Space Kaijuu

Great news on the Intrada release, whenever it gets released.  Hopefully it will have the complete Autobot/Decepticon Battle theme without the extra fade out at the end.  I doubt they will include the original soundtrack since that would create additional licensing and cost issues, but a definitive version of DiCola's score would be great in it's own right.

Really, outside of that one track, the entire score has been released via BotCon CDs but the music in the film was heavily edited from what appears on the CDs.  If Intrada plans to do this right, I suspect that they will basically be including all the tracks that were released previously along with alternate versions edited to match how they were presented in the movie.  We'll know in January, I guess.

Update: I now have the Transformers Visual Works art book and several of the Transformers Generations volumes that I can use for additional artwork and content.  I also have the "Transformers Vault" book on it's way, which might provide some useful content.

Is it Japanese text or Japanese dialog?  I can translate Japanese text but not dialog.

Ok, I've made a few updates to the list of features.  I have English, Spanish, and French subtitles that were created for the HD US Theatrical version while the Spanish, French, and Japanese audio were intended for the international version so I will be including them with the SD international version.

Thanks reave.  If you have the colors of the original cels to compare the blu-ray video to, that would be nice just to make sure none of the colors were significantly altered.  Keep in mind that the theatrical presentation doesn't always match the color of the original cels, though.

Well, I now have a bunch of different versions of this movie on video for comparison. :)

Along with the Australian Blu-Ray and US 2-disc DVD set, I managed to get the original US Rhino release, the Metrodome 2-disc "ultimate edition", and I have the Metrodome "reconstructed" release on it's way in the mail (It was $5 after shipping so, eh, why not.  I want to hear the notoriously bad 5.1 mix they created for it, anyway).  Thankfully, I got all the DVDs I as used copies for cheap.

I'm looking for more of the storyboards for the unused scenes.  I have what was on the Sony/Metrodome DVDs, the extra storyboards from the Rhino DVD, a handful of extras that I found from various sites, but there are still a few segments I would like to find or get better quality versions.

The Rigid Tools poster is part of one of the short films featuring Roger Rabbit and not the original movie.  I'm over 2/3 done restoring the Rigid Tools poster in the short film but it's taking longer than I'd like.  The holidays and other commitments have been getting in the way.

I have some character profile screens I've been working on for some of the extra content.  I'm not sure if I'll go with the cel shaded versions of the character art or the solid color versions at this time but here are some sample images, scaled down to 720p resolution:

http://i.imgur.com/CP2Nylq.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/fSl4X1X.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/UYlZc3Y.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/LlHF1Ww.jpg

I actually looked into upscaling the alternate opening titles and, due to the way that the opening titles fade in and out along with the limited quality of the available sources for the international opening, it wouldn't work too well.

Update: I now have the French, Spanish, and Japanese dubs along with French, Spanish, and English subtitles.  The audio I have for the Spanish version isn't the greatest of quality, though.  I'm doing what I can to try and clean it up as much as possible in hopes of being able to use it.

I have the Italian dub and subtitles but the time it would take to sync them with the BD video doesn't seem to be very worthwhile.

Back on topic, I now have the stereo Japanese language dub off the Japanese laserdisc, thanks to a generous donor who wishes to remain anonymous.  Does anyone know if the movie was dubbed into Spanish or French and, if so, is there a decent source for the dubbed audio?

I thought this board consisted of only 5 real users and everyone else was a sock puppet.

Sorry, I meant to say they are from the same source material.  The BD transfer doesn't show signs of DVNR but the grain is a lot more controlled since this was an animated feature.  There are spots with light dust and scratches but the negatives were obviously still in pretty good condition overall. The Dino DeLaurentiis logo at the beginning has a couple of torn frames that were removed on the DVD versions and there are a couple of reel changes that fade to black and have a different number of black frames before the movie fades back in but everything else seems to match up.

Every single version of the movie that I've seen has different color timing and most of them seem to bump the saturation up too much.  The Sony transfer claimed to have accurate color timing but the contrast and saturation are too high, leading to a lot of clipping in the brighter colors.  The BD transfer has some clipping in the blacks but not as bad as the blown whites on several of the DVDs.  The bluray transfer does have quite a few scenes where the areas that should be grey end up with a blue or pink tinge.

I thought about doing a remastered version of the movie that would have most of the animation errors fixed, such as fixing mis-colored cells and layering errors, but that would be for a much later project.

Metrodome has several releases.  They released one version titled "Transformers The Movie Reconstructed" which used a new transfer that gives the full frame from the negative, including information along the edges that would normally be cut off be even a full-frame 35mm projector.  The downsides to this release are the fact that it's field-blended PAL video and the audio was unpleasantly remixed with some of the sound effects removed or badly reduced while extra sound effects that weren't in the movie originally were added in for surround effects. The reviews I've read all seem to agree that the sound on this release is pretty terrible overall.

There was another later Metrodome DVD that was released as both a single disc "Special Edition" and a double-disc "Ultimate Edition".  This release is in widescreen with slightly better detail and color than the Sony release and better sound but it also suffers, once again, from field-blended PAL video.  The Ultimate Edition has more extras but not nearly as many as the Sony 20th anniversary release.

Metrodome released the movie as a region-free barebones blu-ray in the UK which appears to use the same source as the SE/UE DVD release only in 1080p24, so no field blending.  It has DTS audio but no special features to speak of.  Madman released an Australian Region-B Blu-ray that has the same video transfer and most of the extras that were on the Metrodome Ultimate Edition DVD.  The DTS track is released with a Dolby Digital track, but a running commentary track is included.

Okay, so now the question is, do I crack the spine on my "Transformers Generations Deluxe" artbook so I can get additional content...

Are you sure you aren't confusing the reconstructed version transfer with the Rhino transfer?  Earlier you said that the colors were oversaturated and had too much red but it looks like that was the case with the Rhino release more than any other version.  Metrodome pulled a new transfer directly off the negatives for the Reconstructed version and, from what I understand, this base transfer was used for the Sony 20th Anniversary release and the Metrodome Ultimate Edition, albeit with different color grading and contrast adjustments.

I think the Reconstructed version uses the same transfer that was used for the UK and Austrialian BD.  The US anniversary edition has a lot of areas with blown out whites while the BD has a few areas of where the darker areas are too dark and lose some details.

Does anyone whether the UK Metrodome "Reconstructed" or "Ultimate Edition" releases used frame blending or PAL speedup to convert the video to 25fps?

If i can get the nzb, I should be able to get the missing parts.

Demonovation said:

Not sure if anyone brought this up yet, but what about Return to Oz? That seems up Team Blu's alley. I know there is a 1080i version out there. There is also an awesome feature length documentary called Return To Oz: The Joy That Got Away that was an internet only release. There's also extras from the DVD and a lot of cool stuff floating out there on YouTube. I think this is a really under appreciated classic that deserves a proper release that I know it will never get!

VUDU also has this one in 1080p HDX, so video sources are available.  There is one Japanese LD with digital stereo sound (This one: http://www.lddb.com/laserdisc/38562/PILF-1052/Return-to-Oz-%281985%29 ).  I found a couple of Japanese auctions that have that LD so I could help to get it for a LPCM digital audio track if the project is of interest.

I have the CDs for "Lighting Their Darkest Hour" and the 20th Anniversary reissue of the original Soundtrack album.  I used those to create the isolated score.

"Lighting Their Darkest Hour" has the complete score, including tracks that weren't included on the previous score album but it omits the unused audition track.  My only gripe is that all the releases use the version of the "Autobot/Decepticon Battle" track that appeared on the original soundtrack and not the original source score.  It fades out early at the end so I had to do a lot of work to reconstruct the correct fadeout for the isolated score.

Most of the tracks in-film were edited differently from what was on the soundtrack albums, so the isolated score will be quite different from what is on the CD releases.

Chewtobacca said:

Space Kaijuu said:I don't have the Japanese audio but a kind donor, who wishes to remain anonymous, has provided me with a rip of the stereo LPCM audio from the Japanese Laserdisc.

That's fantastic because the LD that has PCM is extremely expensive.  Do you plan to sync the PCM to the BD?

If you're referring to eBay auctions, a lot of that has been due to people overpricing the auctions or getting trolled by shill bidders.  In Japan, good condition used copies show up every few months on Japanese auction sites and sell for roughly $50-75.

StarThoughts said:

The isolated music and score track sounds like it is going to be entertaining. There have been so many differing releases of DiCola's score it will be nice to have something comprehensive.

Yeah, it took a lot of work to piece it all together properly.  The score was obviously written so that it could be edited and looped in places to fit with the final action sequences.

So, it seems I might be able to get the Japanese dub track as well but I don't have the resources to have it translated to English at the moment.  If I had a script, creating the subtitles wouldn't be an issue.

I don't have the Japanese audio but a kind donor, who wishes to remain anonymous, has provided me with a rip of the stereo LPCM audio from the Japanese Laserdisc.

Also, I just finished the isolated music and score track.

Every transfer of the movie has different color timing.  Both the Sony transfer used for the 20th Anniversary DVD and the Metrodome transfer used on the UK and Australian BDs have decent color but neither one matches and both show signs that the colors may still be wrong.  It seems like ever since the Rhino DVD, they've been making more and more of an effort to oversaturate the colors as well.  I'm not sure f it is simply a desire to try and make every video release look more vivid than the previous one or something wrong with the negatives they've been using.

(edit: I found out that the UK releases used a new transfer off of the original negatives.)

I'm hoping for a BD50.  I'd have to compress the extras too much to make it all fit on a BD25.

I have a copy of the Rhino DVD coming now, so I can get the extra material off of that one.  I really wish I could get a hold of the original Japanese Laserdisc so I could get the original stereo sound mix off of it.

How about a Teddy Ruxpin Raider?

Not Star Wars but still batsh*t:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/TRANSFORMERS-Movie-LaserDisc-LD-HillCrane-HCL-7001-VERY-RARE-ORIGINAL-1ST-/330968379515