Originally posted by: LasermanFor a start, DVD is 4:2:0, even consumer HDTV (1080i or 720p) is only 4:2:0 so your colour resolution is horribly, horribly compromised compared to film where there is effectively a 1:1 resolution match for colour to picture information. Just to nitpick, when you say film holds as much colour as picture information (which is true at the time it's filmed), and is comparable to 4:4:4 - what we're talking about is the original star wars negatives, which have deteriated so much that they need to be colour corrected scene by scene (and I might add that they didn't do a perfect job in 1993 or in 2004 with this correcting). With this in mind, wouldn't it be fair to say that the master star wars film reels do not hold colour as well anymore? Wouldn't this be more comparable to 4:2:0 then to 4:4:4?
I have great respect for Francis Ford Coppola (more then any other single director), his movie "The Outsiders" is one of the finest movies I've ever seen. He is known for his attention to detail, and the quality of his works. If he prefers digital over film, I'm sure it's because of the quality.
Here's an excerpt from Cameron's interview with The Hollywood Reporter (I know his point of view is far from fact):
THR: How does the HD look blown up to 15-perf/70mm?
Cameron: It looks phenomenal. To say we're wildly enthusiastic would not be overstating it. One has to bear in mind, though, that it's a 16:9 aspect ratio, so it doesn't fill the entire height of the Imax screen. It chops off a bit at the top and bottom. But in a 3-D environment, you don't really notice that.
The amount of data available from a 35mm negative is much less than the amount of data available from an HD frame.
THR: Film purists argue the opposite.
Cameron: They're wrong. You can take an HD image and blow it up by double before you start to see the same amount of granularity you have with a 35mm negative. George Lucas did some tests that I flew up to see, and it corresponded to what we'd found. I'd say the Sony HD 900 series cameras are generating an image that's about equivalent to a 65mm original negative.Also, keep in mind when comparing the quality of detail in the 2004 release, that a lot of that detail is in newly created digital elements introduced to those scenes - and there are so many alterations that are of course going to be better and more crisp then the original film, so that when you watch the entire SE movies an illusion is created making you believe it's more crisp with more detail then the film itself had. Maybe I'm wrong, and the original SW negatives do hold picture information to the equilivant of 1080p - but I still really doubt it, I think a good quality interpolation upscale of DVD resolution would look pretty close. On the other hand, it would look better to be natively scanned at a higher resolution, just because there's less scaling going on. Just because some 35MM film can hold "up to 4000" lines (or however many) doesn't mean the SW negatives do - no matter what the technology.
If they transferred it again, and only removed large, visible, obvious deformities - it wouldn't be that different to the 1993 master, even if it was scanned at 720p or 1080p."
This is something a lot of people incorrectly assume.
If they fed the OT through one of the new arriscan machines, it would look immeasurably better than the 1993 transfers. I kind of got that out wrong anyway, yes of course they would look better, more crisp and contain better quality - probably much better quality. But it would not look as good quality as the Special Edition. Also, I tend to confuse what I'm talking about (in other words, make it confusing for you, the reader) - most of the time I'm talking about "our" collective ability rather than Lucasfilm's abilities.
I also disagree with what you're saying about laserdisc quality - I've watched Laserdiscs projected by professional-grade mounted movie projectors (thanks to friends who are complete movie geeks - and it sounds like you've watched them too) and the quality is good. It's not fantastic, of course, but it's still good enough to enjoy on a big screen. By the way, many independent films are filmed digitally at DVD resolution and are still more then acceptable theatrically.
"I don't own a 35mm print of SW, but have had access to some in the past, and while they were useful as a colour reference, none would have been good enough for a high quality scan."
So it seems we do agree on the basic premise.They would also be risking a gaol term. If the print got into the wild, I'm pretty sure Lucasfilm would put a lot of resources into tracking down where it was done. They are quite forgiving of the 'home' user making his own versions and playing with laserdiscs, but if a film facility scanned a print I'm pretty sure all hell would break loose. (Speculation on my part of course)
Agreed. Also, I know for a fact Lucasfilm has never been happy about pirated SW copies - I remember in about 1999 reading on their website (starwars.com) a statement against the circulation of pirated LD-based DVD copies. At the time they were mostly the SE, as I understand it. They said it's true they would be better quality then VHS, but that they would not equal DVD quality.(BTW. a huge thanks to everyone here, I'm not officially back, and promise not to take this thread any further off topic - but I borrowed a computer and thought I'd drop in and say hi. Hopefully I'll be back properly in a couple of months and will rejoin the fray.)
Well you're welcome, I've heard a lot of good things about you. 
