Charles Threepio

Could you send me the Chris Langham episode, too? Thanks!

Do you still have this? Thanks!

Has anyone been able to make a scan with the original 003 footage since this thread was last updated?

Not unless you get incredibly lucky like I did last year with The Magic School Bus. Plus, based on experience, you can expect to pay a pretty penny if you go down that road.

If this is still up, I’d like a link. Thanks!

I’m 21 minutes into the edit (nearly a quarter of the way through), and already I came across a brace of trouble spots: during the radiation incident, and just after the accusation scene nearly 20 minutes in. Both appear to be sourced from use of the laser videodisc release in the Italian print during moments that were altered for the second Director’s Cut in 2004. The first of these I was able to patch up quick and dirty with EbSynth and GIMP, but it still doesn’t look great. At this point, I’m starting to wonder if maybe I should put this project on hold until another full-color 35mm print of the studio cut or the first Director’s Cut surfaces.

I’d like a link, too. Thanks!

Oh, harder than a Divx disc, eh?

If someone could obtain the original closing credits along with John Milner’s original death date and get them scanned, I’m hoping to integrate them with the Blu-ray footage as part of my 1973 theatrical cut restoration, which I plan to start work, and a thread, on after I finish the 1971 theatrical cut of THX-1138.

I wonder if it’s any better than the theatrical version…

I’m upscaling using Avisynth and nnedi3_rpow2 with slight sharpening intervals to enhance the quality. Hopefully, I can beat George Lucas to the punch in releasing a 4K version of this, so that fans can enjoy it in 4K before the 2004 DC gets the 4K treatment.

Here’s a current list of my projects. The ones in bold are currently being worked on actively, or else are in active preparation to be made. The ones without links are pending and may have work started on them after I’ve completed or made sufficient progress on one of my projects.

1. Logo Preservation - unfinished project
2. KTP’s Best of the Worst (multiple projects linked within - 0 releases)
3. KTP’s The Marvelous Movies of Oz (multiple projects linked within - 0 releases)
4. KTP’s Carry On PBS (multiple projects linked within - 0 releases)
5. KTP’s Enhanced Speed (multiple projects linked within - 0 releases)
6. KTP’s Classic Performances (multiple projects linked within - 0 releases)
7. KTP’s Gold Standard Collection (multiple projects linked within - 0 releases)
8. Gold Standard Collection #1: A Fistful of Dollars - unfinished project
9. Marvel Studios 10th Anniversary Film Festival (multiple projects linked within - unfinished project)
10. Film Odyssey (1972) (multiple projects linked within - 1 release - on hold for the time being)
11. PBS 50 (multiple projects linked within - 1 release - on hold for the time being)
12. Civilisation (1970) - Original PBS Broadcast Reconstruction - unfinished project
13. David Macaulay Classics: Fully Restored - unfinished project
14. Toy Story (1995) 1.5K restoration in 3D - a WIP, v1.0.3 currently available
15. Koopa Troopa Productions presents the compleat Sailor Moon - unfinished project
16. Battle Angel Alita (1080p and 4K UHD) - unfinished project
17. The Magic School Bus in 4K (1994-1997) - unfinished project
18. Star Wars: Ultimate Edition - unfinished project - on hold for the time being
19. Casting calls for fandubs
20. New video format proposal - unfinished project
21. Gold Standard Collection #2: Akira: The Complete Experience (WIP) - WIP (November 2020)
22. Gold Standard Collection #3: THX-1138 (theatrical cut and first Director’s Cut) (a WIP) - WIP (January 2021)
23. American Graffiti (1973 and 1978 versions) - will create a thread for it after I finish the 1971 theatrical cut of THX-1138
24. A Bug’s Life (1998) 2K restoration - will create a thread for it sometime in 2022
25. For a Few Dollars More - will create a thread for it after I finish work on A Fistful of Dollars
26. Zillion - will create a thread for it after I finish work on Akira

Thanks. I’d finished with v1.0.2 of my Toy Story project last month and took a bit of a break from it, satisfied thus far with my progress; I plan to get back to it and work on v1.1 sometime this winter or spring, both to clean up visual imperfections and to start adding foreign language versions.

For Akira, I’m currently waiting on some very important materials before getting started with that one; however, I do have most of what I need for the project.

As for this project, I’m laying the foundations for this one as we speak and should have at least some of the 1971 theatrical cut assembled in Blender over the weekend.

I’m just starting work on a 4K THX-1138 restoration project. Unlike other restoration projects that cobble together the Italian 35mm print, the Director’s Cut Blu-ray, and the laser videodisc release, I’m going to use the Director’s Cut Blu-ray for the most part, and only splice in segments from the Italian 35mm print as necessary. I’ll also try and re-edit a text shot that resulted in the laser videodisc release being used at one point in that project, resulting in a rather noticeable flaw at the very start of the next shot, so that only the highest quality sources will be used.

I’ll do this in 2 versions. Initially, I’ll conform the Blu-ray, with spliced-in Italian 35mm segments as necessary, to the 1971 theatrical cut, which trimmed the scene with SEN and the children near the end and rearranged a few scenes in the middle leading up to THX’s imprisonment. Later on, I’ll do the 1977 Director’s Cut. Both times, I’ll retain the MPAA card at the start (the 1971 theatrical cut will use the GP card from Patton, while the 1977 Director’s Cut will use the PG card from The Evictors).

Restoration processing will be done with EBSynth, Blender (for color correction), and GIMP. I’ll also use GIMP to edit the text shot I’d mentioned earlier, and I might consider testing EBSynth’s potential for depth map generation (for purposes of 3D conversion) on the climactic chase sequence. If necessary, I might also attempt a color restoration of the black and white 35mm print I’ll be using as a guide for the 1971 theatrical cut.

I’m still waiting for a file of the original Japanese closing credits special feature to possibly use for this restoration.

I’ve been taking some well-earned time off, but I’ll get back to it soon, hopefully in the spring. I should have the materials to prepare a top-quality 1.5K French Canadian restoration by then, the next phase of this project. I might also take care of the most serious incidents of banding at the same time.

Chewielewis said:

No Crowdfunding

Well thats us out

That’s why I said “the wealthy among us”.

With everything the late Michael Jackson’s been in the news for in recent years, it’s highly doubtful that Captain EO will ever get an official home media release, let alone in 3D. So, it’s been left to the wealthy among us to take up the challenge of preserving this picture in all its original 3D glory.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/MICHAEL-JACKSON-CAPTAIN-EO-original-motion-picture-reel-4-16K-HDR-3-D/254752861804

OK, how does v1.0.2 look compared to the 4K UHD? Any honest opinions?

If Kino doesn’t fix the way the Theatrical Cut was cut this time around, too, I shall be very put off.

Nobody’s satisfied with the official colors of at least one release of all three? Fine. I’ll compile an 8K Ultimate Edition myself using the latest non-revisionist releases, as soon as I can find the time and resources to make such a compilation.

Based on the linked-to posts JonathanArthur19 showed me, I decided to scrap the coloring and try another one that looked more like the images in said posts. This will form the basis of v1.0.2, which I’m uploading as I type this. Those who got v1.0.1 will get v1.0.2 shortly, via DM; everyone else, please send requests via DM.

And those who watch v1.0.2, please give me your full honest opinion on how the new color correction looks, and what, if anything, I can do to fix any flaws you might detect; I strive to please the customer as much and as quickly as I can, because the customer is always right.

I wish I could. As it is, I could use some help on that front. At any rate, are the Viewmaster slides still up for reference on another thread?

I’ll work on the Gaussian Blur settings first, maybe tone that down to multiples of 3 instead of 5 as a starting point, so that the softening won’t look as intense. Again, my goal with the Gaussian Blur is to make it so the blues and reds are just slightly softer than the greens, as the green layer of 3-strip Technicolor was always the sharpest of the three color layers, historically speaking.

Thanks! I was trying to replicate the 3-strip Technicolor look, and so I intended for the blues and reds to look slightly less sharp than the greens (but just slightly). Also, in accordance with the modern technique, I wasn’t going to add the key layer (basically 50% of the green strip on black and white film), but it would’ve looked a quite bit blurrier without the key layer. So, I composited the key layer over the other three layers with a soft light blend (the green and blue layers both use the add blend) and reduced multiplication to 0.500.

As for the red layer, I gave it a hue of 0 and a saturation of 0.905; for the green layer, the hue was 0.333 and the saturation was 0.263; and the blue layer had a hue of 0.667 and a saturation of 0.482. All were in accordance with the values seen on page 6 of this paper, under the heading “A Spectrally Based Method for the Emulation of the Technicolor Process on Digital Images”.

Regarding the blurriness, I applied a Gaussian blur of 15 to the red layer, a Gaussian blur of 5 to the green layer, and a Gaussian blur of 10 to the blue layer, while leaving the key layer unblurred. If anyone has any better values for me to use for each layer, feel free to let me know.