No worries, no fears, the theatrical cut is still in play. I'm not going to do the extended cut but I still thought it best to start at the longest cut and work down. Cutting the TV cut down to the theatrical is a trivial thing, so a theatrical cut will happen; just after the TV
Aliens (Part 2)
So after cutting the Extended cut down to the TV cut (and adding the parts needed from the Theatrical cut) I decided I wanted to "fix" the Bishop scene in the hanger. For those who don't know. When the spacedoors are opened in the end of Aliens, Bishop grabs Newt and saves her from being sucked into the vaccum of space. In that scene you can briefly see Lance Henriksen is clearly sticking out of a hole in bottom of the set. Its been a famous error that Aliens has had from the beginning. Something you point out to your buddies. well for the BD, Cameron went back and had the hole digitally removed. It wanted to put it back.
Luckliy I had a recording of the old HDTV broadcast. It is from before all the BD's changes in colors, etc. Problem was the HDTV had logo at the bottom right.
Taking some advice from Doombot, I was researching how to do rotoscope in Adobe Effects to fix the hole under Bishop when I had an idea. I thought about Adobe Premiere and using layers and opacity. So I re-graded the HDTV broadcast to match the BD. I then layered them up. I turned down the opacity so I could match the frames spacial as much as possible, in keeping with advice _,,,^..^,,,_ gave me. The HDTV broadcast is 1.77 vs the 1.85 of the BD, so the HDTV has more top and bottom picture whereas the BD had more info on the right (the HDTV was a little more stretched and wrapped too).
So once lined them up, I got the HDTV broadcast and carved out the area where the logo was and lowered the opacity to 0 so the lower layer of the BD came through. And it worked as long as the color regrade. This was the simplest fix since the area of the logo is in the same place all the time. Problem was I noticed all the imperfections of the HDTV broadcast. Not as sharp, lower bitrate, etc. So I decided to reverse the procedure and have the BD as the top layer and bleed in the HDTV part. Problem is unlike the logo, the area to cut keeps changing. So basically it was like old-school manual rotoscoping, I cut the scene into each frame and manually craved out the area to add the HDTV part.
It worked pretty well. Only problem was the HDTV was still a bit pixealted, so Doombot re-grained the HDTV for me, I did the process again and it seems to be a pretty good match:
BD/BD with fix
I even found a mistake in the BD footage. When the computer guy painted out the hole in the ground he didn't fix the lens flare in one frame. You can see in this pic the triangle cut out of the blue lens flare under Bishop's armpit (and a shadow that doesn't make sense):
BD/BD with fix
Here is the fixed clip in motion:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LA2AJYXrD4c&feature=youtu.be
Aliens (Part 1)
After having a conversation with Stamper over on Fanres, he informed me that what I thought I knew about the TV cut of Aliens is wrong. Orginally, I thought that the TV cut was the Extended cut with the LV-426 removed. That is not true. The Aliens TV cut is a hybrid between the Theatrical and Extended. It contains all the emotional scenes (Ripley's daughter) and all the action with the sentry gun but none of the extra bits and pieces. Comparing it to the Extended cut here are the difference I can find:
-has Ripley's daughter scene (Her 11th birthday)
-no extra conference room lines (...its the view of this inquest...)
-missing Burke's extra lines (...saw the commercial)
-no extra scene in the Sulaco
-no extra Hudson lines (...knives, sharp sticks...)
-no extra Hudson motion tracker scene (Good one, Hudson)
-no scene outside with Ripley, Burke and Gorman entering the colony (Are you alright?)
-does have the robot sentry intro (But the good news..., without they really kick ass line)
-does have the discussion about the planning the barricades (..we put the other sentry here..)
-does have the scene of setting up the robot sentry guns (Fire in the hole)
-does have the scene of the guns scanning the hallways
-does have Ripley and Newt discussing Ripley's daughter (She's dead)
-no bee hives comparison lines (...bees, man...)
-does have first sentry attack scene (..its a shooting gallery..)
-does have the second sentry attack scene (maybe we got them demoralized)
-has the Ellen/Dwayne exchange
Couple of other interesting things about this cut. In this version the gun order is fixed. In theatrical prints, old VHS, old LDs when Ripley gets ready to enter the hive, she pulls down flame thrower from the wall, puts down a pulse rifle on the table, pulls a pulse rifle puts down a flame thrower. Like the Bishop hole, its a famous goof. The SE LD I think has this order too (maybe someone can check). The 95 LD definitely has the wrong order (theatrical order), same with the DVD and the old HDTV master. The TV cut has the correct order. The only other time that has appeared is the BD. So clearly Cameron had a lot to do with this TV cut.
Another interesting thing is while everyone seems to have their profanity removed or have individual words redubbed by other actors, all of Hudson's lines containing profanity are redubbed instead of the individual word. There is an audible difference in the lines. Is also sounds like Bill Paxton doing the lines not a replacement actor. I wonder if Cameron had him re-do the lines?
So I think instead of the Theatrical cut, I'm going to recreate the TV cut. Its just too interesting of a cut. And the Theatrical is easy to re-create from the TV cut. All of the violence is in the TV cut (chestburster, etc) as it was in the broadcast. I could preserve the TV audio but the main audio would be the LD PCM 2.0 from the extended cut. The only point of contention is the scene were Ripley says goodbye to Jonsey the cat is remove. Most likely for the profanity. I decide to keep this in the my project.
Ok some updates for those of you who haven't been following the threads on fanres:
Alien
Doombot noticed an error on a different project I was working on. It looked like detail and grain had been erased in my encode. Long story short. Using the file type I was created errors converting back and forth and destroyed grain. This also happened on Alien. So I went back to BD encoded it to a new AVI and started over. That fixed the problem but it means I have to regrade the movie again. That's not as bad as it sounds since I have all the regrade info for the original files, so instead of re-coloring I just need to re-apply the colors. Still it will take a few weeks to re-do.
Otherwise the soundtracks are finally all in sync and ready to go
The 16:9 HD master of Prometheus is a strange beast (no pun intended). I only caught the ending and made a quick recording of it (off the channel FX in the US). Unfortunately, it not so easy to say its crop or open matte, since many shots are cropped but others are totally recomposed. For example:
Cable broadcast/BD
All these shots appear to have the sides cut (barring a little elbow room in the last one). I thought initially that it was just the CGI shots that were cropped from 2.35 to 16:9 but I found live shots that were cropped and some CGI shots opened up. So I thought the whole thing was cropped.
Nope, there are many shots that are opened up but not just a simple opening of the top and bottom from the digital captured, they are totally recomposed. Some have more on the top and bottom but lose on the sides or some variation thereof:
Cable broadcast/BD
You can see that the recomposing is all over the place. Add a little of the bottom frame here, lose the right side of the frame there. What's clear is it wasn't random, it was very specific. Its kind of like a S35 re-composition.
What I don't know was whether the Imax was like this or not. They said they opened it up for the Imax digital but that may not be that simple. I also don't know if all HD masters are like this.
Double Post
That's right on the money Space Ranger, thanks for the help going to try it myself.
Sorry, for the late response guys. Been out of the loop with the OT for a few days. skoal, at this point this is more research for a project. I'm not actively working on a regrade at the moment. Got too many unfinished project at the moment, so I don't want to make any promises. I will get to it but it will be awhile.
Concerning the pink in the LD. Its a debate when you regrade if you should grade perfectly to the source or what's more consistent/looks better. I'm more of the to the source fellow, otherwise I'm imposing what I like best which is how we get into the situation of needing regrades. Having said that, the pink I think is just of weakness of the transfer equipment of the time and perhaps the print. I've seen it in some transfers of the age and would probably pare down a little of it. For example of the pics I posted earlier:
CC LD/BD/BD Regrade
I removed some of the pink to return the picture more towards the blue and white in my regrade test. To be sure there is still pink/magenta there but its lessened. I didn't want to push it all out but I'd probably take some more out in the final grade to get the panels closer to white. Certainly better then the lime green of the BD at least in that scene
Your comparison of the amount of available picture is interesting Space Ranger. Since the CC is a 35mm reduction, I expected much less picture then the BD. And yes those panels in the stewardess scene are brown over the BD's yellow. Your assessment of the hue is correct. Frankly, that wasn't to hard to fix. I still can't figure how to fix the green moon surface in the shuttle scene. Get it back to the brown of the LD.
Yes sir that's is the full picture frame, Spaced Ranger. Perhaps the differences arrive from CAV misframing the captainsolo pointed out.
I assume for calibration the color bars are only useful for the LD that they are on? Shame mine doesn't have them.
Looks pretty damn good, Commodore. I think you got it pretty dead on there.
CSchmidlapp said:
DoomBot said:
Youtube video blocked already, damn
Damn, will look for alternatives later and re-link.
Anybody know any that are good and HD?
Vimeo is an option but has a upload cap on free acounts.
Try dailymotion like the Team Negative guys. I'm really excited to see the results.
I've never heard of RE vision but now you have my curiosity. How well did it work color matching?
Well since no one had anything to say, let me just say this looks amazing! Its great to finally see the true colors of TGTB&TU.
The pink is built into the master for the LD. In fact its not uncommon to see a pink tint on older telecine masters from the late 80s and into the 90s. Much like its not uncommon to see green in HD masters today.
I definitely see green in the BD master. Anytime there is white it tends to be green, subtract enough on that green and you get close to the same level of pink of the LD master.
I think most of the pics of 35mm or 70mm/15 look more like the prologues colors then TDK's blu-ray:
Looks like a green tint with a little yellow thrown in.
CSchmidlapp said:
PDB said:
The Dark Knight's colors on BD is suppose to different from its theatrical run, quoting:
"On The Dark Knight Blu-ray transfer, the biggest error – by far the biggest error – its producers committed was the complete change of the film's original color timing. The Dark Knight was not copied with an optical printer. The original material – I held it in my hands – it was gorgeous. It was absolutely gorgeous. It was… I fell flat off my chair. (Laughs) The colors are so different compared to those that appear in the Blu-ray transfer. I've seen the Blu-ray once, and I've never looked at it again. "
http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=6885
Outside of that quote if I remember correctly didn't the IMAX preview on the Batman Begin BD look different color wise then what it looked like on The Dark Knight?
Thanks for this PDB, this was going to be my next line of enquiry.
Is this the same for Begins?
Will investigate further.
Anybody got or have a link to any 35mm frames?
Not sure what colors Torsten Kaiser was talking about in that interview. Its sad he didn't elaborate. Especially what "original material" meant. ?
I don't have the IMAX preview from Batman Begins handy so I can't make a comparison but I just found Xylon's old comparison from the AVSforum. I did remember people thinking it was odd that the preview had not only a different colors but also different framing:
BB IMAX Preview/TDK IMAX Opening
http://www.avsforum.com/forum/150-blu-ray-software/1089714-dark-knight-comparison-pix.html
Itunes Trailer/BD
Not sure if that's the color difference that he is referencing. Does anyone have the IMAX shots from that Dark Knight Trilogy boxset?
I saw BB a while back and remember it looking similar to the blu-ray. A very brown color palette.
The Dark Knight’s colors on BD are different from its theatrical run, quoting:
"<span style=“font-size: 10px;”>On</span> The Dark Knight <span style=“font-size: 10px;”>Blu-ray transfer, the biggest error – by far the biggest error – its producers committed was the complete change of the film’s original color timing.</span> The Dark Knight <span style=“font-size: 10px;”>was not copied with an optical printer. The original material – I held it in my hands – it was gorgeous. It was absolutely gorgeous. It was… I fell flat off my chair. (Laughs) The colors are so different compared to those that appear in the Blu-ray transfer. I’ve seen the Blu-ray once, and I’ve never looked at it again. "</span>
<span style=“font-size: 10.3999996185303px;”>http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=6885</span>
<span style=“font-size: 10.3999996185303px;”>Outside of that quote if I remember correctly didn’t the IMAX preview on the Batman Begin BD look different color wise then what it looked like on The Dark Knight?</span>
Spaced Ranger, I could be wrong but I think the pink may just be a result of being an old telecine. I've seen similar pink in masters from the late 80s and 90s. It can easily be removed and I did peal away a little in my test regrade pics but I wanted to post the LD pics as is.
Asaki, I agree that the BD doesn't look bad outside the blanket green added. Its just the LD was approved by the man himself. So since this is the internet those differences minor as they can be sometimes are important. Beside there are enough color differences to warrant a discussion.
captainsolo, I got a Shure based off Disclord recommendations. Sadly, its an early model, the 5000 over the better 5200/5300 but it was super cheap on ebay and in perfect condition.
Great looking project, I'm very excited to see the results.
I did the whole center cut out for TDK and TDKR's IMAX scenes and it worked pretty well. When I compared my version of TDKR to the DVD there were small differences. Where the DVD's frame was panned and tilted up or down. But only slightly. Not that big of a deal but I'd like to prefer the accuracy of this project over my own work (not to mention DTS)
captainsolo said:
Also keep in mind, the WB was from a newly struck print off of the 65mm negative. This being done in the early 2000's means that none of the process would have involved vintage equipment, stock or processes. The Criterion used a 35mm print which will itself look different. (I saw one like this and it remains the best edition yet in my book. Usually you see the 2K WB remaster or a 35mm print made from the "new" WB edition.)
It's also good you got the CLV version because according to an old post of Disclord's I found, the CAV is misframed badly...at least on the rotted 3M first issue. I never realized that my second copy is a 3M, which is rotted, but my usual one that doesn't really have any is the Pioneer reissue. I'll have to check the framings since Pioneer made both CAV and CLV in 1990.
(http://www.quadraphonicquad.com/forums/showthread.php?15100-quot-2001-a-Space-Odyssey-quot-Laserdisc-Criterion-Box-set-GREAT-SURROUND)
Also here, disclord discussed the audio used and how the six-track element transferred had some distortion and a lack in bass compared to the later discrete transfers. On my system some distortion is inherent and if properly decoded through say a Shure HTS processor into proper 4 channel DS we might be able to better present this alongside the 5.1 discrete from MGM which still has the original mix.
I'll have to also check the PCM on my MGM CLV and see if it runs better.
Good read captainsolo. Not sure if the CLV is reframed correctly but in the short time I looked at it, it seems fine (notwithstanding coming from a 35mm print vs 65/70).
Luckily, If someone was ever to try this project I have the PCM track from the Crtiterion LD and the AC-3 5.1 from the MGM DVD. Also luckily I have a 1st gen Shure HTS among my matrix decoders ;).
Let me know what you find on the PCM track. I haven't listen to it in surround yet. In the meantime here is a quick, quick regrade of the BD to the LD:
Not perfect but you get the idea.
Nice results Spaced Ranger.
Strange I could always see the pics. I re-uploaded ld comp 2. They are on S1 now. Let's see if you can see them now.
Now for some comparisons. They may not be the same exact frame.
Criterion CLV LD/MGM DVD (Should be the same master as the MGM LD)/BD
You can see a bit of the exasperating modern green tint added to the BD
Thanks SkySnake, downloading now
Wow talk about good timing. I was just getting photos together to post here. I got the LD Monday and just did a very quick and dirty capture of the LD last night. It was just to see what it looked like. Sadly, there are no color bars on the CLV which is odd for a Criterion.
Edit: Notice compared to the DVDBeaver pics, that the corn is orange but the peas and fish are green. Here are two more from the DVDBeaver pics
team_negative1 said:
We should have access to the entire trilogy, the second and third movies are LPP. The Raiders print is supposed to be in good condition, but we don't have all the details yet.
The planning for that is in the very early stages. Once we are ready to announce something, we'll be more definite.
Team Negative1
Badass. I shouldn't say this on a Star Wars forum but I would look more forward to that then A New Hope and ROTJ (and I love those movies)
team_negative1 said:
At some point we will be working on the Indiana Jones trilogy. But that will be some time from now. Will be interesting to see the colors on the prints.
Team Negative1
That made my day thanks guys
Ok, I found a copy of the CLV. I would of preferred the CAV because color bars as Spaced Ranger pointed out and the extras but the CLV was a steal so I'm not thinking twice about it. Once I get the disc, I will try to do a capture and post some pics from it vs the HD, old DVD.
I have a copy of the old MGM DVD which I assume is the same master as the MGM LD (supposedly has the original dialog panning soundtrack also)