A Christmas Story (1983) Laserdisc [ML104599] synced to 4K UHD

Movie: A Christmas Story (1983)
Format: Laserdisc [ML104599]
Input Soundtrack: 16-bit, 44.1khz, Stereo (bit perfect)
Output Soundtrack: 16-bit, 44.1khz, Stereo
Ripped/Synced by: emunateD
Synced to: 4K UHD



PM for link

heyo!

(im not sure if this is the right section for this project but it doesnt look to fit cleanly anywhere so ill just put it here for now, and if need be i can repost in a different section; this is just at the idea/prototype phase rn)

so one thing that i occasionally notice, watching a Blu-ray after having seen a theatrical release is the forced subtitles style. Blu-ray subtitles use a bitmap (i.e. image based) format, which is very versatile and can basically replicate any kind of subtitle style. this makes it ever more annoying when they seemingly don't put effort into retaining style (font, size, etc.) that is presented in theatrical releases. and so, my idea is to (attempt to) reconstruct forced stylised subtitles for releases which the style did not make it to the home release

Sony seems to be a big perpetrator, with the 2 examples i have done as prototypes both being from Sony, and it seems to link back to their use of forced subtitle elements within a standard full subtitle track (created with a unified, standard style) compared to having a dedicated subtitle track for the forced subs (or alternating style within a track).

for my first example, i looked to Uncharted (2022), namely because it inexplicably contains non-burned forced subs for foreign dialogue and burned sub for foreign onscreen text.

forced Blu-ray subs:


burned on-screen text:


and so, this offered an opportunity to replicate the burned text style for the forced dialogue, like so:



now, this is not a pixel perfect reconstruction; i also went non-italic for the dialogue and placed the subs lower down in the frame. but it does its job imo.

i also have tried with Bullet Train (also 2022 lol). for this one i found no reference, but i saw it in the cinema a few times so im pretty sure its close.




again the idea is not necesarily to get it pixel perfect (although if good reference exists i will most certainly try) but to get close enough as to invoke the style and maintain the vibe, if that makes sense.

my release of the mummy trilogy has this issue so im planning to look into that, and of course if anyone wants to contribute i think thatd be cool, there's tons of films i haven't seen which i imagine some of which have this issue.

for now, all my subs are in the ASS format, im gonna use these for my media server so i dont need to bother with format stuff as much, but i may look into re-inserting these back into a BDMV format for disc based consumption.

any thoughts/ideas regarding this project idea, feel free to share! 

Hello all,

I'm a collector of a lot of old things from my youth. Mostly video games, but also, old movies, cartoons and TV shows.

As much as I try using a lot of the newer upscaling tech that's available, sometimes you just need to clean up the source.

Looking forward to rediscovery and thanks in advance for all the great work everyone in the community does.

Pulp Fiction (1994) DTS Laserdisc [12154 AS] synced to 4K UHD

Movie: Pulp Fiction (1994)
Format: Laserdisc [12154 AS]
Input Soundtrack: 20-bit, 44.1khz, 5.1 DTS Surround (bit perfect)
Output Soundtrack: 24-bit, 44.1khz, 5.1 FLAC Surround
Ripped/Synced by: emunateD
Synced to: 4K UHD



PM for link

The film has had a spotty history in regards to its audio mix.
Many earlier analogue releases sounded quite mixed (no pun intended) compared to the 2003 DVD release. Particularly the Japanese and Taiwanese releases, which were in a full fat 384 kbps for 2.0 dual-mono.
The earlier VHS and LaserDisc releases often had the audio mix tampered with, but the 2003 DVD, while lossy, still presented the audio as closest to the original magnetic mono source as possible, and had a healthy bitrate of 384kbps for dual-mono.
The Blu-ray releases sounded even worse than the analogue releases, as seen here. With heavy amounts of hiss and bass reduction making the audio sound duller compared to past releases. With one exception, that is the US 2011 Disney Blu-ray, and even that has its own problems.
Even though it is shockingly close to the 2003 DVD's audio mix, the volume is overall reduced, so that the noise would not be as audible. At around the 0:23:35 mark, the music should stop but it continues on in the Disney Blu-ray, probably as the intended silence makes the noise more audible. And near the end, additional music plays over extended English credits, with some of the additional music overlapping with the original.

This is when I decided to take matters into my own hands and fix the 2011 Disney Blu-ray's Japanese audio track. Even when I am a novice who is mostly self-taught mixed with a bit of audio stuff experience from a friend. Basically recreate a (mostly) lossless version of the 2003 DVD mix, or a patched and better version of the 2011 Disney Blu-ray mix.
I first converted the Taiwanese DVD and the Disney Blu-ray's audio tracks to WAV. I then applied batch volume normalisation for them through Wavosaur. After this, the audio patterns between both versions are almost 1:1.
After that, I then went to Audacity to sync up the audio by the sample pattern in the two sections that need patching (the 23-minute mark and the ending).
Since the DVD and Blu-ray syncs are not 1:1, I had to zoom in on Audacity and sync the audio tracks by the sample pattern. Even though this is the first time I edited per sample, it was entirely an on-the-fly decision. And I was originally planning on doing a sloppier job.
I split the audio clips for the two sections, and then moved the section from the 2003 DVD mix to the 2011 Disney Blu-ray mix for both of them.
I exported the audio in both 2.0 dual-mono (like most releases) and a 1.0 mix (which I usually prefer for mono tracks).
Surprisingly, despite some self-doubt inside of me, I managed to find this job easy and educational.

I merely did this to learn more about audio engineering, and to finally give one of my favourite films of all time the audio mix it truly deserves.
Please feel free to PM me if you want the audio.

This is synced up to the Japanese BDs.

Hi all,

I'm a frustrated videophile that loves the potential of high bitrate, low compression (totally OK with using a more efficient compression codec), dynamic HDR (eg DV or HDR10+)...

but

the implementation by film / TV studios and display / player companies is a mess...the problems even with players sending correct Dolby Vision profile 7 from UHD BD discs to displays is one example...then the fact the a lot of DV releases look worse in some scenes than either SDR or standard HDR10...

Also the restoration of old releases is a particular interest...

See you in the forums!

Hello there! This is my first post as I just discovered this awesome community! As I stated in the subject heading, I ran a video store in the 90's, and I'm a long-time movie collector myself (started collecting in the late-80's). I have nearly 10,000 films in my personal collection, many of them Laserdiscs and Betamax (I'm a well-known member on both Laserdisc Forever and the Beta is Better Facebook groups and suspect I may know many of you already).

By trade, I've spent the past twenty years working as a video editor, and have access to much of the equipment and software needed to help with preservation.

I recently created custom reconstructions of the 1984 Vincent Price Halloween Thriller tv special and the 1986 film, Willy Milly - as no watchable versions of either were available anywhere online. I'd be happy to share either of my efforts with this community (PM please).

I believe I may also have many of the releases members here are seeking in my collection and look forward to contributing to the preservation of many original sound mixes. I'm unsure how up-to-date many of the "want-lists" here on the forums are, but I will engage with members here individually if I see any ongoing projects I can help out with.

Background on the film

The original release date of "Star Trek: The Motion Picture" was on a tight schedule and what debuted in theaters in 1979 had many rough edges, most noticeably some essentially unfinished FX and a rough sound mix. Several important scenes were cut for time to accommodate often languid cutting for those scenes where effects were completed at the last minute.

The Director's Edition of "Star Trek: The Motion Picture" premiered in 2001. It was conceived of by its producers, Daren R. Dochterman, Michael Matessino and David C. Fein, who were longtime Star Trek fans and collaborators with the film's director, Robert Wise.

Robert Wise described the new cut in the liner notes of the original DVD: "Thanks once again to Paramount's support, we have been able to complete the film as "The Director's Edition." In addition to finding a new, and I feel, proper editorial balance for the film, we have also completed those effects shots and scenes which we had to abort in 1979, and have given the film a proper final sound mix. It has been an opportunity which I never believed would happen, and one for which I am grateful beyond words."

The 2001 version was completed in SD, with new effect work by Foundation Imaging. Robert Wise closely supervised the film's cutting, while letting the producers more freely tweak the film's effects. While the 2001 effects cut in fairly successfully with the SD transfer of the film, the fact that it had not been budgeted for an HD master in 2001 limited it to a DVD release. After years of lobbying Paramount, the DE's producers successfully got a greenlight to recreate the edit in HD/4K, working from the most recent 4K remaster of the film that Paramount completed in 2021. Robert Wise passed away in 2005, so this version of the DE was supervised by the producers who kept very close to the 2001 edit, but continued to freely tweak the film's FX. Given their respect for Wise, it's clear they feel these additional changes are within their remit: working from what Wise originally oversaw in 2001.



My Fanedit

I strongly feel that the Director's Edition of "Star Trek: The Motion Picture" is the best version, giving it a necessary final editing pass and finished sound mix. However, the PQ on the 2022 DE is unfortunately quite inconsistent: most noticeably much of the film has been subjected to ugly, aggressive digital noise reduction. The new effects work is also very inconsistent, more understandably so considering their (lack of) resources, but some of it shouldn't have been released as is if they couldn't improve on what they had.

My fanedit syncs all the live action footage from the theatrical 4K master to the DE, eliminating as much obtrusive DNR as possible as well as the often revisionist and wonky color grading used for the DE. It also uses the new effects when needed, but prefers the original theatrical unaltered effects when I felt they were already fully realized. (This is a guideline that is not always strictly followed, both out of necessity as well as personal preference: for example I prefer, and have used, the new matte work on Vulcan). Further work (color-grading, further edits, added grain) has been done to hopefully meld this all together as best it can be. If you are familiar with my old effort to bring the 2001 edit to HD, this follows a similar philosophy.

Video Sources

This edit was completed in 1080p SDR as I do not have the ability to grade or monitor in HDR or 4K.

I worked from these sources:
2021 Theatrical Blu-ray (4K remaster).
2022 "Special Longer Version" UHD (the same 4K master, which I tone-mapped to SDR and matched its brightness with the 2021 Blu-ray).
2022 Director's Edition Blu-ray

The theatrical/SLV master has generally nice quality live action footage, while the DE's live action footage is often aggressively de-noised and features a very revisionist and awkward color grade (frequent use/abuse of power windows and such). The effects footage for both masters is very problematic. The theatrical master often uses a filter that smears all the frames of a shot together, which ruins detail for fast motion, while the DE uses a more traditional, though no less aggressive, temporal noise reduction method combined with sharpening. This often has less fine detail overall but retains detail much better on motion. I tend to prefer the theatrical master for slow-moving model shots as it often looks more natural, while using the DE for fast-moving shots and composite shots with live-action (which are often extremely smeary on the theatrical master). However, this is far from consistent, and many shots do not offer a good option and leave you picking the least bad option or compositing the shots together in various ways to try and minimize the flaws of each source.

Sample Frames and Release Details

Linked below is a general overview of the picture quality as well as some of my changes compared with the DE. This does not cover many of the changes made: nearly every shot is different from the DE, since most of the live action footage has been swapped out for the theatrical master with the special effects reviewed on a per-shot basis. I have also made further adjustments to many, many shots.
Sample frames: https://imgur.com/a/Cq8hwwu

Video: 1080p MKV - 30 GB
Both the video and audio are BD-compliant if you want to remux this for a Blu-ray. This edit runs in sync with the 2022 Director's Edition and you can mux in any audio or subtitles that sync to it. Please support the official release and purchase the official blu-ray or UHD.

Audio:
1. TrueHD 8ch / Atmos Track [eng]
2. Dolby AC3 6ch / Compatibility Track [eng]
3. Dolby AC3 stereo / Commentary with David C. Fein, Michael Matessino and Daren R. Dochterman [eng]
4. Dolby AC3 stereo / Commentary with Robert Wise, Stephen Collins, Jerry Goldsmith, Douglas Trumbull and John Dykstra [eng]
5. Dolby AC3 stereo / Isolated Score

Subtitles:
1. Forced Alien Subtitles - Theatrical “Translation” / These follow the original 1979 subtitles for alien languages with the original typeface. The DE had edited this in an attempt to further obscure that the actors were originally speaking English on set, but I've always found it to be too awkward.
2. Forced Alien Subtitles - DE “Translation” / Direct from the DE Blu-ray
3. English Subtitles
4. SDH English Subtitles
5. Commentary with David C. Fein, Michael Matessino and Daren R. Dochterman
6. Commentary with Robert Wise, Stephen Collins, Jerry Goldsmith, Douglas Trumbull and John Dykstra
7. Text commentary by Michael and Denise Okuda
Also included are an array of subtitles in multiple languages from the official release of the DE.

Now available! PM me (click my user name and then select “Send iguanaclerk a private message”). Also on myspleen.

Just joined this platform and can’t wait to find some gems and exchange some ideas.

I used to be very active on FanRes before the forum split but for various unrelated reasons I had to step back from things and never managed to get into a habit of posting regularly here on FanRestore...but now that I'm getting back into the swing of things I thought the best to start would be with an introduction.

As I said I used to be very active here, mostly talking about my work to try and preserve various hard to find versions of Highlander films, which even got to the stage where I bought a beat up 35mm print of a rare version of Highlander 2 and started to slowly restore it! I also chipped in my thoughts and helped give feedback on other topics and projects and generally really enjoyed interacting with everyone.

However around the time of the forum split (sorry if that's a taboo subject, I'm a bit out of touch) my work life started to get busier and then there was an illness and death in the family...all of which sapped any energy I had for personal projects and led to a couple of years of severe burnout. During this period I also had to spend a lot of time away from my home and editing PC so most of my projects just ground to a halt. I don't mean to sound too dramatic, I was never in a harmful place, just a busy one that lead to me having to drop a lot of hobbies I love for a while, but now that I'm back in a good place It's time to start picking up my old projects and working again.

It's not all been bad news though. Through my preservation work I managed to make some interesting contacts and what limited creative capacity I've had in recent years has actually gone towards paid editing work, to the extent that you can now find my name on the 4K Blu Ray release of Highlander! Needless to say being involved with a home video release of my favourite film was a real highlight and a huge boost when I  needed it most.

I'm hoping to pick up some of my old projects and threads here soon. 35mm work has been slow but I'm getting back into the swing of it again, and my video encoding has improved greatly so I might try and put out some improved versions of my completed projects.

To get me back into the swing of things I finally put together the fan edit of Highlander 2 that everyone kept telling me to make. It was a lot of fun and encouraged me to get back into fan editing and fan preservation again. I'm planning to release it properly next month once I've had a bit of feedback from a few friends.

I've tried to at least keep up with PMs while I've been inactive here, but I let them build up again in recent months; I'll try an address each one in the next few days.

TLDR: Sorry I was gone for so long, but I'm back now. I missed this place!