logo Sign In

Scruffy

User Group
Members
Join date
29-Nov-2005
Last activity
31-May-2016
Posts
625

Post History

Post
#246674
Topic
First Impressions of the OOT ...
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/246674/action/topic#246674
Time
Zombie --

That largely agrees with and supplements my research, but I came to a conclusion that I'm not sure you did, or maybe was outside the scope of your post. In or around 1997, the O-neg was restored. Certain portions were removed for SE alteration, and we can assume that those film elements are lost. But every one was scanned at 2k so the SE alterations can be made. Hard drive space is cheap, so we can assume the digital versions of these portions are not lost. So, in 1997, we have 90% of the O-neg intact in the SE and the remaining 10% in the digital domain.

In or around 2004, the entire SE was scanned at HD resolution. At this point, the 90% of the SE that existed only on film enters the digital domain. Because those are the portions that were not substantially altered, the entire O-OT now exists in the digital domain at HD or greater resolution. Further work was done on the movies, but it isn't relevant to us, and I assume an untouched copy of the HD scan was kept for various reasons.

This gives Lucasfilm everything they need to produce a fine DVD/BD/HD DVD of the O-OT. They just have to find the relevant files and give some interns a few days with an editing suite to paste it together and color time it. (I don't mean to belittle film or video postproduction, but they don't exactly need ILM's A-team here.) The sound mix might pose some additional challenges, but with the laserdiscs and the DVDs there's enough sound material in the digital domain today to put together a quasi-authentic "good enough" stereo mix.

I think this would be easier than making a new DI from the Technicolor masters and less personally irksome to George. It might disappoint those of us who had been hoping for a full restoration, all three original sound mixes, etc. But for me, at least, it would be a buy.

There's a few potential problems with this scenario. The SE negative may have picked up some dirt between 1997 and 2004; Lucasfilm evidently skipped the film cleaning that time and trusted Lowry to fix it digitally. In this scenario, that won't happen. There's also the possibility that Lucasfilm didn't keep the initial stages of their digital work, that they just deleted them when they decided they were done. Such an act of wanton carelessness would boggle the mind; but Lucas does seem to be a packrat, and he learned how that pays off when he did the 1997 recomposites, so I think he kept them.

Thoughts, comments, flames?
Post
#246608
Topic
The Merits of the Prequel Trilogy and the "Saga"
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/246608/action/topic#246608
Time
Originally posted by: Jumpman
Scruffy,

Alot of the Prequels are made up of ideas Lucas couldn't achieve or would "save for later." What's wrong with that?

Nothing's wrong with that. What's wrong is using this as an apology for the films. Their pedigree doesn't matter if they don't show the quality expected from the breed.

Conceptual break? I mean, it is two different eras in this storyline. That's not such a bad thing if you want to get across the impression that life before the Empire was vastly different.


Okay, here's some examples of concepts that were altered between the OT and the PT...

In the OT, it was established that Jedi training began during adolescence. ("He is too old to begin the training. / Was I that much younger when you taught me?") In the PT, it's established that Jedi training begins during prepubescence.

In the OT, it's established that Mrs. Skywalker stayed with Leia but died when she was very young. In the PT, she dies in childbirth.

In the OT, Boba Fett and the stormtroopers are not all clones of the same source. (They have different accents and, depending on how you interpret visual cues, different faces.) In the PT, they are all clones of a bounty hunter.

In the OT, a dying Jedi typically disappeared, and this was curious or even unremarkable. In the PT, dying Jedi leave behind corpses. There is no strong correlation between disposition of the corpse and later appearance as a ghost.

Heck, the ideas behind the OT weren't even static during the making of the OT. If you believe that the story was mutable and dynamic from 1977-1983 but entered stasis from 1983 to 2005, I've got a bridge to Alderaan to sell you.
Post
#246589
Topic
The Merits of the Prequel Trilogy and the "Saga"
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/246589/action/topic#246589
Time
Originally posted by: vote_for_palpatine
Originally posted by: Jumpman
Well, a version of the midichlorians was at one point in either an early draft of Star Wars or in his early notes about Star Wars. It's not something he came up with in the mid-90's. He's had the idea for it or a version of it in his notes since the beginning.


Obviously, his instinct not to include them in Star Wars was correct. The Force was much cooler when it couldn't be quantified. In Star Wars, command of the Force was apparently attainable to those willing to walk the path...in The Phantom Menace, command of the Force comes from winning the genetic lottery.


Indeed. Fans of the PT often point to PT concepts or characters that existed in some antique draft or notes developed decades ago. This gives the impression that the PT is made up of refuse, bits and pieces that were rejected when creating the Star Wars Trilogy.

I would like to offer a comparison to J.R.R. Tolkien. Tolkien spent fifty-six years of his life writing the Silmarillion, but it was never published while he was alive. He did include bits and pieces of it in the second edition (special edition, if you will) of the Hobbit and every edition of the Lord of the Rings. When the Silmarillion was finally published by his son, it fit very well into the universe established by the earlier books.

Elements of the PT are so jarring to many fans because they were not foreshadowed or hinted at by the OT, or the SE. There is not hint of Qui-Gon Jinn, "younglings," midiclorians, dead Padme, Fett clones, etc., even where one would expect them. There exists a very clear conceptual break between the OT and the PT, regardless of how many OT notes, drafts, etc. include characters or ideas later used in the PT.
Post
#246217
Topic
You've Failed, Your Highness.
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/246217/action/topic#246217
Time
Originally posted by: zombie84
"Emperor" denotes tyranny much more than "King" or "Supreme [insert title]". Its associated more with dictatorship type of government.

By whom? I've never made this association. Is HIM Akihito a greater tyrant than HM King Saud? Was HIM George VI a dictator and HM George VI not? Is Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei a better ruler than Imperators like Caesar Augustus or Marcus Aurelius? Was the Fuhrer really better than the Kaiser?

No, Imperial dignity does not imply anything about the relation of the ruler to the commoners (except, perhaps, distance). It implies an unequal relationship between the ruler and other rulers. An Emperor is superior to kings, either by virtue of maintaining a political empire or by heading both state and church. Palpatine was an emperor because he assumed monarchical dignity but did not strip such dignity from his subjects, such as the monarch of Alderaan.

The truth is that most people--and I'm sure Lucas himself--don't know that "majesty" or "highness" have specific uses. I sure didn't.


Lucas spent years working on Star Wars. That is more than enough time to get an education, and learn the meaning of words that one uses. Many people do come up with glaring holes in their education, but part of being a productive adult is recognizing them and filling them in when necessary. And again, Lucas was not the sole creator of Return of the Jedi. Kasdan helped him write it, and at least three British subjects were on set when the lines were spoken (Marquand, McDiarmid, Prowse, and/or Anderson). They probably had a greater understanding of royal styles than the American Lucas. Hamill may have picked up a bit about royal styles, too, while working on Britannia Hospital. I haven't seen it, but it seems to use HRH rather freely.
Post
#246171
Topic
You've Failed, Your Highness.
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/246171/action/topic#246171
Time
Originally posted by: zombie84
I think you are reading too much into the semantics. "Your highness" can also be used as a general term to denote supreme authority. Luke's use of it acknowledges Palpatine as the supreme authority of the galactic civilization yet he uses it in the context of defiance--what he is really saying is "you may be the supreme ruler of this world but i will not bow down to you."


"Highness" has not represented a supreme authority in English-speaking countries for a number of years. A totalitarian dictator like Palpatine really should've used "majesty." It comes from maiestas, the dignity of the state in the Roman Republic, which later came to refer to the person of the Roman Emperor. Palpatine was definitely the "L'etat, c'est moi" type who would demand the dignity of maiestas.

If Lucas did not wish to use Imperial courtesies in his writing, he would've made Palpatine something other than an Emperor. He had no problem creating new words to represent rank or titles that did not translate well into English, e.g. Moff and Padawan.
Post
#246167
Topic
You've Failed, Your Highness.
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/246167/action/topic#246167
Time
Originally posted by: auraloffalwaffle
I think it is more likely, from a character point of view, that Luke was thinking of his good friend Han Solo when he used "your Highness". After all, Solo had thrown that one at Leia many times. We should probably be grateful that he didn't just say:

"Look, your worshipfulness, I take orders from just one person! Me!!"


I'm going to do "your worshipfulness" next.
Post
#246085
Topic
ghosting in the dvds
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/246085/action/topic#246085
Time
Well, you could copy the MPEG-PS to your hard drive with something like vobcopy, using cat to piece the vob files together, then extract the M2V stream with extract_mpeg2, export that to a series of still frames with "transcode -y im -F png" and hand-paint the trails out of each frame with the GIMP, then pipe png2yuv through mpeg2enc to make a new M2V stream, extract the original AC3 stream from your MPEG program stream, multiplex the AC3 and M2V streams together with mplex, use dvdauthor to set up the DVD file system, and burn it with growisofs or whatever your favorite DVD burning program is.

Kind of a lot of work, though.
Post
#246054
Topic
First Impressions of the OOT ...
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/246054/action/topic#246054
Time
Parts of the oneg to be modified were cut out and sent to ILM for digital scanning; unless GL took a magnet to every hard drive at ILM, they still exist. Parts that had irrevocably faded were replaced with new elements struck from one the three color separations made years ago. The whole thing was assembled into a new negative for use in printing IPs. So, in 1997 we have ...

a) Effectively the complete original negative, with the caveat that some parts were Technicolor three strip inserts and some parts only exist in digital form, and

b) the Technicolor masters themselves. (Reports vary on the quality of these, but the consensus seems to be that they're a stable, perfect copy of a less than perfect negative.)

Evidently, using the Technicolor elements is almost a "lost art," and the expense was greater than hiring people to physically clean the extant negatives. If it really is cost prohibitive to make a new negative from the Technicolor elements, then Lucas really was careless IF he chopped up his only Star Wars negative in the nineties. Or at least, one can say he is not risk averse; if something calamitous were to happen to his negative during the SE process, he'd have to go back to the more expensive Technicolor process instead of falling back on his prepared second negative.

In any case, the fact remains that a 1993 video was not the "starting point" for the Special Editions. The starting point was a 1994 film restoration project.
Post
#246034
Topic
First Impressions of the OOT ...
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/246034/action/topic#246034
Time
Originally posted by: Go-Mer-Tonic
To him the SE -is- the high quality presentation of the classic trilogy.

The O-OT was put on there in the best quality he had on hand to represent the starting point from which the SE was created from, and to be sure, it's the best the O-OT has ever looked on a home video release to date.


(emphasis mine)

The SE was not created from a 1993 video master of the trilogy. It was created from a restored negative that was begun, IIRC, in 1995. Most Lucas apologists claim this negative no longer exists and no duplicates of it were made (though why such carelessness is considered meat for apologism is beyond be). You can say the 1993 master "represents" the later restored negative, but that's kind of stretching things. It represents the narrative starting point for the SE, but not the filmic starting point (except insofar as both the SE negative and the 1993 video come from the same original source).
Post
#245998
Topic
"BUT ANAMORPHIC ENHANCEMENT ALTERS THE MOVIES!!!"
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/245998/action/topic#245998
Time
Originally posted by: Raul2106
My source is female. I don't know what gender the restorationist is. Cable-X1 and to everyone else following his negative flow RELAX... I have not said anything impossible.


So that's the new standard of proof?

Hay guys, the 30th Anniversary Box Set of Star Wars will contain a tiny vial of Anthony Daniels's blood, which Lucas has been slowly collecting and freezing since the 1970s. It's not impossible!
Post
#245942
Topic
"BUT ANAMORPHIC ENHANCEMENT ALTERS THE MOVIES!!!"
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/245942/action/topic#245942
Time
Raul: Until you provide evidence that your statements are true, few people are going to believe you. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof; you haven't provided the proof, and you lack the public credentials to make such claims without proof. If you cannot publicly reveal the identity of your source, I suggest a compromise.

There are a number of people who do have the credentials to make such claims without providing explicit proof. I suggest you contact one of them and establish a dialogue between your source and this trusted figure. Bill Hunt of The Digital Bits seems to have some lines into Lucasfilm; were he to confirm your statements, they would quickly become internet gospel. There are posters on this forum who could confirm or deny your story while maintaining the confidentiality of your source. A simple thumb up or thumb down from any of these figures would go a long way towards ending this confusion.
Post
#245836
Topic
You've Failed, Your Highness.
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/245836/action/topic#245836
Time
First draft. Thoughts?

An apparent error exists in the pivotal throne room sequence in Return of the Jedi, but by carefully considering the knowledge and motivation of all players concerned, we can reconcile this error and learn more about the scene. The apparent error occurs in this exchange:

PALPATINE: Your hate has made you powerful. Now, fulfill your destiny. Take your father's place at my side.

LUKE: Never. I'll never turn to the dark side. You've failed, your highness. I am a Jedi, like my father before me.

PALPATINE: So be it, Jedi.

The apparent error occurs when Luke Skywalker address Emperor Palpatine as "your higness." The proper form of address for an Emperor is, "Your Imperial Majesty." Luke used, "Your highness," which is the form of address for, "reigning dukes and members of reigning ducal houses, members of some grand ducal houses, junior members of some royal houses, emirs and sheikhs" (Wikipedia). Why did Luke use the incorrect form of address?

The first possibility is that the creators of Return of the Jedi simply did not know how to address an Emperor. Certainly, few people have occasion to interact with an Emperor. But this is unlikely; Lucas had spent years designing the story of a rebellion against an empire, which is certainly enough time to discover those courtesies on adopts around an emperor. Furthermore, the Emperor was played by Ian McDiarmid, a subject of HRH Elizabeth II. Any well-read subject of Elizabeth would know that the HH style is inappropriate for a sovereign.

The second possibility is that Luke did not know the proper way to address the Emperor. Darth Vader failed to provide any social cues when he addressed Palpatine as, "My master." Luke must have known, or suspected, that Palpatine was Vader's master in the Sith cult, and that only Vader could address Palpatine as such. But Luke would have had any number of other cues instructing him on how to speak to the Emperor. By this point in galactic history, Palpatine had reigned for over twenty years; he would have been the subject of innumerable news broadcasts, documentaries, propaganda pieces, and entertainments. Even on Tatooine and with the Rebel Alliance Luke would have been exposed to at least some of these materials, providing him with an education in Imperial courtesies.

The third possibility is that Luke deliberately used a lower style in order to insult the Emperor, or bring him down a notch. It seems Palpatine suspects this, too; when he calls Luke, "Jedi," his voice is full of mocking derision. But if Luke did use a lesser form of address to insult the sovereign, why did he choose, "Your highness?"

Luke was not intent on simply slinging harsh language at the Emperor; he wanted his barb to have a true point. He chose to delegitimize the Emperor with a lesser style, probably one in accord with the last position held by Palpatine that the Rebel Alliance consideres legitimate. If that position had been President, Luke would have used, "Your Excellency;" had it been Senator, he would've used, "Senator." Why did he instead choose a style of nobility that had no place in galactic governance? The answer must lie further back than Palpatine's galactic career.

We know that Naboo has an elected sovereign; it is possible they create other noblepersons by election or royal fiat. Palpatine may have held a minor title and style on Naboo before being elected a planetary or sectorial representative. When he took up his duties on the offworld parliament, this courtesy title would have been superceded by his new title ("Senator" in the Galactic Senate), which was later superceded by the titles of Supreme Chancellor and Emperor, and the HH style superceded by HE and HIM.

When Luke faces down Palpatine, he denies thoroughly Palpatine's authority.

"You are no Emperor, you're not a legitimate President, and you don't even have the right to sit on the Senate you've disbanded! You are a minor noble from a backwater world with a sinecure office and a courtesy title! And I shall show you that courtesy, and no more!"
Post
#245833
Topic
The Trekkies Are Unbelievable
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/245833/action/topic#245833
Time
To address a few comments ...

Star Trek was shot on 35 mm film with the intention of being displayed on NTSC technology. Making an HD version is easy; you just run the film through your digital scanner and click the HD radio button instead of the 480i radio button. The problem you run into is with the optical shots; they've got all kinds of dupe grain and matte lines on them. This was visible, but not too troubling, on NTSC video. But in HD, they make the shots practically unwatchable.

Why remaster the show for HD? There's a crazy big market for Star Trek right now. There's at least three blocks dedicated to Star Trek on my cable package; Star Trek Uncut and Star Trek 2.0 on cable, and Star Trek "remastered" in syndication. Star Trek packages will become more valuable over the next couple of years as the hype machine for Star Trek XI gets into gear. And then there's Shatner; William Shatner is a popular actor right now due to Boston Legal and his tongue-in-cheek public persona.

So, having an HD-ready version of Star Trek for syndication (and later optical disc release) is a no-brainer. But what do you do about the visual effects? I'm sure the original elements are long since lost; they cannot be recomposited like Lucas did for Star Wars. So they have to be recreated. And in the process of recreation, a few creative liberties can be taken to reduce the number of stock shots. This is very much in the spirit of restoration that Mike Verta wrote about on Star Wars Legacy, and the complete opposite of Lucas-style revisionism. And that's why I love it and why you should love it, too.
Post
#245718
Topic
"BUT ANAMORPHIC ENHANCEMENT ALTERS THE MOVIES!!!"
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/245718/action/topic#245718
Time
Originally posted by: ESHBG

But all of these are around the same time, right? '07, the "Year of Star Wars"* can be his final year.

From what little we know, the 3D movies will run from 2007 to 2012. George will be busy during that time expanding the 3D market. The TV show will start in 2008, and run for at least four seasons to make a syndication package.

*I posted this in a few other threads, but LFL is already using that phrase and made a few quick comments about video game releases, collectibles, etc., in '07. They are hyping everything up and they claim the year will be HUGE!


A marketing department claiming the coming product cycle will be HUGE? Perhaps even BETTER THAN BEFORE and a MUST-BUY for a LIMITED TIME ONLY? Mirabile dictu!

I read comic solicitations, so I'm kind of immune to the OH GOD THIS WILL BE HUGE YOU CAN'T MISS IT EVERYTHING CHANGES!!!1 hype.
Post
#245667
Topic
"BUT ANAMORPHIC ENHANCEMENT ALTERS THE MOVIES!!!"
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/245667/action/topic#245667
Time
Originally posted by: ESHBG
Originally posted by: Raul2106
The facts are this next year is what everybody is here for.

Yep, exactly.

I really, really think Lucas isn't lying about one thing: he wants to move on from SW.


If he wants to move on from Star Wars so badly, wants to go out with a bang on the 30th, why is he redoing the "Saga" in 3D and launching a concurrent television series? He may be done personally writing Star Wars stories, but he's still using it toward his own ends.
Post
#245560
Topic
"BUT ANAMORPHIC ENHANCEMENT ALTERS THE MOVIES!!!"
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/245560/action/topic#245560
Time
It's not a matter of accepting or not accepting non-anamorphic DVDs, the fact is right now we don't have a choice!


No, Mielr. You always have a choice. But people tend to lose their brains when it comes to Star Wars and forget this fundamental truth of the human situation. A rational person would say, "This is the best choice," or, "This is not the best choice," or, "I cannot determine which choice is best." Irrational people deny even the possibility of choice*. To your credit, you seem to believe that the GOUT is the best choice, but you also make the mistake of saying it's the only choice. (That is, no choice at all.)

Personally, I think the GOUT is neither the only choice nor the best choice. I also think buying into it limits future choices by providing a disincentive against creating quality products may retard the progress of the art and science of home video. But I tend to get philosophical and zealous about such things. Call it the Rebel in me.

* I am referring, of course, to situations in which decisions are made, in which the choosing faculty or will is exercised. Not to situations where there legitimately is no choice because will is irrelevant; you cannot choose to negate gravity, for instance.