A Few Words About A few words about...™ The Lord of the Rings Trilogy - Extended Edition -- in Blu-ray (1 Viewer)

[Josh Steinberg]

I am by no means an expert on Lord Of The Rings, but I find the EEs to be far superior to the theatricals... as a non-devotee, you'd figure that I'd be in for the shorter versions, but ironically, the shorter versions feel much longer to me. The extended versions, in my not-so-humble opinion, are paced far better and just fly by when I watch them.

 

[Tom Logan]

Originally Posted by Bob_S.

Oh, by the way, does anyone know if Peter Jackson has commented on this? I'm assuming he has seen at least some scenes from this set and has given his approval. Is it possible he wanted it this way?

Bill Hunt (Digital Bits) said that "production-related" sources told him that Jackson and the DP approved all changes to these discs.

 

[Derrick King]

Originally Posted by Tom Logan
One guess is that Jackson is retrospectively getting the films to match the look of the forthcoming Hobbit films. If so, I find that just too Lucas for words.

The theatrical cuts, with the theatrical color timing are out on Blu-ray. There is nothing "Lucas" about this at all.

 

[Tom Logan]

^Excellent point.

But it leads to the question: Why change the color timing AT ALL from TE to EE? Word is that Jackson and Lesnie (the DP) approved these changes. To what artistic end?

Someone on another board who attended the FOTR EE screening last night (AMC theaters) reported that Peter Jackson said, in the intro played before the film, that the version being shown was the same transfer as the soon-to-be-released Blu-ray EEs.

All attendees of last night's theater showing of FOTR EE who have posted on this say that the film looked great, with no blue-green push. Some had already seen the grabs and clips showing the grading difference, and went looking for it last night. They didn't find it.

So why would these Blu-rays look so different from what was shown in theaters less than 24 hours ago?

 

[Bob_S.]

For the record, I didn't say that the film did not have a blue/green tint to it. It's possible that it did but I just didn't notice it. I don't have the color scheme of the dvd's burned into my mind for comparison. I'm just not an expert in that area as some members on here are. I was studying the picture for sharpness and was happy with it. If what we get on blu ray is what I saw last night, I would be happy with it.

 

[Tom Logan]

Originally Posted by Bob_S.
For the record, I didn't say that the film did not have a blue/green tint to it. It's possible that it did but I just didn't notice it. I don't have the color scheme of the dvd's burned into my mind for comparison. I'm just not an expert in that area as some members on here are. I was studying the picture for sharpness and was happy with it. If what we get on blu ray is what I saw last night, I would be happy with it.

Thanks for that. Others at another forum who had been alerted to the (apparent) disc grading changes before last night specifically looked for blue-green tint during key scenes at the screening. They found none.

 

[Douglas Monce]

More fuel for the fire... A video featuring Jackson and Lesnie discussing the digital color grading done to the theatrical release of FOTR.



After watching that video, I find the color-timing on my theatrical edition Blu-rays to be a lot closer to what Jackson and Lesnie seemed to be after, versus the screen caps we are seeing (mostly on other sites) of the supposed extended edition Blu-rays. In the video, they discuss adding more of a golden hue to the shire (Hobbiton) to bring out the greens, rather than just pumping up the green. That golden hue is how the theatrical Blu-ray looks compared the extended edition screen caps.

Mark

Its funny but watch that again, I find that I MUCH prefer the non-computer color graded versions of almost every shot!
Doug

 

[Douglas Monce]

Here's something that will play with your mind....

Click the following link to watch the short youtube video. This video is a segment taken directly from the extended edition Blu-ray discs. Watch carefully to see if you feel the image is too cyan or too green. Pay particular attention during the closeup of Gandalf when he says "And what about very old friends". Is the sky behind Gandalf an appropriate shade of Blue?



When I watched that video (by itself), although it looks too dark, I felt the color appeared to be just fine. Maybe just a tiny little bit on the teal side, but not as bad as the screen caps made it out.

THEN I went back to the earlier split-screen video of the same scene (the one with the EE Blu-ray on the left and the TE Blu-ray on the right):



Guess what?.... The first video, which moments before looked pretty much fine to my eye, suddenly seemed way too teal!!

Seriously, compare the two. Pause the videos in the same spots (particularly that scene with the sky behind Gandalf) and compare. The one taken from the actual discs looks pretty much the same as the left side of the split-screen video. Too teal!

Bottom line, I couldn't trust what my eyes were telling me when I watched the first video by itself. I thought it looked fine. Now I think it looks too teal.

I beginning to think I'll just save the money and stick with the theatrical edition Blu-rays. I'm sorry, but this new color timing just seems wrong.

Mark

My first question is, is the sky appropriate for what?
Secondly, this very phenomenon is exactly why I never listen to people who claim to know exactly what a film looked like when it was released 53 years ago (or when ever). The human eye, and brain adjusts itself to accommodate changes in color. Which is why day light doesn't seem to be super blue to us when compared to tungsten lamps indoors. A card that may appear to be perfectly white on its own, may seem to be rather yellow when compared to another card that is just slightly shifted to the blue.
Human perception is not accurate in the least!
Doug

 

[Bill Hunt]

I suggested to my sources that Wingnut might want to look into the situation, and asked if perhaps Jackson or Lesnie would consider issuing some kind of statement to address the issue before it gets too out of hand. I was told that all of my communications with them, and the links I provided to them to relevant screenshots and forum discussions were being kicked upstairs. It's possible Jackson might comment if he feels it important to do so. I'm staying in touch, and will try to post updates either here or on The Bits or both. One thing I can tell you is that while yes, there are some slight color timing changes, they do not appear to me - on a properly calibrated display - to be anywhere near as drastic as some of these screencaps would indicate. As Robert said, it's one or two points here and there, but it's very far from some of what I've seen posted online. Believe me, I love these films and know them well. If I thought there was something to be outraged about, I'd be the first to be outraged. But after all the bruhaha in the days leading up to getting my hands on the discs, I was very pleasantly surprised by the quality. No joke, to me the added disc space really enhances the depth in the image. And as I said, the color changes are not nearly as dramatic as people have made them seem.

Originally Posted by Tom Logan
Bill Hunt (Digital Bits) said that "production-related" sources told him that Jackson and the DP approved all changes to these discs.

 

[Douglas Monce]

 I like this bit of perspective-giving, but if the grading is in error (and the split-screen video comparison of Gandalf arriving at Bilbo's is damning, IMHO), then let's make sure we call it as we see it.  "Imperfect" for arguably the most important disc set in the catalog--at $28 per disc!--is hardly acceptable.   "What's special about the coloring problem," for me, is that even in the EE clip by itself (without the split screen TE to emphasize the difference), that sky looks like Gandalf is in Transformers, not FOTR.  It's egregious.  I can only hope the actual discs aren't so bad, as RAH indicates.
  

How can it be in error if its what the filmmakers intended? After all they did the color grading.Doug

 

[Bill Hunt]

Here's a question to throw out there: Is it possible that there ARE problems with some of the international copies of these discs, but the North American copies are unaffected? Am I mistaken, or have a lot of the screenshots come from European sources?

 

[Douglas Monce]

^Excellent point.

But it leads to the question: Why change the color timing AT ALL from TE to EE? Word is that Jackson and Lesnie (the DP) approved these changes. To what artistic end?

Someone on another board who attended the FOTR EE screening last night (AMC theaters) reported that Peter Jackson said, in the intro played before the film, that the version being shown was the same transfer as the soon-to-be-released Blu-ray EEs.

All attendees of last night's theater showing of FOTR EE who have posted on this say that the film looked great, with no blue-green push. Some had already seen the grabs and clips showing the grading difference, and went looking for it last night. They didn't find it.

So why would these Blu-rays look so different from what was shown in theaters less than 24 hours ago?

Perhaps by the time you get to that scene, your eyes have adjusted. Its possible those shots only look strange when taken out of context of viewing the actual film.
Doug

 

[Douglas Monce]

Here's a question to throw out there: Is it possible that there ARE problems with some of the international copies of these discs, but the North American copies are unaffected? Am I mistaken, or have a lot of the screenshots come from European sources?

Excellent question.
Doug

 

[Tom Logan]

According to a poster at AVS, capsaholic uses the legit Thai retail discs. Have a look.

http://www.caps-a-holic.com/hd_vergleiche/index.php?vergleich=lord_of_the_rings_1_bd1

 

[Douglas Monce]

So in other words, the answer to Bill's question is no, it not the North American release.
Doug

 

[Mark Booth]

Originally Posted by Bill Hunt
I suggested to my sources that Wingnut might want to look into the situation, and asked if perhaps Jackson or Lesnie would consider issuing some kind of statement to address the issue before it gets too out of hand. I was told that all of my communications with them, and the links I provided to them to relevant screenshots and forum discussions were being kicked upstairs. It's possible Jackson might comment if he feels it important to do so. I'm staying in touch, and will try to post updates either here or on The Bits or both. One thing I can tell you is that while yes, there are some slight color timing changes, they do not appear to me - on a properly calibrated display - to be anywhere near as drastic as some of these screencaps would indicate. As Robert said, it's one or two points here and there, but it's very far from some of what I've seen posted online. Believe me, I love these films and know them well. If I thought there was something to be outraged about, I'd be the first to be outraged. But after all the bruhaha in the days leading up to getting my hands on the discs, I was very pleasantly surprised by the quality. No joke, to me the added disc space really enhances the depth in the image. And as I said, the color changes are not nearly as dramatic as people have made them seem.

Bill,

We have all seen the screen shot of the snow scene that you provided to one reader. While I agree that your screen shot might look slightly less teal in the foreground snow compared to the other EE screen shots of the same scene, your screen shot is still significantly (and I do mean SIGNIFICANTLY) more teal than the theatrical edition looks on Blu-ray. The difference is not what I would describe as "slight". Not by a long shot.

Here is the three panel comparison. The left image is one of the EE screen caps that first surfaced. The right image is the theatrical edition Blu-ray. The image in the middle is the one you provided to a reader.

So much for the problem being just the international versions.

BTW, click on the image to see a larger version. Look at the top of the ring in the two left images. Compare that to the theatrical Blu-ray on the right. The teal/green even permeates the ring.

That's YOUR screen shot. How can you not be outraged?

Mark

 

[Bill Hunt]

Mark, keep in mind, the image was literally a photograph I took with a digital camera of my monitor, and it was meant ONLY to illustrate that what I'm seeing on the actual disc is notably different from what's visible in some of the posted screenshots. That's it. I would not begin to claim that you can or should draw ANY other conclusions than that from the image. All I can tell you is that in my opinion the actual discs I have don't look nearly as bad as the posted screenshots in terms of color - especially when you look at more than just a few single frame grabs - and my posted review reflects that. My display has been professionally calibrated. And Robert Harris seems to have had the same experience I've had. Beyond that, I don't know what else to tell you. I can only call it like I see it. The growing outrage in some corners of the Interweb is WAY above my pay grade, though I suspect much of this will die down in a couple weeks, when people start to get their hands on the actual final product. There is just no substitute for your own eyeballs, watching the actual discs on a properly calibrated display.

 

[madshi]

Here's a question to throw out there: Is it possible that there ARE problems with some of the international copies of these discs, but the North American copies are unaffected? Am I mistaken, or have a lot of the screenshots come from European sources?

FWIW, every single Warner Blu-Ray that I've seen so far had bit-for-bit identical video encodings world-wide. I've compared many Warner Blu-Rays Europe vs. USA.
I believe the explanation for why the color regrading looks more extreme on the screenshots compared to real movie watching is simply the way the human eyes/brain work. Our eyes very quickly and easily adjust to different white points. If you watch a movie, you usually have the lights turned off. So what you see on screen is the only thing you see. Consequently, your eyes adjust to the white point displayed on screen. However, if you watch screenshots on your computer monitor, you usually have the lights turned on, and so you see a different white point in your room. As a result your eyes don't adjust to the white point of the movie encoding.

 

[Bill Hunt]

Good points, Mathias. Plus, individual computer monitors are also differently calibrated, video cards display color differently, different frame grab processes may affect the image, etc. But the larger point is that - even setting aside the differences illustrated in the image above - when you're actually watching the full film on a correctly-calibrated display - as opposed to staring for long periods of time at a single 1/24th of a second screen shot - what you experience isn't going to be as bad as what's on these screenshots. You're also usually watching the film on a screen which is dark on all sides of the image compared to the image itself (black bars, the TV frame), whereas these screenshots are being seen against bright white web page backgrounds which also affect color perception.

 

[Romanche]

Originally Posted by Bill Hunt
Good points, Mathias. Plus, individual computer monitors are also differently calibrated, video cards display color differently, different frame grab processes may affect the image, etc.

I've also found that even using the same video card and frame grab process, the player can affect the look of the screenshots. Many of the captures I've seen online suffer from what I'd call a "VLC" effect and don't match what I see in my players of choice. I've just made a post about it on the blu-ray.com forums:

http://forum.blu-ray.com/blu-ray-movies-north-america/163012-lord-rings-extended-editions-june-28-pre-order-up-165.html#post4850278

If you have the time, could you clarify whether the QuickTime and XBMC captures look closer to what you've been seeing, or if it's still far off?