It's another case of every source being different here. The 35mm print is green, the GOUT is purple, the Blu-ray is pink. And the Senator is red, as far as I can tell:

This is a still taken from the video which is very dark from the outset, so I'm not sure how much to read into this. But it does seem that it has a very strong pink or lilac shift in whatever case, with the shadows remaining quite greenish yellow. I'll post a third pass, but it'll have pink in it for sure.

JEDIT: Here it is.

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/56174

It's kind of a cross between the GOUT and the Senator coloration. That's quite enough hassle for one shot.

So here's where I go a bit insane. Is it too much to ask for Lucasfilm to do as good a job on their high definition release as they did with their standard definition release?

I worked so long on the DVD version of this scene, never even suspecting that the Blu-ray would be worse. So here's what I did: The negative1 video has the most detail here, so I placed that into the shot, color corrected the whole thing, and rendered the whole shot in 1080p.

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/56007

JEDIT: 2nd pass at this shot: http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/56117

Yep, that's one reason why I didn't want it to be so accurate. Not to worry, I'm still in the process of setting up a workflow, so everything will probably get another pass before it's all said and done. I realize now that I need a histogram in the editing program, so the software will change soon. Incidentally, working in 1080p is sloooow!

I probably won't switch to this program, but has anyone here tried Davinci Resolve? I would have downloaded the lite version to test, but it's incompatible with my system.

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/55748/picture:0

A second pass at the last screenshots. Chewie is now more accurate to the photo, though not necessarily to the scene.

bttfbrasilfan: That looks almost spot on to the photo in my opinion. I wouldn't want the skin tones to get any greener than the photo however, looking at the skin tones in the rest of the scene. The contrast is probably too high in my version though.

pittrek: Is this in reference to the last three screenshots? Han's armor is quite bright, but on my monitor all the detail is still there.

Here's what I see in the last three pictures: In the first one of Han and Chewie, the lights behind Chewie are blown out, obscuring some of his fur. This is probably the most severe visible loss of detail that I can see. Some of the colors are blown out in the histogram though, now that I look at it in Photoshop. I really wish Premiere Elements had a histogram function!

fmalover: What details have been lost? Nitpicking is necessary in order to keep me on my toes! ;)

Having just worked through a (almost) shot-by-shot correction of the control room scene, I begin to appreciate the effort it took Harmy to do his correction. And that's only 1/30th of the film! I just compared my version of the scene to Despecialized, and they're not all that different. I bumped up the saturation on the Despecialized playback, and they were quite comparable in many ways. The saturation levels may be the biggest difference between them, other than a slight bluish-green tint on Harmy's version which is very characteristic of the Blu-ray and is remarkably difficult to remove. I may be overzealous in removing it as some of that could be accurate.

You_Too: This project has a similar history. I spent the better part of a year, on and off, working with the problems in the DVD in preparation for the comprehensive work and getting to know the film. Everything has the same seven layers of correction even before I work on individual shots.

Thanks frank!

There are some projects made by OT members which should help this project along, but which ones to use? I'm thinking AntcuFaalb's Pre-ANH Star Wars Bootleg for the original colortiming. Thoughts?

JEDIT:

Here are the last three screenshots from the control room scene which correspond to the Senator photos:

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/55562/picture:0

Almost every shot in that scene had to be isolated and corrected separately, but that scene is practically done...for now!

So here's how I'm thinking of tackling this monster: First I'll use the primary sources (the Senator pictures and video) to correct those shots, as I've started doing. I'll be able to use some of these photos to correct entire scenes (such as the control room scene above). However the majority of the film will have no primary sources at all, so it will remain unfinished until sources from a Technicolor print become available. There are several projects (such as the Legacy Edition) which should eventually provide excellent resources, so that work will wait.

There is something that I'm sure someone here could help with. My library of reference photos is lacking. Does anyone know where I could find color set photos, such as of Sir Alec Guinness or Harrison Ford in costume for example?

Thanks, I'm working on that scene right now, so it is useful. It's good to know that Luke had green hair in a version other than the Technicolor. Very cool. It would be good to have some version of the Special Edition and the originals (other than the GOUT) to compare.

New Screenshots: 1: Han Control Room, 2: Luke Control Room, 3: Final Shot.

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/55424/picture:0

A New Hope Technicolor Recreation v2 is available on MySpleen.

V3, which is a slightly more compact encode of V2 but otherwise identical, is also available via PM.

All requests for further changes will be directed to the trash compactor, to be used as food for the Dianoga. 😉

Downloadable Comparison Gallery (in progress)

A lightweight V1 is also available on Myspleen.

Original Post Follows:

Here it is; a shot-by-shot color corrected and slightly despecialized version of the Star Wars ANH 2011 Blu-ray!

The goal for this project is to correct the atrocious color of the blu-ray and adapt it to the look of a 1977 Technicolor film while at the same time using the 2004 German HD broadcast to remove the most baffling 2011 changes.

In addition, using other sources, I am fixing hundreds of individual color and luminance issues throughout the film including crushed highlights, miscolored lights and lasers, missing gradients, and bad individual frames. Essentially this is the Special Edition seen in the best possible light.

One reason that I am not performing a full despecialization is that this project will be the basis of Harmy’s fully Despecialized Edition version 3.0, so it makes sense to have an SE version of the film for those who want it or want to make their own semi-despecialized versions of the film. I am also interested in seeing what the added footage such as the Jabba scene will look like with '77 color.

The despecializations involve reverting the 2011 Blu-ray to the 2004 edition using the German HD broadcast, with a few exceptions. The reversions are:
-Returning R2’s jump cut roll in the Tantive IV secondary corridor
-Recreating the SE mountain removal in the '77 version of the Binary Sunset, since the Blu-ray has extremely degraded color and detail.

-Removing the ‘Ghost Luke’ homestead artifact introduced in the Special Edition
-Removing the rocks around R2-D2 in the Tusken Attack
-Returning the color of the degraded SE shots to their original color

-Replacing the 2004 recomposited Lightsaber effects with '77 film versions (The SE lightsabers often have incorrect colors and clearly use degraded elements to the point that the lightsaber effect is just a misshapen blob, making them impossible to correct without additional luminosity detail)

2011 Blu-ray changes that remain:
-The gray escape pod door is averaged with the original blue version, since the blue is over-represented in the Blu-ray
-The Han/Greedo shootout, since unlike the 2004 version they both shoot at essentially the same time, and a fully despecialized version of this scene requires Harmy’s skill and resources

Sources for this project are the photos and video of the Technicolor Star Wars projection in the Senator Theater, screenshots that Mike Verta has made available on his website, the 2004 HDTV Broadcast, Team Blu’s GOUT, Team Blu’s '97 version, Team -1’s Silver Screen Edition, Technicolor frame scans, and numerous set and costume photos.

Current status of project as of 5-25-18: Version 1 is available as a 20gb encode on the spleen and a 34gb encode through PM.

Project status as of 9-20-23: Version 3 is available via PM. Note that I consider this project complete, so there will be no further updates or any use of the 2019 digital version of the film, which has its own issues.

Questions, comments, complaints, nitpicking, over-analyzing, opinions, speculation, and wild theories are welcome.

Thanks, I will!

But I think that the time has come to move to a different thread. My goal was to find global settings that fix many of the problems of the film, and these have been found. It's a seven page word document right now, so I can post that here or send it to whoever is interested, just say the word.

Today saw a big test: applying these settings to the Blu-ray. The source is the 1080p disc, in all its glory. I'll let the results speak for themselves:

Fine detail:

Now the scene-by-scene (and shot by shot) correction can begin. Who knows when it will end?

This project has been in hibernation for a while as I figure out how it should continue, but here's a small update:

I've done a shot-by-shot correction of the Death Star explosion rather slavishly from the video of the Senator screening:

https://vimeo.com/82958022

Password: DS

Apparently the Death Star is quite blue in that shot. I suspect that the desaturation of the explosion for the DVD stems from a decision to make the Death Star a neutral gray, which then carried over to the explosion itself.

Comparison of the final shot:

Sorry about the lack of updates recently, there's been a lot of school and a lot of education happening.

I'd help out with this, but I'm not sure where to do that. I'm guessing people know this, but I found an old auction on Ebay from February which claims that the print was sold for 490 dollars. If this is the same one, the buyer will make a good profit. Here's the listing:

What, Palpatine was one of the only cool things about them. The prequels should have been from his perspective. It's not easy to hoodwink an entire galaxy, unless their representatives are complete idiots.

Oh. ohhh.

darklordoftech said:

Humby said:

darklordoftech said:

Anyway, the sequel trilogy can do things to compensate for the prequels. For example, Luke could say, "The Jedi used to believe in midichlorians, but we now know that midichlorians don't exist."

In my eyes, I would much rather have a PT plot point be ignored than try to be fixed.  A scene like this would take me out of the moment.  Memories of Qui-Gon and young Anakin, memories of Palpatine's silly create life speech, these would all come flooding back and seriously take me out of what would probably be a meaningful conversation about the force (the only place a scene like this could probably fit).  Overall, it just seems unnecessary, other than appeasing a few disheartened fans.

I don't mean to pick on your idea, specifically, but it was a good example for me to explain why I feel it is more important to let the prequels be, reference them only in a broader manner, and leave the details out.  That way, those who want to ignore the prequels can continue to do so, but those who enjoy the prequels aren't completely left out.

If you avoid dealing with one problem, you create more. For example, if you let midichlorians exist without mentioning them, you'd have to come up with a reason for the Jedi not bloodtesting people that they would bloodtest according to all logic. In case you're wondering, I do think that The Joker's non-mentioning in Dark Knight Rises is awkward.

Additionally, there are things that I WANT to be mentioned. For example, Palpatine's scheming.

Avoiding a problem may not work in real life, but framing a story to exclude awkward continuity issues is a good strategy in movies. A movie is like a dream in more ways than one. It need only be engaging and continuous in the moment. There's no reason for Leia to explain the nuanced reasons why she is leading the Death Star to the Rebel Base. It would simply slow the story down, and reasons can be invented later in the viewer's mind. There should be reasons for every action of course, but they don't need to be stated outright.

But surely you know that it was George's original vision to have everyone be purple-skinned aliens, don't you?

I did see this, don't know about the movie, but it's got that excellent technicolor look to it alright. It makes me sad to see films like Into Darkness and The Desolation of Smaug go with really harsh red and blue gradients instead of allowing the original colors shine through.

The Complete Saga Blu-ray has arrived! This marks the fourth time I've bought copies of the original trilogy. Luckily I got this one half-off, because I wasn't prepared to pay money for the prequels. Dirty rotten thing to do, making someone pay for that just to get the bonus features. Anyway, the project continues....

frank678 said:

just to be contrary, i prefered your first result! can you make two versions? one theatrically accurate one and then one with a green/yellow tint called the "limited edition/frank edition" or something

That's not contrary, I like the first one better as well. This is why I keep referring to the Senator photos, though they're probably inaccurate in several ways. They just look gorgeous. I'll try to match them, then pull it back to the other sources. The final will land somewhere between the available sources in terms of brightness and color.

Yeah, the the green was too heavy. Rendered a new one:

Incidentally, in this shot there is a single frame where Leia's face gets much more saturated. I would never have seen it if I wasn't going frame by frame, but it's in the Blu-ray as well. I wonder if it was in the original movie.

The green is for you Frank!

Well, and also for matching to the Senator photos, and, yeah.

Yeah, it's not particularly problematic, it's just that I'm trying to get a feel for the differences. Not a game changer by any means.

Just getting a feel for the Death Star interiors:

Same settings for both shots.

In preparation for working with the Blu ray, I thought it would be a good idea to determine in what ways it differed from the DVD. Looking at the pink flashes and the highlights, it seems to me that the DVD is actually better than the Blu ray. The Blu ray seems to turn the highlights red to a greater extent than the DVD, and in some cases the highlights actually have less detail than the DVD!

I used a screenshot of the Blu ray that I found online for this comparison. The highlights are clearly blown out in the Blu ray, and also in the GOUT for this shot, though I didn't include it in this comparison. Despecialized seems to fix this problem to some extent, but some detail has already been irretrievably lost in the Blu ray, such as in the bright part of Luke's hair and the ridges on his armor, so it's obviously not present in Despecialized in these places. I'll continue examining the Blu ray, but I'm disappointed that the DVD is a better source in some regards than the Blu-ray.

Pink removal:

I'd say your new attempt is quite an improvement, and probably not possible to get clean audio in a silent scene.

As to the amplitude change, I'm not sure it matters in any case. I used the Amplify effect in Audacity to make the volume of both tracks similar. The thinking behind it was carried over from when I was trying to cancel out audio by inverting the waveform of the copied audio track, and to successfully cancel the two waveforms they needed to be of equal height. Again, not sure that it matters when using Knockout, but I did the same thing to the Leia hologram speech and it seemed to improve the quality.