"Club Penton" - Ask questions to Hollywood insider "Penton-Man"

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Jeff Kleist

Amir is Amir, that's his real name, at one time a fairly well respected software engineer, now a shill without a country.

Yes, that is his real name….
http://valleywag.com/tech/amir-majidimehr/

Even says so in the court records
http://blog.seattlepi.com/microsoft/library/PX08636.pdf - he sure was one for “putting incentives on the table”.
Even for a *science* forum during the format war... so people have told me.

He won’t be doing anymore of that.

[Doctorossi]

Originally Posted by PeterTHX

Depends on what the definition of "is" was at the time it was written, hence the "when".

I'm the one who said "is" (you said "are") and I wasn't trying to correct your tense.

Originally Posted by PeterTHX

Are we clear yet?

I'm pretty clear that you're confused, if that's what you're asking.

[Doctorossi]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

He won’t be doing anymore of that.

Neither will the Post-Intelligencer; your link is busted.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Doctorossi

Neither will the Post-Intelligencer; your link is busted.

Try it again.
Or else go to the court house as its public record.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

For those who are unaware of Grover’s track record………..it has to be mighty fine in order to qualify and become chairman of the Digital Preservation and Archiving subcommittee….
http://www.theasc.com/clubhouse/committee_tech.html#

^
I just noticed that the list on the ASC site is incomplete as there is also a

Non-Theatrical Display Subcommitte
The chairman being Don Eklund (of SPHE), and in regards to the recent discussion, his people will be doing the encoding/authoring of the Blu-ray LoA just like they have done so on other modern day films and classics which people should be familiar with.
Such as………

A Passage to India
Capote/In Cold Blood
La femme NAKITA
The Ray Harryhausen Collection

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Torsten Kaiser TLE

Torsten Kaiser
TLEFilms
Mastering & Film Restoration Projects in High Definition; 2K, 4K

Hello Torsten, long time no hear from.
Good to see you back.

[Penton-Man]

I've received several query PM’s about movie trailers, in regards to how valuable are they in accessing the picture quality of the main feature in Blu-ray, etc.
I thought I had already discussed this issue at length before but, I’ll try to reiterate what I said in the past and possibly make some additional comments when I’ve got more time to.

I’m buried this week and I’m just leaving my office now. (8:00 PST)
Later.

[Esox50]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

I’m buried this week and I’m just leaving my office now. (8:00 PST)

I did an 8:10AM - 8PM...with about a 5 minute break.

-Esox (1 s)

PS: Cigar?

[PeterTHX]

Originally Posted by Doctorossi

I'm pretty clear that you're confused, if that's what you're asking.

Ah well. Just trying to lighten the mood.

I figured that nonsense was good for a chuckle or two.

[Doctorossi]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

Try it again.

Okay, now that it works, what's the relevance?

[Jeff Kleist]

It establishes a methodology

[Vincent Pereira]

Originally Posted by Jeff Kleist

That story about the different LOAs was out years ago

They didn't consult RAH, who knows David Lean's preferences to a T, and mis-colortimed it and used an old master. A new scan was done for the Superbit, and it was properly color timed

Actually I don't think a new scan was made at all. I'm pretty sure both DVD incarnations of LAWRENCE OF ARABIA were based off the same oldish film-to-HD transfer. The difference is the first edition had additional EE applied at the standard-definition level after it was downconverted, and was improperly color-timed to begin with during telecine. Harris did an HD tape-to-tape color correction of the original master for the SuperBit DVD, and didn't apply any additional EE to the standard-def downconversion (there was already a bit of EE baked into the original HD telecine he was working from). This was all covered in an old thread at the hometheaterforum as I recall.

Vincent

[Doctorossi]

Originally Posted by Jeff Kleist

It establishes a methodology

And?

A methodology of what, for what and of what importance to any discussion here?

[Oliver K]

Originally Posted by Vincent Pereira

Actually I don't think a new scan was made at all. I'm pretty sure both DVD incarnations of LAWRENCE OF ARABIA were based off the same oldish film-to-HD transfer. The difference is the first edition had additional EE applied at the standard-definition level after it was downconverted, and was improperly color-timed to begin with during telecine. Harris did an HD tape-to-tape color correction of the original master for the SuperBit DVD, and didn't apply any additional EE to the standard-def downconversion (there was already a bit of EE baked into the original HD telecine he was working from). This was all covered in an old thread at the hometheaterforum as I recall.

Vincent

That is exactly what I have gathered, too.

I would guess that this HD version is also the source for the sniplet to be seen in some trailers on Sony Blu-Rays. Lawrence also has been aired in HD in Korea, in the US and in the UK and it seems that all of these are coming from the same source.

[Oliver K]

It has been discussed on here so this is a little follow-up on the HTF chat with Schawn Belston on the Robe:
There were never more than 20 participants in the chat, which I thought was quite a disappointing turnout. Whoever is interested in The Robe should get a transcript of the chat, it was really informative.

A few interesting bits (for me):

The original 4 channel mix with directional dialogue will be on the discs

Thankfully there was no processing done to correct an/or conceal the geometric imperfections caused by the original Cinemascope lenses

Martin Scorsese (again) helped the project by making available a vintage German IBTech print from his collection that was used to help with color timing.

A new duplicate(digital) negative is available for the Robe as a result of the restoration

In anticipation of the demand for 4k software down the road the raw 4k files from the scan of the available elements will be preserved


With other not so nice news like the bad review for Gandhi and the low sales figures for recent classic releases it is hard to demand for many more of them as it seems that titles like The Robe, The Professionals and others will take a very long time to break even with what it costs to release them given the little interest in those titles.

I would also like to put out here one probable factor that has not been talked about that much that I think is contributing to holding back classic titles from being sold in larger numbers initially: These movies do not have as much of a novelty value for most buyers and often they are initially priced more or less like a new release. The strategy for many buyers seems not to buy for example Close Encounters for 30$ but to wait until it is on sale for much less which usually happens pretty fast with some studios and their classics. I don't know if there is much that can be done about this as you cannot fault buyers for waiting a little for a title they already know but maybe it would be nice not to start with prices that high (relatively speaking) only to reduce them by often up to 50% very quickly and on a repeated basis.

Edit: The transcript of the chat is already available:
http://www.hometheaterforum.com/chat/belston.txt

[Living Near Shamu]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

Yes, that is his real name….
http://valleywag.com/tech/amir-majidimehr/

Even says so in the court records
http://blog.seattlepi.com/microsoft/library/PX08636.pdf - he sure was one for “putting incentives on the table”.
Even for a *science* forum during the format war... so people have told me.

He won’t be doing anymore of that.

Good information. I also read about Jim Allchin and his distaste for Vista. Funny how he resigned the day Vista came out for the public.

As for Amir, it was also very interesting how he leaves MS around the time that Warner announced it was going all Blu. Not sure if his whole agenda was to extend the war or to really try to convince studios and vendors that HD-DVD was way better.

Either way if he put all of his efforts in that one basket, he came out on the wrong side of the deal. Of course, it didn't help that everyone knew his name and association with MS and everyone (well, almost everyone, lol) had an idea of what was going on.

Penton, did you ever met face to face with him, and did he knew who you were on the forums?

[SquidPuppet]

Originally Posted by PeterTHX

Depends on what the definition of "is" was at the time it was written, hence the "when".

Are we clear yet?

Not ... enough..... coffee yet to.... think..... it ...through

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Oliver K

There were never more than 20 participants in the chat, which I thought was quite a disappointing turnout.

Quite disappointing........and a real shame.

I venture if people were to google his name, they would probably discover that he has spoken at film conferences and such all over the world.
A missed opportunity for those that were online at the time and were aware of the chat.

[Penton-Man]

Top of the Morning to all my Irish friends today.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VhuDkhvOpBc

[Jeff Kleist]

As for Amir, it was also very interesting how he leaves MS around the time that Warner announced it was going all Blu. Not sure if his whole agenda was to extend the war or to really try to convince studios and vendors that HD-DVD was way better.

Microsoft's goal was always chaos IMO. Once they figured out that their technology wasn't going to be part of the game, and that HD media be a revenue source (HDi, VC-1 for most studios), their goal was to get this inconvienient stepping stone over with so people move to download services that use MS software, and hopefully pay them per-transaction royalties