Deterioration of Animated Classics; what's happening?

[Escapay]

I'm not gonna simplify the way I talk or write for some people, I don' have to do that, (that's Escapay's job )

Woohoo, deathie's #32* groupie has the job of simplifying his posts! I feel so special.

Zulu, King of the Dwarf People

*32 refers to one of my favorite numbers, the others being 7, 15, and 96

[MinnieMe]

Miss MinnieMe, i didn't write something shi++y directed to make fun of you, and if that post offended you my apologies, but what I did was copy paste several posts of various members and just substitute the words DVD for Blu-ray, and VHS for DVD in them to highlight the irony in a thread where people were saying good riddance to VHS in a forum where at the same time on another thread people were saying they wanted any new format to fail cus it was gonna make their current format investment (in their eyes) instantly obsolete. If you couldn't see the irony of that and it touched a personal nerve in you I'm sorry but that was not its purpose. So again i'm sorry you took it that way. I guess i can't be too ironic in here. Or post detailed answers neither.

I can see the irony, I was offended because you were posting directly making fun of me. So what if you were ALSO making fun of others at the same time? Just because I wasn't the only one means that I shouldn't be insulted by you? You took something I had said, changed it around, and made it seem preposterous. I'm sorry I'm not as technologically knowledgable as you are. What I had said was TRUE in my post- and was actually directly related to what I had SEEN happen with VHS & DVD so I don't see why you had to pick my post and decide to make fun of it.

I don't understand why you had to bring me into a thread I wasn't even involved in, OR that YOU decided to post something about ME when I had never said a word to offend you.

I haven't complained about your lengthy or techy posts in the past, I've just skipped them. Keep to your technological explanations and KEEP ME OUT of your posts. That's all I ask.

Thanks so much.

[dvdjunkie]

And just to clarify things.............I was the one that wrote a PM to Deathiemouse about his lengthy postings. I find them very informative, but on a forum such as this I think they are unwarranted. I am not in any way shape or form attacking him for his knowledge and his ability to put two words together that mean something. What I was trying to say is what MinnieMe said, and that is - a lengthy essay that puts more people off than turns more people on, should be avoided. Heck I could have answered the question in eight or ten lines myself, but I don't know all those 'techno' words to make it make sense.

My hat is off to you, Deathiemouse, first of all for your passion and knowledge of those things that matter most, the preservation and safekeeping of our world's treasures in film. I thoroughly support that also. I commend you for your persistence that everyone should read your excessively long posts. Some do, some don't. I wish I could illustrate with words the way you do.

If you feel that I unjustly attacked you, and I didn't, I am truly sorry. I think Escapay and MinnieMe were just expounding on what I had said about your excessively long posts. Please accept my apology and keep on with your attempts to educate us.

[Pluto Region1]

.....Film preservation is an important subject (after all is basically 20th century art preservation) and since here on UD we care about films many of us should be aware about all the little things that go into insuring that Cinderella or Bambi look as good on video as they do on the original NEGATIVE.....

Well I seemed to have highjacked my own thread, but that is ok if it helps get all this hostility out where it can get resolved.

But to go back to the original subject, Deathies post reminded me of something that I wanted to bring up in this thread. I was reading that Disney has an archive department. At some point in their history at the studios, a bunch of films had been shoved into ice cream containers for safe keeping (why? I don't know. I am assuming this was back in the 1950s or so) And they were recently discovered in the last few years and had to be restored. From what I read, it appears they completed the task in 2004. It was not clear why they shoved them in the cartons, One can only wonder if the cartons were thought to be good for preserving film?

Anyway, the gist is that they had always cared about preserving the animation even if they had to shove it in ice cream containers at one point, and now they have a preservation division at Disney and have developed state of the art techniques (Disney worked with archivists at the Getty) to preserve everything correctly. Very impressive.

[so it goes]

Just want to say that I, for one, love Deathie's long detailed posts. I think they are just the thing that is missing in most places on the internet.

I say bring on more informative film history! I've learned more form reading His posts than I have from anything else on this board. I truly appreciate his attention to details, facts and history. This post in question was quite helpful as I had some of the very same questions. I think these types of posts do have a place on the board. Many people are going to have similar questions or want to learn about such things and Deathie makes that possible. If you don't want to read that much, don't, no one is forcing you, but please don't say it is unnecessary or doesn't have it's place because others feel that it does and do enjoy it.

Thank you, that is all from me.

[Lazario]

I think I have an important question:

I believe I get the gist of Deathie Mouse's original post... But... I've got to know something - I know there was probably a lot of money in something like Warner's new amazing print of Gone With the Wind for that huge DVD boxset. I can't watch that movie, it's boring as hell, and long! But I have seen firsthand the transfer because I know someone who owns that 4-disc set and the movie looks PERFECT, it stands up to just about any new transfer of a new movie, it's BREATH-TAKING! And, what- it's from the 1930's right? Why can't a movie from 1988 look half that good? I can't think of one that does! I haven't asked a question yet in this post, I just got here and read (90 percent of) it. It seems like these people found a way to make this movie look great and the lengths they went to must have been yeah costly and all that. But, I guess I want to know - doesn't less work have to go into removing the really distracting and negative grain from a movie like 1988's The Kiss (which I've complained about a dozen times at least at filmtalk.com, I think) and therefore can't the studio accomplish a nice-looking print for an affordable cost.

If you can rent it, please do - the grain in the opening train scene is SO THICK, it looks like it's snowing inside. You can't see anything else.

[2099net]

I think I have an important question:

I believe I get the gist of Deathie Mouse's original post... But... I've got to know something - I know there was probably a lot of money in something like Warner's new amazing print of Gone With the Wind for that huge DVD boxset. I can't watch that movie, it's boring as hell, and long! But I have seen firsthand the transfer because I know someone who owns that 4-disc set and the movie looks PERFECT, it stands up to just about any new transfer of a new movie, it's BREATH-TAKING! And, what- it's from the 1930's right? Why can't a movie from 1988 look half that good?

[Snipped for space]

I believe, like most other things it comes down to money and appreciation. There's no reason why any film cannot have a decent (or at least half-decent) restoration. True, in some cases not all of the elements exist, but these tend to be exceptions.

I'm going to go on about Dr Who again, but don't tune out. At least not yet. There's a group of fans who call themselves The Restoration Team who work at the BBC and offer their services for free and restore old Dr Who episodes for DVD. Now, the average Dr Who DVD sells about 15,000-20,000 copies in the UK. But they work wonders on the marterial that they have. They've even written software that changes 25fps film to 50fps to restore the original "video-like" look and feel by estimating the missing frames when only a film copy made for overseas sales exists in the BBC archives. Beyond that, they work wonders with the soundtrack, reconstruct tv trailers that only exist on audio by splicing in the appropriate clips from the episode(s) (when most DVDs can't even be bothered to put theatrical trailers on these days), and manually removie dirt and scratches frame-by-frame. (see www.restoration-team.co.uk for more info - click on DVDs).

So if that can be done for a "lame british tv show" just because people care so much about it, there's no reason for crappy DVD releases of most films. Except of course, the time and money it takes to do a restoration.

[deathie mouse]

As for why Gone With the Wind a 60+ year old movie can look so perfect compared to todays? Lazario, i dont remember for certain if I saw The Kiss in theaters (too long ago) but at least i saw it somewhere and i don't remember grain (like as omg this film is grainy) but i also don't remember the opening scene. Maybe it has intentional grain?

Anyway, The Kiss was shot on (i think) Standart 35mm USA 1.85 Widescreen color negative and that makes its physical dimension height to be 11.33mm, while Gone With the Wind, just like Disney 35mm Academy ratio movies, was shot with a negative height dimension of 15.24mm. Not only that, but it was shot in B/W film Technicolor (again like Disney animation) so each frame is recorded on three negatives and for the DVD they used the Ultra Resolution method supposedly deriving the color image from the b/w separations, therefore (excuse the math) a square area of The Kiss color negative has 11.33 x 11.33 mm = 128 square millimeters, while one in Gone With The Wind has 15.24 x 15.24 mm = 232 square millimeters MULTIPLIED by THREE = 698 square millimeters

698/128 = 5+


So all else being equal the Gone With The Wind negative would have 5 times less the grain, of course it's different emulsions and etc, but film real state is always film real state and also b/w film theoreticaly used to be better than color, etc, etc yadda yadda mew.

Also in addition to that, GonieWindy has been Lowrysized, and he has his own propietary methods of getting the image separated from the grain and if i told you how he'd have to kill me

The video transfer from The Kiss might have been made from the negative but also could been made from copies of it like interpositives, internegatives, or even a print? and each adds more grain so that could be a reason too.

(And here, since everybody seems to think this, I'll mention again this misconception that for a DVD you have to have or make a nice print, which is wrong, it isn't so! If you have the negative or intermediates you don't have to have or make a good print, scan the negative! it looks better! Stop thinking that there has to be a good print surviving (or made) only, to do a video transfer. Prints basically are needed to watch a movie. On a film projector. . )

See how good Gone With The Wind is. No print.

to paraphase Lazario's question:

Can the studio accomplish a nice-looking VIDEO for an affordable cost?

For that see netty's post

But of course the studio may not have the good film elements survving, the resources, or the "will" (more $$$?) to do it.

[GOGOinVegas]

I often learn something new when I read one of Deathies posts , which is not something I can say of a lot of other people's. Where would an 'Ultimate Guide to Disney DVD' be without DMouse? I'll take 'technobabble' over just 'babble' anytime

[Pluto Region1]

Just want to say that I, for one, love Deathie's long detailed posts. I think they are just the thing that is missing in most places on the internet.

I say bring on more informative film history! I've learned more form reading His posts than I have from anything else on this board. I truly appreciate his attention to details, facts and history. This post in question was quite helpful as I had some of the very same questions. I think these types of posts do have a place on the board. Many people are going to have similar questions or want to learn about such things and Deathie makes that possible. If you don't want to read that much, don't, no one is forcing you, but please don't say it is unnecessary or doesn't have it's place because others feel that it does and do enjoy it. Thank you, that is all from me.

I second all of the above. I did post in the suggestions area to make his post a sticky or even be added to the FAQs page.