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31-Aug-2004
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4-Dec-2019
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421

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Post
#277099
Topic
Seeking advice on creating an anamorphic version
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/277099/action/topic#277099
Time
Hey,

I was reading up on avisynth and was wondering if people around here already knew how to use it or had already done this. It sounds like with the right plug-ins and right commands it would be relatively simple to create an anamorphic progressive scan version of the DVD's. Is this the case? If so, can someone just write out the script commands that would be needed and list the plug-ins? I'm just trying to tap brains that are already full, not asking people to do the research for me. The steps, as I see them, are:

1.) convert DVD to .avi (I have DVD decrypter but I don't know how to get past that)

2.) crop the video and make it anamorphic

3.) de-interlace it (the avisynth website made it sound pretty easy, with the right plugins, but I've heard this is hard)

Any insight?
Post
#220187
Topic
It's finally official
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/220187/action/topic#220187
Time
I guess it's been official for awhile, but that PR letter confirms it for me. The writer says "(which represents George's vision of the movie)" for the new trilogy and re-done old trilogy. Taken together with the rest of Lucas' portfolio - The OOT was a mistake. The best mistake ever made.

As I said, I guess I've heard that general message from the Star Wars HQ for a while, but that confirms it in cold hard english - he was aiming for a different target and happened to hit the "best movies ever" target by accident.

Looks like Howard the Duck finally makes sense.
Post
#122975
Topic
The Things We Hate And Love Thread .
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/122975/action/topic#122975
Time
I just want to interject in here, bless you Warbler. Whatever thread you are on is better for it. You never overstate yourself, you always speak reasonably, I don't know. I always like seeing you around.

And I agree with Shim (if I translated correctly that these arguments always end up circular and repetitive, since new people are always poking in and few people read the whole backlog. I know I didn't. I had no idea this all started over a comment on homosexuality. Now I do. Now my last long post seems over-abstracted, but I'll leave it.

Moving on - I hate it when you are a little sick, but not sick enough to really stay home from work. Just sick enough to be unhappy. Dang.

And bless you, Warbler. Everywhere you go.
Post
#122590
Topic
The Things We Hate And Love Thread .
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/122590/action/topic#122590
Time
Jumping back on the bigger topic (I don't swing by as much as I used to, but I picked up as much context as I could...)

Just a thought: to believe in truth is immediately to believe in falsehood. Any philosophy/religion that espouses truth immediately segregates all beliefs or fundamentals into true and false. To eliminate falsehood you have to eliminate truth, and you arrive at relativism. This is the prevailing philosophy in Europe and (I believe, but I apologize if I'm wrong) the American left. A bit of that philosophy enfuses any modern western mentality. Differences between beliefs become classified as differences in perspective, culture, upbringing, personality...the differences remain but they are now just that - differences.

One concept of freedom is the freedom to be whoever/whatever you desire without any strife or struggle about it. This concept cannot exist alongside falsehood, because if there is falsehood, there are certain things that people will disagree with. If what you want to be is wrong in some people's opinion, you will have to bear the weight of their disapproval. Thus, these people do not feel perfectly "free", they are in conflict with other people. So they abolish absolute truth in order to abolish falsehood, and thus be "free".

Other people start from the concept of truth - they believe that there are things that are true, or good, or right, and therefore there are other thigns that are false, or evil, or wrong. Christians fall into this category; Jesus says "no one gets to the Father but by me" and other things, stating that there is only one way to heaven, only one way to survive Judgment (namely, by accepting the fact that we need a savior since we have broken the law, and then accepting that Jesus is the only one with the authority to save us). If there is only one way to get to heaven, then there are lots of ways that don't get to heaven.

Bear with me, I'm bringing it around to the point -

So, for a Christian who believes that to say to someone "You need Jesus and this other stuff is wrong" is no more oppressive or intolerant than a doctor who says "you have an infection and you need antibiotics, your daily vitamins aren't going to make this go away." It's simply the way things are.

Now, for the Christian to force Jesus (a la the Inquisition) or for the doctor to force antibiotics down your throat IS oppressive. It isn't the doctor's decision whether or not you want to get better. He's just there to give his best judgment of the situation and use his knowledge to help you if you want it. I realize that a doctor is more trusted than a Christian today, but for a Christian who believes the bible, he acts from the same perspective as the doctor. It's just not heard from the same perspective.

Continuing with the example, Christians will always believe that some things are wrong and will say so, explicitly or implicitly by their actions. Parties like the ACLU that believe that first version of freedom (that you can be what you want *without* disapproval) will therefore see Christianity as opposing freedom, and will restrict a Christian's ability to live according to their beliefs - all they have accomlished is lifting disapproval from themselves and oppressing a different group.

That's because that vision of freedom is flawed. Freedom is being able to be what you want *despite* disapproval. Allowing Christians to pray before they play in a game will naturally make some people feel denounced and excluded. Putting a Christians into a science class teaching evolution will make them feel denounced and excluded. It is a consequence of freedom, it's something we all have to deal with.

I'm tired of special interest groups telling other special interest groups "you can't make me feel bad, you need to celebrate me." Back to the Christianity example, if the Christian believes that making another group feel bad is the *only* way to save them, by all means make them feel bad. If the scientist believes the Christian is a fool and blinding people to truth, by all means make him feel bad. Just don't force any decision on them. That is what freedom is about. Even though someone thinks I'm wrong, I don't have to change.

And that's why I get upset (finally relating the principle to what JediSage has been talking about) when groups limit Christians' right to express themselves. They are preventing Christians from living how they want so that they don't feel bad. And, to be fair, there are times that Christians go too far as well and limit other groups' ability to act. That isn't the example that Jesus set - when the rich young ruler didn't want none of it, Jesus let him walk away. The Christian role is to tirelessly, relentlessly express and live our beliefs and welcome anyone who chooses Jesus, not to choose Jesus for them. That choice happens between God and that person.

But this nation was founded on Christianity, so as it grows increasingly non-Christian it will face the backlash as people revolt against the Christian values inherent in the system and the culture.

Bottom line - groups shouldn't fight other groups because they feel bad, they should only fight when they are forced to become something they don't want to be. Just because someone is praying on your campus or a teacher said Christianity is wrong doesn't mean your rights are being threatened.
Post
#122584
Topic
Video Games - a general discussion thread
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/122584/action/topic#122584
Time
Change in topic -

I never had any problems in college but now that I'm a working stiff there is a much smaller contingent of gamers in my social circle. Any of y'all on xbox live? Sometimes I get tired of playing with kids whose voices have yet to change and are just taking their new arsenal of curses and suggestive language for a test drive. So I wouldn't mind filling up my friends list with a few OT types.

I'm RileyCastejon on there, if anyone is interested.

---

Oh, and regarding the next gen, I'm all about the revolution. Since I never deemed the gamecube worth the time, the backwards compatibility would help me catch up on the gems that I missed. But I don't know where Nintendo is taking this whole thing, if the controller is gyro sensitive or just going in the wrong direction, it could screw up the whole thing. So I'm waiting to see what this revolution is all about.

I'm one of those cheapassgamers (check out www.cheapassgamer.com if you've never seen it) who waits two years before entering the new generation, when everything is cheap, so I'll have plenty of information when decision time comes. In the meantime, I catch up on my backlog of games from this generation.
Post
#107974
Topic
ROTS: Palpatine's Master
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/107974/action/topic#107974
Time

OK, so as I read around, it seems that everyone, or at least a majority, has assumed that when Palpatine tells his story about the guy bringing people back from the dead, that that guy was actually Palpatine’s master and the apprentice who killed him was Palpatine himself.

Where the crap did that conclusion come from? Did I miss something? At first I thought it was just some people who conjectured it as “likely”, which it is, I guess. But now it’s popping up everywhere in a bunch of different threads.

All I remember hearing is that there is a story about a Sith Lord so powerful that he could … blah blah blah.

Post
#107966
Topic
a fresh rant about ep.3
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/107966/action/topic#107966
Time
Just two things to contribute:

1) I agree that the magic of the first three films has been irrevocably lost. Although I am one of those who loved ep 3 when I saw it, there is NO going back to what Star Wars was in my brain before these new movies were made. I would go back if I could.

2) They tried to give people "high language" in this one, which deals, among other things, with a lack of contractions. Ewan took awhile, but in this film he nailed it and the dialogue sounded natural even though it was "high." Portman never mastered the skill, so she just sounds unnatural with the language. I believe that is the failing of many of the actors. Picture Samuel L. Jackson doing Shakespeare. Is he comfortable onstage? Can he express himself through the dialogue? Star Wars is not Shakespeare, but re-structure the sentences and remove contractions and, as far as the actor is concerned, it might as well be.
Post
#106840
Topic
Symbolism in ROTS
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/106840/action/topic#106840
Time
Don't forget "ye gods" that Jar Jar says in Ep. I.

At the Myth and Magic museum tour thing, Lucas spoke on the force. He was trying to not make a religious statement but wanted religiousity in it, so he tried to make something that drew on everything, sort of an everyman's spirituality without embracing or excluding any one system of beliefs. So you have strains of Shinto (binding all living things together with a "force"), Christianity (a conscious, purposeful power greater than us that works through us to accomplish its own good will when we surrender to it), a bit of Hinduism with the whole fate/destiny/karma thing (I may be off on that one, feel free to correct me), Buddhism (becoming one with the force through meditation and concentration, with force visions and stuff), the occult of the Dark Side (bending a power greater than yourself to your own will, but ultimately being broken by it and accomplishing that greater power's evil ends rather than your own), and hard-core science (by which I mean believing scientific laws account for the totality of the universe - in this case included by midichlorians).

So it's not surprising to find Christian references in there. I feel the PT has replaced the Shinto edge of the OT with the hard-core science view, but still allows for some sort of spiritual reality behind the science. And I guess it did center more on the Christian/Occult portion of the force... Anakin's bad dreams seemed to come from the Buddhist facet.

But I'm no expert on world religions, I've just had a little exposure to most of them and somewhere heard GL's intention in creating the Force.
Post
#106621
Topic
My review of Episode III (minor, minor spoilers)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/106621/action/topic#106621
Time
All I can think of is that he was living with the skywalkers. Perhaps, being out on Tatooine, having the name skywalker wasn't too dangerous. But if the whole family changed their name suddenly, or adopted a son with a different last name and no one knew where he came from, it would be reason to talk and word might get out? Maybe it was just to keep from stirring up the pot since they were already in the outer rim.

That's just a stretch rationalization, but it came to me.
Post
#106606
Topic
Did they make the right decision? - use of technology in the Prequels
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/106606/action/topic#106606
Time

I was just wondering about all of y’alls opinions about the PT in general, specifically Episode III.

Lucasarts made full use of the technology now available to them in creating droids, action sequences, battles, and so forth. As a result, we have much more epic battles, with more people, which allows people to die, which in turn allows for realistic accuracy (i.e. the stormtroopers hit their targets and so forth). In the OT, we had so few people in a battle that no one could get hit. This makes for a much more realistic battle tone, but also makes for a disconnect in the tone and style of the films.

Likewise, the space battles have gotten more complex with each iteration. This makes for (what I thought) a beautiful and exciting space battle in Ep. III, but at the same time there’s a disconnect in style and tone.

Again with the Aliens, vehicles, and droids. Most everyone agrees that Episode I was too big for its britches and should have used puppets, but I feel that Episode III pulled it off appropriately, minus Yoda’s facial expressions, which still fell short of the puppet (though they were far, far from a disappointment).

So, the question - do you think Lucasarts did the right thing to use all the technology and cinematic advances from the past 20 years to make a more realistic, more visually exciting film, and in general make what they felt (note: not what you felt) was the best film they could make with the given resources, or should they have limited themselves to the original style for the sake of continuity and faithfulness to the 80’s SciFi genre?

As a note, I have always felt the latter. But after seeing Episode III, where I feel the film actually grew into its shoes, I’m contemplating admitting I was wrong and supporting the decisions that were made.

Post
#106568
Topic
My review of Episode III (minor, minor spoilers)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/106568/action/topic#106568
Time
Two quick notes (not to detract from the movie...I loved it and I am excited about Star Wars in a way I hardly remember being before...)

why the re-introduction of midichlorians? "luminous beings are we, not this crude matter..." or, rather we're crude matter with little pieces of crude matter that give us the illusion of beign luminous. The whole point of luminosity is that you don't NEED an intermediary, a part of you actually exists on a spiritual plane. Oh well.

And the other thing, the ambiguity of force powers. Seems like Obi Wan could have used the force to lift those buzz bots off of his fighter. It was life or death situation, he could have done it without anger, fear, or destruction, and so forth. I understand it was exciting, but there's always that struggle between what the force should be, in theory, and how it actually gets used.

Oh well. Sorry to gripe/nitpick. I'm a whiner.
Post
#106554
Topic
My review of Episode III (minor, minor spoilers)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/106554/action/topic#106554
Time
Overall: I think this was the first of the Prequels worthy of the Star Wars legacy. I really liked it.

What was awesome:
-changed the juvenile humor of the first two (farting animals, Jar Jar's tongue) for some tongue-in-cheek humor (like the droids in the elevator. I don't know what exactly they changed, but it had that Star Wars "feel" we're always talking about.

-way to finally answer the "why doesn't Qui Gonn disappear?" question! And they tied it in with Anakin's obsession with cheating death, and contrasted the natural power of the light side with the equivalent unnatural power of the dark side. Well done!

-better pacing (AOTC was too chopped), better acting, better dialogue. I only cringed once...maybe I'll grow to love that line in the future by virtue of its sap?

-Yoda actually hinted at MagnoliaFan's take on the "prophecy of the one!" MagFan says balance could mean the end of the sith, it could also be a darker prophecy at reducing the force to two sith and two jedi, thus establishing balance. Yoda hinted at this, and the viewer can draw his own conclusion at the end of the movie when we see the two pairs.

-Way to include the Lava duel Lucas originally had planned for ROTJ.

-Better Anakin tension, saw the good and the bad and we were able to root for him, all the while knowing the tragedy that was to unfold.

-LOVED the lizard-steed.

What they got wrong:
-mis-marketed General Greivous. He was supposed to be a bad-arse jedi killing machine. He just ran and got his butt kicked. Sure, he was cool, but he was a completely different character than Clone Wars and starwars.com led us to believe. Totally mis-marketed and so kind of ruined.

-I didn't hear a Screaming Wilhelm...did anyone else?

-They gave me a convincing reason for Anakin to turn to the dark side but there was no convincing reason for him to stay on the darkside. I wish they had given him a consuming hatred for the emporer, so he was trying to learn the power to kill him, kind of like an addiction. But after Padme was dead, I had trouble believing that Anakin would then venture down the Lord Vader path...something was missed.

-OK, so you have to ruin the "I am your father" surprise, that's just the way it goes. But I REALLY wish they had kept Leia a mystery. Future generations could still have the experience in ESB when Yoda says "there is another" (oh yeah, and Obi Wan supposedly didn't know about her? "He was our last hope"? But he's the one who hid them? Whatever. I think that was a pre-existing inconsistency). Anyway, Yoday says "there is another" and everyone's wondering where's luke's sister? And then in ROTJ we find out it's Leia. But now everyone forever will know from the get go. That did not have to be given away.

-The one loose end that will eat at me forever is what happened to R2 that he went from a Comm-catching, rocket-flying, droid-beating, spaceship-jumping, pop-a-wheelying tin-can of terror to a geriatric astromech. R2 was a *little* over the top, not too bad, but when we see his old role, there's just no connection. I though maybe he would take heavy damage or something at the end of the film, but no dice.

Anyway, it was great. When I finally got over my denial at Episode I and conceded that it was a bad movie, I told everyone that I held out hope that the completed trilogy would give context to it and make it good. Episode II did indeed improve it; the whole was greater than the sum of the parts. With a quality ending that successfully captured the greatness of Star Wars, I'm hoping that going back and seeing the entire PT, the context will make it valuable as a whole. Hoping hoping hoping. We'll see.

My kids are still seeing the OT first whenver they're born, though : )
Post
#105268
Topic
Samuel L. Jackson & Laurence Fishburne
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/105268/action/topic#105268
Time
I just get their names confused. When I'm thinking of Morgan Freeman, Lawrence Fishburne, or Samuel Jackson I have to take a moment to think of which name goes with the one I'm thinking of. But I never get the men themselves confused.

Is that a sign of latent racial thinking to categorize the actors together just because they're all black and in similar movies? Or is that just a logical consequence of three guys sharing a salient characteristic that happens to be divided along racial lines? Oh well.
Post
#93293
Topic
Riddles
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/93293/action/topic#93293
Time
Seeing as how I'm dating one lawyer and related to another, I'll take a stab with my lay-legal expertise:

He had already been accused and convicted incorrectly of the murder (and the person wasn't dead at all). He later got out and actually murdered that person, but couldn't go to jail again for the same crime?
Post
#92193
Topic
The Matrix/ Terminator written by a woman?
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/92193/action/topic#92193
Time
It says she's getting payment for the terminator movies as well, and all three matrix movies. I wonder...why didn't she sue after T2 did so well? And why would Time-Warner continue making the other two movies along the same lines, after a suit was filed in 99?

It's possible that they thought they were changing it sufficiently to be their own creation, so they went ahead. Maybe they thing they're in the right, genuinely. We'd have to read Stewart's works to be sure. It's possible it's true, but there's many things that don't make sense in there.
Post
#90543
Topic
Cartoons!
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/90543/action/topic#90543
Time
Maybe YOU all have but I haven't. here I am.

First thing to add: when I was in Japan and walking down the street there's just a vending machine on the sidewalk selling bottles of wine, sake, and cans of beer...that was cool. Wine bottles in a streetside vending machine.

Second thing to add: I love cartoons. Have any of you heard of Home Movies? First season is on DVD now. It's ingenious.


For the mainstream, I'm a big fan of:
The Tick
Family Guy
Cowboy Bebop (In general, I'm sure I would love Anime, but I find the boobs and impossible costumes filtering into my brain has a detrimental effect on my life and my relationships. I made an exception for Bebop)
Roger Ramjet
Freakazoid
Earthworm Jim
Road Rovers (had it's moments...I doubt I could watch it now, 10 years later)
Sealab 2021, in small doses. Except the episode 'Fusebox'. I could watch that one every day. Actually...I did for awhile. When I had it on tape.

and I second the conversation that I'm sure has been had already, what happened to the days of classical music and opera with intelligent subject matter? Basically, when did cartoons get corporatized and planned in board room brainstorm sessions, rather than in the minds of artists?
Post
#90519
Topic
Riddles
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/90519/action/topic#90519
Time
Sorry, I thought the original question specified that they grabbed left, then right. That's not specified. So let's say four philosophers grab their left fork, then their right for. One philosopher grabs his right fork, then his left fork. This way, they will never lock up.

But the question says they grab BOTH forks...does this constrain the philosophers to a simultaneous grab? Because then they can't grab one at a time...