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ocpmovie

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Post
#193171
Topic
The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Director's Cut (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/193171/action/topic#193171
Time
Today I got a paperback copy of The Pleasantries of the Incredible Mullah Nasrudin, by Idries Shah, with illustrations by Richard Williams and Errol LeCain (1968).


A very nice book, a very entertaining read since it's all about the wisdom of the fool .... Teaching truths through zenlike humor.

The illustrations are whimsical and nice and a good thing to have for any fan of The Thief .... since of course The Thief grew out of Richard's aborted plan to make a film about Mullah Nasrudin (it fell apart when people related to Shah were asking for too much of a cut of the film's gross).

The Thief himself appears here in early form - in two stories as a thief, and in many other illustrations as a townsperson (there are also other characters dressed like the Thief). Other Thieflike character designs are in evidence throughout - people who look like Zigzag's courtiers. There's even a drawing which looks like The Thief talking to a very primitive Princess Yumyum.

There are artistic patterns which were used later as background design elements in The Thief (the "rose window" from when The Thief steals Yumyum's shoes is there on one page) ...

It's nice to see, and I'll go ahead and scan it. If you can find a used copy of this book for cheap somewhere, with Williams' illustrations intact, I'd recommend it.

(The copy I got sadly replaces Williams' original cover with one by another artist, but it's intact inside.)
Post
#193169
Topic
The Mask - Workprint (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/193169/action/topic#193169
Time
Put me on a list for this one.

Since you're on my list for my current project anyway. =)


How much of the footage in the workprint is identical to the released version? I mean, you could edit the DVD picture (and the DVD's Viking and Newspaper deleted scenes) over most of this and get something more watchable.


Which I'm doing in a more complicated form with another workprint at the moment.
Post
#193108
Topic
The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Director's Cut (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/193108/action/topic#193108
Time
I'm using Mac.

And yeah, I split Arabian Knight up into the 12 component chapters and did them as 24p PhotoJPEG Quicktime files.

Just saving back as M2V for DVD use would be fine, as I can rip that as PhotoJPEG, but if you can save as PhotoJPEG that would be even better. =)

For all the others, you can just save them as DVDs ...

Excited to see what you can do!
Post
#192963
Topic
The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Director's Cut (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/192963/action/topic#192963
Time
Oh dear Christ, get it OFF! GET IT OFF!

That's from one of the goddamn Calvert SONGS!




NOOOOOOOOOOOOO


Lovely restoration work though.

Anyway Faceman, you'll get your package in a few hours. The version of Arabian Knight that you'll actually be restoring happens to be widescreen. (And not as nice as that pan & scan copy I'm sure, but it's widescreen.)

Amazing how much better your restoration looks. I'll probably piss myself when you get hold of the widescreen version!


I've sent you Princess and the Cobbler too, which has only been released in pan & scan. =( Actually if you wanted you could use your restoration of the Miramax Pan & Scan for Princess and the Cobbler. There are very few visual differences between the two and I could easily hack them together. (Princess is running at 25 fps rather than 24 though, it runs fast cos it's PAL. I've slowed the clips down for my own use, and slowed the audio down, since it's a better sound mix than Miramax's.)

Uh, the only thing we actually need the Princess and the Cobbler for is some stuff later in the film - all of it quite short - a shot of Zigzag meeting One Eye, the entire witch scene and some stuff in the March and Destruction of the One Eye War Machine, and the ending and credits. You don't have to restore these clips but I wouldn't mind. (You can tell the scenes easy in my edit, because they're pan & scan when the rest is widescreen!)

(Note: also only appearing in Princess - a quick shot of King Nod during the opening narration. This isn't in my restoration though.)


I've also sent you a million documentaries and other films which have awful picture quality. You can have fun with any of them too if you like. =)
Post
#192885
Topic
The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Director's Cut (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/192885/action/topic#192885
Time
There's actually some good animation in there (check out "No Girl's Toy" by Richard and some of the camel stuff by Art) ... but it's all obscured by terrible coloring, backgrounds, xerox "inking" ... the nuts and bolts of some of the motion is okay, but it's really hard to tell considering the CHEAPNESS of the whole affair. If Richard had cared and had all the time and $$ in teh world he could have done brilliant photography like on The Thief .... but this was a rush job which was taken away from him late in the game, so it is what it is.

Which is, um, not really good.
Post
#192880
Topic
The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Director's Cut (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/192880/action/topic#192880
Time
Neat that you're doing a little 8-10 minute intro. I had always intended to do a big documentary about the history of the film, from Nasrudin to Aladdin, called "The Animator Who Never Gave Up." I haven't had the time or hard drive space, since I'm editing this myself! By the time I'm finally done I'll probably not go through with the work to do the doc.

What would be great would be a comparison between The Thief and Aladdin. "Cut off your hand if they don't like your face" with the Thief's hands getting chopped off, Zigzag asking for the hand of Yumyum intercut with Jafar doing the same. Abu's eyes doing what The Thief's do ...


Titles ...


I actually originally reproduced the original ending blah "Copyright Richard Williams Animation Ltd." at the end. Except it looked awful, so I took it out.

I've never seen a logo for Richard Williams Studio, animated or otherwise. I figured it'd be enough to call it a Richard Williams Film rather than fake something. I suppose there's material there to work from. It'd probably be Thief related. But it's not something that I see a big need for.

I can send you the actual JPEGs from my credits to blow up or whatever. Stanch needs to be credited just as "Stanch."



>>I'll do the same thing with I Drew Roger Rabbit.

Now that is good news indeed. =)

I didn't really spot much (any) of the same making of footage from I Drew Roger Rabbit on the new DVD documentary, but there are certainly some film clips you can restore (and things which are also in The Thief Who Never Gave Up).

You can also turn the pencil tests black and white so they're not ugly orange.

I've enclosed two different transfers of I Drew Roger Rabbit on your discs. One is from an NTSC source. The better one is converted from a PAL source, but has dropouts in it, and ghosting all over the image. Also, I had to speed up the audio slightly to match the picture, and it lost a lot of quality along the way (strangely). I can send you the original PAL AC3 audio for that.
Post
#192849
Topic
The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Director's Cut (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/192849/action/topic#192849
Time
Glad you're digging the rough cut. =) I knew you'd appreciate this package greatly.

It's ridiculous some of the stuff they cut - some of the best animation in the picture. "3-D" sort of stuff. But oh well.

I have a feeling the Maiden from Mombassa scene was cut out of censorship concerns rather than being unfinished. It's in Calvert's first cut. But you're right, it isn't finished. (That never stopped Calvert before - he finished something in most every scene - apart from the Thief stuff which was always finished anyway.)



And yeah, I bet you're right about that print. Seems like just a print off the street.

>>I don't know if this is because of the Japanese DVD, but judging from the fidelity of his voice, they really didn't need to add so much bass.

None of the sound is from the Japanese DVD, it's all from "Princess." I've had to slow down the audio (as the PAL version is sped up), and I lowered the pitch while doing that, very purposely.

In my original workprint, Price's voice sounds a lot lower than in the Miramax cut, which could be due to the poor quality reproduction, as the workprint seems to have more bass fidelity than treble, but I suspect it's more due to Williams' mix, which I quite like - it's more subtle and dreamlike.

So I did lower the pitch of the "Princess" audio a bit, especially since I was using it largely for Price's lines (and Roofless etc). I suspect you've got a better sound system than I do - wonder how it sounds on yours. Hm.
Post
#192643
Topic
The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Director's Cut (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/192643/action/topic#192643
Time
Okay! LOTS OF BIG HIGH QUALITY SCANS UP!

http://orangecow.org/thief/bookscans/

First off, let's start off with the entire scanned article from Comics Scene - I read it when I was 7. Still have it. All these scans are very big.

http://orangecow.org/thief/bookscans/comicsscene1.jpg
http://orangecow.org/thief/bookscans/comicsscene2.jpg
http://orangecow.org/thief/bookscans/comicsscene3.jpg
http://orangecow.org/thief/bookscans/comicsscene4.jpg
http://orangecow.org/thief/bookscans/comicsscene5.jpg
http://orangecow.org/thief/bookscans/comicsscene6.jpg
http://orangecow.org/thief/bookscans/comicsscene7.jpg

Then ...

I decided to scan everything from "The Animator's Survival Kit" that related to The Thief or anything that was on the additional discs we've been creating for this collection. (A Christmas Carol, the commercials ...)

All these scans are very big, and the goal is that if anyone wants to make custom covers for some of the extra discs, you'll find plenty of material here.

http://orangecow.org/thief/bookscans/


Some comments on some of this:

This donkey appears to be the Mullah Nasrudin's donkey, from the aborted Nasrudin film that eventually became The Thief and the Cobbler.

http://orangecow.org/thief/bookscans/nasrudindonkey.jpg

It matches the design seen on the cover of the Nasrudin book, perfectly. If so, this is the only real artwork I've ever seen from this project.

Here's an entire run sequence for the Old Witch. This animation appears in the finished Thief and the Cobbler film (the Princess version, anyway), but not in this form. The Old Witch's head has been redrawn - this would appear to be an early version of the animation, completed sometime before 1980, with a different design for the Old Witch. She has a longer nose, a little ponytail for hair instead of the bun, and more expressive eyebrows. Looking closely at the final version, it appears that the new design was traced over this animation ... sadly losing some of its quality because of that.

http://orangecow.org/thief/bookscans/oldwitchduck.jpg
http://orangecow.org/thief/bookscans/oldwitchruns7.jpg

This changing of character designs when they'd already been animated happened a lot on this film. Phido in particular has had at least three designs that we can see in various documentaries and the workprint, and the final design is in some ways not as interesting, since it was simply traced over the old material. Early designs are evident all over the workprint for King Nod, Zigzag and The Thief.



(Incidentally, in many scenes in Who Framed Roger Rabbit, there's a newspaper prop "Toon Kills Man" showing an earlier design for Jessica Rabbit - she's blonde, has a much different face and a different dress which covers her breasts. It's even given closeups at times. Some scenes were reshot with a fixed version of the "pattycake photos," but the early jessica remains in many scenes. Suppose you could fix that digitally these days.)
Post
#192618
Topic
Info: Matrix Universe - Question to the Crowd...
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/192618/action/topic#192618
Time
Please encode the audio in a format Quicktime can read. AC3 audio on an AVI is ridiculous.


I was able to play it in VLC. I didn't like it - the footage was obviously dropped in, and amounted to nothing more than a couple of awkward reaction shots.


I like the idea of using footage from Sweet November, though I never saw that film and don't know if it's appropriate.


I hope you cut down Matrix Reloaded most significantly, as that is one of the worst films I've seen.
Post
#192586
Topic
The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Director's Cut (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/192586/action/topic#192586
Time
Yeah, I saw the making of from the RR DVD a while ago. It's a good one, very in depth, talking with Simon Wells and Andres Deja .... I didn't watch the kids disc though, and I can't seem to Netflix it.

How 'bout you put both the trailer and the documentary for kids on your Animating Art disc?
If you can send me disc 1 of Roger, I'd appreciate it.

>> In fact, all three cartoons are 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen and have 5.1 sound! Not that it means anything for this project since they're not RWS productions.

Well, technically there is one Richard Williams contribution to Tummy Trouble. The voice of Droopy - an outtake from WFRR. =)



As far as the Pink Panther titles go, you really haven't gotten my package of DVDs yet, have you? Heheh ....


They're on there, along with everything else, on nine discs. Maybe you'll find something else on there you'll want to restore. Heh.
Post
#192509
Topic
The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Director's Cut (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/192509/action/topic#192509
Time
Hmm. I Netflixed the special edition of Who Framed Roger Rabbit, which I'd seen ... a good special edition with good new documentaries, though Williams isn't in the commentary =(

The Thief rates a few mentions in the "trivia track." Eighteen years later, Who Framed Roger Rabbit seems just as much of a technical achievement and miracle as it did then. Such a great film, brilliantly directed, animated, performed and effects-ized. Er. A rare combination of talents.

Bit of Star Wars related trivia - obviously there are a few Star Wars connections to Roger, most obvious being the presence of Richard Le Parmentier as Lt. Santino. But here's my favorite - in many of Jessica's scenes, the music is being improvised by a group of jazz musicians, including soloist Jerry Hey. Jerry Hey would later ... well, you know.

Anyway.

What they sent is actually disc 2 of the set, the widescreen version and the "adult" special features.

If I recall correctly, disc 1 is the pan & scan version with special features for kids.

I assume the trailer is on disc 1. It ain't on disc 2. I'd quite like to have the trailer. Might come in handy.

Anyone got this set?

Patrick?
Post
#192299
Topic
The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Director's Cut (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/192299/action/topic#192299
Time
Mailed out 14 packages yesterday, 11 today, pretty much all "Thief" care packages to the people who've been helping out here.

I have dug up a 1988 issue of "Comics Scene" magazine (from the publishers of Starlog/Fangoria), which features a very in-depth article about The Thief, called "Richard Williams and The Thief: 23 Years of Arabian Nights." (An ironic title considering the Miramax title!)

Williams didn't allow any actual artwork from The Thief to be used in the article (Roger Rabbit artwork is included instead), but talks about it at length.

I was 7. I slept on Roger Rabbit bedsheets. I had a Roger bendy toy and a Jessica PVC. You better believe I was interested in The Thief.

Weirdly, the article mentions "Princesses Yumyum and Meme" ... but doesn't mention Tack.

The issue also talks to John Byrne about the She-Hulk (a definite favorite of mine when I was about 12-13, and still great), they talk to Alan Moore, which went over my head at the time, discuss Garfield and Friends, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Bakshi/Kricfalusi's Beany & Cecil revival (which I was interested in having been reared on the original, but which was cancelled immediately) ...

Seriously, reading this, times have not changed a bit.

I also dug up my copy of Williams' The Animator's Survival Kit, and Tony White's The Animator's Workbook. The White book I also received in 1988 ... Christmas 1988. Hell of a book to dump on a 7 year old. Then again, at 7 I wasn't much different than I am now.
Post
#191871
Topic
Info: Matrix Universe - Question to the Crowd...
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/191871/action/topic#191871
Time
Yeah, I think it'll work. But there are certainly people who could CGI something over Reeves' eyes. That's not a ridiculously hard job especially if the scenes are not long.

Is this gonna be one movie? Because the Matrix sequels do not have enough good material in them for more than one movie I think .... preferably including material from the superior Animatrix also.
Post
#191721
Topic
FAN EDIT REQUEST THREAD - Post your dream Fan Edits Here!
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/191721/action/topic#191721
Time
I attempted an edit of the A Chorus Line movie once many years ago, because it's such a classic show and such a horrible movie, but I gave up on it as impossible, just because it doesn't have "Hello Twelve, Hello Thirteen, Hello Love" in it at all. That's the centerpiece of the whole show, without it the movie doesn't have a heart. There's really no way to fake an entire musical number.

Somehow I suspect someone could reedit Schumacher's awful Phantom of the Opera film to replace their non-singer Phantom with Michael Crawford's voice (and other voices from the original soundtrack) wherever possible, and remove the "sideshow boy" flashback. That would be neat. Emmy Rossum and her lowcut dresses can stay though. =)

(This is sounding like a better and better idea to me. Some creative editing could fix some of Schumacher's more uninspired camera angles and lighting - if a closer shot is needed on a too-wide shot, one could grab the pan & scan version and letterbox that, to get a closer take ... chromakey and filters could make any colored lighting more subtle ...)

How about Almost Famous with extended musical sequences including some form of "Small Time Blues?" ("Small Time Blues" was the inspiration for the "Angel Town" sequence in my film Gods of Los Angeles.)

The Masters of the Universe movie would be a fun reedit - it would still suck, but one could reedit it to be more like an episode of the TV series. You could make it short ...


Oh! At one point I had considered doing an edit of Monty Python's The Meaning of Life - reinstating the cut scenes from the DVD, moving The Crimson Permanent Assurance back into the movie at the right point, and reinstating cut/changed lines heard on the soundtrack album ("Well, it's sort of a link." "Ooh, have a nice month.")


Oh! This would be weird and kind of pointless, but how about an edit of The Nightmare Before Christmas which uses the opening/closing narration (Patrick Stewart) from the soundtrack album, maybe a couple of cut shots from the DVD if they're worth it (but there's not much to speak of), and maybe even have someone animate (via CGI, but to look like cutout silhouettes) the cut "Oogie's Dance" segment heard on the soundtrack and discussed in the book.

That would be pointless, wouldn't it ...

Easy dumb obvious one - Extended Sin City. Cut back into one movie, a la the theatrical cut, but with the extra scenes of Hartigan's wife and Mort and the Nurse put AFTER the appearance by Senator Roark, where they'll make about ten times more sense.

In my "impossible dream edit" category:

Terry Gilliam claims that his second-to-last cut of The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (running 12 minutes longer) was much better than what was released, because it had a more natural pace and "breathing room." This cut is long since lost. The Criterion DVD didn't turn up much deleted footage ... most notable was a better extended cameo for Gilliam himself.

The deleted host segments from MST3K: The Movie have turned up somewhere, haven't they? Probably a terrible cam bootleg from one of the conventions.