slade37

User Group: Members
Join date: 22-May-2003
Last activity: 11-Jun-2005
Posts: 6

Post History

Post: #161113
Topic: EVERYONE MUST READ: Forum Rules (defunct)
Link: https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/161113/action/topic#161113
Time: 6-Dec-2005 1:26 PM

Nevermind... It's the 2004 edition.

Post: #161109
Topic: EVERYONE MUST READ: Forum Rules (defunct)
Link: https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/161109/action/topic#161109
Time: 6-Dec-2005 1:21 PM

I get weekly release announcements concerning categories of DVDs I've I selected as favorites. I just got one today that really shocked me. The package claims to be the classic trilogy. Anyone know if it's truly the untouched originals or just a term used for marketing.

http://www.dvdempire.com/Exec/v4_item.asp?userid=99364364867227&item_id=752705

You can click on the DVD package image to get a closer view and see the back.

- Slade

Post: #114005
Topic: Another Trilogy DVD Screw Up?
Link: https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/114005/action/topic#114005
Time: 10-Jun-2005 11:43 PM

I agree with the comments on different TVs. However, that may vary with brand and age of the TV as well as how much control you have over the screen settings. My comments were primarily about same equipment and same format. Different releases seemed to be fairly consistant.

I view DVDs as simple computer programs that control how a video file is played. Having a DVD player does not mean you can play every DVD. ...unlike other formats. Excluding advances like new recording speeds and differences in broadcast standards (NTSC, PAL, SECAM), if you owned a VHS VCR, you could play all VHS tapes. ...the same for LaserDisc, 8mm, SuperVHS, Beta or CED. Most people have heard about issues with The Matrix DVD (original edition, not the new collection). I have two players, one recorder, and one DVD+/-RW on my PC. Urusei Yatsura OVA box set will not play properly on my JVC player or my PC, but they will play correctly on my Sony player and Panasonic recorder. On my PC, the disc will simply show me a list of video files and I chose which one to view - no menus, no subtitles - just the raw video file with audio. Other DVDs start as they should.

...and somehow the software on my PC got upgraded (or a driver did) and it's not acting up anymore. One of my Law & Order DVDs wouldn't play either and I was trying to confirm which one. That OVA box set just worked too. Now, it's just my JVC player.

Anyway... Is it possible that firmware in each player might be interpretating a DVD's programming a little differently causing slight differences in how the player displays the image? I realize there is a basic standard in place for the DVD format, but because of patents and some of the technologies that may go into a player, could there be some minor variations in each player?

Post: #109906
Topic: Another Trilogy DVD Screw Up?
Link: https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/109906/action/topic#109906
Time: 28-May-2005 9:07 PM

If part of the frame is missing, it can't be the original aspect ratio. I can understand a small bit missing, but from the frame capture, it looks more like a compromise was made - keeping most of the image but focusing on a key part too. I do understand that in some theaters this may happen, but I've never seen a video release that chopped off that much of the frame and still claim to be the original aspect ratio. Besides extras, even with LaserDiscs, new editions may have differences in image quality, but I've never seen a noticeable difference in the amount of the frame being shown.

This is simply a theory for the differences in the images of the original message. Nowhere on the box does the widescreen version of the DVDs claim to be the original aspect ratio. According to DVD Empire, these are supposed to be the original aspect ratio, but I didn't see this on the box I saw at Best Buy. I admit I may have overlooked it. Since I have no plans to purchase it, I don't know what's stated inside.

I'm always annoyed when I see movies being altered - everything from the original Star Wars Trilogy to the censorship of Terror of Mechagodzilla (both TV and video editions). I can't tell from the images posted here whether the aspect ratio has been tampered with. ...but any form of full screen (pan/scan) bugs me, knowing that part of the image is missing. Unfortunately, I'm finding some DVDs to be inferior to the LaserDisc. Some anime DVDs are missing subtitles that exist on the LaserDisc.

Before I drift too far off topic, I've already purchased two different copies of the Star Wars trilogy on LaserDisc (original full screen editions from CBS/Fox - Hope and Empire in CAV, Jedi was CLV, and the THX LBX CLV - I guess they're the faces edition I hear people mention). I have not been given a reason to buy the DVDs yet. I still don't understand why Lucas can't do what his friend Speilberg did with E.T. - except now Lucas has three different editions of each movie and a possible fourth planned.

I probably wouldn't have minded things as much if Lucas had done what Robert Wise did with Star Trek The Motion Picture DVD. He did re-edit and add CGI because he didn't have the time to edit the movie the way he originally wanted to. (The film was so rushed that prints were shipped while still wet with developing fluids - according to extras on the DVD) However, he limited the CGI effects to what may have been possible in 1979. It not like watching CGI added to the original Flash Gordon serial which is how I feel about what Lucas has done. The original trilogy effects were better than those old serials, but things just don't look right.

Plus, one more note, we can no longer see the effects that caused Star Wars to win an Academy Award. All records of how good the original effects were for their time are now being destroyed and lost. Lucas is destroying the records of the achievements of his production crews. We can't see what John Stears, John Dykstra, Richard Edlund, Grant McCune, and Robert Blalack achieved on A New Hope. You can do a search at http://www.oscars.org/awardsdatabase/index.html and see whose work is lost to the public now.

Hmmm... I guess I said more than I had planned for this topic. Sorry if I drifted too far. I can get carried away at times.

Post: #105551
Topic: Another Trilogy DVD Screw Up?
Link: https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/105551/action/topic#105551
Time: 13-May-2005 4:41 PM

Quote
It's not the case, even with a 16x9 you would still have small black bars on top and bottom, and the film aspect ratio is something like 2.35:1 or something like that...

That's what I said. The DVDs were made for 16x9 TVs - not using the original aspect ratio of the movies. These DVDs are a type of 16x9 full screen transfer - a 16x9 pan\scan version to fill a 16x9 TV screen.

I checked the DVD box while at the store the other day. It does say it is enhanced for 16x9 TVs. It does not claim to respresent the original aspect ratio.

Post: #102247
Topic: Another Trilogy DVD Screw Up?
Link: https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/102247/action/topic#102247
Time: 24-Apr-2005 8:45 PM

I haven't researched this much, but I've noticed many DVDs that claimed they are optimized for 16x9 TVs. ...not necessarily the original deminsions of the frame that was shot. This cropping may simply be a type of 16x9 pan/scan. I can't think of a better way to discribe it. Unless the packaging states otherwise, Widescreen editions may simply mean 16x9 so we might be seeing a new kind of "full screen" version in the sense that it's intended to fill the screen of an HDTV television. We just lose less of the image.

- Slade