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378 Terabytes Of Star Wars on 600 G5s
Mrbill points to this USA Today story on the
digital makeover given to the original Star Wars trilogy, noting that the digitized films have also been converted to HD for later release as high-definition DVDs.
You can now watch your childhood dreams get stomped on ... in HIGH DEFINITION!
Of course. Release the DVDs now. Special edition DVDs next year. Limited Edition DVDs the year after that. Then redo the whole cycle again on high definition DVDs, making it so that people have to buy the trilogy six times, spending a couple hundred bucks.
Well, at least they're not releasing them both individually and as a set with different special features. That would double the number of times it will be released.
...I really hope George Lucas wasn't inspired by my above comment.
Anyone got a torrent?
Kill, Tux, kill!
Its nice to see that we're finally getting the original 3 films on DVD... it does piss me off a bit that Lucas seems to do everything he can to ear a few more bucks... first we'll redo them and release them in to different VHS boxed sets. Wait a few years, now we'll do them on DVD. Wait a few years, now we'll release the HD versions.
Though I guess if consumers keep buying them, then you can't really blame Lucas too much.
Can someone in the know please answer these questions?
1. When the much hated special editions were released, were the originals digitized and altered then reprinted?
2. Is the stock that this company used the original, originals? Meaning that when lucas got the cleaned-up digitized versions he had to go back and redo all the SE stuff?
finally
3. Does this give hope to the idea there might someday be a Highdefinition original cut version of the films?
Thanks in advance!
Scratches and loss of color is not the only degredation to SW that seems to have developed over time. A copy I watched recently seemed to have developed small cute computer animated characters that detracted from the development of suspense in the film..
Why exactly did it need to be restored again anyways? I mean, wasn't it restored for the THX video re-releases a decade ago and further restored for the theatrical re-releases with new scenes?
If they could only digitally remaster Lucas to restore him to his original 1970's form. I'd pay 70 bucks for that.
The office has 80 employees, running 600 networked Power Mac G5. Assuming no bulk discounts, that's about $1.8 million total, or $22,500 per employee. I wish I worked for a company with those resources. Any chance they're running Seti@home when not working on any projects? ;-)
So that's how Lucas intends to discourage piracy.
I have to hand it to him; Between not having enough space and bandwidth, and not wanting to see how he's butchered Star Wars this time, I don't think I would bother trying to share the 378TB of video.
I tip my pirate hat to you. Arr.
Can somebody just post a link to the torrent?
I have been refusing to give any more money to Lucas, be it the new DVDs or Episode III, but the commercials for the trilogy DVDs almost (ALMOST!) changed my mind) they change is very apparent, even if you've watched the LDs or especially on cable. All three films look much crisper and brighter - I almost thought for a second that Lucas had added some new stuff.
I still won't be buying the trilogy, but I'm amazed at how good the restoration looks.
"There is no time, sir, at which ties do not matter," Jeeves, (Jeeves and the Impending Doom)
Like honestly, I understand keeping with the original, but in retrospect if you really wanted the true triology, you would pull out your VHS tapes, and watch it into oblivion. When you put in a dvd that is low-quality, poor sound, yeah the novelty will be pretty cool, and the story carries it, but it would get old fast. In comparison to everything we have now, the late 1970's were not known for their technological feats. And while I would rather him not add the extra scenes to the movie, the fact that he remastered the audio, and is hidef'ing the video is a plus. Basically its either original and crappy, or hidef sweetness and alterations.
je suis parce que j'aime
So now that it's been restored 3 times, had scenes added once and re-edited twice, how many re-releases do you think it will take before it contains no shred of the original film and it becomes a romantic comedy set in a hospital?
"Go for it George Lucas. Ruin all of your movies. "
Empire Strikes back, despite being 'special', is still entertaining.
Though I agree with the sentiment, we've been around this block a million times. Don't buy it. Let the people who do enjoy it. In the mean time, let's talk about something a little more up-beat:
- Lots of people were employed to work on this.
- The technology and experience will help ILM make better effects for upcoming movies.
- SW in HD will hopefully make broad adoption of higher-resolution DVD players an easier transition.
- Just the number '378 Terabytes' is enough to cause underwear tents to rise all over the Slashdot population.
"Derp de derp."
So does being done on Apple G5's constitute a washing away of all of lucas' sins, or will they have to burn the hardware in order to keep the contamination from spreding???
You need a FREE iPod Nano
So the question I've been dying to find out from all the high def zealots out there is... does making a high definition recording of something originally recorded in some other definition (in this case celluloid) going to look "better"? It's been my experience dealing with image processing of "analog" imagery that the higher up in resolution you go, the more "anomolies" can be detected...i.e. there is only so much you can do with the original baseline, and going up in resolution requires huge amounts of post processing to clean up those anomolies. AAANNND the final product is still limited by the originals. So even if we get more lines of resolution from the celluloid, the celluloid is still the limit on how good you can go. So will high def DVD STAR WARS look better than standard DVD STAR WARS. Probably, but not any better than the original and not THAT much better than standard DVD. I think the movie industry (and music too) have lost the fact that we aren't clamoring for higer resolutions of our recorded media, we just want ones that don't wear out. That's why I think SACD and DVD-A haven't taken off.
Dear George,
Could you please stop using our computers? You are lame. We are leet.
Thanks.
Steve
I bet if the restoration was done on a beowulf cluster of old amigas running Linux, everyone would start saying Greedo shooting first was the best thing that ever happened to the trilogy...
(Holy Karma-Risk Batman!)
There are two kinds of fool. One says, This is old, and therefore good. And one says, This is new, and therefore better.
virtually guaranteeing that the Hans/Greedo controversy will continue. At this rate, soon Hans will not have even shot Greedo. It will turn out that due to a high fat diet and sedentary life-style befitting a rich assasin, Greedo's arteries were clogged full of cholesterol. Hans didn't shoot Greedo, he was dead before he hit the table!!
My other computer is a Jacquard loom.
1) Lucas is a money-grubbing third-rate director.
2) Can they wipe out Jar-Jar?
3) Jar-Jar is not in these episodes, you moron.
4) Who you calling a moron? Lucas is a money-grubbing moron.
5) Why are they doing it on Macs when it is cheaper to do it on Linux?
6) No, it's not. Look at Virginia Tech.
7) Teh MACS suck.
8) Nope, you idiot, M$ sucks.
9) You are all idiots, Lucas sucks.
Nothing else to see here. Move along now.
And the newly enhanced, more humane Stormtroopers will all carry flashlights instead of blasters.
Ian Caven is a regular member of the Vancouver Python User's Group and he spoke about this amazing system at our conference a month ago.
One intersting bit is that the vast majority of this system is written in Python using numpy. Ian says "he doesn't know how they would have done it" otherwise. C is used for the inner loops but Python does the majority of the algorithmic stuff that makes one image processing job (e.g. removing dust) different from another (e.g. correcting for film degradation). Python also manages all of the distributed processing.
Another interesting bit is that they are using Python, Zope and HTTP to make a virtual file system for managing the frames and movies. This will help with the storage management problems that arise from working with such massive files.
There are other amazing facts but it is hard to know which are competitive secrets that are better not divulged. One hint I'll give is that the productivity of the programmers at this company would shock you. They've obviously benefitted from building on a very high-level language and they also have some very sharp tools they've built themselves to make these amazing jobs possible.
Just shut the fuck up. Please? They're movies, for fuck's sake. Some of us enjoy them and would like to continue doing so without you and your gloomy band of whiners coming along to piss in the pool. I love the original movies too. I've watched them more times than I can count and can recite my favorite lines, but it's not my religion. I cannot relate to you whiners who consider these films to be some cornerstone of your existence. I wish you would all just fuck off and stop spazzing out every time the words Star Wars flash in front of your face.
There... much better. Now on with the comment.
They were part of my childhood too, but I had lots and lots of other great things in my childhood that had nothing to do with Lucasfilm Ltd. so even if Lucas decided to replace the characters in films with Looney Tunes animations, it wouldn't really make that big a dent in my life. If Lucas wants to futz around with the originals to make them his ultimate vision, then more power to him. Yeah, it sucks a little because it drills a little hole in that precious bag of nostalgia that we carry around, but in the end, is it really that big a deal?
Seriously? Did you really feel the need to scream rape of your childhood like that?
Get over it. Quick. And please stop drawing attention to yourself every time you feel your precious youth has been violated by a fucking movie. It gets tiresome REAL quick.
--Rick "If it isn't broken, take it apart and find out why."
I first saw the unedited, original cut of Star Wars in late 1976, when it consisted of the original reels fresh out of the cameras from the various sets. That was the best version - the definitive version.. I mean, Han shot Gredo fifteen times in subsequent takes.
Damn you to hell, George, for cutting that original 52 hour uncut version! What were you thinking, you butcher!?? Do you think you had the right to cut and change things AFTER THEY WERE FILMED? It's almost as if you had something else in your head about what the films should be, and when the filmed material didn't suit, you cut it and changed it, you bastard, until they fit what you wanted.. how could you? Who do you think you are?
So, I'll be hanging on to my 27 reels of original film, and ignore some new version that's been changed by some idiot who really had nothing to do with the films at all..
Oh my god, that must be real high definition!!
But why the heck do you need 600 G5s to view it?
This "locking viewers in with Apple hardware" bullshit must go!
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
I mean, doesn't anyone else here see what Lucas is doing? He's not stomping on your childhood dreams...it's pure marketing genius. Remeber back when Coke said it was changing the recipe for Coca-Cola? Their sales went through the roof for the ORIGINAL coke!
He's releasing the "Special Editions" now. He'll make the money off of them...let them stay out there for like a year or two. THEN it will be get the entire box set of Episodes 1-6 that will set you back like $150...let that stay out there a few years until they don't sell anymore.
Then around 6 years from now or so, the Original 3 movies with no changes at all...the ones that were released starting back in 1977 will be a box set. There's certainly a market for this now and everyone that's bitching and moaning will snatch it up!
Lucas won't be laughing all the way to the bank btw...he'll just install a bank at Skywalker Ranch and be done with it.
"Leo Fender was in a 'state of grace' when he designed the Stratocaster." -- Paul Reed Smith
> These are the kinds things which whiny nerds like me are
> complaining about.
One would think that reading this thread, hundreds of people absolutely hate what Lucas has done to his movies. However, looking more carefully, it seems we've got a relatively small crowd of really angry people posting millions of times to a story for a movie they hate with every fiber in their bones. It seems the time could be better spent if they would get together with a co-op of like-minded individuals, and make their own version of Star Wars, where Han Solo is a trigger-happy murderer and rubber suits are king.
It's Lucas's movie. He had a vision for the movie, and he was clearly disappointed that he couldn't make that movie because of the limitations of effects in those days. Now he has the chance to get closer to his vision. Yes, his vision does include flatulent animals, but, hey it's his right.
As a fan of Star Wars since 1978 (when I was old enough to see Star Wars in the theater), I like the changes Lucas made to his movies. I think that if every time Lucas released a version of his movies for a new format with no changes ("Well, I used that rubber suit in 1975, and it looks good in 2004!"), that would be a bit disappointing. I saw the documentary last night, and it was clear that Lucas was embarrassed by the cantina scene. I think Mark Hamill said it was like something out of the Nutcracker Suite. So, Lucas makes a few changes to make the movie he intended.
I like Episodes I and II, too. And no matter how many times rabid Slashdot posters like to say otherwise, Jar Jar is no more annoying than C3PO in the Episodes IV-VI or a screenful of Ewoks.
Insert simplistic political, ideological, or personal proselytization here.
Just wait for the sexology (that's like trilogy but with 6, right?) to come out on a single disc on blu-ray, and save your groats till then.
Nothing costs nothing
You know, as a Star Wars fan I tend to dislike some of the changes made in the SE of the original series. So people even go as far as to say that Lucas butchered the series. I don't really see how this could be considered butchering the series. If you enjoyed the movies in their original form, you should still be able to enjoy them now. The core of the movies remains untouched, and only a few scenes had small alterations. Star Wars is still great in my mind, it still has a great story, battles that were way before its time, and an engulfing universe that continues to be expanded today. If a few changes ruined the movies for you, then you must not have enjoyed them that much in the first place.
SIGFAULT
Really.
Both editions should be available, though, for those whose fanaticism is more religious than mine. That is, if LucasFilm even bothered saving a digital version of the original print during the Special Edition restoration.
Well one could ease his or her conscience by recognizing that one can not actually buy these movies anymore, in any format. Even in music school we were allowed to photocopy music that was out of print. ;-)
Nice article. But nothing new.
If you are interested in reading more on how the experts restore old stock then you can't do better than visit the 'Doctor Who Restoration' web site.
These bunch of guys have to restore awful video and film masters from the sixties.
http://www.restoration-team.co.uk/
Look up in the DVD releases section:
'Lost in Time' or the detailed 'The Seeds of Death' article.
They have before and after examples that will blow your mind!
Stuart http://stuarthalliday.com/