Jonno

Glad to hear it! Doing a bit of seeding myself here and there, hopefully folks are pulling it down at a decent enough speed.

By the way, there are 3 easter eggs to look out for ;-)

Great discs - my first introduction to fan-made Star Wars DVDs. Of course the quality can't compare to later efforts (or indeed the GOUT-sourced stuff) but they're a lovely evocation of what Definitive Edition DVDs might have looked like.

Darth Venal said:

Adywan, why not do a commentary track with someone else, so you'd find explaining things easier? One-handed commentaries often lack spontaneity because the person is just monologuing.

That's a really good idea - some of the best professional commentaries are basically just focused conversations, and flow really nicely because there's someone else there to continually provoke comment and discussion.

With this project being a somewhat one-man operation it might be hard to include an actual collaborator, but someone sufficiently well-versed in the alternate versions would be ideal for asking the right questions...

Thanks Cassius!

Thanks, that's really useful. Lovely work.

Just out of interest, what's the font used on the 'Only for persons...' part? That would need editing if other certificates were used (and that text layer seems to be rasterised).

One small issue, very anal and probably not even accurate - isn't the film title normally justified to the left on ratings cards?

Fantastic news on the next Alien movie:

http://www.totalfilm.com/news/ridley-scott-s-directing-the-alien-prequel

Oh boy, I was afraid someone would ask that! ;-)

As with the last disc, I'm sorry but I simply don't have the time to dismantle, convert and rebuild the project myself (it's even more demanding this time, since there are even more elements involved).

I do see we have a guide on this subject right here: http://originaltrilogy.com/forum/topic.cfm/Doctor-Ms-berGuide-for-Full-PAL-to-NTSC-DVD-Conversion/topic/10111/. I haven't looked into it, but if anyone wants to try it for those in NTSC land they have my full blessing (and I'm very happy to supply menu PSDs or anything else that might be useful).

ThrowgnCpr said:

if you need someone to upload to RS, let me know.

That would be great, actually - do you want to PM me your details so I can send you a disc?

I really liked the cover you made for the first three volumes, by the way!

V said:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=64qf6cRijYU

Yep, that's the one. Closest thing I've found to the thing that I remember.

I quite like having fantastical childhood recollections - memories get much less creative as you get older ;-)

Just in case you really are trying to make a serious point...

From his posts it's clear that the OP meant scary in the literal, rather than wacky and ironic, sense.

Actual songs are only ever used in celebration or for light relief - 'scary' isn't even close to being a factor.

But there are certainly plenty of scary score cues. I think the creepiest is the one that accompanies Boushh/Leia's sneaking around Jabba's palace and reawakening Han. The tension doesn't break until the helmet comes off ;-)

Crikey, now I have a lot to live up to! :-)

Ok, I'm burning some copies now to send out to the initial recipients tomorrow. Hope everyone enjoys the disc, and of course feedback would be most welcome.

Cassius76 is on 'wide distribution' duties, so I'll leave him to drop some euphemistic hints when he's ready!

C3PX said:

Jonno said:

I'd just like to state here, once and for all, that a SONG is a piece of music with VOCALS. The term does not apply to instrumental music, such as film scores.

 

Sure, he did just say, "Scariest star wars song?" in the title of his thread, but in his actual post he wrote,

what is the scariest star wars music/song/track to you?

I think this sufficiently proves he knows the difference between song and instrumental music.

Considering that there are hardly any actual songs in the Star Wars universe, let alone scary ones, it's clear that he considers the terms to be (at the very least) interchangeable.

But don't get me wrong, my little rant wasn't intended as a personal attack on the guy - I was more despairing of a prevalent misconception that I've encountered again and again wherever film scores are discussed.

I'd just like to state here, once and for all, that a SONG is a piece of music with VOCALS. The term does not apply to instrumental music, such as film scores - piece/track/cue is fine, but not song.

Now please pass this on to the rest of the internet k thx.

I was hoping we'd find something like that via this thread, but nowt as yet. Googling for 'BBFC' images is frustrating too - you'd think they'd be more commonplace!

Where'd you get your Rank ads, by the way? Off Youtube, or do you have a better quality source?

I hope no-one really does do that. Assuming that most young kids are shown Star Wars for the first time by a parent or older relative, you'd hope that they'd have the sense and good taste to start with the 'real thing'.

Maybe I'm being too charitable of modern parenting ;-)

The worst part is that the big reveal is far more mystifying than the 'mystery' itself. I'm still not entirely sure whether 'normal' Palpatine's transformation into 'haggard' Palpatine was caused by damage or merely the dropping of a disguise...

About time too…

On the disc:

James Cameron: A Director and His Work
Excerpt from VISUAL FUTURIST: The Art & Life of Syd Mead
Vintage preview and review from Entertainment Tonight
Excerpt from The Greatest Ever 80s Movies
Trailers and TV spots
Alien War featurettes
Aliens: Ride at the Speed of Fright

If all goes to plan the authoring should take about another week, then I’ll start sending out some discs. If you’re in a position to PiF, start a torrent or upload to a newsgroup, PM me your address and I’ll see you get a copy.

Thanks to everyone who contributed materials - I think this disc mainly consists of material from TB1971, Meedermow and Rijir, but if you provided anything on the list and I’ve forgotten you (it’s been a couple of years!) let me know and I’ll make sure you get a credit.

And thanks to Ash595 for yet another cool cover! I hope everyone finds this disc to have been worth the wait.

This may have been mentioned before, but continuity-wise it's baffling that there were THREE types of battle droids (of which presumably thousands were built) around at the time of the Naboo blockade and Clone Wars, but none have ever been seen since. Did they all self-destruct at the end of the war?

I'd have preferred that an existing design, like IG-88 or this guy had been reverse-engineered for the prequels - in the case of the CZ droid I'm not even sure we see a working model in the OT, so it might have been cool to see them in their heyday as part of a formidable army (they sure look scary enough!)

Monroville said:

I guess that is the good thing about computers now... you can take the VHS and enhance the colors so as to have the saturation you like while retaining the detail that you want (short of the same video being put out in higher definition).

Indeed - and the key phrase here is 'the saturation you like', since without further reference sources (or the opportunity to consult the director / DoP) you can't really pin down which look was actually intended.

Of ALL the writers to work on the new Who, Moffat has most consistently demonstrated that he understands what the show is about - the pathos, wit and great science fiction ideas in his episodes have been pitch perfect throughout.

He'll do ok.

First official photo of the new Doctor in costume: http://www.bbc.co.uk/doctorwho/medialibrary/images/wide-screen/karen_matt_1440x900.jpg#

Orinoco_Womble said:

Aleksbmw said:

Thinking Pinnacle Miro DC30 plus, probably going to be reclocked (separate precision crystal oscillator with its own power supply) for even more accurate A/D conversion.

A mate of mine has a DC-30+ and from what he tells me M-JPG does not re-compress well for MPG2/DVD.  Also, I think he mentioned something about the colour space being limited or not accurate or something.  I think from memory he mentioned that the RT2000 might be better as this used pretty much uncompressed M-JPEG and might not give the same sorts of problems.

 

I'm amazed there's anyone still using a DC30! Are there even post-Win98 drivers for it? And I don't think it will plug into any software later than Premiere 5 (though I guess it does have a standalone capture app).

A fully uncompressed capture card sounds like a must for this kind of work - there was recently a brief discussion about them in the tech forum.

By the way, the RT2000 was only DV and MPEG-2. And wasn't supported by an OS after Win2000. Wow, my head is just filled with information about obsolete crap!

budwhite said:

Technical mumbo jumbo. But it's interesting. Thanks for the info.

 

And he was using layman's terms, too...

Love the cover, d_j. I might have to steal that label idea for my VHS-style covers - I could never fully decide what a DVD disc made in 1983 would look like, but that's a very good start!

Moth3r said:

Not sure exactly what you're trying to say here. My old £20 card, bought in 2004, can capture uncompressed.

Only that I didn't think there was such a thing as a cheap uncompressed analogue capture card, but I was obviously wrong :-)

£20? That's mad... I wouldn't expect to find one of those half-arsed USB capture boxes for that amount.

I was doing most of my own analogue transfers around 2004 - looks like I missed a trick! I used a DV Storm card, which was a great editing accelerator but could only capture DV - I've subsequently discovered how limited that format is (particularly if you're encoding again to MPEG-2). You live and learn...

The problem with the current range of cards is that DV is usually considered good enough for SD capture - you want uncompressed, which is something else (and until recently quite uncommon on the more affordable hardware, so the Intensity Pro is quite a bargain if it will do the job for you).

I don't see that the MXO2 will give any particular advantages in your case - it does pretty much the same thing for SD analogue sources (Matrox themselves did a comparison: http://www.matrox.com/video/en/products/mxo2_mini/intensity_pro/ which suggests that the benefits are entirely in the HD arena).

The company that I work for is a dealer for both, but SD processes only get the most cursory testing here (and only ever in PAL). Shame you're (presumably) not in the UK, or else we could have organised a try-out - it sounds like the work you're doing is considerably more interesting than most of our existing clients!