New Star Wars DVD's?
- Thread starter Kabob
- Start date
Next will be the box set, then plain HD-DVD and blu-ray, then HD-DVD and blu-ray box sets, then . . .
FYI, Lucas claims to have "erased over" the masters of the original versions, so the original versions on these DVDs are supposed to be about the same quality as the laserdisc rip bootlegs on eBay.
FYI, Lucas claims to have "erased over" the masters of the original versions, so the original versions on these DVDs are supposed to be about the same quality as the laserdisc rip bootlegs on eBay.
Everyone here obviously missed the thread a couple days ago asking who was going to get the 'new' set.
The first disc is the same as the discs in the 2004 set. The bonus disc has the O-OT (no CGI Special Edition stuff), and some Lego Star Wars II Demo. The Originals are non-anamorphic. They are from the Laserdisc Masters from like 1993. They redid the opening crawl on Star Wars to match the 1977 version with no Episode IV: A New Hope. Thats it. The quality isn't great, but its not terrible from the screenshots I've seen in reviews. I'm sure it want look good on a big HDTV though.
Although I don't mind the Special Editions I really wished there was a good transfer for the Originals on DVD. Clean it up a little, and make them Anamorphic.
Although I don't mind the Special Editions I really wished there was a good transfer for the Originals on DVD. Clean it up a little, and make them Anamorphic.
Yeah. They're doing the same sh!t with LOTR now. I wonder if the new features are worth having 2 copies...
HendrixFan
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- Oct 18, 2001
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This was just posted over at the hometheaterforum.com by someone named Jay. I thought that you guys might find it interesting:
"1993 technology"
I would tend to agree with those who've stated that this refers to film elements, not video transfers. However, if that's the case, then he misspoke, because the 1993 film elements really date back to 1985, when new interpositives were struck from the original negatives for video transfer purposes. It was stated in various materials surrounding the 1997 Special Editions that the original negatives had not been touched since that time (1985), as they had been stored in a salt mine in the midwest somewhere.
So if we are to take the "1993 technology" statement at face value, then he would have to be referring to the film-to-tape transfer (which might even include the primitive, smeary DVNR that plagues the Definitive and "Faces" laserdiscs). Which, we can all agree, would be silly, so I'm optimistically thinking the other way.
Some folks were asking about the restoration history.
While I'm sure they did the best they could to make a good transfer of the element available at the time, there was not a 1993 "restoration" in any film-preservation sense of the word.
That would have to wait until 1996 when they were prepping the Special Edition. At first, the intention was simply a re-release of ANH only, using new elements struck from the o-neg. But when they had a look at it, they discovered that much of it had "gone pink". Much of the film had been shot on a new Eastman stock that, as it turned out, was unstable (I recall reading that the Jaws negative also suffers from this).
This shows that when the film was originally conformed, original camera negative was cut, and not dupe negative as is sometimes done instead.
Before any other tricks were done, the negative was meticulously cleaned and treated at YCM labs: removing dirt by hand, fixing splices, etc. The pink portions were then duped and fixed photochemically--as far as I've been able to determine, shots that were not being further enhanced with new effects were not scanned and color-corrected digitally (but anything's possible).
A few bits of negative were too far gone and had to be replaced using new neg struck from existing postive(s). One such source was a three-strip Technicolor (yes!) print Lucas had had made back in the day for his personal archive. I know that sounds unlikely as late as 1977 but that's what I came across in my research.
While they were at it, they replaced all the wipes and dissolves: when opticals are made, at least two generations are lost as the shots are duped and rephotographed, so it was determined that redoing them with 1996 duping technology would yield better results, and it did. (This would indicate that the oneg trims of this footage still existed, which is amazing.)
New negatives of these shots were then cut into the negative, replacing the deteriorated portions.
This process inspired Lucas to let ILM warm up for the prequels by creating new material for the re-release. So all the necessary shots (not the entire movie) were scanned in at 2K, the new CG elements added, and were then shot back out to film and cut into the negative. A few 1976/7 special effects shots were scanned in for the sole purpose of cleaning them of printed-in dirt and whatnot; I have b-roll of an ILMer clone-stamping out dirt blobs from Luke training with the lightsaber aboard the Millennium Falcon, a shot that was not plastered with new CG elements.
You see what's happening to the negative all this time? It's being subsumed by new material, bit by bit. Some of it avoidable, some not. Somewhere I have a sound bite of Lucas saying the negative now contains something like 250 (I don't remember the exact number but it's in the 200s) pieces of new negative. This is the reason Lucas has said the original "doesn't exist anymore", because from the perspective of original elements as the ideal, it doesn't. The fact that one could always go back to existing positive elements is of course what made the statement truthful only from a certain point of view.
ESB and ROTJ were treated similarly, without the same difficulties with deteriorating oneg.
Flash forward to 2004. A somewhat late (from a preparatory standpoint) decision is made to make DVDs. The entire 1997 versions are scanned in, ILM makes a few more changes, and digital files are sent to Lowry Digital. The timeframe is much shorter than they prefer and they do the best they can. They do not make new scans of the negatives themselves and do not have access to any other original elements--just the already-tinkered-with stuff from ILM.
This workflow qualifies as a remastering, not a restoration. A restoration involves getting your white-gloved hands on the original negative and doing what you can to make it look like it's supposed to. Cleaning up a scan so it can be encoded to MPEG-2 is not a restoration.
So the films have only been "restored" once, in 1986.
Moreover, not nearly as much restoration has been done as could have been. Somewhere at ILM (or probably offsite by now) are boxes and boxes of every little strip of film used to compose an effects shot in the original trilogy. Every rock that goes by, every beauty pass of a starship....everything, all separate on their own film element. If they really wanted to clean up the effects shots, they could scan in all these elements and recomposite them digitally. Everything in the same place as it was before, but no generational loss, no printed-in dirt. (For the record, I would not want such a thing done to an "original version" release, but for the special editions, why not?)
Regarding the "original version" footage seen in "Empire of Dreams":
I haven't watched the documentary in a while, but as I recall the original crawl was the only thing that would've come from a 1977 print. All the other non-SE stuff was simply from older video transfers, as someone pointed out. The documentary was not edited on-site at LFL: they hired a documentary filmmaker (too lazy to look up his name at this point), who surely has his own facilities he likes to use. He probably just popped in the laserdiscs and digitized the footage he needed--the documentary was being edited on video anyway, so the transfer was good enough. Remember, he wasn't given a lot of time."
SO the ones released today, 9/12, are the original trilogy without the CGI added from the late 90's?
Are the CGI revisions available also? I sorta stopped collecting dvds years ago but i'd love this set.
Are the CGI revisions available also? I sorta stopped collecting dvds years ago but i'd love this set.
Laserdisc rips FTW!
How's this then, I wish we could get a digitally remastered movies WITHOUT the unnecessary additions/changes. I don't mind if it's digitally remastered, honest I don't. Just don't change the CONTENT.
How's this then, I wish we could get a digitally remastered movies WITHOUT the unnecessary additions/changes. I don't mind if it's digitally remastered, honest I don't. Just don't change the CONTENT.
Nope, sorry, Luke's getting a walkie-talkie to scream into as he falls and Greedo shoots first. Thanks Lucas!
WTF?
I just realized that i bought the set from a year ago or two. I have the silver wide screen edition. I honestly thought this was just a release of the original uncut/ uncgi of the original.
DAMN IT. Now i'm contemplating not buying this set because i'd have a useless set of the same stuff .. but i want that original discs badly.
Anyhow, are there plans on the horizon for the 1-3 movies in boxed form?
Maybe a segue is planned that occurs between the two trilogies called Ewok Picnic, starring Jar-Jar Binks as himself, and an aging Carrie Fisher who wakes up at the end from a valium induced comma.
SoulAssassin
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- Feb 1, 2001
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I have a friend who knows a guy who bumped into this guy on the street who heard on the radio that the laserdisc versions were put on DVD by some kind soul years ago and has been available on the bittorrent network for years.
/or so I heard
/or so I heard
SoulAssassin
Diamond Member
- Feb 1, 2001
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Originally posted by: mugs
Yes, we all know that, but some of us don't mind paying for the legit version.
It's the whole "fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me" thing. Maybe, just maybe, when they release the ultimate 6 disc set I'll buy it but they have enough of my money for the time being.
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