What is this you ask? This is a “theatrical” reconstruction (mostly) of Star Wars using the UHD 2160p HDR version as it’s main source.
This is not a pure theatrical reconstruction though. It is very close to theatrical.
I call it D+77.
All my posts and updates have been on the other forum. I just didn’t want to maintain two discussions about it. I’m posting this here for those not on the other site to know what this is.
V2.3 is the latest version available at the usual place.
Sources used…
The 2160p UHD BluRay was used as the primary source for this project.
My DNR of 4k77 shots are used to restore original shots where needed. For many shots I
went back to the RAW anamorphic scan used to make 4K77. A shot from another Technicolor
print was used as well.
A few shots were provided by SkyDude for this project. Thank You.
100% of this project is 4k sourced.
v2.3 is now theatrically synced. We’re calling it ROUT synced for “Restored Original Unaltered Trilogy”.
v2.2 and prior were GOUT synced because I didn’t have complete audio to use.
4K83, D+80 and now D+77 are all fully theatrically synced, to view the complete theatrical experience. The 2006 DVD was a piece of crap in every way and as such is now depreciated.
GOUT is a bad arthritic condition that needed to be cured.
Greedo subs…
I hardcoded the original Greedo subs using the .sup file from Project Threepio.
Audio…
I muxed in the English stereo, 5.1 and mono tracks but I used ac3 files instead of the DTS-MA files. Too many people have issues playing the DTS-MA tracks so it’s more accommodating this way. I personally always convert DTS to ac3 anyway. If you really need DTS-MA I figured you’d know how to mux them in yourself.
Colour…
The original HDR grade took advantage of the wider colour gamut. Since I’m working in SDR, rec.709, I needed to tame the HDR grade. What this means is areas that lacked saturation have been boosted but areas that would have gotten oversaturated with that change have been scaled back. I did a saturation rebalance. Other colour tweaks were used to make it the best I could.
Colour is - HDR tonemapped with a LUT provided by age - final colour by me using only curves (sat-vs-sat, luma-vs-sat, hue-vs-sat, and standard RGB curves).
Colour is loosely based on a colour correction by DrDre.
Theatrical but not really theatrical…
I restored most of the original 1977 shots of the film, removing most of the CGI and other unnecessary changes. My goal was quality over authenticity though.
My intent was to keep it as theatrical as possible, but I’m willing to sacrifice some authenticity for quality sake, so some creative license was used in the process.
It’s theatrical in spirit.