The Sword In The Stone 50th Anniversary (Blu-ray) Available For Preorder (1 Viewer)

[Sam Favate]

Haven't seen the disc yet, so I can't say one way or the other how it looks, but here is a very positive review:

http://www.cinemaretro.com/index.php?/archives/7591-BLU-RAY-REVIEW-DISNEYS-THE-SWORD-IN-THE-STONE-50TH-ANNIVERSARY-EDITION.html

From CinemaRetro:

The new Blu-ray, which also contains a standard definition DVD and a digital copy, is a revelation to behold. The picture can only be described as gorgeous and does not give a hint as to being over fifty years-old thanks to digital restoration. Colors are bright and sharp and look sterling on a large high definition display.

 

[FoxyMulder]

An opposing view to the above review.

http://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/61405/sword-in-the-stone-the/

From that review.

[font="Verdana;font-size:10pt"]Eagle eyed viewers might note some banding here and there and there are some scenes that are soft, though this looks like an issue with the source material more so than with the transfer itself. Until the movie goes on, and the whole thing seems soft, scrubbed even. Those who like really clean, grain free presentations will probably be pleased, but those expecting this to look like traditional hand drawn animation presented on film will probably not be so thrilled. Colors look good, they're well defined and don't bleed over one another, but a lot of detail seems to have been washed away in an avalanche of smeary noise reduction filtering.[/font]

 

[Mark-W]

Joe,

I watched it for a few minutes last night, mostly to see if the AR bothered me (I have both previous versions on DVD and preferred the 1.33:1 version.), and nothing looked horrible to me last night.
There is the same clean up we're all aware of by now, and there is some removal of visual information as a result, but, nothing like the smearing and blurring I see on The Sword and The Stone.

I plan to watch it in its entirety it this weekend after watching several minutes of the two previous DVDs for visual comparison.

I also want to add that I am red/green colorblind, so I while I am great at noticing issues with detail loss and textures going awry, issues like color banding or colors being off would be things I could never address.

Please let us know what you think about Robin Hood.

 

[Stephen_J_H]

Those who point to Disney's switch from inking to Xeroxing may have a point. While the animation would have gone through cleanup before Xeroxing, the animation lines in the Xeroxed features (which extend through to The Great Mouse Detective and Oliver and Company, IIRC) certainly had a rough-hewn quality to them. An accurate representation can be found in Disney Animation: The Illusion of Life by Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston. There is a still in that book where the authors show a split image of a background painting, both with the lines and without, and it looks like a pencil sketch with colour underlay. Very difficult to reproduce when trying to remove film grain and reveal the sketchwork underneath. Since Disney films were either produced through sequential exposure or had separations produced, a better method might have been to reproduce the "velvet" texture of a Tech IB print, which minimises grain without completely obscuring it, but what do I know?

 

[John-Weller]

Aspect ratio - this should be widescreen.

 

[Mark Cappelletty]

Mark, thanks for the heads up on this. I put my copy in last night and on every frame I stopped, there was some sort of weird smearing and blurriness. Background textures are totally soft-- and you can notice this in the moving image and not just freeze-frames. You'd have to be wearing out-of-date prescription glasses to miss how crummy the image looks as a whole.

I called Regina at BVHE and she couldn't have been nicer. I told her that it looked like the technicians were way over-zealous in their use of image-editing software (I tried to keep the conversation as general as possible) and that the picture looked, for lack of a better term, "greasy." I said that I'd rather have a dirty-looking film over one that has been so obviously over-scrubbed of detail. I also suggested that BVHE needs to go back to the original elements and totally retransfer this. I'm not holding my breath, but hopefully something will come of this if enough people complain.

uVSthem,

If it is like all their other releases, it will be the same source image.

I have been contacting Disney through all available means, including on their DisneyStore FB page. So far I got one canned response suggesting I had trouble ordering that told me to have a pixie perfect day!

Un hun.

I did get this at the DisneyStore FB page a few minutes ago:
We are so sorry to hear this, Mark. Please contact (800) 723-4763 for assistance. -Mya

Anyone else wants to call, there's the number.. and it is saying it is BVHE.

 

[Mark-W]

Those who point to Disney's switch from inking to Xeroxing may have a point. While the animation would have gone through cleanup before Xeroxing, the animation lines in the Xeroxed features (which extend through to The Great Mouse Detective and Oliver and Company, IIRC) certainly had a rough-hewn quality to them. An accurate representation can be found in Disney Animation: The Illusion of Life by Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston. There is a still in that book where the authors show a split image of a background painting, both with the lines and without, and it looks like a pencil sketch with colour underlay. Very difficult to reproduce when trying to remove film grain and reveal the sketchwork underneath. Since Disney films were either produced through sequential exposure or had separations produced, a better method might have been to reproduce the "velvet" texture of a Tech IB print, which minimises grain without completely obscuring it, but what do I know?

Thanks, Stephen! That is one of my main points.

There is a difference between taking animation that had all very clean lines and clean blocks of color contained within designated items, as in Sleeping Beauty, and scrubbing it to look like the naked animation cells, absent of the film's properties, and taking animation that, by its very nature, has very few clean lines, and attempting to "clean it" in a manner that does NOT reflect the details of the original acetate animation cells, as in The Sword in the Stone, 101 Dalmatians, and other Disney animated films of that era.

It amounts to what I did to this drawing of Prince Adam from Disney's Beauty and the Beast:

The bottom image could [in some warped sense] be considered cleaner than the image above it, even though the image above has much more detail and precise image information than the "cleaned up" version below.

That, it seems, is what they did to The Sword and the Stone for this release.

I feel like Snow White through Sleeping Beauty on Blu-ray attempt to look like the best possible version of those original animation cells.

For a film like The Sword and the Stone on Blu-ray, there is nothing about the final product that represents what those animation cells would look like under the best of circumstances.

That, to me, is the difference.

Also, FYI Costco did take back the Blu-ray even though I had watched it. I explained why. There were nice about it! I felt bad for returning something that they had no blame in making unacceptable.

I am still waiting to hear back from iTunes on my request for a refund for the $17.99 to download the wrong HD version.
I told them if they can get me the other HD version, that would be fine, but it may not be up to them. I have no idea how their licensing works.

 

[Chuck Pennington]

They may give you a one time credit (the iTunes store), but don't expect anything else.

There are other ways of getting the prior HD master out there that I can't go into in this forum.

I'm making a split screen video comparison now to better show the differences.

The positives: the image is greatly stabilized and all the cel dirt and dust has been wiped clean. Colors are vibrant and even and close to the way the feature has always looked on video. The proper aspect ratio is on display and the cropping appears fine.

The negatives: the grain has been removed entirely, but so has a great amount of the detail. The rough character outlines are often smeared or softened, and wide shots suffer most notably from the DVNR process employed.

The funny thing is there will be people who think the current version looks great, and I'll bet those are the same people that would've been pleased with a less altered version as well. I'm not quite sure what audience wants a softer, smearier version of this film on Blu-ray.

It isn't like this incarnation won't still please kids, if they are even watching it. Modern animated films are so different in character and tone now... I wonder if perhaps the largest audience for this film now are collectors and older Disney aficionados. One thing is clear to me - the style of the film has changed with this kind of processing, and it makes the study of the animation difficult as well. Lines are blurred or start to disappear, or other lines are thinned out. And the destruction changes from frame to frame.

Funny thing is the "smearing" gets far worse as the film goes on, especially from the scene where Merlin starts using magic to help Wart with his kitchen detail. The sequence always had a large amount of floating cel dust in evidence, and perhaps that is why the DVNR was turned up. It stays at a destructive level throughout the balance of the film.

The image on the left is from a previous HD master and the one on the right is from the new Blu-ray.

 

[Mark-W]

They may give you a one time credit (the iTunes store), but don't expect anything else.

There are other ways of getting the prior HD master out there that I can't go into in this forum.

I'm making a split screen video comparison now to better show the differences.

The positives: the image is greatly stabilized and all the cel dirt and dust has been wiped clean. Colors are vibrant and even and close to the way the feature has always looked on video. The proper aspect ratio is on display and the cropping appears fine.

The negatives: the grain has been removed entirely, but so has a great amount of the detail. The rough character outlines are often smeared or softened, and wide shots suffer most notably from the DVNR process employed.

The funny thing is there will be people who think the current version looks great, and I'll bet those are the same people that would've been pleased with a less altered version as well. I'm not quite sure what audience wants a softer, smearier version of this film on Blu-ray.

It isn't like this incarnation won't still please kids, if they are even watching it. Modern animated films are so different in character and tone now... I wonder if perhaps the largest audience for this film now are collectors and older Disney aficionados. One thing is clear to me - the style of the film has changed with this kind of processing, and it makes the study of the animation difficult as well. Lines are blurred or start to disappear, or other lines are thinned out. And the destruction changes from frame to frame.

Funny thing is the "smearing" gets far worse as the film goes on, especially from the scene where Merlin starts using magic to help Wart with his kitchen detail. The sequence always had a large amount of floating cel dust in evidence, and perhaps that is why the DVNR was turned up. It stays at a destructive level throughout the balance of the film.

The image on the left is from a previous HD master and the one on the right is from the new Blu-ray.

SWORDanothercomparison.jpg

I got this from Apple today:
Dear Mark,

This is Philip and I will be your Advisor for today. I'm sorry to learn that this item did not meet the standard of quality you have come to expect from the iTunes Store. I understand the video has a blurry quality. I have submitted this item for investigation. Apple takes the quality of the items offered on the iTunes Store seriously and will investigate the issue with this item.

I have reversed the charge for "The Sword In the Stone". Within 10 business days, a credit of 17.99 USD should be posted to the credit card that appears on the receipt for that purchase.

Thank you very much for being an iTunes Store Customer. I hope this has been informative and please let me know if you need more help.

Sincerely,

Philip
iTunes Store/Mac App Store Customer Support
Please Note: I work Mon - Fri, 09:00 AM - 06:00 PM EST

First Name : Mark
Last Name : Walker
Email :
Lang_Country : en_US
Product : iTunes Store
Support Subject : Other iTunes Store Topics
Sub Issue : Quality of purchased content
GCRM Case ID :
See additional info below
Choose the iTunes Store or App Store for your country: United States
Item title: The Sword in the Stone HD
Order number:
Details:
I was called yesterday and described the issue with the picture quality on this HD image being completely unacceptable and the Apple support person told me it would be ideal if I called back later. They also said that the number would in an email from Apple. I got an email with the support ticket number, but not a number to call and I was told to call about around noon. To be brief, several days ago you offered an HD copy of Disney's THE SWORD IN THE STONE that accurately reflected what the animators created all those years ago. I have seen screen captures of it. It was also aspect ratio 1.33:1. I paid $17.99 and what I got was a blurry mess that looks nothing like this film should look. I called Disney DVD & Blu-ray support and they suggested I contact you to get a refund. I do not want this in this form. If you still have available the HD version that was on iTunes last week, that would be a good exchange. Otherwise I would like a refund.

So, they are reversing the charges! Nice!!! Honestly, I would have preferred getting the former HD iTunes version and have them keep the $17.99.

Chuck,

Thanks for your review. I appreciate the extra time and attention in your review.
I agree with your questioning who they think they're restoring this film for, though I know my nephew was glued to the set when we turned on Peter Pan.

Best,

 

[Chuck Pennington]

If anyone wants to compare the transfers in motion, you can download a split-screen comparison here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/r3lwndws9j0s1tm/The%20Sword%20in%20the%20Stone%20comparison_oldHDvsBluray.mp4Don't view it in your browser as it will be very choppy and blocky.I also posted it to YouTube, but you know what that means with all the added compression. Still, if you choose to compare it that way, make sure you choose 1080p and go to full screen playback. You can find it by searching for "Sword in the Stone HD comparison" on YouTube.

 

[MatthewA]

Ouch. It's worse than I thought. Look at the black lines on Archimedes at 00:02:18.14. In the old transfer, his chest feathers are clear and sharp. In the new transfer, they're so smudged, they're barely distinguishable.

I so want the excess DNR to have been a mistake.

(And there's a Hidden Mickey at 00:01:46.56)

 

[Mark-P]

Great comparison video, Chuck. It really does illustrate what has been done. On the plus side they did eliminate a lot of cell dust and they stabilized the image!

 

[Mark-W]

Once again the "ignore member" feature at this forum comes in handy. Just because someone has access to the internet does not mean we have to have a conversation with them, particularly if we find an absence of benefit from said conversation.

Then why did you reply to this thread in the first place then? If anything from you're last few replys on here its that you like to create unnecessary drama.

 

[FoxyMulder]

On the plus side they did eliminate a lot of cell dust and they stabilized the image!

The original animators knew the colour of these films would look different when seen on a film print, they inked taking this into account, now we have Disney using the animators cels to work out the colours for the film but forgetting about how they would look different on film prints, thus we are not getting proper colours on many of these releases, look at some of the mistakes made in the last release of Sleeping Beauty, it's revisionism at work when we should be having restoration, they are not doing things the right way.

There isn't a single Disney classic that has not had the DNR treatment, with some releases it's light, with others like Sword In The Stone it's heavy handed, i hope that sometimes in the future all of these animated films get re-released and actually look like films, yes Sleeping Beauty looked good but it wasn't as perfect as it could have been, even the CAPS titles are not getting it right with ringing on Aladdin ( UK release ) and in some scenes of Beauty and the Beast, i also think Beauty was lightened up, you could see too much in the dungeon scene before Beast reveals himself, the 3D version seems darker and more like how i remember the movie playing in cinemas.

It's nice to see people rallying against this release but i would rather see a concentrated effort to get Disney to respect their animated films were made for the cinema, they should have film texture, they should have the original colours, i guess they are happy because the average viewer will buy this release and all the others they put out and not have a clue that anything is wrong, Disney will make money but they are damaging their legacy and sticking a finger up at the old time animators who painstakingly made these movies along the way.

 

[Chuck Pennington]

haineshisway, on 07 Aug 2013 - 8:32 PM, said:"I must be blind or something, because I think every one of the screen caps from the Blu-ray look better than the HD thing you used for comparison, especially in the color and density department."-------------------------#1 - I'm not suggesting that the prior HD master should've been pressed to Blu-ray "as is" or that it is perfect - the print has some damage marks and the master shows up every bit of photographed cel dust and dirt and it can be distracting.#2 - It may be difficult to spot the differences on a regular computer screen. Try saving some of the 1920x1080 captures and view them on a regular HDTV if possible.#3 - My point was to illustrate how much heavy DVNR was used on this release and how a prior HD master didn't suffer from the same issues. I think it's better to try to show what I mean than endlessly debate it based on my anecdotal observations. As I stated either on this thread or the other one for THE SWORD IN THE STONE (the one with the HTF review), the new master is stable (the other one weaves quite a lot), has great color, and I'm fine with the framing.#4 - I want an excellent Blu-ray release with true picture and sound - and by true I mean one that hasn't been scrubbed to the point of losing fine detail. I'd take photographed cel dust and dirt and a few print flaws over a smeary, soft "flawless" version any day. I'm not spending the time and effort to share my observations because I enjoy trashing releases. I wanted to like it. I hope that my observations, illustrated by images and video, might cause someone to look further.

 

[Scrubelicious]

BVHE suggested I contact iTunes and request a refund, so I have.


iTunes said they will report it as a quality issue and that may result it in getting pulled, but I would imagine it will require more than one person who paid for it to request a refund.

At the moment I'am Eyeballing The Sword in The Stone in the EU iTunes Store, they have a special for 3,99.

But it seems there is no Widescreen edition anymore? The details only display Format Fullscreen.


Thanks

 

[Konstantinos]

Can someone please explain it to me like I'm a 5 year old?

Why Disney releases this "abomination" (i'm sorry for using this word) on Bluray, and then it releases this GORGEOUS HD grainy version at amazon (this is ever better than the HDTV version that was around), which looks like the way every Disney animation film should be released?

Also gorgeous is the HD amazon version of The Three Caballeros.

 

[Dick]

Great comparison video, Chuck. It really does illustrate what has been done. On the plus side they did eliminate a lot of cell dust and they stabilized the image!

I'll take cell dust and grain over blurry any damn day of the week. Shame on Disney that they never fixed this for the commercial Blu-ray.

 

[Patrick McCart]

Wow, I might actually download the Amazon digital version. That looks just about perfect other than being 4x3 instead of 1.75:1.

I'm still amazed that Disney never fixed this or Mickey's Christmas Carol. Absolute garbage quality.

 

[Dick]

Wow, I might actually download the Amazon digital version. That looks just about perfect other than being 4x3 instead of 1.75:1.

I'm still amazed that Disney never fixed this or Mickey's Christmas Carol. Absolute garbage quality.

Problem is, you can't burn a copy in order to have a physical disc. If that could happen, and if studios and Amazon/iTunes could provide something close to 1080p (I know, extreme band width), I'd be much more amenable to the idea.