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skyjedi2005

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25-Apr-2005
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5-Feb-2017
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Post
#386525
Topic
¤ A NEW HOPE ¤ Score Restoration Project - (To be updated) (* unfinished project *)
Time

ABC said:

 

OK, someone has graciously sent to me the 1986 CD release I was begging for. ... Thanks again man, if you read me !!!...

And now that I've heard some of it, may I come back to this:

 

skyjedi2005 said:

The CD has the same problems as the 70's source tape as remarked upon in the anthology book i think by Lukas Kendal. 

 

... MY ! Have you only ever give a listen to it ?!!! If you want to feel the wood, the brass and the strings, it is THE Star Wars recording in its excellence. There's no so much to do it seems to improve it, however I don't say it'll be an easy task.

I'm not gonna work on it before a while, but I may post a sample just for the pleasure if I have a chance to give it a try.

Oh i have the Cd and it sounds quite good, just was remarking on how Lucasfilm nowadays wants a completely clean release free of any analog noise to have them sound modern i don't know. You could claim this was done to match the prequels except the special edition soundtracks were done before the prequels scores, and even the digitally recorded scores of those sound better and have better dynamics than the SE jedi release.  What a blunder that release and empire strikes back were.

The dynamics on the 1 disc return of the jedi and empire strikes back are pretty good sounding for early cd releases, the special editions in my opinion other than giving unreleased material are an abomination, even the anthology box which was better than the SE left a lot to be desired. 

Lucasfilm obviously has no intention of transfering those decaying masters they have and giving us a definitive release, who nows perhaps all the original recordings will be lost to time and all we will have is a bad digital SE copy, kind of like the original verions of the films are rotting in his vaults and no dvd or blu ray release made from the existing elements.  It is laughable considering how there is a an existing fanbase for these things to not to release them and make money.

In a perfect world you could have a complete return of the jedi score free of jedi rocks, with the same sound quality or better than the single LP vinyl record release.  The fact that they left the fancy man source track off the SE to make room for the awful jedi rocks is so dumb it boggles the mind. So does crushing the dynamics and running the music through such a harsh noise filter after already being a second or third generation copy of the recently located original masters which lucas won't pay to transfer.

Lucas probably thinks the dsd sony releases are perfect as he does his limited to 1080P digital transfer of the original trilogy recut with cartoon cgi, and bad colors and too much digital video noise reduction.

To me the best the best star wars music release i will ever see is the 1993 anthology, just like the 1993 definitive laserdisc collection will be the best the films of the original original trilogy ever look and sound on home video.

There will be no modern benchmarks lucas does not even consider a blu ray release and never probably will until the end of the formats life cycle like he did for dvd.

The same reason why there is no High Definition audio release of the original trilogy scores in DVD-A, sacd or other formats.  He is happy with mediocrity, and less someone disagree i say watch those horrendous prequels and indy 4 back to back for a taste of bitter medicine that Lucas does not care.

Post
#386193
Topic
Worst of Wookiepedia
Time

I which book were the Nightsisters first introduced.  I remember The Courtship of Princess Leia by Dave Wolverton. 

That looks like an artists interpretation of them and not necessarily the best but it is better than the standard witches crossed with vampires motif,lol.

Its like asian, crossed with native american meets the joker from the dark knight,lol.

Or maybe they are just some wacky KISS fans who did some serious drugs.

Post
#385822
Topic
AVATAR and 3D in general....
Time

I have always been a bit unimpressed with cameron since after he made titanic.  His script for spider man was awful. dark angels second season was garbage and so on, the fact that he let the terminator franchise fall into crappy filmakers hands etc.

Not making his promised True Lies part 2, understandable now because cartoon Muslim terrorists can't be taken as a joke after 911.

I have always been intrested in more science fiction from cameron since he directed the first two terminators and aliens and the abyss, too bad all we have had recently is documentaries one film titanic.

Been looking forward to his live action anime project that was put on hold for this avatar thing.

I have also wondered why his film output has been so small, Spielberg and Lucas manage huge companies and still put out a lot of movies, not always quality but at least quantity.  Also digital domain is also no longer reallly a huge player and Companies like ILM and Weta have taken all the most noticeable projects.

DID he start up a new effects company for Avatar or is all the work being farmed out to different people?

Post
#385711
Topic
¤ A NEW HOPE ¤ Score Restoration Project - (To be updated) (* unfinished project *)
Time

Only star wars is a double cd release reflecting the double LP, empire was a single disc even though there was a double LP, jedi got both a single LP and single CD.

the usa polydor cd is now quite hard to find.  Hopefully someone on these boards has it. 

The CD has the same problems as the 70's source tape as remarked upon in the anthology book i think by Lukas Kendal. 

The funny thing is now if someone unearthed those tapes at the Lucas Ranch the technology exists to make them really shine like the recent Beatles CD re-issues.

Instead they opted to make them sound overly clean on the special edition releases and far from complete, and the sound crushed and lacking any high frequency information on return of the jedi.

I think i remember reading that Lucasfilm almost scrapped the anthology release because it did not meet their standards.  I think it was mentioned by the person who did the anthlogy transfers on a message board.

The funny thing is the scores can mostly be reconstructed from the anthology release, and we almost did not get it.  We lucked out that the anthology release and the definitive laserdisc was released or the originals would probably be buried completely with contempt, claiming the special edition was better.

Post
#385474
Topic
Special Edition Restoration
Time

I think the 70mm film cels from willets designs came from the original internegative or at least a duplicate.

Jedi was the worst condition out of all three which is bizarre to say the least, while star wars may have looked a bit magenta sometimes, and empire had very good color.

What was the reason for the blow up to 70mm, only the vista vision effects would have been close to 70mm, while the rest was photographed on 35mm.

Was it because that way as a collectible you don't need a magnifying glass?

While printing the film to 70mm would increase and compound the grain issue prevalent on the several generations of optical effects used.  Would also enhance the garbage mattes.  Only the live action photography would benefit really.

Post
#384988
Topic
OFFICIAL MLB THREAD
Time

A certain cheating Pitcher pal of Clemens pulled out a win for the Yankees, and is it a wonder almost their entire bullpen is on the juice, the cheaters won.

You won't hear any excuses from me either on the Red Sox cheating with Manny Ramirez and David Ortiz, or the cheatriots.

I hate all cheaters they all should be stripped of trophies thrown out of professional sports, face fines and prison time and be barred from the hall of fame.

Post
#384724
Topic
Re-Cast Star Wars
Time

xhonzi said:

Or of the New Gods...  have you heard that the director wanted to make a Jack Kirby 4th World movie starring Darkseid, but he couldn't so he changed the names in his script to those of He-Man and crew and thus was born Masters of the Universe the Movie...?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masters_of_the_Universe_(film)#Comparison_with_Jack_Kirby.27s_Fourth_World

I heard a few years ago of a new gods movie and there was even a script floating around, i could not find it online though recently.  The project was nixed because it was deemed too expensive.  But i always thought it was because there would be comparisons to star wars and possibly a lawsuit from lucasfilm despite the fact Lucas borrowed liberally from Kirbys New Gods and Fantastic Four at least according to the woman who wrote the book star wars the magic of myth.

I find this slightly hilarious as Lucas has been called the biggest plagiarist of all time and has been rewarded with billions for  it.

I have always wondered if Alex Raymond and Edgar Rice Burroughs were alive would they sue Lucas?

I know both Kurosawa, Joseph campbell, and Asimov were delighted by Lucas borrowing from them.

I remember reading somewhere that Roddenberry was embittered by lucas alleged stealing of ideas from star trek, and also that Frank Herbert considered a lawsuit against Lucas before his death.

Post
#384538
Topic
OFFICIAL MLB THREAD
Time

I just wish cheaters never prospered.

Too bad in reality they do.

Look how many championships the yankees won with clemens, and how many cy young awards clemens won.

The all time greats did not use steroids.  If Baseball is our national pastime it needs to be cleaned up not by the government but the baseball commissioner has to do his job.

I wish the Red Sox were in the series but i will now want The Phillies to win because the Yankees don't deserve to win any more than the Chicago Blacksox who fixed the series and were several of them banned for life and the curse not lifted for almost a hundred years.

Post
#384536
Topic
Re-Cast Star Wars
Time

They made a ripoff of star wars in the eighties after return of the jedi it was called masters of the universe, and had frank langella as skeletor. They called it star wats for the eighties.

The ripoffs are always crap though just like flash gordon 1980 was a poor substitute for 1977's star wars.

They called starship troopers star wars for the 90's and it was crap.

And Star Trek 2009 was a bad remake of scenes from the original star wars trilogy transported into the trek world and its characters,lame.

Pine Kirk is as horrible as Hayden Skywalker, a joke to both franchises and an insult to the fanbase.

Post
#384524
Topic
OT: Favorite Special Effects
Time

What you really should do is start an ILM thread on the old school ilm effects before the 90's starting to get rid of them.

A book i really highly recommend is the art of special effects , aka industrial light and magic.  Not the cg into the digital realm garbage but the one on real optical and practical special effects.

Yeah there was cg in the first star wars film, return of the jedi and star trek II but it was not all cgi all the time and was very limited.

Episode 1 contrary to popular belief did have models and sets built if on a hell of a smaller scale than return of the jedi at least they did a blending of both techs and used real film.  Also the production designs by doug chiang were faithful if different to ralph mcqaurries, and were real paintings not down on a computer.  Therefore though mediocre in spririt the phantom menace was the last "real star wars film"  Episode II were video games by comparison and complete abominations especially epeisode III which should have been a fans dream instead of nightmare of seeing their favorite franchise crapped on.

In star treks VI and VII and VIII they had Cgi enterprises as well as models.  In the new film there were none and it looked like a damn playstation 3 game that they spent 200 million on.

Just like t2 both old school and new school, avatar completely cgi and looks like an animated feature,lol.

My favorites are tons of things.  The Enterprise jumping to warp and in dry dock in star trek the motion picture by former ilmers and not ilm, in star trek the motion picture.  The mutura nebula scene in wrath of khan and the genesis effect.  The delorean scale model shots in the back to the future trilogy.

The opening scene of star wars with the star destroyer reveal, the x wings diving on the death star trench in star wars faked by the dystraflex motion control camera rig.

The lightsabers in the original trilogy, the sound effects which i also consider to be a special effect by ben burrt.

Burtt's sound design and worldizing were special as they were not what was traditional studio foley work and using pre recorded cataloged sounds, he went into the real world to record things.  They did not overuse synthesizers like previous sci fi pictures did.

To me the most beautiful scenes of empire strikes back are the real helicopter shots of finse blended with small sets of walker models with fake snow and matte paintings to create the ice world of hoth.

To me empire has the best cinematography of the 3, the best acting and best screenplay.  Everyone was on their top form in that film, when it came to return of the jedi for budget reasons and others things started to be phoned in a bit, even if the crew remained completely professional, Lucas heart seemed to no longer be in it and he wanted the thing over and done with.  Also he always went with the it is good enough philosophy.  He was angry at dykstra for spending the money on getting the realistic effects lucas wanted on star wars, he claimed you could throw models on a stick towards the camera.  When starting up a non union effects house was incredibly expensive to do from the ground on up.

He was angry to Kurtz for allowing the acting to come along more natrualy in empire by allowing kershner more takes and set ups, and trying to get the perfect shot.  I'm surprised he was not accused of being an David Lean or Stanley Kubrick, speningd tons on retakes was not lucas style.  Watch graffiti, thx, or star wars 77 to prove my point valid.

Star Wars would not have been possible without those crazy kids in the 70's who worked at ilm for almost nothing, who got little or no credit going forward as the dude who was responsible for everything  created star wars by himself, just ask him he will tell the same as he talks to the media.

He may have been the inspiration and started it all up with his own ideas and money, but he sometimes i think should recall the people a little more who really made the original trilogy shine and why the prequels sucked and were absolute dreck.

In my own little imagined perfect saga the prequels and special editions don't exist, there were backstories and sequels planned that were never filmed and exist only in the minds of fans. The Zahn trilogy was a nice bit of EU and the special editions and prequels only exist in an alternate universe continuity, like bizarro world in superman,lol.

Star Wars was budgeted at ten million and went over budget.  I believe Lucas had to pay penalties, which amounted to almost nothing seeing as the film was a tremendous hit. I think it went like a half million dollars over budget or something.  The studio originally imposed a budet ofd nine million i believe and originally wanted it for between 4-6 milliion, lol.

Compare star wars 10.5 million dollar budget to the phantom menace which was probably over a hundred million dollars there is no comparison and star wars is the better film, rofl.

Post
#383768
Topic
.: The X9 Project :. (Released)
Time

That is why the X-0 team chose the player because it had direct access to the composite signal.

Didn't they mod the player for RGB output?

Let arnie do what he wants to do, i think he is capturing the japan special collection and not the faces /definitive which is the same as the gout dvd.

There is no way a fan even with the best equipment can get a better picture straight off a laserdisc versus a D-1 digital master tape which lucasfilm used for its dvd.

Post
#383502
Topic
INTERNATIONAL CAPS LOCK DAY 10-22-09
Time

ferris209 said:

Hey fellas,

PSYCHO_DAYV loves his caps lock button, probably more than life itself. I'll bet that when PSYCHO_DAYV dies, his obituary will be all caps as well as the flyer at his funeral and his big finale will be that his casket is a great big CAPS LOCK button!!!

 

Yep, PSYCHO_DAYV is the Billy Mays of the internet world....

 

Just deal with it guys!!!

You really don't have to do that either there is always the ignore button, thanks to Jay.  It is a genius invention,lol.

I don't have anybody on ignore yet.  Usually moth3r and Jay ban the trolls before they become a problem.

Post
#383440
Topic
AVATAR and 3D in general....
Time

I still think the 3D HD video and the effects make this look like an incredibly expensive animated movie or videogame, but i don't love cgi unless it is minimalist and serves the story.

I am sick and tired of movies that are cgi effects reels and pyrotechnics reels/videos than an actual story being told.  And i blame people like Lucas and his cohorts for starting this alarming chain of events.

Post
#383422
Topic
Why does the EU hate villains?
Time

Actually it is a mistake in Battlestar Galactica as well at least the 78 version which was a star wars clone for tv.

Right down to Dirk Benedicts starbuck being a Han Solo type.

The realistic Galactica and politics nonsense was started by Ronald Moore who had already helped star trek jump the shark, maybe not as bad as Braga or Berman but pretty awful nontheless.

He did not create Galactica and while the remake stayed true to galactica's mythology in the beginning it completely jumped the shark with the cylon subplot and the end of the series was absolutely awful.  The guy should never be able to write television again so awful.

Maybe not as Awful as JJ's Abrams Star Trek but still a false Clone of the original series created by Glen Larson.

The one change i actually liked was Starbuck as a kickass female warrior and pilot, and a completely believable character created around that and a backstory.  I would venture to give credit to the other writers before ron moore though, he was kind of like the producer more than anything.

As for heroes being unrealistic that have morals and are good hearted people i find that bullshit there were plenty of such heroes who served in World War I and World War II.  The American Revolution and the Civil War as well. I would even say there are many young people who are shedding blood right now in the middle east and abroad so we have freedom to talk about silly things like star wars.

 

Star Wars itself references many Eastern tenets of religion or spirituality.  There must always be two opposing forces a yin and a yang, good and evil one cannot exist independently of the other and they have to neutralize each other out for their to be a balance.  Though this may be a western oversimplification, not sure but i think this is what i read in some book about star wars. 

 

The idea of absolute evil and absolute good is shown to be incompatible with human experience, people are more a product of their environment and the choices they make as far as phychology is concerned.  And Look at the Example given in Return of the Jedi luke makes the choice to throw his lighstaber away rather than become as evil as his father, he renounces the evil temptations of the emporer even if it costs him his life, because he believed in a spark of goodness in his father.  Star Wars kind of plays off on the whole idea of destiny vs free will, not sure if the two ideas and concepts always mesh together.

Moral Relativism always leads into discussion of Religion and politics and i would rather not go into that here so i removed any overt reference to such in my post other than the fact that lucas played with the concepts of the two in creating his universe.  The fact that their was no moral relativism in the original trilogy says that the prequels are like star wars turned on its head, so they are false and not in canon with the oot.

 

Lucas came back to star wars and decided to revisit it in the context of the 90's morally ambiguous heroes dark for darkness sake, and anti heroes.  Completely out of step with the sources he cribbed for star wars like John Carter of Mars and Flash Gordon, or even the westerns lucas looked to where you had good guys and bad guys, or the swashbuckling films and pirate films of yesteryear.

It seems to me Lucas wanted more to talk about stupid politics Bush and the Iraq war with episode II and III rather than give us a backstory to the trilogy that made any sort of sense.

I wanted a rollicking adventure story where at the end the hero loses everything and goes bad for good reasons a strong and powerful Epic that we were promised.  Instead we got Hayden wooden and whiny delivering Bushisms.

 

Anti heroes may work for the dark knight and watchman, or George RR Martin's fantasy series a song of ice and fire, but they have nothing to do with star wars except maybe in contrast to the hero motif used, as in han solo kind of being an antihero in star wars 77 but then we see he is actually a good dude.

Lucas played Hamill's heroic character of luke who is very straightforward and naive and pure hearted off of the star pirate han solo who is amoral a killer, and a mecernary kind of like the man with no name from sergio leone played by eastwood.

The original trilogy is Luke Centric it is Luke's journey and by co- incidence Hamill bacame a better actor and matured as the series continued in empire and jedi you actually get to see luke grow as a person.  These films are very powerful.  The prequels should have echoed that better than what we got.  Anakin's journey should have been the same prototypical heroes journey as lukes except he was seduced by the darkside and luke held his ground and was tempted but not entirely corrupted, somehow anakin is more weak morally than luke. 

Or are things that way just cause its in the script, Anakin had to go dark to get to  what is known now as episode IV, so Lucas shoehorned a lot of nonsense together slipshod and lazy like.

When the man has the talent or once did to make a strong moving piece of fiction with plenty of help from the right people of course,lol.

 

Now if the script sucks, the acting sucks or directing sucks Lucas can overcompensate with more cgi characters and creatures and environments as if those are more interesting to him than the characters and human relationships are.  I mean in the prequels and crystal skull there seemed to be a whole lot more going on in the background and the bad cgi than the actors as if the actors were a special effect!  The cgi was the main thing, the story and acting took a back seat.  Completely ridiculous it as if they put the carriage before the horse.  Now i Know Spielberg directed skull but Lucas had a very heavy influence on the final film that he may as well just have directed it.

Basically the star wars special editions and prequels made it very clear to me that Lucas does not understand the mentality of his own creation star wars the oot, or that maybe the originals were a happy accident and he did not know what he had on his hands was a veritable classic beloved of millions, or he knew and still decided to destroy it.

I know everyone is entitled to their own opinion but it is completely crazy that he thinks the special editions and prequels are better than the originals.  The very idea is so far off base it is laughable.  None of those films will ever be on the afi list either, too bad mr lucas hates his own creation, done with many many other hands to help him.  The collaboration of these other artists and minds makes it even more of a crime to art as far as i am concerned that the originals only exist in a non anamorphic dvd from a d1 laserdisc master.

Post
#382973
Topic
Re-Cast Star Wars
Time

But then the sequels would have been full of the same godawful writing and cgi that was in evidence in Crystal skull, the phantom menace. attack of the clones and revenge of the sith.

What if Episode seven came out ten years after return of the jedi in 1993?

Following on the heels of the 3rd indiana jones film The Last Crusade and the second best in the trilogy imho.

They could have been good providing Lucas come up with the general ideas and outline, have it fleshed out by a good screenwriter like Lawrence Kasden was able to do on the empire strikes back.  And bring in Directors other than himself to make them.   Bringing in new blood was not the problem with the prequels, the problem was in not getting the right people, less collaboration and an unwillingness to delegate anything and direct every stage of production himself, was lucas chief failing as far as I'm concerned.  And he is a terrible writer but has a great visual sense, not so good when it comes to actors or character acting.

For instance they tried unsucessfully for a long time in finding the person to write the fourth indiana jones or a director.  Finally Lucas had to sit down and write the blasted thing himself and have Koepp polish it, and Speilberg directed it.  Would the film have been better had a different writer and story and director been chosen, hard to say could have been worse than the mediocre stuff we got we could have gotten something like the mummy 3.

I mean i would rather have Crystal Skull as it is then a fourth one written and directed by M. Knight, man the very idea of such crappyness would bring horrors unfathomable upon the masses,lol.

Post
#382969
Topic
Re-Cast Star Wars
Time

Well if Lucas did not stop making them in 83, and pre production had commenced in late 83 on the sequel trilogy we could have had episode 7 as early as 1986, then episode 8 in 1989, and Episode 9 in 1992.  Then the first prequel in 1995, the second in 1998, and the third in 2001 as he had originally planned i believe.

Plus we would not have needed as much over use of cgi, at least in the sequels though the prequels should have also been minimal cgi or cgi free.  Then make sure you don't create non existent characters from the original backstory like qui gon and jar jar binks, dooku or darth maul, have yoda as kenobis master, have anakin older in episode 1.  Have Anakin and Obi as good friends, actually make anakins turn make sense and start out with him being a good guy and likeable like luke from the oot.

Make sure not to cast Natalie Portman as Luke and Leia's mother, or Hayden as Anakin.

No padawans, i prefer the term apprentice and no god awful midi-chlorians.

No coruscant an EU creation, name the planet something else, Had Abbadon was not any better.

There was no jedi temple in existence in the oot, and if there has to be a jedi temple why on the stomping grounds of palpatine seems a bit too convenient.

Post
#382456
Topic
OFFICIAL MLB THREAD
Time

TV's Frink said:

skyjedi2005 said:

The only time i have seen the Angels win the world series is in the pathetically bad angels in the outfield, a fictional movie where the angels are so bad they need an act of god to win. So angels help them cheat,lol.

Um, what about 2002?  Please tell me you're older than six lol.

I was joking of course i was aware of 2002, i just did not watch it because it was not the Red Sox,lol.

I was also referring back to when i was a kid, when i also never believed the red sox could ever win another world series.  But allegedly the players did steroids so they cheated so it does not count, nor do all the pariots superbowls when referring to football because they cheated.  nor are like the last six world titles the Yankees have won.  I hate cheaters they are scum.

Post
#382416
Topic
OFFICIAL MLB THREAD
Time

The only time i have seen the Angels win the world series is in the pathetically bad angels in the outfield, a fictional movie where the angels are so bad they need an act of god to win. So angels help them cheat,lol.

Even so the two biggest teams in baseball are also cheaters they had players using steroids.

That is why i don't follow pro sports or college sports as much as i would if they did not all cheat and do roids, or cheat like a certain football team by video taping the other team.  Videogate was retarded, i can't believe even Arlen Spector got involved, it definitely was really fucking pathetic.