Dracula (1958): Restored UK Master

[PDB]

I didn’t realize it but POD has two transfers on the disc, the previous Hammer/UK one and the US version with 20th Century fanfare. The color timing is interesting:

http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film4/blu-ray_r...lu-ray.htm

[loot]

I dunno, I think they were just going for a dark feel 'cos it's a vampire movie.

[The Aluminum Falcon]

While Curse of Frankenstein was lucky enough to get a newly restored transfer on HBO Max, Dracula uses the older transfer, same as the 2002 DVD. With better cropping than that release, it actually turns out to be a pretty okay transfer.

Doesn't have the crushed blacks of the current Warner BD or the blue tint of the UK BD.

Luckily, the 2002 transfer is available from Germany on BD.

2002 Transfer (HBO MAX)


2002 Transfer (DE BD)


Newer Transfer (WB BD)

[pipefan413]

While Curse of Frankenstein was lucky enough to get a newly restored transfer on HBO Max, Dracula uses the older transfer, same as the 2002 DVD. With better cropping than that release, it actually turns out to be a pretty okay transfer.

Doesn't have the crushed blacks of the current Warner BD or the blue tint of the UK BD.

Luckily, the 2002 transfer is available from Germany on BD.

2002 Transfer (HBO MAX)


2002 Transfer (DE BD)


Newer Transfer (WB BD)

Well that explains why I thought the Warner BD looked a lot better than people were saying... turns out I don't have the Warner disc, I have the German one, which just has the same cover art as the Warner. Hahah.

Thanks for that!

[The Aluminum Falcon]

Haha that's funny! Bit crazy how many different versions of Dracula there are out there. But, that German one is a gem since it also should have the blue-tinted UK master, should you want it, on the same disc!

There's also an older OOP German disc which is the longest version of Dracula available, adding one more shot from the Japanese reels missing from the UK master.

[pipefan413]

Haha that's funny! Bit crazy how many different versions of Dracula there are out there. But, that German one is a gem since it also should have the blue-tinted UK master, should you want it, on the same disc!

There's also an older OOP German disc which is the longest version of Dracula available, adding one more shot from the Japanese reels missing from the UK master.

I know, I very nearly spent a rather stupid amount of money on that OOP German one, having ascertained the difference. But the thing is, honestly, I'm more interested in the colour presentation, which is still absolutely horrid on the German disc (same as the UK one by the looks of it). On top of that, audio sync on the UK restoration with the added footage is incorrect, I dunno if you noticed that: it always bugged me that you can hear stuff clanking about before Van Helsing actually grabs at / knocks it on that UK restoration, but on the German transfer of that older master, it's in sync. Presumably this is simply to do with not being able to match the audio from the UK source to the extra film frames from the JP source, so they've just... ignored it and hoped nobody would notice, I guess? People complained about the sync of the German copy with the extra footage added in, but I dunno if it's because it's different from the out-of-sync UK one or if it's just even worse because they added even more video frames but didn't compensate in the audio, or whatever. Who knows. Certainly, I've seen audio sync issues on more than one German BD.

Part of me is awfully tempted to grab the Japanese LaserDisc (which annoyingly, I've just noticed is for sale from a seller I just ordered from recently, and I could've had it without paying any more postage) and potentially resync it to the "uncut" master, ideally from the OOP German disc which I still don't have yet, but the colour is never going to be great even with significant correction and it would involve a lot of faff with the audio to get it to sync (hell, even the BFI can't get it right, apparently). For the time being, my go-to is the "original" (as opposed to "restored") version off the 2019 German disc I've got.

[The Aluminum Falcon]

To be honest, were I to redo this release (which unfortunately wouldn't happen immediately), I'd color correct the original version from the 2019 German disc. It doesn't have the cropping issues of the DVD, the crushed blacks of the WB BD, or the blue tint of the UK BD. Detail-wise, though it's an older scan, it's pretty comparable with the UK restoration and the slightly lifted blacks could more easily be corrected than the other way 'round.

I'd probably get the extra footage from the unrestored Japanese reels to see if I can get better color timing out of it than the version integrated into the DE BD.

That said, looking back at my old custom, the UK BD surprisingly can be color corrected to an ok amount, but it doesn't compare to starting with the original version.

[The Aluminum Falcon]

If anyone is interested, I've done a new regrade of HORROR OF DRACULA based on an IB print reference, sourced from the older scan which has more color fidelity than the BFI master.

PM me if you'd like to see! I could use some testers to check for problem areas.

I just did the US cut for now, but if there's enough interest, I'll do a version with ALL the Japanese footage reinserted.