with you.

Agreed, the ST could really use a cameo by Sheriff J. W. Pepper.

 I guess I need to start that thread so you guys understand it has nothing to do with parrots.

It will by the time we're through with it. BRAWK!

Hal 9000 said:

TV's Frink said:

I think we need a parroty thread in off topic.

 May the cracker be with you.

Agreed, the ST could really use a cameo by Sheriff J. W. Pepper.

m_s0 said:

CatBus said:

Maybe he's hoping George will bid on it so that he can burn it.

Nah, he's way too busy ensuring Disney gets Ep VII right to bother with this sort of stuff.

He's got a fever, and the only prescription is more Jar-Jar!

Maybe he's hoping George will bid on it so that he can burn it.

Edited my post while you were posting.  You're probably right, we'll get a 4K SE release, so we can have just a little insult with our injury.  Doesn't figure into an OOT release at all, although it would maybe be a better source for our restorations.

darklordoftech said:

CatBus said: they ALREADY have "Star Wars" HD masters, no new scans needed.  They can milk that 2011 release via streaming/broadcast licensing indefinitely at no additional cost (I think they recognize that further physical media releases are not really going to go very far, but they probably attribute that to "our brave new streaming world" and not "our version of Star Wars blows").  To them, these 2011 films are Star Wars.  Why re-scan what you already have?

Are you aware that they already rescanned in 4K?

AFAICT that was already in the pipe before Disney came along.  Disney has done nothing, and could very well do nothing with that scan too. But you're right--they could pay to keep that project going since it's partly done, and then they'd have a 4K SE master for relatively cheap, which I don't think is very helpful in the whole OOT release department, but maybe it's give us some better raw materials for restorations.  Small favors I suppose.

Wazzles said:

CatBus said:

...and the only thing tipping the balance in favor of an OOT release is treating historically important films with respect, which Disney hasn't thus far indicated is much of a factor to them.

That's with their own properties, though, and even when they change them, it's mostly the same thing. There are no dramatic story differences of added effects, just digital color and animation. I see no reason for them to restore Star Wars in the same way, since it would be more expensive than just doing an IP scan and a conservative dash of DNR.

Oh, I agree they won't add further changes on the scale of what Lucas has done, because if nothing else there's no ego to feed.  But the fact is, they can get a Special Edition Blu-ray for a lot cheaper than they can get an OOT Blu-ray.  If the people in charge don't give a damn about film history, they ALREADY have "Star Wars" HD masters, no new scans needed.  They can milk that 2011 release via streaming/broadcast licensing indefinitely at no additional cost (I think they recognize that further physical media releases are not really going to go very far, but they probably attribute that to "our brave new streaming world" and not "our version of Star Wars blows").  To them, these 2011 films are Star Wars.  Why re-scan what you already have?

darklordoftech said:

RicOlie_2 said:

...The average person doesn't even know about the SE, never mind care about the controversy...

It's not a matter of what the average person thinks (most people don't remember the prequels and those that do think that "Sith" is Palpatine's race and call Anakin "Luke"), but rather it's a matter of if there are enought fans to make a difference in the sales and whether or not the average person has any desire to re-buy the blu-rays.

I have to agree with RicOlie_2 and others on this. As far as fans of the OOT go, there may be quite a few of them today, but there's fewer every year.  By the time Disney gets around to even considering an OOT Blu-ray release, the math behind such an undertaking may not actually add up (even if it does today), and the only thing tipping the balance in favor of an OOT release is treating historically important films with respect, which Disney hasn't thus far indicated is much of a factor to them.  I'd put the odds at less than 50/50 now and dropping every year it continues to not happen (until the copyrights expire and then the odds suddenly jump to 100%, assuming the sun hasn't gone nova by then).

I should note that I'm a pessimist by nature and I am occasionally pleasantly surprised.  However, if I thought there were decent odds on a respectful Star Wars release within my lifetime, I wouldn't be doing what I'm doing, so there's a benefit in pessimism.

Also, the odds vary depending on what you'd call an OOT release.  The odds are best on a release with the 1993 audio, and 1981 crawl, so even under my most pollyanna happy daydreams, we still need to hold onto those Laserdisc audio rips and 1977 crawl/flyovers for reconstructions.

unamochilla2 said:

How was the GOUT advertised back in 2006? Was it advertised as being the theatrical version of the films or the 2004 films with the theatrical versions taking the back seat?

I don't know about everywhere else, but around here (Pacific Northwest, USA) it was advertised as having the theatrical versions, period.  You wouldn't necessarily even know it also had the Special Editions included, which added, I believe, to the shock and disappointment people felt when the "theatrical versions" turned out to be lackluster bonus material rather than the main feature.

That said, I think that's due to the marketing people not necessarily getting the memo that the theatrical versions were to be treated like something you found on the bottom or your shoe.  They saw something truly unique and marketable about this particular release of the Special Editions, and they marketed the hell out of that aspect, to the degree that you'd be forgiven for thinking there was nothing else in the release.

Wow, 91GB! If you're looking for ways to break this up, you could do per-movie, or break it down further by per-mix-date.

Looking forward to hearing that digital theatrical Jedi mix (and many others, I'm sure)!

Don't minimize it.  Using "autist" as a derogatory term was simply outside the realm of basic civility.  While this doesn't excuse threats of bodily harm, it was the first punch, as it were.  The mods have spoken.  Chill, move on.

Although to be honest, A-words in general do seem to be a trigger for Easterhay.  I recall he also threw a complete wobbly when I used the word "astute" to compliment his son once.  True story.

pyrocles said:

According to Encyclopedia.com, citing "Women in World History: A Biographical Encyclopedia," Leigh Brackett's name is pronounced "Lee BRACK-it."

Thanks much, that's the one I was least certain about, at least in terms of getting close enough not to raise the ire of someone who knew the correct pronunciation.

I'll peek through encyclopedia.com and see if I can find others not mentioned elsewhere.

IIRC the issue people care about most with the theatrical Blu-rays is slightly lower detail that the EE's, but I'm not sure it's at all clear that projection prints like these would provide noticeably more detail--perhaps even less.  People certainly complain plenty about the colors on FOTR:EE, but I'm not sure these would provide any more help for correcting that than the existing home video transfers (EE DVD or theatrical BD).

In a perfect world with infinite time and money, I'd say go for it, but I'm inclined to say we should save our time and money for other projects where film prints fill a more pressing need.  I'm sure there will be differing opinions ;)

PM sent--sorry it's such a big download for two SRT files.  Thank you for the compliment, though!

PM sent.

DuracellEnergizer said:

TV's Frink said:

You forgot Gary Kurtz.

He's a bad mother--

Shut yo' mouth.

Pretty damned excited about this.

No. I can say with absolute confidence, no.

TV's Frink said:

I thought we weren't going to bring that up again.

Can't unsee it, sorry.

TV's Frink said:

Because some people shouldn't be allowed to use the internet.

You're probably not referring to our friend with the crotchless kangaroo outfit, are you?

I need a few drinks in me before I'm willing to do the Full Harmy.

Some have conspiracy-theorized that the GOUT went through an extra "add video noise" step to ensure it looked bad compared to the Special Editions. I don't think that's true, but it would provide an explanation.

deepanddark20 said:

I thought the idea behind their project was that the GOUT, even for all its flaws, is the best version of the unaltered trilogy that has thus far been officially released, but some comments made in this discussion are making me think otherwise

AntcuFaalb already answered this pretty completely, but I wanted to add that most of the issues with the GOUT are fixable, and indeed are fixed in our preservations.  The colors can be corrected so that they're even better than the JSC.  You can replace the lossy '93 stereo GOUT audio with the lossless theatrical audio of your choice.  The only thing you can't fix is the DVNR--and even though the DVNR is occasionally awful, for most people that's not enough to counteract the resolution advantage of the GOUT, or other advantages like the theatrical crawl, etc.  Most people, including myself, do consider the GOUT to be the best official release, but the point is arguable, depending on your priorities.  And frankly, the fact that it's arguable at all shows that there are very serious problems with the GOUT, because a half-decent DVD release would have been hands-down better across the board.

Wazzles said:

So I'm just curious, is it really worth it to pay $5k for a Laserdisc player? How much more quality could you possibly pull out of a Laserdisc? Isn't it still going to top out at lower quality than DVD? I mean, Laserdisc is awesome, but not THAT awesome.

Not worth it to me, no.  But everyone has their priorities (and budgets).

For Star Wars, the Laserdiscs would top out at less than DVD-quality, but remember that the DVD we're talking about (the GOUT) also tops out at less than DVD-quality, so it's closer than you'd think.  And since the DVD has issues other than resolution where it's bested by some Laserdisc releases (DVNR, color accuracy, theatrical audio, uncompressed audio), a Star Wars fan could quite reasonably prefer a Laserdisc to that particular DVD, and sometimes you just have to have the best.

It's not really that Laserdisc is so awesome, so much as that Laserdisc was awesome for its time, and some DVDs are so bad that the Laserdiscs can still compare quite favorably to them.  Kinda like when there's a Blu-ray release that's so bad people still prefer the DVD for that particular title.  Doesn't happen a lot, but it happens.  The GOUT is one of those releases that's so bad the previous generation media format is at least arguably better.

Also, for your amusement, look up MUSE Laserdiscs, which the $5K X0 can play, not that this applies to Star Wars.

ww12345 said:

CatBus said:

Won't anyone think of the Sorbians?

 The Sorbetians?

Not a typo.