WXM

Nokes said:

… i need to see the best possible version…

The two versions on this site, they’re likely both as done as they’ll be. I believe the 35mm one hit some rights issues so its version on YT is probably as final as that one would be because getting slammed with a C&D likely took a lot of wind out of that restorer’s sails. However, you can contact that restorer to learn…

This version here in this thread, I’m biased (I’m the one who manually cleaned up over 2000 frames of print damage from this version), but I think it looks and sounds great. If you want to see this version, PM Octorox. You can find his posts in the previous pages. The detailed info on Venny’s 35mm version is of course in the thread that GregZ just provided a link for.

These are two different-looking “end results” that I think cover most bases of what someone would prefer to see at this point in time where there is still no HD disc release.

(SpacemanDoug beat me to posting as I was putting this together, but for kicks anyway…)

What I read was additional footage was shot by Spielberg very soon after the TV airing to “upgrade” the movie to a theatrical experience. Obviously, this new footage was not intended to be 4:3, it was shot only intended for theatrical viewing for a wider screen experience. (I’ll let other people state what that exact TR ar was.) So, yeah, it could be said that if nothing else, that new footage was intended to be non-4:3.

Another piece of the puzzle is that it would appear the master film elements for the TV version were lost in a big fire at Universal, so the additional-footage theatrical version is the only version that’s in great shape for modern viewing.

All of this together points to the answer being: the original TV — 4:3 — version is NOT the definitive version, the TR is. And for anyone who wants to adhere to the orig TV version instead, they have to unfortunately settle for resolution in the SD realm. This is why the new 4k disc has a very nice image of the TR, but the orig TV version in that same set looks horrendous (part being the atrocious attempt at AI upscaling).

At least that’s what I’ve gleaned from reading around, but I’m no authority. Maybe someone else will correct what I have above. (Edit: SpacemanDoug has some more detailed info, beat me to posting this)

I saw Star Wars about 25 times in the same theater first run, and the two previews for all of those viewings are burned into my memory: The World’s Greatest Lover and Damnation Alley, 100% those showed before SW in its initial run in at least one theater in '77-'78.

frendon said:

…the only thing I noticed was that in some portions there are 4 corners of the frame that show some type of blur, hardly noticeable but I thought I’d mention it.

The 4:3 version isn’t full width and the 16:9 isn’t full height, so that means the corners lack a little information because neither version can supply everything (because if one of those had all the information then there’d be no need for hybriding like this 😃). The blurred material in the corners in this hybrid version is filling that’s intended to make the corners’ missing information not as obvious as solid black (boxes) would be, is a “best that can be done here” trick as it were to make the viewing a little smoother.

Due to how well it’s turning out, I can’t help but show this bit I’m working on for stwd4nder2/his project. I’m HD-re-doing the SD/VHS credits…

MonkeyLizard10 said:

Using After Effects takes ages to load in the DNGs and to render out to a video file compared to … it seems like maybe PP just assumes TIFFs are sRGB and doesn’t look at TIFF metadata … Anyway, I’ll see.

I have the best solution advice for all this that you’ve ever heard. You are dealing with all kinds of big digital picture things it seems. Well, I recommend you:

1. turn all the picture things into 240p resolution
2. save them all as jpg with quality slider moved down to “3”

and finally, erase every other frame and set the frame rate to 12 frames per second.

All these steps will make the file thingies much easier to wrangle, will save you 8% hard drive space, etc., yay! 😃

Big j/k of course. Your work/efforts here are over my head in a number of ways (I’ve never had/come across a DNG file in my life). Thanks for sharing your trials and tribulations, 'tis interesting and informative! May these bumps all smooth out…without you having to do the steps I suggested above 😃

I’m sure I speak for everyone when I say…

Thank you very much for everything, Jay! Don’t stress or beat yourself up at all. We appreciate everything, all good, thanks a million for all your efforts and for this site! 😃 😃 😃

DJPitaB said:

Unless I can get a better source than the DVDs, can anyone direct me to the best tool to use for the deinterlace/detelecine process so that I can avoid the jaggies? I’m using a Mac, and the best results I’ve gotten so far have come from Handbrake, but no matter how I adjust the deinterlace/detelecine settings, I always seem to get artifacts in the same parts of the episode.

This isn’t a direct answer to your request, but the above reminded of this thread (link). Doing something similar for the first seasons of The Simpsons, Chewielewis found there was a mishmash in the episodes as aired that made it such that one couldn’t do a blanket pass to end up with full/nice de-interlacing. If you’ve already seen/well know of this thread then my apologies, but especially since Simpsons and Futurama might have taken some similar routes in productions of their first seasons (but maybe that’s an incorrect assumption!)…

https://originaltrilogy.com/topic/The-Simpsons-Embiggened-Edition-on-hiatus/id/55848/page/1

undefined said:

So, does anyone know if a full scan of either the original camera negative, or the 35mm prints exists?

Regarding the OCN, from what I’ve gathered that has never been released in any form because the movie has so many digital effects that its master is in the form of a 2k or 2.5k digital file, which is what the 4k UHD was made from. If you don’t know, when the 4k was coming out someone announced all the original elements were newly scanned (and effects recomposited, etc.) but this turned out to be false…which makes sense: to redo all those the digital mods to the image would probably be very cost prohibitive.

At least that’s the picture I’ve gathered from reading around the 'net regarding the OCN.

Maleficent said:

That sounds interesting! But if these are prints that were used in cinemas, isn’t there a risk that the quality of these prints has deteriorated due to frequent use and/or their age and/or poor storage?

Yes, and this is why some of these fan scan projects take a long time to be released. Prints are beat up, faded, missing frames where some magic needs to be done to replace them, and other.

To try to be short-ish answering about OCN…
The select takes are all carefully spliced together (by a negative cutter) after the editor (somewhat to very likely with input from the director) finish all the editing decisions (which could take months [to edit a feature film]). The OCN and a 35mm release print will be identical in regards to the number of frames and those frames’ contents because “the OCN” of the movie is the raw camera footage turned into one long print that is now the movie. (I reiterate, this is all very general and not always the case. And I’ve never worked in a big film industry on these sides to see any of this in person, so…)

All the excess you’re talking about is “cutting room floor” stuff. Okay, that stuff is all also OCN, but that’s not usually what people are referring to when taking about THE OCN of a film. They’re talking about the final edit of all the carefully-picked takes that have been carefully edited down to the frame then assembled by a negative cutter. The excess ala alternate takes, bloopers, etc… I don’t want to pretend I really have good knowledge of what happened/happens to all that, but the general paths seems to be: a) thrown in the garbage b) stored on purpose/just in case c) weren’t intended to be around but somehow survived.

I obviously like talking about this stuff, 'tis fun for me 😃 but this thread is about Disney films so, Maleficent, I guess I recommend searching around for these kinds of answers on the 'net, in other threads, etc., so this thread can get back on track, eh? (If you really want to hear more of my blab specifically you can PM me, but again I’m not some super at-the-source fountain of this kind of knowledge.)

[EDIT: Moiisty beat me with his nice and concise answer, but for those interest in a more blabby reply here it is 😃]

Maleficent said:

I am interested in the topic, but unfortunately I know too little about it. What exactly does “35mm scan” mean? I assume that it means that an original camera negative is scanned and not just any copy of a copy of this negative?

Incorrect (99.9% of the time). The following is simplified a bit; research if you want more solid/detailed info…

When ya see fans doing a 35mm scan, they are scanning one of the many prints that were out in the world showing at theaters back when that was the way the industry operated (pre-digital). There’s pretty much no way in h$## a fan is going to get the one-of-a-kind OCN for a film.

However a STUDIO making/releasing a BD quite likely WILL use OCN. DVD was a different ballgame. A good number of DVD’s did not go back to the OCN. They used prints a lot, which is why some people on this site and FanRestore.com cherish their special DVDs of certain films: they have the correct THEATRICAL color/contrast look of the film as seen in theaters. (Again, these are all broad strokes of example and explanation.)

There are some disadvantages to some fans when it comes to watching OCN scans (used for BD/UHD releases). “How could that be possible? That’s THE best image source, right?” The answer is that color (correction) work was done for releases after the OCN was put together. So… Well, my fave example is The Road Warrior/Mad Max 2. In theaters the (color-timed/changed) release prints had the post-apocalyptic setting looking dingy, dusty, brown-ish. However, the OCN — what the cameras captured — did NOT have brownish sky. The cameras captured nice blue sky (and sometimes nicely green plants), looked much more like a nice postcard than the release in theaters…because the filmmakers knew they didn’t have to spend all the time to shower every location with brown dust while filming. In post they could just brown-it-out a bit and wallah (and it DID work, the recoloring looks much more post-apocalyptic in the theater release prints than the scan of the OCN you can get on BD).

SO, a fan who scans a mere print of TRW/MM2 that showed in theaters will have a movie that reflects the post-apocalyptic haze that the filmmaker wanted, a re-coloring that helps the setting, helps the vision…whereas if you get a BD with the straight OCN scan, you’re getting something a little too pretty looking, which would also be the case if a fan somehow got the one-of-a-kind camera negative to scan. By getting/using a 35mm release print instead, they rather automatically get the color work that we all saw in theaters and don’t have to start from scratch re-doing the color of every shot in the film (to match an old LD or DVD they’d use as a reference).

Maleficent said:

However, I would be cautious not to get too excited, as it is possible that other scenes have been distorted by the use of colour filters or similar. Perhaps someone already has this UHD and can report on it? By the way, I’m not a fan of this film either, but if this release is really perfect and shows the film as it was made, then maybe there’s hope that the other Disney films will also get proper releases.

Tone can’t be carried over into words on a screen well and with what’s ahead I’m urged to say that I’m casual with this, not aiming to jab/poke with a pointy stick…

This seems to be a case where if this area (good releases of classic Disney animation) is your bag then this release should be a “vote with your wallet pick,” seems quite unlikely that celluloid this old is going to be a “perfect” (or near) release on home format at this point in time. As seen above, many of the hardcore people here say this release is very good and worth rewarding the efforts of, which is something I never thought I’d see from a D release of their older films. Even if some comparisons reveal scenes where something doesn’t quite match original cel colors (which is a whole other rabbit hole ala “you should not expect things to match”) I’d still say show Disney that THIS restoration crew is the one they should hire again, reward, and of course ya do this via a certain purchase. 😃

Yeah, it will be sweet when some fully automated thing can do the 100% likes of what I/we accomplish with our most careful cleaning/patching. But until then, Phoenix is one thing you 35mm scan guys are using, right-o to that.

Thanks for the replies, DoomBot. 😃

DoomBot said:

Using this software https://digitalvision.world/products/phoenix/

Not doing every single frame in the film, just making it less distracting…

Ah, thanks for that info. What are your thoughts on this. Alleycat had this in a thread of his over at FanRestore

“…was then taken into Topaz for some further cleaning”

Do you have any thoughts or experience using the AI stuff (ala Topaz) for de-specking/de-scratching? Is it good for only certain situations maybe? Or do you really think Phoenix would be/is better?

TGR97 said:

We finished JP3 and are in the midst of cleaning it.

Curious the method(software) currently used for such cleaning. What do you use? (And I assume this cleaning is getting rid of specks and scratches?)

Hi!

Using the brute method of putting that search through google, I’m coming up with the answer no, no one (here at least) has fan edited DCAoR. Here’s the closest I came up with, but not what you’re looking for
https://originaltrilogy.com/topic/The-Dark-Crystal-The-Great-Conjunction-Released/id/71960

There might be such an edit at one of the other places, but I’m not on may main computer now with those bookmarks handy so maybe someone else will have that avenue answer?

Since I’ve been following the hell out of the game for years, I’ll give something less “diplomatic” than what you (burritossocial) said/the way you put it.

Overall the “game” missed a number of unfortunate marks, but also very much hit one to a degree (as per the top post above) such that it has a small legion of lovers despite the numerous shortfallings or (far) worse.

For those who want to hear my blab on specifics, here ya go (but of course some people disagree with the likes of this):

• The combat aspect is atrocious, with numerous things about it almost in the territory of “unbelievable!” to be in place for a work that has such visual fidelity/solidity, and is a product of this day and age of gaming.

• A LOT of the planned content was cut in the end, by release, leaving an experience that seems too anemic to the player’s senses when the end is reached, even with this being a purposefully very alien, un-defined, surreal world…

• To many people, after a while it turns into a case of the emperor has no clothes. Everyone is super excited when they get the first tastes of the game, the world, but after piles of walking around solving uninspired puzzles, dealing with the same two enemy (types) over and over again — all this adding to the fact that there just doesn’t seem to be any points to the goings-on to latch onto let alone find deeply satisfying from a writing standpoint — all this leaves many players a (non-)experience that feels like “there’s no there there,” is much more like a semi-interactive art exhibit, a frustrating/boring walking simulator than a game.

• Even the artistic aspect is hobbled in some ways for those wanting to just walk around to enjoy the world. The (atrocious/lame/repetitive) enemies get in the way, plus there are invisible walls everywhere that keep the player who really wants to just walk around and admire the detail from being able to indulge in that kind of thing as much as should be possible considering the kind of “game” SCORN seems to be. (Additionally on this point, there’s no option to lower your weapon from being wielded, so for those wanting to enjoy the art and snap screen grabs, the weapon is always going to be on screen, leaving people frustratedly puzzled at why the devs can’t be bothered to have a button to lower the weapon in their piece that’s supposed to be largely about looking at the world and admire all the intricate detail.)

• Speaking of the “incredible artwork,” this game is obviously very biting off the works of Giger, but also perhaps some other famous other artists to a degree. This undermines the notion that the artistic vision and work behind this game are worthy of being bowed down to, as it could be said that they merely rode on the coattails of — used — other artists’ incredible output in a way that rather integrity-drains the one thing about the game that the makers delivered on (since the writing for the game’s happenings is a disappointing mess or is non-existent depending on the non-SCORN-lover ya talk to).

• There was a bit of drama with the devs in the kickstarter about a year before launch that looked very bad. To the showrunners’ credit they did a huge course correction in a nice grand way, which is neat, but especially with how kickstarter had grown a reputation with games that “ya shouldn’t bother funding that kinda stuff there” due to endless vaporware and more, it was pretty shocking to see the very excited backers for SCORN be treated so badly by the devs over mere very reasonable requests…such that even the devs’ attempt to turn that fully around couldn’t fully shake off all the damage they had done.

• There’s actually even more what I see as legit criticism that could be listed, but this is long enough, eh? 😃

Despite all of that being complained out, my end take is that it’s better to have this strange and neat-looking “game” out in the landscape to take a peek at for those in the mood to do so (especially since one can just experience it via watching a free playthrough video rather than paying $40 for a “game” that is more art exhibit, and doesn’t even fully nail that) than for it to have been recognized early as something that wasn’t going to fully work and be ditched.

Overall though, it is rather annoying and depressing that so much of the game misses the mark, even in little ways, is so wildly up and down between its (up=)look/world and then (down=)your main enemy is just a headless plucked chicken(thing)!!! But games that bite off this much of the “haven’t seen this kind of thing much before!” pie, very few of them seem to end up 10/10 so perhaps the inspiration wall is as much to blame here as the devs with SCORN? 🤷

Can you tell us what’s the story with the background being so different on the final frame grab (UHD)?

Master Lawdog said:

Well I don’t have that much on me, so I’m sorry, Mundungus.

It’s okay. Amazingly, just an hour ago someone in the neighborhood left out a palette with almost that much cash and “Free” sign, so I’m still going to be able to get those square watermelons anyway…but I’m going to have to get smaller ones due to being short few million so no extra slices to share. 😦

.
But more seriously, I hope my breaking up the stream of pure requests to you with some silliness for a couple of posts was a tiny, fun diversion for you. (If not, my apolos.) Thanks for being such a great member of the community, M Lawdog 😃

Hi Master Lawdog! I went to archive org to access your link where you said you were giving away $100,000,000 for free, but the link had vanished. I could really use a free $100,000,000 (as there are some really expensive square watermelons I’d just LOVE to have) so can you PM a link too that dough?

Mucho thanks in advance! (And I’ll mail you a slice of right-angle watermelon as extra thanks for the hundred million smackaroos) 😃 😉 😄

Since someone else brought this thread to the front I can ask about this little thing without too much guilt…

I fully agree that the Corman dub is almost all an abomination. However, I — and I know I’m far from the only one — prefer the hauntingly melancholic “Taking off” (song) in the Corman version over what is to me the upbeat-almost-goofy original Japanese and newer English versions of the song. (99.9% of the time I way prefer original language+E subs for anything.)

Does anyone have a good copy of this track (that’s better than the ones on YT)? The song is all I’m interested in.

I strongly suspect this is one of those things where the masters were thrown away decades ago and the 40-year-old Corman VHSs are the highest quality one will find, but I don’t know for sure, am not well researched in this, so seeing if anyone here…

Thanks for listening/reading.

thebiggerpictures said:

Thank you so much! I tweeted at the Director about it - he actually reached out to me this morning via Twitter and email. We are going to set up a zoom meeting for after Christmas to discuss further. Very exciting!

Wow, that’s awesome! This makes me a slight weirdo I guess, but I LOVE the “Happy Working Song” and especially “That’s How You Know” bits from Enchanted (and I love the rest of the movie too). Those two are some of my fave things on screen this century, no joke. And you get to chat with the man who made it all! Very neat-o to say the least. May it go more than well 😃

Do you pull each other’s tails?
Do you feed each other seeds?
https://youtu.be/07frAlgGSE8?t=11
😄
No, there is something sweeter
Everybody needs…

Hello and welcome to the site! (not that I’m anyone special here 😃)

Sounds like very hardcore work there. Impressive all over the place. Are you a pro doing this project in your spare time or just a very (very) advanced hobbyist?

Just from your one post there I very much hope Kevin Lima gets to see your work. I did a restoration on something that was directed by a big-timey person and he saw it and gave a thumbs up, which is a huge thrill of course. And you’ve likely seen the Brave Little Toaster thread, where the restorers there have some kind of contact with the director. So it’s not outside the realm of possibility.

Class316, that sounds great! But a tiny request: Can you guys do a quick encode stretching the x to a 32:9 ar for my ultra-wide monitor, do more DNR than was done to the LotR/T2 4k releases, slather the image with alternating teal and yellow tints, and add frame rate mods/effects so it always appears like soap opera 120Hz refresh motion interpolation? I know you’ll say, “Couldn’t be happier to oblige with all that!” so I’ll give a thanks now ahead of time 😃

Just being silly of course. Wow, all you guys’ work here on OT with these Fantasia’s (TonyWDA’s thread too)… fascinating watching all these releases stepping higher and higher up the quality ladder, all the approaches…! Thanks so much for sharing not only the end results but the (telling the) steps!

StarkillerAG said:

Most of these edits are on fanedit.org, so you could just look them up there. Failing that, you could look them up on Google.

That’s what I indeed did, I say thanks again for posting, SAG!