SF01

JayArgonaut said:

Could be worthwhile to track down this as a reference point (and perhaps for a preservation.) 😃

Don’t even get me started, I’ve been emailing Detla continously for 3-4 years now, since I learned about the existance of this copy. All they can say is that they don’t know, that they no longer use VHS tapes, or other generic responses… The tapes are certainly decomissiones (since they are expired) and most likely destroyed. Even the Delta preservation museum doen’t have them.

Spotted pie up their final tract of digestive system, I’m bought industrial JVS VHS duplicator and I will be making my own copies, if anyone’s interested.

Small update.

I will be getting Blackmagic stuff to transfer digtal masters to VHS, so the project will soon move from “fantasy” to “doable”.

Though I still need to do some research and work on the covers. Andsince getting golden cases like the prequels had I guess I will have to do cardboard and maybe a nice box-set, like the 1995 and 2000 releases of trilogy had. Or maybe 1997 style with Ben Swolo’s helmet instead of Vader’s?

Very interesting.

However I have an update on my project.
DV is something I might do, but I will be getting Blackmagic Hyperdeck and Teranex Mini to record the new SW films to VHS, so I guess I can go the otherway aroud and trasfer ISD that way to Hyperdeck to 4:2:2 and upscaled. Which is a step up from DV I think.

I’ll update when I get the equipment.

Actually this would be a great idea, since I’m having a hard time customizing them to look more like European covers of 2000-2005 VHS releases.

digitalfreaknyc said:

JayArgonaut said:

digitalfreaknyc said:

I’d rather deal with whatever problems NTSC has than ever listen to the pitchy sped-up mess of PAL.

Not all PAL material is affected by the speed up issue and with those that are, it can be easily worked around. I live in a formerly PAL broadcasting nation, my parents are from an NTSC region - I’d rather deal with neither of the problems with both standards.

Every DVD I bought back in the day did. I would say that the ones that compensated were far in the minority. Of course, now it’s extremely easy to work around. Then? Not so much.

Blame studios. PAL pulldown is easy.
With Pal you ger better resolution image and no messed up fields.

OK, the tape plays fine on the setup: VCR -> DV converter -> PC on live feed theough VLC.

But I noticed both on TV and VLC the picture jums up and down by few scanlines on all tapes.

Williarob said:

SF01 said:

Williarob said:

The biggest problem I found with DV capture is that is uses 4:1:1 chroma subsampling which really reduces the picture quality.

In 4:1:1 chroma subsampling, the horizontal color resolution is quartered to reduce the bandwidth by half. In 4:2:2 chroma subsampling the two chroma components are sampled at half the sample rate of luma: the horizontal chroma resolution is halved. This reduces the bandwidth of an uncompressed video signal by one-third with little to no visual difference.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chroma_subsampling

You are completely right about 4:1:1, but you might have missed one important detail. The ISD is PAL and I’m capturing in PAL and in PAL the chroma subsampling is 4:2:0, not 4:1:1, which looks light years better.

Oh, I didn’t know that it was 4:2:0 in PAL. That should look much better 😃 Carry on!

The whole existance of NTSC was the biggest mistake in history of television. Always problems…

Williarob said:

The biggest problem I found with DV capture is that is uses 4:1:1 chroma subsampling which really reduces the picture quality.

In 4:1:1 chroma subsampling, the horizontal color resolution is quartered to reduce the bandwidth by half. In 4:2:2 chroma subsampling the two chroma components are sampled at half the sample rate of luma: the horizontal chroma resolution is halved. This reduces the bandwidth of an uncompressed video signal by one-third with little to no visual difference.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chroma_subsampling

You are completely right about 4:1:1, but you might have missed one important detail. The ISD is PAL and I’m capturing in PAL and in PAL the chroma subsampling is 4:2:0, not 4:1:1, which looks light years better.

Jonno said:

SF01 said:

DV is still better than DVD compression, even sourced frmo lossless capture.

No argument there. It just seems unlikely that DV files will be useful for actual viewing, so some further conversion will be needed in most cases, and that’s where returns begin to diminish rapidly. But hey, at least someone’s putting this stuff out there in some form.

Pure DV files are easy to watch, if you have latest sata, or USB 3.0. It’s only 25 Mbps. A huge plus is that it is intraframe. I’d love to do them i lossless 4:4:4 and compress to BD, but I do not have the equipment at the moment.
Once I do, it will be done again.
Now I am cleaning up disc space to do the set in the way I can.

Plus, the D-VHS deck will provide the best possible output quality.

Jonno said:

Sometimes the context and presentation is of equal interest to content, especially for folks who had the set originally.

I did the same with the features from the roughly-contemporary Alien Trilogy set - fifty people downloaded that, even though most of the material is already freely available from better sources.

By the way, I’d avoid DV for something like this, personally - it’s a pretty punishing codec for analogue sources. A preferable route would be lossless capture, followed by conversion to h.264 for delivery. But it’s your project, of course.

I only have DV passthrough device. But obviously in the future I plan to purchasebetter A/D converters.

DV is still better than DVD compression, even sourced frmo lossless capture.

adywan said:

There is Macrovision on the Executor box set. All the special features, minus the 4 “making of” specials were on the Definitive collection laserdisc set. Someone has already captured those and converted them to DVD but i can’t remember who’s set these were on. These would be higher quality than copying from VHS

Which LD set? PAL or NTSC? As general rule Laserdisc would be higher quality, but it depends on transfer. Would be worth comparing and worth having diversity. And I’m not going to compress them to DVD. I could do image of Blu-Ray SD though. The 4 making of you reffer to the bonus VHS?

JayArgonaut said:

Dobrze! 😃
Just wondered, will Macrovision be a problem?

If it is present, than there is a chance that might prove difficult, I’ll do a test.

JayArgonaut said:

SF01 said:

In my country there was a paper box with 3 films in 1995, no special features in pan and scan with voiceover (Still better than dubbing). I’m still hunting it, but I have all other tapes, 5 of PT (I and II in widescreen subtitles and pan and scan with dubbing and III in pan and scan in dubbing, there wasn’t widescreen) and 9 of OT (silver and golden special edition and 2000 rerelease of special edition). I am not counting rental only films and pirated versions.

A voiceover? Which country, is it Poland? I have Episode I in widescreen on UK VHS. Unlike the other EU nations, we only received the VHS release of II in pan and scan. III on VHS was produced but wasn’t even advertised over here.

Poland indeed, we had I and II in both variants and III in pan and scan with dubbig only. I also have US Collectors editio of I.

JayArgonaut said:

Ok, gotcha! I have those exact versions on VHS: PAL UK releases.

Look forward to seeing the captures. 😃

Widescreen as well?

In my country there was a paper box with 3 films in 1995, no special features in pan and scan with voiceover (Still better than dubbing). I’m still hunting it, but I have all other tapes, 5 of PT (I and II in widescreen subtitles and pan and scan with dubbing and III in pan and scan in dubbing, there wasn’t widescreen) and 9 of OT (silver and golden special edition and 2000 rerelease of special edition). I am not counting rental only films and pirated versions.

JayArgonaut said:

Thanks for offering to do this.

I have a MiniDV camcorder with a pass-through option that I use for capturing analogue sources, straight into my Mac. Simplicity itself! FireWire cable between the camera and the computer and then I have the RAW file. My camera is PAL only, so for NTSC and tasks where I need Huffyuv, I’ve got a dedicated PC with a capture card.

Can you give more information about the bonus features?

First of all, you don’t get literally RAW from DV camcorder, but raw DV file yes.

Second, I am not sure if my VCR outputs native NTSC signal from NTSC tapes. For DV transfers I use DSR-2000AP, much better quality than regular camcorder.

I was thinking to purchase equipment to transfer straight to HD, but that later.

The list of bonus features is available here:
http://www.thestarwarstrilogy.com/starwars/post/2014/12/11/Executor-Box-Set
Inside the box there is a specific list for each tape.

JayArgonaut said:

Then please share! 😃

Are the films themselves widescreen or pan and scan?

The ISD is widescreen, the bonus features are usually 4:3, with exception of some trailers.

I’ll share the news when I’m done ransferring them.

Though I was also thinking of capturing VHS to FHD, but I have no means now.

That would be cool, thank you.

There is/was a VHS copy of TFA used by Delta airlines, bot for 3 years now they do everything they can not to answer my question who made those for them.

Some of the features were never released on Blu-Ray, that’s a fact.

Hello.

Is it worth the effort to try to transfer ISD executor box-set into DV video? Or any other VHS tapes for that matter?

I’ve been transferring that way many home VHS films from various people, so might be something I could do.

Straight VHS rips with no upgrades of some SW tapes.

What do you think?

Hello.

I am a brand new user, but a long time aficionado and VHS collector.
Currently I own almost all VHS releases that were available in my country and the ISD box from UK (#261).

I have always been thinking of making custom VHS editions of post-III films, there was even VHS of VII in Delta airlines, but I cannot get any solid information from them about who made those ever since 2016…

I have purchased JVC’s studio VHS mastering deck and multi-tape duplicator both S-VHS capable. And I thought why not finally do them.

1st step is source mastering to file that is compatible with VHS standard, then transfer to the mastertape, or straight to duplicator from digital file, the latter eliminating deteriorating master tape, or use a digital tape, but I only have DVCAM digital deck and DV is unsuitable as master.

But the final step are the covers and labels.

So my question is, will there be any kind person that could help me with a project of VHS cover both as slip cover and clamshell cover in the style of post-2000 covers (black background, gold titles, fake catalogue numbers, and EAN numbes from kinky products, descriptions, credits, etc)?

Something similar to this:
https://imgur.com/gallery/OfLT9
https://imgur.com/gallery/DXSE5
https://imgur.com/gallery/KwW7Z