Lawrence of Arabia 4K UHD (1962)

[AlphaNoodle]

Originally Posted by steel_breeze

Oddly the steelbook LoA has that missing Taxi Driver shot inserted, right after Lawrence gives his pistol to his Bedouin guide. Very avant-garde.

Haha dang that's very interesting, so it seems there are differences

[Fjodor2000]

Just watched the first disc.

Nice overall. But one thing that stands out is that the blue desert skies are really grainy/noisy/bad encoded. Cannot decide what is the root cause at this point.

Also, looks like there's some kind of vertical stripes coming in "waves" on those blue skies in several scenes. A bit hard to describe. It all looks like there's an incoming sand storm, when there isn't.

Should we not expect better than this from 65 mm?

[Reflection]

Originally Posted by Fjodor2000

Just watched the first disc.

Nice overall. But one thing that stands out is that the blue desert skies are really grainy/noisy/bad encoded. Cannot decide what is the root cause at this point.

Also, looks like there's some kind of vertical stripes coming in "waves" on those blue skies in several scenes. A bit hard to describe. It all looks like there's an incoming sand storm, when there isn't.

Should we not expect better than this from 65 mm?

That's not good, i'll look out for this when my disc eventually arrives.

[Daytrader]

Strange, as this is just the reprint of the 10/10 5/5 score for video, that was given before, alot of the reviews i have read, say its the best 4K ever released.

I think that this is probably the best 4K transfer I’ve ever seen. It almost looks three-dimensional on the screen. Not my quote by the way, not got my copy yet.

[2112rushfan]

Originally Posted by Fjodor2000

Just watched the first disc.

Nice overall. But one thing that stands out is that the blue desert skies are really grainy/noisy/bad encoded. Cannot decide what is the root cause at this point.

Also, looks like there's some kind of vertical stripes coming in "waves" on those blue skies in several scenes. A bit hard to describe. It all looks like there's an incoming sand storm, when there isn't.

Should we not expect better than this from 65 mm?

I wrote about this when the disc first came out and was told that the "wavy-ness" was due to the extreme desert heat damaging the negatives

[Fjodor2000]

Originally Posted by 2112rushfan

I wrote about this when the disc first came out and was told that the "wavy-ness" was due to the extreme desert heat damaging the negatives

Ok, sounds unusual, but could explain it perhaps. I guess the peak heat could be around 40-50 degrees Celsius in the desert. But I don't know how heat affects film negatives.

The regarding the "the blue desert skies are really grainy/noisy/bad encoded", I still find that unexpected, but it's present. I mean it's shot in desert sun with super high ambient brightness and on 65 mm. So shouldn't it be possible to use film negative with really low noise, and fine grain?

[sherlockjr]

Originally Posted by Fjodor2000

Ok, sounds unusual, but could explain it perhaps. I guess the peak heat could be around 40-50 degrees Celsius in the desert. But I don't know how heat affects film negatives.

The regarding the "the blue desert skies are really grainy/noisy/bad encoded", I still find that unexpected, but it's present. I mean it's shot in desert sun with super high ambient brightness and on 65 mm. So shouldn't it be possible to use film negative with really low noise, and fine grain?

Heat adversely affects film negative. Often significantly. As for "film negative with really low noise and fine grain" you're talking about the film stock that was available to use 65 years ago, not today. There's been major improvements in film stock and emulsion, including size of grain, etc over almost 3/4s of a century.

[Fjodor2000]

Originally Posted by sherlockjr

As for "film negative with really low noise and fine grain" you're talking about the film stock that was available to use 65 years ago, not today. There's been major improvements in film stock and emulsion, including size of grain, etc over almost 3/4s of a century.

I’m comparing to other 65 mm movies from the same era, e.g. 2001 A Space Odyssey from 1968, and LoA is from 1962. And LoA desert scenes were shot under much brighter ambient light conditions, so should be able to use really low ISO film with low noise and fine grain.

[thebarnman]

Originally Posted by Fjodor2000

I’m comparing to other 65 mm movies from the same era, e.g. 2001 A Space Odyssey from 1968, and LoA is from 1962. And LoA desert scenes were shot under much brighter ambient light conditions, so should be able to use really low ISO film with low noise and fine grain.

The use of HDR can effect the way grain looks especially in light areas and in sky shots.

I'm mostly interested if this version is filtered like the last 4K release or not.

[Daytrader]

Originally Posted by thebarnman

The use of HDR can effect the way grain looks especially in light areas and in sky shots.

I'm mostly interested if this version is filtered like the last 4K release or not.

I thought this was just a reissue ?

[lgans316]

Un-Limited edition my azz lol.

[Geoff D]

Originally Posted by Fjodor2000

I’m comparing to other 65 mm movies from the same era, e.g. 2001 A Space Odyssey from 1968, and LoA is from 1962. And LoA desert scenes were shot under much brighter ambient light conditions, so should be able to use really low ISO film with low noise and fine grain.

You got the right ta-ta but the wrong ho-ho. As sherlock tried to explain above, the film we have today is nothing like it was 60-odd years ago. The basics are absolutely the same as they've always been - the thicker the exposure, the grain is less visible - but the emulsions are not. Although they were very very slow back then, rated at 50 ASA (32 for daylight with a filter) for the 5250 used on Lawrence, the grain was much more prominent than with modern stocks as the technology wasn't as advanced (look up T-grain).

The entire reason why the industry tried out larger format options at that time (55mm, 65mm, VV) was to reduce the grain, but it didn't eliminate it and when going back to the original negatives for these transfers you're getting it raw, to say nothing of how HDR can greatly exacerbate it. You mentioned several things going on with Lawrence's UHD as you see it, and I think it's a combination of all of them: more grain than what we might otherwise perceive 65mm to have, restoration artefacts from patching the warped, cracked negative being brutally exposed in HDR (frozen gloopy grain, vertical 'pillars' where they've painted over scratches etc), and lastly surprisingly iffy compression from Sony. Even tho they split the movie over 166GB worth of discs neither is anywhere close to being filled and the main video encode is having to fight with 14 (!) audio tracks gobbling up an average of 15 Mb/s on their own.

Why doesn't 2001:ASO look as shonky then? It was shot on a slightly newer emulsion, still 50 ASA but newer nonetheless, and under tightly controlled studio conditions, the negative itself didn't need anything like the drastic digital work that Lawrence did to restore for 4K, the encode to UHD disc is simply betterer, and there's also the smattering of DNR going on to minimise the grain.

I keep saying it, but it's such a shame Lawrence had Dobly Vision first time around as there's no technical reason there for Sony to revisit it. Strip out most of those audio tracks, really bump up the bitrate and that'd be one less gripe I'd have with it. That said, if it didn't have Dobly and they were doing a re-release today it might've ended up with an even cruddier MOD encode anyway

[Geoff D]

Originally Posted by Daytrader

Strange, as this is just the reprint of the 10/10 5/5 score for video, that was given before, alot of the reviews i have read, say its the best 4K ever released.

I think that this is probably the best 4K transfer I’ve ever seen. It almost looks three-dimensional on the screen. Not my quote by the way, not got my copy yet.

Not all reviews: https://forum.blu-ray.com/showpost.p...&postcount=531

[apricissimus]

I think the movie looks fantastic on a 4K disc, and I swear, I don't know why some people seem to go looking for the tiniest flaws to get mad about. Like you don't even want to enjoy the movie.

[Daytrader]

Originally Posted by Geoff D

Not all reviews: https://forum.blu-ray.com/showpost.p...&postcount=531

Wow, nice review, just finished reading it, hope when it arrives, i will get sucked into the movie, i am sure i will, then i wont notice the flaws so much.

[Geoff D]

Originally Posted by Daytrader

Wow, nice review, just finished reading it, hope when it arrives, i will get sucked into the movie, i am sure i will, then i wont notice the flaws so much.

It looks betterer than it has any right to, given how badly damaged the negative is, and 99.9% of people will be dazzled and rightly so, but at the same time it falls short of the lofty standards that Sony have set for 4K in several respects. I'd love to see a new restoration outright as this 2012 one isn't suitable for HDR IMO, hopefully it'll get revisited again in my lifetime.

[ImBlu_DaBaDee]

Originally Posted by Geoff D

hopefully it'll get revisited again in my lifetime.

Lawrence of Arabia at The Sphere

[Geoff D]

Originally Posted by ImBlu_DaBaDee

Lawrence of Arabia at The Sphere

The trick, William Potter, is not *minding* that it hurts

[apricissimus]

Originally Posted by ImBlu_DaBaDee

Lawrence of Arabia at The Sphere

They'll take out all the boring bits and it'll be a brisk 87 minutes.

[anephric]

It is recognized that you have a funny sense of boring.