No, I am just not tolerating people espousing stupid things. Either back up what you are saying with proof or be quiet. You bring down the quality of education by pretending that creationism has any merit.
And yes, I would say you are a serious idiot for believing in that if such was the case. Only in the U.S. is there the pretense of respecting that. Its an embarasssment everywhere else. I hope you don't believe in that shit.
You are saying creationsm has scientific basis? My god man. come on. seriously.
I guess, if you are a fucking moron. Seriously. stuff like this pisses me off. it's stuff like this that makes people think Americans are retarded. You will only find this line of thinking in the glorious United States of A, where you actually have a significant portion of the population that believes in Creationism like a bunch of retarded assholes.
darth_ender said:
Such generalizations are the very definition of bigotry, no? I disagree with Canada's liberal stance on so many things, yet I don't march through town singing, "Blame Canada."
It's not a generalization when this comes from discussion within the various levels of American government.
Again, this is why I stay out of American politics. They are in their own world and my country isn't part of that, nor am I. There is nothing biogoted about embracing everyone and the right to health, love and safety for all. Good luck with it though. I truely mean that.
Answer: overthrowing the government is not on our minds. Just hearing that sounds genuinely insane. Seriously, is that something Americans think about? This perplexes me.
The "right to bear arms" part of the US constitution is as out of date as the right to slavery. It was written in there in pioneer times during the wild wild west, when there was danger all around and not much government. To Canadians it is bewildering--and also hilarious and sad--that this has remained. It's an obsolete law, just like owning a dildo in Arkensas can technically send you to a prison.
The unfortunate fact is that there is too many of you to think otherwise.
Case in point: Canada is ruled by a conservative government. In fact, the ruling party is officially called The Conservative Party. When the issue of gay marriage comes up, the conservative party shrugs and says "why is this in discussion?" We all support gay marriage, it's everyone's right. Why bring up the issue? The conservative government supports gay marriage to the point that it's not even in discussiuon. Same with healthcare. "Universal healthcare, of course. Why discusss it?" Same with gun control. "Why in the world would you need guns? You are a danger to society with a gun, so we are going to regulate you." This is the conservative party. Not the Liberal party. And the opposition--because we have a parliamentary system--is a socialist party. We're okay with that. We also believe in the separation of religion and government, and those issues don't factor into our politics. They are outside of it. This is the ruling right-wing government we have, which has been controversial. I don't support it. Stephen Harper is not my prime minister. Nor is he to most the people I know. He has been a pox on this country for the better part of the decade, and can eat shit as far as I am concerned. And yet, this is as conservative as we get. That says a lot, no? And this isn't unusual for most of western europe too.
When the right-wing leg of the Canadian government is more liberal than the Democratic leg of the American government, you have problems. It's impossible not to feel that way. It simply is the way the situation is. So, sorry, American culture has justified itself through numbers. It's not all bad, especially in the northern states. There isn't much difference between Pennsylvania and New York, and Ontario.
This is why I don't get into discussion about American politics. Americans come across as fucking idiotic maniacs to most Canadians and we're too polite to risk offending our neighbours. The truth is that most of us think you are all psychopaths, for stuff like the shooting in the first place and then reactions like this in the second place. Good luck with your gun-obsessed mess.
People in Canada are affected by this too. It's called empathy. While there are events just as terrible all over the world, the media doesn't report on them. So, because people are aware of this--it affects them. It's not mind control. If you hear about 20 kids gunned down in a school and feel nothing you have no empathy or connection to your fellow human beings, especially if this occured in an area of the world where you live. Mind control? Are you fucking retarded? It's just a bunch of kids that got gunned down. That IS shocking, because in north America that pretty much doesn't happen with victims this young. A friend of mine had to pull over when she heard about this on the radio. She's 29 and has a 9 month old infant, so it hit home. She's not American, nor does she live in America--in fact, she was born and raised in Bulgaria.
What's wrong with people?
I'm not sure what the point here is. Obviously DK is just a film that was commenting on the general anxieties of the modern era and the role of vigilante violence in society. There are a few coincidences here, which isn't surprising; Aurora is a common name. It's the town in Waynes World, and it's also a town right near me in Canada, plus in at least two other locations in the US, plus it's used in other names (aurora borealis, etc.). What is the implication beyond this? Is he trying to say Chris Nolan set up the shooting and put hints of it in his movie five years ago? Either he is--and he IS nuts--or there isn't much point to posting something like this.
I don't understand people who thought the movie was long. It was the perfect length. And it was the shortest Jackson-Tolkien film yet! Without the credits it's just a little over two and a half hours. I would say it is the fastest paced and most action packed of the four films so far. None of that Lothlorien crap that brought Fellowship to a screeching halt. There is one Rivendel scene but it's short and awesome--and involves two of the funnest cameos in the entire film (actually three, but one especially is a treat to see). Won't spoil it, but yeah.
Long and boring? Hate to see what those reviews thought of the other three films.
It's different than the 30FPS video/sitcom/news style. It is actually much, much smoother. The problem with that 30FPS soap opera rate is that it's smoother than film, yet still far enough away from real life motion that it still looks...odd. We say "cheap" but that's solely because we have only seen it used in low-budget TV/video productions. There's nothing inherantly "cheap" about it, but it's certainly not impressive. The 48FPS rate is far beyond that, as much as 30fps is different than 24fps. I wish they had gone with Doug Trumbull's 128 FPS, which is apparently indistinguishable from real life.
Saw the film in IMAX, 3D and 48FPS.
The first five minutes of 48FPS felt strange, but after a few minutes you adjust. I really liked it. Everything felt incredibly realistic, and with the 3D it sometimes felt like you were there. By far the most immersive theater experience I've had.
I will say that the use of 48FPS will make filmmakers adjust their style. Peter Jackson seems to have a bit. One of the reasons Michael Bay can have his shakycam on steroids thing is because the motion blur basically hides much of the actual motion; if you were to do shots like that at 48FPS you'd throw up. Some shots in the Hobbit where the camera was moving quickly made it look like things were moving too quickly, but these were only a handful. Overall I was impressed. Once you get over that shock it really works; at first it seems like everything is moving fast, like when you fast-forward a movie, but it's really just because you see every movement, every wrinkle of fabric or crumpling of paper when people are doing things, when your brain accepts that after a minute or two there isn't any problem. And it works really well with the 3D--I can't imagine shooting one without the other. I hope more movies do it this well. The 3D alone rivals the best examples I have seen. 48FPS just was the icing on the cake. After a while you don't notice it--reminds me of watching widescreen on 4x3 TVs in the 1990s, you just sort of forget about it after a minute or two--but if the movie were to suddenly shift to 24FPS halfway through you would think it was all blurry and slow.
This is a good philosophical point. He's right. Discuss!
SpilkaBilka, that is such a good thread, I don't even have the time to properly respond to it. But to answer your question: yes, a scan of a theatrical print makes sense for many reasons. One of them, which I have just become aware of, is that the VFX shots of star wars were deliberately degraded to blend in better with the live action footage. I didn't know that--but it's pretty interesting! Anyway, stick around, we should talk more! :)
Maybe. It's still ambiguous enough that I don't know if he is being sarcastic or sincere...I guess that is part of what makes it interesting to analayze him and his work. I mean, wearing the "Han Shot First" shirt...is he making a statement, mocking us, or is he just entirely clueless? I don't even know anymore lol. I think that's part of the problem: maybe Lucas himself doesn't know what the hell he is even saying.
Yeah, I would say it's a pan and scan vs widescreen thing. I discovered widescreen in the mid-1990s and it blew my mind--shots that I had grown up with (Star Wars, for example) actually looked VERY different in their original composition. Part of the excitement of discovering widescreen was that it was like watching the films for the first time all over again. Especially anamorphc "scope" films. In 1998, I spent $90 for a widescreen VHS set of the OT SE--and it was dented, on top of it! But I knew I would be seeing the films "for the first time again". I was 12 years old. For a 12 year to spend $90 dollars on films he already had--and not just the OOT, I already bought the pan and scan SE the year earlier--it was practically crazy. This was all the money I had!
SpilkaBilka:
This happens all the time. People have seen "alternate" footage in Star Wars. But it's on a tape they recorded over. Or lost. Or it was only aired once.
It's actually nothing more than a psychological phenomenon known as 'false memories', and because Star Wars played a big part in fans' early life this tends to crop up often. None of them are real. The great thing about Star Wars being so popular is that it's extremely well documented, and these things can easily be verified. Some people swear the Biggs footage was originally included in an early TV broadcast, that no one taped. Or was it an early screening? No, it was the 1981 re-release? Or was it, a rare VHS re-issue?
Not to cast aside your entire thing, I'm not trying to be rude. But especially when you consider how much work goes in to altering the negative or tape master for new footage, and the fact that this release was a multi-million-unit selling, practically record-breaking release, it probably is just old memories from your childhood playing games on you. I have a few memories of things that did not--and could not--exist, given the variables, and I think everyone does, even if they don't know it. It's a surprisingly common phenomenon, but hard to argue against because it's a perception thing--or PROVE, which is why we know there is such a thing as this. This is the first I've heard of ROTJ footage, other than ships crashing into the Death Star shield--something I swear I saw, but I now realized was from the audio cassette that came with the ROTJ storybook that made this cut moment a very vivid memory (in my imagination).
I agree: Blu-ray is often better than 35mm prints. I went to a screening of the Evangelion remake in the best theater in Toronto and they were projecting a blu-ray, and it looked better than most animated films I've seen on film.
But that is much different than a study saying the typical/average range of a projection is 500-800 lines. Lucasfilm is just quoting that study.
The typical resolution of a modern print is about on par with a 720p HD video, something around 700-1000 lines of resolution. That is as much as twice the resolution as what that study is reporting, and their figures are an average figure, the implication being that there are prints far lower in resolution than that. What the hell were they looking at? Part of the reason they used Bollywood prints, I must assume, is because of legality and affordability: Hollywood doesn't sell it's own prints, or easily loan them, and they are always way, way more expensive than something from most overseas countries. There is no Bollywood market in North America, so prints might be cheap and available. That is my take, since it seems unusual for a western produced study to use so many examples from the east.
I can tell you from first hand experience as a working professional in the camera department, in the biggest and most widely recognized camera organization on the planet, who conducts these sorts of tests himself, that that study makes no sense. The fact that it is mainly Bollywood prints probably has a lot to do with it.
But if someone said that your typical print of a Hollywood movies is about 800 lines of resolution, I would believe that. Some are more, some are less, but that is a realistic figure, something believable at least.
HOWEVER....
and this is a big however...
One must also compare against the actual resolution of HD video. If I transfer and upscale my VHS to blu-ray, that VHS transfer is technically 1920x1080 lines of resolution. But it's really not. When we measure film resolution--because it's not digital, it has no fixed pixel dimensions--we measure the resolving power of the lens, in other words how many lines you can visibly discern. On the negative, this is 4 or 5 thousand lines of resolving power, to go by the commonly quoted figure (again: depends on the specific example). On the release print it tends to be between 700 and 1000, give or take. But the "resolution" of HD--1920x1080--is not the actual resolving power. It's a measurement of the image dimensions, in pixels. So, 1080p images don't always have 1920x1080 lines of horizontal and verticle resolution, that's just the size of the image. I think people forget that.
CatBus said:
zombie84 said:
Yeah, I don't buy that study either. I've done extensive lab-quality tests of my own using Panaflex cameras, resolution charts and 35mm film, and I wasn't getting those results. 800 is a believable number, but 500 in the average? Sorry, there's a reason why we don't screen really good VHS tapes at theaters. There is great generational loss, but 500 discernable lines is pretty crappy, I find that hard to be typical, plus there are things other than resolution, which was the problem with early HD.
That's the problem with "average". Assuming a credible study, they were averaging in hundreds of crappy 16mm slasher flicks shot in low light. That's what could have been at the average theatre at the time, right? And "globally" average too?--ugh, so Bollywood comprises most of the sample, great. See the problem? Averages are meaningless when trying to make a statement about something specific. Ask any woman who wants to be a firefighter, and is told the "average woman" isn't strong enough, but nobody bothers to check if she's strong enough...
Yeah that's the thing.
A typical Hollywood release print would not show up with 500 lines of resolution, or else they would all look blurry. A film like Star Wars Episode I, for example. But if we are talking Bollywood, then sure, maybe.
The thing is, film has no fixed resolution so it depends on the variables, which depend on your equipment. Low-speed Kodak stock shot on new Zeiss primes on a Panaflex Millennium, in a controlled and well-lit location, will not give you 500 lines on a release print, it will be more like 800 or 1000. However, Bollywood often uses older equipment, shot in gurrella style--in fact they often buy a lot of the American equipment when Hollywood rental houses are looking to get newer, updated inventory. So, the conditions the films are shot and the equipment being used is different, because they don't have the same type of budget. Hong Kong used to make films like that too, although it is changing now.
So, although the results of this study may be accurate--I've read the study before--in terms of what you and I were to actually see when we go to the theater, it's way off. When I saw Inception on 35mm the other year, it certainly had more 500 or 600 lines of resolution--in fact, it had a sharper image than the digital projection I saw of it later that summer. Like I said, I would believe a figure like 800 lines or so, but for the "average" figure to extend to 500 lines is pretty unbelievable. I worked in the Cinematographer Guild as a camera assistant, and before every production I would be at Panavision, or whatever rental house we were using (Panavision, nine times out of ten), and start doing these kinds of tests. You have to, to make sure the camera provides what you are expecting when you bring it to set.
There's also the matter of Digital Intermediates. I don't know if this study took that into account. No one really does film-to-film photochemical only anymore without any transfer stage, so it's useless to study a process that doesn't involve digitizing the footage.
That info about dupe stock for Star Wars is interesting though, I hadn't heard that before.
Haha, do you think maybe they will take it out now that there is a sequel trilogy?
Actually, I hope Disney makes a Special Edition update, because it will probably add something to the film. Only someone like George Lucas could think making Darth Vader go "NOOoo" was a good idea. Actually, I think some of these additions are actually just his way of fucking with critics. "Oh, you laughed in the theater when Darth Vader said 'Nooo' in Episode III? Well, fuck you, I thought it was good, in fact I'm going to put it in Return of the Jedi TOO! How do you like them apples?" Because I mean if he really cared about the films...why would he sell them to Disney?
He always used the analogy of the films being his children so he wanted to make sure they were properly protected...so, did he just sell his kids for a huge paycheck?
I'm off topic now, but man that guy is hard to figure out sometimes.
Yub Nub suited the original trilogy as an ender. It feels out of place with the prequels. The Star Wars trilogy was essentially a feel-good story about overcoming impossible odds, defeating injustice and the power of friendship. Yub Nub is a bit silly, but considering you are watching a giant party where teddy bears are dancing with characters you have grown to love over the years as they celebrate their triumph, it somehow suited it. It fit with the plot and tone of ROTJ, and the trilogy itself.
Yub Nub never had much widespread hate against it, and had little to do with the reputation of Jedi. In fact, Victory Celebration got a lot of criticism in 1997, because instead of the feel-good ending song you had some melancholy Enya type thing that is even more out of place musically. It fits the additions of the SE and the expanded story of the prequels, but since a lot of people hate those things in the first place they care little for the accompanying track that replaced the original.
Yeah, I don't buy that study either. I've done extensive lab-quality tests of my own using Panaflex cameras, resolution charts and 35mm film, and I wasn't getting those results. 800 is a believable number, but 500 in the average? Sorry, there's a reason why we don't screen really good VHS tapes at theaters. There is great generational loss, but 500 discernable lines is pretty crappy, I find that hard to be typical, plus there are things other than resolution, which was the problem with early HD.
Too bad you had to see it on a plane ride! It's much better on pretty much any format, as you may imagine. But it depends more on script and characters than action and effects, so I guess that's why it wasn't totally deflated. Testament to the film, I guess.
I was tossing up watching The Thing or Dawn of the Dead, but somehow ended up watching Star Trek VI. Whenever I watch that film it's under random circumstances. Anyway, I saw it about 9 months ago and it holds up as it always does. I usually say STII is my favourite, but I suspect this is better made and better acted but I just can't get over the status of STII. I remember seeing this in the theater in 1991 and having my mind absolutely, totally blown. Remember, I was like 7, so the only movies I had seen up until then was Land Before Time and Honey I Shrunk the Kids and whatnot. I still have memories of that screening, despite how young I was. Top notch special effects--that hold up just as well today, mind you--tons of action, humour, great performances, suspence, spaceships shooting each other, even some gore, plus a breathless pace, with a political alegory that went right over my 7 year old head. Hard to ask for more for a little boy in 1991. I mean, Star Wars was long dead, and it would be another 5 or 6 years before they started making sci-fi action films again. This was as good as it got, and it still holds up as well as it did then--maybe better.
Yup, I'm assuming that is the shot in question. It was added late, enough to have it on 35mm, but too late for the first 70mm premier.