Strange artifact on LOST IN SPACE DVD (1 Viewer)

While plowing through the remaining LOST IN SPACE episodes that I haven't yet watched, I reached Season 3, Volume 2. Starting with the first episode, "Target Earth", I noticed a blip appearing in an odd spot on the screen. Backing the episode up to investigate, I found the frame at around the 17:52 mark, captured it, and am posting it here:



It appears like a watermark used to denote film reel changes, but it's in an odd place on the frame. Usually these are in an upper corner, out of the way. This one also doesn't seem to be at any kind of reel change point, but then again, what do I know?

Also odd about this one is that (and it's hard to see here) inside the white circular outline there appear to be dark letters. The topmost one at 12 o'clock looks like a "G".

This is no great revelation - the transfers on these episodes are pretty awful overall - just an oddity that I thought some forum members might care to see/discuss/investigate/explain.

Harry

It just so happens that I received LIS S3 vol2 last night and promptly sat down to watch "Target Earth" with my 5 year old (The best episode in the set, IMO, followed by "The Time Merchant" and my guilty pleasure, "The Promised Planet"). I'll have to go back and check this out for myself. The transfers are indeed bad, just like vol 1 and only now purchased vol 2 because my son likes the show so much and I managed to purchase it for under $15. I hope like hell that TT and VTTBOTS are far better in image quality.

Are you speaking English? What are they?

I suppose I am, to the vintage TV crowd, anyway.

TT - The Time Tunnel
VTTBOTS - Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea

Looks like a changeover cue- when TV stations ran film on the air they put cues in all kinds of weird places. Is this right before where a commercial would go?

Not that I noticed. It was pretty much in the middle of a scene. Of course with commercial, chopped-up broadcasts, anything's possible.

Having received the new TIME TUNNEL VOLUME 1 DVD set, and seeing how great a job CAN be done on old series like this, I kind of feel sorry for the true LOST IN SPACE fans.

Though I bought all of the LOST IN SPACE sets, and am somewhat of a fan, I really just grabbed them to complete the collection. Season One of the show was the best, and I had gotten that. The rest I picked up when I could with coupons and discounts.

How disappointing it must be for the die-hard fan to see his favorite series treated so poorly, while the failed (perceived) sister series TIME TUNNEL is released in a magnificent, pristine form.

I'll likely be picking up all of the other Irwin Allen sets as they are released. I have fond memories of certain episodes of all of them. TIME TUNNEL, though, was by far my favorite.

It's nice to know that after the LOST IN SPACE DVD debacle, that the powers that be got the message. Sadly, though, too late for the true LOST IN SPACE fan. Perhaps a future re-release done properly will follow. It's unlikely though, that Fox would offer discounts or rebates for those who purchased the earlier abominations - but that would be a classy move, wouldn't it?

Indeed it would, Harry. Count me as one of the LIS fans that is truly disappointed in the S3 transfer. Watching an episode of TT now on DVD will make it all too apparent just how shoddy the "The Anti-matter Man" looks by comparison. But I am willing to forgive all if the episode transfer quality (B/W & Color) of "Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea" (my favorite of the Irwin Allen shows) compares favorably to TT.

If you want to see a direct comparison, click here.

http://lostinspaceforum.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=general&action=display&thread=25

 

One frame is from LIS, the other, Land of the Giants. (same footage).

 

Quite a bit of quality missing from LIS.