[Released] Harry Potter saga - open matte

[spoRv]

babouin told me he has another HP6 open matte HDTV; so, now there are two HDTV sources for that film, hence no missing frames, and improved quality where both have the same parts; he also added he has other HP2 and HP4 sources, so I can say we should be frame-lost-free for those two. Thanks again to him!

HP7 and HP8 have French, German, Italian AC-3 640kbps tracks, while the Spanish ones I got were "only" 448kbps; I managed to find out new sources with the proper 640kbps AND .sub tracks, so the whole saga would get the same audio and subs tracks.

The new 4K UHD-BD have DTS-HD MA tracks for French and German now (poor Italians and Spanish should live with the older AC-3 tracks...), and English get a DTS-X track; I wonder if it's possible to get those tracks bit-perfect, as they would be a very great addition - even if I'm pretty sure it is not possible (yet) and if it is, we need a source for them.

HP1 video is basically finished; as I wrote before, unless a complete (read: with no missing frames, at least not in the middle of a shot) would show up, I think we could be happy with this "99.8% perfect" compromise.
HP1 audio is available for all languages, but I'd like to include English DTS-HD MA instead of PCM, first to get minor size with same quality, second because HP7 and HP8 has those tracks, and have the whole saga with the same kind of audio track would be nice; waiting for an answer from a friend about this.

I'm going to encode lossless video, then I would make a test clip using both BD-25 and BD-50 as target, to see if the former could retain enough grain; if not, I'll go with my first BD-50 project - if someone that released a BD-50 project AND actually burned it on a BD-50 (and it worked) would chime in for eventual hints, I'm all ears!

[nightstalkerpoet]

Looks good to me. ☺

Just the audio fixes left. I'm excited to watch the finished project.

[nightstalkerpoet]

The only issue with the DTS-HD track is the McGonnagall office scene. You'll either have tu reencode to switch to Harry saying "Philosopher's Stone," or you'll have to crop that shot in from the bd as well.

[nirbateman]

As for the UHDBd's, they are only available for the last 4 films at the moment, with the first 4 expected to be released this year.

While we're on UHDBD's, if they can be gotten, I think they should prove to be a much better source for video overlays, as the previous master is incredibly outdated and the BD's have very low bitrates with an obsolete encoder.

So I would wait with the video until all are released in UHD if you can get it.

[spoRv]

The only issue with the DTS-HD track is the McGonnagall office scene. You'll either have tu reencode to switch to Harry  saying "Philosopher's Stone," or you'll have to crop that shot in from the bd as well.

Nope, as it would be produced using the British "Philosopher" PCM track.

While we're on UHDBD's, if they can be gotten, I think they should prove to be a much better source for video overlays, as the previous master is incredibly outdated and the BD's have very low bitrates with an obsolete encoder.

I know, but as the BD would be used for very brief parts - we are at less than 25s for the whole first film, excluding final credits - I don't think there is a need to wait. They could be useful eventually for HP7 and HP8 for the cropped parts - in particular HP7, as we have not a 1080i/p source yet.

[nightstalkerpoet]

I'm confused. You're encoding your own dts-hd track then?

Here's another source for the WB opening for HP1
https://youtu.be/yrH5tKSmczw

It says it's from Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory.

[spoRv]

I'm confused. You're encoding your own dts-hd track then?

Not personally, but yes, a PCM 5.1 -> DTS-HD MA encoding.

[spoRv]

UPDATES:

HP 1 lossless encoding ready; now we have just to wait for the English DTS-HD MA - it will be ready in two or three days - then lossy encoding; I can say it should be ready in four days max!

Time to work on HP 2 now...

[spoRv]

UPDATES:

HP 1: improved the opening credits; now the title is a bit larger, but still with the right proportions, and the clouds are way less stretched than before, that's almost impossible to say they are so...

HP 2: I worked all day on it; sadly, there are 10 shots with missing frames, and a lot of single frames here and there with those nasty green blocks due to broadcasting errors... but fear not! babouin saved the day! (thanks again, you are our hero! ) he uploaded another source, that would serve as the following:

• improve overall quality - increase details, lower noise and MPEG blocks
  
• add ten vertical lines, for almost 20k pixels more - that's a whopping 1%, folks!
  
• thanks to the previous thing, avoid upscale (and subsequent quality loss)

There is just to wait for the second source to be downloaded - three days, I'm afraid... after that, I could start to actively work on this.

Meanwhile, I *could eventually* start to work on HP 3, but disk space is tyrant, and I've almost run out of it... let's find a solution now!

[nirbateman]

Awesome work, Andrea!