Proposal: The James Cameron Project

[PDB]

Haven't had a lot of time to play around with this till today. Still adjusting the color correction. This first batch of pics are the raw color matching vs the macro adjusted pics which have more contrast, a pushed black level, shadow balance, adjusted mids/highs, saturation and some global color tweaks to offset the contrast changes.

Raw/Adjusted


Here are some more pics from the current version before individual shot adjustments. As these pics are not adjusted per shot, some colors might be wrong as auto-color matching isn't always perfect. But its closer:







Any better?

[stwd4nder2]

Any better?

I think so, yeah

[zoidberg]

Are you referencing the fact that the lasers are changed to a different color in the later DVDs?

Not particularly, just that there is a lot of strange stuff baked into the HD master (ie the Extreme Edition DVD master) compared to the previous LD/DVD master. Not to say that the earlier master is right, far from it, it's just less wrong

[alexp2000]

Any better?

Yeah looks really nice. For someone who’s pretty new to the regrading process, when you talk about auto-colour matching is that using the Dre tool or something else?

[The Aluminum Falcon]

@PDB definitely an improvement!!! I enjoy the added contrast to the image.

[PDB]

Any better?

Yeah looks really nice. For someone who’s pretty new to the regrading process, when you talk about auto-colour matching is that using the Dre tool or something else?

Dre's tool is indispensable for regrading but it is very manual. In other words, you have to take a pic from the target and then another pic from the source, create the LUT and apply it. Then repeat for every shot or scene, depending on how you proceed.

I know some people experimented in making Dre's program run batch processing (ie doing many shots at once) but not sure how far that got. Still would love that feature.

I'm doing some auto matching software in AVisynth (like ColourlikeFBF or Coloradjust) and features in Premiere. That stuff is never perfect, far less correct then Dre tends to be but I find it lays down a base where I can go in and adjust it overall and then go fix shots using Dre.

Hope that helps.

[BDgeek]

Any better?

WOW! Looks great, so much better! 
Congratulations PDB


[rant] To think we have so many obscure movies (which still, I love most) released on stunning 4K home video releases by independent labels like Vinegar Syndrome, Scorpion, Arrow while one of the greatest and most influential action/sci-fi movie hasn't been significantly upgraded or properly released since first early 90'ies home video release.  [/rant off]

[borisanddoris]

This is all rather exciting. For a tech guru like Cameron, seeing so many of his films get weird treatments on video boggles the mind. I have thought of doing Titanic myself but I’m kind of holding out for a UHD to see if they improve things over the Blu-ray which just has some gross coloring that looks nothing like the prints I’ve seen.

For T2, I’ve got the AC3 and LPCM audio from the US THX release if you’d like to include it. It does differ from the DVD to my ears. The LPCM is especially killer.

[CSchmidlapp]

Ouch.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/johnarcher/...2aff4b74f0

Your project needs to include Titanic.

[PDB]

This is all rather exciting. For a tech guru like Cameron, seeing so many of his films get weird treatments on video boggles the mind. I have thought of doing Titanic myself but I’m kind of holding out for a UHD to see if they improve things over the Blu-ray which just has some gross coloring that looks nothing like the prints I’ve seen.

For T2, I’ve got the AC3 and LPCM audio from the US THX release if you’d like to include it. It does differ from the DVD to my ears. The LPCM is especially killer.

I would definitely love to add the THX's AC3 and PCM, thanks borisanddoris.

Also big thanks to Neon for the Abyss OAR DVD's soundtracks.

Sadly, I think the fault of these releases is in fact, Cameron's own doing. As on cue:

Ouch.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/johnarcher/...2aff4b74f0

Your project needs to include Titanic.

Wow. That's the worst. I don't like HFR but this isn't even true HFR. Its just making up a bunch of fake frames. Maybe its for the best he never released Abyss or TL. God know what they would look like.