msycamore

Asaki said:

That is a tiny bit of an improvement, but I think I still prefer the Technidisc.

Well, I like the Technidisc LD myself for various reasons but this capture is so damn good that if you fix the few problems it have and do some color correction you will have something really beautiful. Forget the colors for a moment, just take a look at how this capture compares to the GOUT and my Technidisc capture in clarity and detail.

And most importantly, there's no damn DVNR. :) You have some ugly damage throughout one reel though, and there is unfortunately some chroma smear present, but overall this one wins IMO.

When it comes to doing subs for films, I'm pretty sure it's just a matter of style and preference of the guy doing them combined with making it easy to read. For the '97 SE they didn't put ellipsis on the continuing line like they did in '77 for example. It varies wildly on how it is done on DVD subs as well. I guess there is no rule.

There are people that have been upset by the four dot ellipsis in the A long time ago preface and IIRC the three dots in the crawls for being typographical incorrect. ;)

After looking at these captures again in more detail, I must say that I'm in love. One of the problems I had with ANH in this set before was the colors or the lack of it, that issue are now gone when I see how the actual LD look, I think I'll never go back to my Technidisc LD pressing ever again.

Not to say that it doesn't have its problems, but I think most of it can be corrected and fixed. Chewtobacca, maybe you could take use of this filter: http://www.geocities.com/siwalters_uk/chromashift.html to correct some of the bad color registration.

Just an example with chromashift applied, unfiltered on top.

Empire doesn't have this problem thankfully.  But it does, not as awfully much though. ;)

Harmy said:

Actually, I thought the split sabre was a DVNR artefact until I noticed that it's there in the SE as well and even more visible, since the original element seems to have been recomped with an unreasonable level of sharpness and low contrast, so it seems to have always been there.

Yes, that one is just the prop that is visible.

I'm talking about this one:

GOUT

JSC LD (V8)

The shape of the remote laser beams were affected by the DVNR in most of the shots as well, but then again you will not notice these artifacts in motion, so it doesn't really matter.

That is some damn impressive work you have done, Harmy. I do not understand how you can cope with all this. If I may put forth my opinion about the never ending discussion about the colors of the saber in the Falcon, what I recall and what I have seen on most sources, the saber was leaning more towards cyan in the wide-shots but was more blue in the close-ups.

IMO the many minor "inconsistencies" on the sabers from shot to shot is what made the original sabers to look so damn impressive and real in the first place, maybe it was a stroke of luck but an photographed object shouldn't look identical in every environment, angle and lightning condition etc. especially when that object is moving. If they are completely consistent you'll end up with an prequel saber which IMO look much more fake.

I haven't seen any of your work yet but I think I'll have to swallow my purist stance and check this out when it's ready. The pics I'm seeing of your work look very impressive! :)

Just an observation and minor nitpicking, I think you could have gotten even better results on the remote sequence if you had utilized JSC LD-footage for some of the de-specializing as I'm seeing artifacts caused by the GOUT DVNR on some of your effect elements in those pics - the split saber and wavy remote beam, but I don't think you'll have to worry as you're only seeing these artifacts on a still image.

Incredible work Harmy!

Harmy said:

My guess is that it's the JPG compression utilized by the site I uploaded to, sorry about that (but then, even the Blu picture must have been affected, so the difference should still stand.

Yeah, if that's the case, the advancement in picture quality from the GOUT is pretty vast. Quite incredible what can be done to this old transfer. :)

Harmy said:

I've seen some of the Blu V1 footage and believe me, we're talking vast picture quality improvement here, especially if DJ manages to make it even better for V2.

Here's a comparison I posted some time ago:

Not to undermine d_j's project as I'm sure it does look great, but that comparison of yours is very misleading as not even the GOUT does look that bad, see here: http://originaltrilogy.com/forum/topic.cfm/GOUT-image-stabilization/post/549106/#TopicPost549106

Simon Pegg said:

"Enjoyed Hugo, despite almost being ruined by Phantom Menace 3D trailer. Come and revisit the most disappointing 2 hours of your life, in 3D!"

"Who is going to actually pay for the pleasure of having that ponderous, uneven, clumsy piece of shit, literally shoved in their face? WHO?!!"

Probably the same guys who saw it again and again and again... back in '99.

Viola! :)

I skimmed through Star Wars and Empire recently and these captures are real beauties, by far the best captures I have seen of SW-Laserdiscs. Sharp with fantastic detail, you can even see the dotpattern on Vader's communication screen in Empire that was almost impossible to make out on many other transfers, dotcrawl is almost entirely eliminated, the rainbowing seen is unfortunately a part of these transfers I'm afraid and not something introduced in the captures, the power of the X9 made a big difference, well done Grinder and Arnie.d! thanks for sharing these gems.

At least, you'll not need to worry about the framecounts if you're going to use my Jedi sub script as a base, they should be the same for NTSC and PAL, the difference between them appear later in the film.

TServo2049 said:

msycamore: I agree. Though I reiterate, I would at least like to see the red sun fixed. It literally sticks out like a sore thumb.

It's very similar to the red lights seen in the blockade runner shootout or the red light seen on the Falcon in the Hoth hangar, completely unnatural. The atmospheric depth is gone making the reds look like it was painted on top of the film in the 2004 transfers.

TServo2049 said:

Harmy, I get what you're getting at, I don't think it's supposed to be THAT bright, but in the various bootlegs and other sources I've seen, the sky looks a little brighter and has a little more color in it, and the foreground seems contrast...ier?. In yours, the contrast still looks dull (though some non-SE/non-GOUT images, like the Topps Widevision card, look like that too).

Here's the Puggo Grande, which is what Corellian's mockup reminded me of. Obviously, the sky is too blown-out:

And I keep coming back to Moth3r's version of the '77 widescreen boot (even though the color gradiation of the horizon doesn't really register in this transfer):

Also look at the clip at the beginning of From Star Wars to Jedi - on the Japanese LD transfer, it doesn't look overly bright or blown-out, and even though the sky looks a little too bluish in the Luke closeup, the first shot seems "right"...

If anything, please fix that blood-red sun. It's supposed to be orange, and it is not supposed to look as saturated, sharp-edged or opaque as it does in the '04/'11 transfer. Right now, it seems to pop out from the background - it almost looks like it's pasted over the sky, whereas it used to actually look like it was in the sky.

That's not exactly how Puggo Grande looks though, your example looks very familiar to how I boosted the brightness on it in an example in this thread here: http://originaltrilogy.com/forum/topic.cfm/Star-Wars-Colortiming-Cinematography-was-What-changes-was-done-to-STAR-WARS-in-93/post/429548/#TopicPost429548

This one is untouched:

The same goes for Moth3r's bootleg which looks very different than his original source material it was made from:

Just thought it was important to point it out. Anyway, I actually think it's near impossible for Harmy to make this sequence look like the original scene, not only must he treat it like a special effect as it was digitally messed with in '97 and '04 but the color grading is also so screwed up here that anything he can do to improve it is an major accomplishment in my book.

It has been talked about in several threads since its release, here is one of them: http://originaltrilogy.com/forum/topic.cfm/GOUT-improved-versions/post/405901/#TopicPost405901

If some of you want to get rid of the rainbowing seen in these transfers I can recommend the fft3dfilter in AviSynth.

fft3dfilter(sigma=3,sigma2=3,sigma3=12,sigma4=3,bt=3,plane=1)
fft3dfilter(sigma=3,sigma2=3,sigma3=12,sigma4=3,bt=3,plane=2)

The above command should be input after the IVTC, the results are quite impressive, especially on starfields but be aware that it also desaturate objects that should have color sometimes. This was a problem I was faced with when doing the Technidisc transfer, so I ultimately dropped it for that one, the side effects are at least minor compared to other filters I have tested, you could maybe apply it just where it's absolutely necessary. Something I plan to do for my 2nd attempt.

No, I haven't been able to check that yet. It will be interesting.

Anchorhead said:

msycamore said:

I don't believe these kind of things is done to give fans the middle finger, just take a look at what was done to the trilogy in '97...

No doubt some of those alterations were nothing more than terrible decisions and a clear lack of understanding what made the films special to people over the years.  And I agree that he's been profit-first, art-second since about 1980.

However, The NOOO in the 6th film has been ridiculed so thoroughly, that I honestly believe adding it to the Original Trilogy was a finger to the fans who made fun of it. 

Just as I think his designing & selling the T-shirts that say Han Shot First were also a big "fuck you" to anyone who dared question his altering of the cantina scene - the very scene that established Han as a character.

 

Yeah, it may be a little bit of both and I can agree on the Han Shot First T-shirt, but it's just that I have a hard time to separate the latest kind of alterations with anything that was made as early as '97, to me they're just the same kind of ridiculous alterations, IMO the altered Han and Greedo confrontation or added scream of Luke when he let himself go down the shaft in Cloud City after his confrontation with Vader is on the same level as the added Vader scream/dialogue, just to mention a few.

If some of these latest things really are done in some twisted way to upset a small group of fans, it is not only extremely childish but a very weird move, most of us would not even be the target of such an action, he is only hurting himself that way, we're only interested in the original films and in that "fuck you department" he have already succeeded. ;) Personally I don't give a damn what is done to his Special Editions, and I'm sure you don't care either.

You may be right, but to me the kind of filmmaking we see in the '97SE, Prequel Trilogy, DVD edits and Blu-ray edits is too consistent from ideas to decisions and execution to be such a thing. I could even bring up the 2004 edit of THX 1138. Anyway, it's a fascinating subject, deliberate fuck you or not.

It would be a little weird if they still had the rights to air one of the old versions, but you never know...

I have started with the color correction again, will post some before/after samples for you as I promised earlier when I get the time, you don't have to worry, I'm pretty sure you will like it when you see what I have done, it will just be a subtle thing to get rid of the pink tint.

Or you guys could always wait until I do my own color corrected version straight from the raw files, I wouldn't recommend to re-render my DVD release with a new color setting, not just because of the quality loss a re-encode would present, but there is simply too much chroma noise on it, I don't think the resulting image would be that pleasant. But feel free to do it if you want to.

Your color corrected GOUT pics look very good, You_Too.

As the GOUT transfers have white clipping already, I would be careful to not introduce even more. The whites seems to be a little hot in a few places.

I'm pretty sure you got the 1st printing, compyislife. Besides the glossy versus matte finish, IIRC some of the interior pages had a pink color rather than the yellow/beige of the first one. I bought a mint copy myself of the first printing along with the Empire program on ebay a few years ago, they're not worth that much but it is a very nice thing to own.

Anchorhead said:

EyeShotFirst said:

...further proves that George Lucas wants to screw with us. It's almost like he's cramming in shit, because he knows it will rattle our cage, and the fanboys will lap it up like a kitten on a tit.

I'm not usually a conspiracy type of guy, but that's been my thought on the more ridiculous changes for a while now.  Lucas has been a control freak with a colossal ego for years. 

The moment someone says he shouldn't do something - whether it be peers or fans - he makes it a priority to do it.  The NOOOOOO, the new dragon call, etc -  the more the fan base gets upset, the more he shows them who's boss.  At this point in the history of the franchise, to me, it's the only logical explanation.

I don't believe these kind of things is done to give fans the middle finger, just take a look at what was done to the trilogy in '97, most of those alterations are amazingly stupid and bad and hurt the films far more than any later alterations have done and those changes we saw in that re-release could never have been done to say fuck you fans. Take a look at the poor filmmaking in the prequel trilogy, it's all quite reminiscent of what we're seeing in the further degradation of the classic trilogy in 2004/11.

All these products has made a huge amount of money despite all this, and the money it makes is everything that Lucasfilm see, the 3D release is the next step in whoring this old franchise. I think that Lucas is just a lazy old man that have lost every sensibility of good filmmaking and have found the joy of playing around like a kid with these old creations of his and see what he can come up with and do next with his new digital tools, instead of creating something new, and in the process he also makes enormous amount of money on it. He do what he likes and people are buying it, couldn't be a better situation for him.

I'm sorry to hear that, bkev. Unfortunately there is not many seeders left on this one, it's also available on the newsgroup if you don't have the patience with torrents.

^^ Nice. ;)

Seems my old PC have come back to life again, so maybe I can finally manage to finish this old project. :) 

mverta said:

For what it's worth, I had information from a friend at ILM prior to the GOUT release that the original title and crawl were, indeed, recreated for the 2006 release, albeit carefully and conscientiously.  

That re-creation is probably what we all saw in the web-trailer for that release.

The 2006 bonus DVD's released in Sweden contained Danish, Swedish, Finnish, Norwegian and English hard of hearing subs.

Yeah, that is very much the case, yellow midtones with green highlights...

Thanks again for going through the trouble uploading these huge files, it's very much appreciated, Mallwalker. Looking forward to see the quality of these captures.