Restoring Old Movies

[toef]

I'm sure this has been brought up before, but my lackluster searching skills weren't able to turn up any results.

I like a lot of classic movies, and I'm glad some of them are making their way onto BD, but this made me wonder what the process is like.

Can someone explain how lengthy a process it is to restore an old movie for BD? I know it's mostly (or completely) done by computers, but how long would a regular 2 hour movie take? If it's been brought up before, and if there is a good thread about this, can someone post the link to it.

Also, I kind of understand the difference between 2k and 4k, but how prevalent is 4k, and how does that factor into restoring movies for BD? Does 4k make a difference for non-gigantic screens?

Thanks.

[richieb1971]

It takes as long as it takes. Your assuming every reel of 35mm has the same amount of damage/dust/aging and what not.

The 4k principle is used because in the digital realm going higher than 4k is pointless. That is the point where 35mm film has its digital boundaries. So logic presents you with that choice since it will be digitally stored forever at the highest resolution digitally possible from 35mm. There is no point anyone doing a 1080p restoration and later doing a 2160p for example. You might as well go 4k and then downscale to 1080p or 2160p.

I would say the quickest transfers to 4k are 2 months. Maybe not to do the transfer, but every single frame has to be checked, thats 172800 frames. I might be wildly guessing, but I've never heard of a release date being announced within 2 months of its official release.

[Joe Cain]

Originally Posted by richieb1971

The 4k principle is used because in the digital realm going higher than 4k is pointless. That is the point where 35mm film has its digital boundaries.

(What about 70mm films?)

WB is working on their first-ever 6k scan for A Star Is Born:

Ned Price, vp mastering, Warner Bros. Technical Operations, said that the facility's reason to go to higher resolution was because "The original camera negative contains more information than 2K, though 2K is today's typical display resolution. But we anticipate higher display resolution in the future. So we are attempting to preserve the asset, rather than just create an element for exhibition...6K is typically a costly proposition, so that's why we are testing the waters on 'A Star is Born'. As the size of data is more easily managed and the tools become more accessible, we will increase our resolution."

[kpkelley]

https://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread.php?t=31889

[Bobby Henderson]

The 4k principle is used because in the digital realm going higher than 4k is pointless.

Actually, that is not true at all.

Arri put together a pretty interesting 30 page PDF document about the virtues of using 6K scanning for 4K digital intermediates and 4K scanning for 2K digital intermediates:
4K Plus Motion Picture Imaging

The article has some interesting visual examples of how 2K falls apart in capturing certain kinds of detail from 35mm film frames. A good argument is made in following the same scanning principal many who are involved in print graphics use: scan your original at 150% or more of the final output size/resolution to eliminate problems with moiré and other issues.