Harmy

towne32 said:

Cool, looking forward to the grindhouse.

Do you mean one setting for this scene? One per reel? One for the film? Is any automated cleanup being done for the Grindhouse (guessing no, given the name)?

More or less one per reel, although there were some scenes I had to tackle separately, which tells me that better settings could be found, because each reel should be internally consistent, but like I said, I already had to do a lot of hokery-pokery with the colors to get them looking like this. Someone with better color correction skills could probably do a better job over-all.

GrizzlyAdams said:

I’ve tried as much as I can to read through as much of this thread as possible, but can anyone explain what’s going on with Luke’s shirt during the Obiwan ghost scene on Degobah? Is this something we’re finding out was present originally but then fixed later?

Yes.
BTW, I’m sure he’s talking about this:

OK, here’s a comparison gallery for the Rancor scene of RAW LPP scan vs v2.5 vs Grindhouse.

http://picsurge.com/g/ow51Oo

The grindhouse is one set of settings for the whole thing and yes it does have quite a bit more shadow detail but I included a few shots that were sourced from the BD in v2.5 (already brightened) to remind you that that is what I had to match the black levels of the LPP inserts to, so as not to make them stand out like a sore thumb. There is certainly room for improvement and I was planning on starting on this scene from scratch in v3.0 anyway, because it needs manual rather than automated cleanup to avoid artifacts, but the fact that I had to match the black levels of the Blu-Ray source is definitely something to keep in mind when looking at these. 😃

Oh, also, if you open these two in separate tabs and switch between them, you can very nicely see that the matte painting was recomposited in the '04 (or maybe '97) version:
http://s3.picsurge.com/rrGUtW/Sequence 01.00_05_32_10.Still007.jpg
http://s3.picsurge.com/rrGUtW/Sequence 01.00_05_32_10.Still008.jpg

I will later probably post some comparisons between the raw LPP scan, the Grindhouse color correction and the v2.5 35mm shots.

I agree! That’s why I was trying to explain that my reply was perhaps a bit snarky because it was first written in response to the rude FB comments and then only copied here. I welcome constructive feedback and I do actually agree, that some of the shots are a tad too dark - it just pisses me of when someone on FB says it looks disgusting just from seeing a few images in the gallery.
I remember when putting a new release out was such a joyous thing for me, because this was the only place it got discussed and this place and people here are frickin’ awesome, and now I just need to learn to live with the harsh reality of the social media mayhem 😄

Yeah - I wasn’t posting just directly in reaction to your posts Jaxer, and as I already said on facebook, thanks for your feedback. It was just that so many people were saying the same stuff and many were saying it in not a very nice way (mainly on facebook) that I decided to post about it here and there too so as to avoid more people reporting the same issues (or non-issues as the case with some may be) - not that it worked. 😄

Actually, R2 wouldn’t have been completely monochrome - they really had a model with all black panels that they used to shoot blue-screen shots with. And those shots were shot normally in color.

@Laserschwert: Definitely! Not quite as much as I did with the GOUT but there are some shots that could certainly benefit from it.

@darthsidi - Sure, I understand - and I may have gone a little over-board with the darkening of that particular shot and will probably adjust it in the next version. I just don’t think it’s as bad as people make it out to be.

It’s a bit darker but blacked out? There’s no detail whatsover lost in his face.
The blockade runner shot is restored from 35mm.

I just looked at my master for Grindhouse and I must admit that I figured out some better settings for recovering shadow detail from the LPP there but when I was working on it, v2.5 was already finished and encoded. Well, v3.0 should be even better 😉 I still maintain, that whatever black-crush there is, it’s mostly pretty minimal and shouldn’t be very noticeable, unless comparing to some other source.

Search tehp for harmy or despecialized - they are all in one thread uploaded by Jipp.

Oh, right, well LPP is a type of film stock, developed in the late 70s/early 80 that doesn’t fade when stored properly, so it has the original colors even now. But BD is sourced from the original negative, which has much more detail than a print you would have seen in a theater (this 35mm LPP print is one such) and the optical copying of the film also caused the contrast to increase, which meant more crushed blacks and blown-out whites than the original negative (or the inter-positive print, which was used for the GOUT master). But in short, those black levels are probably pretty accurate to what would be seen in a movie theater.

NeverarGreat said:

Harmy said:

http://picsurge.com/rrGUtW

Ahh, that picture of Leia at the Ewok celebration is tripping me out! Did they cut out her face for the Blu-ray?

LOL, yeah, I noticed that. And actually, no, in v1.0, I put a cut out video of Leia’s HD face from other frames over the GOUT footage used for the missing frames - it looks trippy for sure when swiching back and forth with the real thing like that but on it’s own it actually blended really well and because most everything else was out of focus, putting in Leia’s face in HD really helped to make the transtion less obvious.
I did the same thing with Luke later, which is why in v1.0 he’s smiling with his teeth in that comparison (Still291).

dogdoctor said:

Now I didn’t go and post the numbers of every file that had some loss of detail, I tried to just pull out the ones that seemed to be most affected.

Yeah, I know. Most of the 35mm shots have slightly crushed blacks compared to the previous version and the GOUT but it’s only a small part of the movie and it’s nowhere near as bad as some people make it out to be. Someone on facebook said the new version looked “disgusting” because of the crushed blacks. Seriously.

This should really put the blue-tint thing into perspective:

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/161419/picture:0
http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/161419/picture:1

Look at that and tell me if v2.5 has a blue tint 😉

Another thing I’ve already heard from several people is that the droid torture scene now has a blue tint.
That’s just not true - I think it now has very nice natural colors with a hint of blue from the lighting, where the old version had a strong sepia tint. This should really put it into perspective:

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/161419/picture:0
http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/161419/picture:1

Look at that and tell me if v2.5 has a blue tint 😉

So, let’s try again 😄

Harmy - I definitely see what you are saying with regards to many parts being lighter, but in some frames, even if you lightened a portion of the frame, you really lose the shading detail in the blacks (if I am correct in that is what is defined as black crush).

For some comparison frames:
Stills: 57-58 - loss of detail to Luke

This is one of the recomposited shots (pretty obvious when you look at that comaprison) - when they were recomposited, they were also brightened. It’s supposed to be dark.

Stills: 149-150 - loss of detail to emperor clothing, architecture, and Vader’s helmet.

Again, this shot has been recomposited and is restored using LPP scan - pluss the detail loss is minimal and there’s actually some detail that wasn’t visible on the BD.

Stills: 155-156 - smaller ship is absorbed into space

Again, LPP sourced shot - detail loss is minimal and actually the gradient of the space background is less crushed.

Stills: 181-182 - loss of ship detail behind Luke.
Stills: 183-190 - crushed detail in vegetation shaded areas

All of these are also LPP shots with some minimal dark detail loss but huge gain in fine detail.

Stills: 223-224 - loss of architectural details, emperor’s robe detail

Another recomposited shot replaced with LPP.

Stills: 241-242/245-246/243-244 - loss of Vader lower mask/chain patterning detail

Also LPP source.

All in all, exactly like I said - 99% of the movie is brighter than v1.0, not to mention the BD.
A few newly despecialized shots are marginally darker but it’s nothing as tragic as some people make it out to be - there’s usually minimal shadow detail loss and a huge gain in fine detail, or it is dark, because it’s supposed to be so.

dogdoctor said:
For some comparison frames:
Stills: 57-58 - loss of detail to Luke
Stills: 149-150 - loss of detail to emperor clothing, architecture, and Vader’s helmet.
Stills: 155-156 - smaller ship is absorbed into space
Stills: 181-182 - loss of ship detail behind Luke.
Stills: 183-190 - crushed detail in vegetation shaded areas
Stills: 223-224 - loss of architectural details, emperor’s robe detail
Stills: 241-242/245-246/243-244 - loss of Vader lower mask/chain patterning detail

I’m very confused by the numbers you posted - they don’t match your descriptions (eg. still 149 is the 2.5 image of a space shot and 150 is a v1.0 image of Stardestroyer bridge).

But judging from what you write, most of those are shots that come from the LPP print, which has higher contrast than the BD and it is therefore very difficult to get more detail out of the black in dark scenes.
Some may also be shots I darkened intentionally to hide artifacts.

EDIT: Sorry, I see you were using the file names and I was going by the numbers in the online gallery.

Yes and BTW higher contrast means more crushed blacks and blown-out whites, not less
And the scene with R2 and 3P0 certainly doesn’t have a blue tint - it has very nice natural colors with a hint of blue from the lighting, where the old version had a strong sepia tint.

Somehow a lot people seem to be suffering from the delusion that v2.5 somehow has more crushed blacks than v1.0 and some even said than the official Blu-Ray and I just can’t figure out why. There are a few shots that are darker than v1.0, most of the time because they were darker in the original version and v1.0 still used the SE versions but 99% of v2.5 is brighter than v1.0 and way brighter than the official BD. You can’t use the GOUT to judge this, because it’s washed out and these old home-video releases were usually made extra bright.

It has less crushed blacks, as in the blacks are less crushed.

He’s definitely wrong in that v2.5 is darker than v1.0 - there’s a couple of scenes in v2.5, which are a bit darker, because from what I can tell from the 35mm LPP print and Puggo’s 16mm print, they were originally darker but generally v2.5 is definitely brighter and has less crushed blacks.
Actually, here’s a comparison gallery showing v1.0 vs v2.5:

http://picsurge.com/rrGUtW

For best comparison, I recommend downloading the whole gallery and viewing it in full screen mode in your image browser.

Did you try demuxing first?

evman182 said:

Just out of pure curiosity, if the subtitles were extracted from a 35mm print, why was timing for putting them back in taken from the 16mm print? What’s wrong with the timing in the 35mm print they’re extracted from?

Nothing. But unlike the 35mm scan, Puggo’s 16mm trasfer just isn’t a huge clunky 4K file that would slow down the entire timeline if put onto it to check for timing - it’s just a matter of convenience and the results are the same.

Also, just to clarify, the subtitles weren’t just re-created based on the 35mm scan - they were literally extracted from it in 4K letter by letter.

Did you look at the full res version? It’s not just the picture from the comparison gallery - I highlighted the difference.

Full size

Finally, here is the comparison gallery for ROTJ v2.5:
https://goo.gl/photos/xuSSHRfn9aPFduKAA