I'm getting totally DISGUSTED with collecting TV series on DVD (1 Viewer)

[Jeff Ulmer]

How so? I don't think in most cases that the choice of masters is as simple as walking into a vault and seeing the pristine uncut version and a syndicated version and choosing the syndicated version. I'm sure in many situations, especially on shows that are 30+ years old, that locating intact masters is fairly difficult, and even if they are found, what condition are they in, and how much money would it take to restore them? Until fairly recently, there was no thought of releasing uncut versions, TV certainly wasn't going to run them, so why even bother keeping the elements around, just chuck them out with all the other useless stuff you'll never use again.

Alternately, with all the corporate shuffling that has gone on, it would not be surprising if many of these elements simply got lost. Can you imagine trying to keep track of the millions of feet of film and video that have been produced throughout the history of cinema and TV? Hell, I have a hard enough time trying to find a matching pair of socks, let alone the piece of paper I wrote something down on thirty years and seven relocations ago.

 

[MatthewA]

So, what, we should let them deteriorate to the point where you can never use them in any form again?

When HDTV becomes the norm, should we just use existing NTSC masters and upconvert them as well?

 

[ChadP2k]

I'll add some input on this thread now both from a personal point of view, and from my knowledge of several of Paramount's Series.

In I Love Lucy's case fans are lucky to have Gregg Oppenheimer, the son of I Love Lucy Creator Jess Oppenheimer, who was hired to oversee the ILL on DVD project.

When Lucy was aired in the 1950's it became the first major "filmed" sitcom to air on television, and Desilu productions maintained the rights to the episodes for later syndication. Like most television shows references to sponsors and sponsor products were frequently included in the plot, but when these shows went into syndication during the time new episodes were still being produced those references had to be deleted.

Instead of striking a new set of 35mm prints and editing those Desi ordered the film editors to "cut out" the bits referencing sponsors from the original negatives. These pieces of footage, along with all the outtakes and unused footage were destroyed in a big "bonfire" late in the series run.

Luckily however both Oppenheimer and each of the "stars" of the series recieved a copy of each episode on 16mm film, complete with the original commercials, openings, etc (CBS sent a 16mm film reel for every episode to each station the week the episode was set to air, so they could run it "simultaneously" with the network feed and switch to it if anything went wrong).

The ILL DVDs have been "restored" using additional 16mm footage from the set of prints Jess Oppenheimer kept from his years at I Love Lucy.

In the case of season four something slipped through the cracks with the process and they missed a couple of bits & pieces, but with VERY FEW exceptions what you're seeing on the I Love Lucy DVDs is still more footage than has been seen since the series aired in the 1950's.


In the case of Andy Griffith the "possibly edited" warning on the Season 3 set could be because of lack of available master elements, or damage to original negatives.

When syndication switched from 16mm film to videotape Viacom went back to the original TAGS copies and remastered each episode, editing 3.5 minutes out of each episode for syndication purposes. These shows were what you see on your local stations, and what used to air on TBS.

A few years ago a program director at WFMY-TV in Greensboro told me that after that point Viacom changed hands several times and in the course of the film reels moving from place to place some of the original elements were damaged or "went missing".

Around the year 2000 when TV Land gained the rights to air TAGS Paramount struck new 35mm prints of what they deemed their "master negative" and gave these tapes to TV Land so they could edit their broadcast copies. Typically the entity that controls the show (Paramount, Fox, etc) send stations an already "cut" version of each episode. TV Land however recieves "master" copies and does their own editing.

During this time they re-discovered many of the old epilogues, which TV Land now shows. But a good rule of thumb is if a show is missing its' epilogue on TV Land, chances are it will be missing it on DVD as well because it doesn't exist anymore in the original negatives. That may be the reason for the warning on Season 3.


I'm not certain but I think Paramount might be remastering TAGS in High Definition for the DVD release. I know that all of the I Love Lucy DVDs from Season 2 onward have been produced from new High Definition Restored Masters.

Also, what other people have mentioned here about rights issues is a valid point, the sales of some shows just simply cannot justify the costs that would be required to use an original song or piece of music. At that point the sudio either has to make a decision to give fans a version with replaced music, or not release the show (or season) at all. I for one would rather have a series completed, even with replaced music, as opposed to having the entire project axed.

Let me be clear, I am NOT condoning the release of sets full of syndicated versions but if one or two edits slips through the cracks I'm not going to boycott a whole set.

 

[ChadP2k]

One more point on the availability of uncut masters... for film shows you can have master negatives go missing, get damaged, etc but the risk is even greater for problems with VIDEOTAPED shows, or shows post-produced on Videotape.

In the case of shows like Sanford & Son or All in the Family, etc that were produced entirely on videotape you can have various issues with the source material. 2" Quadruplex videotape, while robust, can suffer from numerous problems over this long of a time period and it could be an issue where parts of the tape were just unusable, or if an original tape goes missing or is damaged beyond repair you may have no choice but to go with a syndicated or otherwise edited version.

You also have shows that might have been film produced, but all of the post production editing was done on videotape. Until recently many studios filmed their shows, then did all of their final editing from videotapes of the film transfers. In many cases there was no policy that required them to go back & edit the film to match the final broadcast master tape. All of the film material was simply stored away (maybe with, or without the final edit decision list showing what footage was used).

Seinfeld is a perfect example of this... one reason it took so long to produce the Seinfeld DVDs is they had to pay people to go back to the original film reels and "cut" every one of them to match the footage used in the original broadcast master tape. I read somewhere where many of the lists showing what footage was used in the early years hadn't been kept either, so t hey had very little to work with.

You're talking about going through THOUSANDS of feet of film to find the right shots, then editing them back together again, adding the sound, etc. Basically it's like producing a whole new show again to get a film master.

Some series like Seinfeld can sell enough sets to justify this enormous cost, but for many series it could never be done. Then it becomes a case similar to that of the videotaped shows... do you go with a damaged or inferior master tape, or a higher quality, better preserved, edited version

 

[Jeff Ulmer]

More good points Chad.

The third option is to use the edited version, but recut the missing pieces in from the inferior master. This is cost prohibitive, and lowers the overall quality fo the release, since the inserted video will be apparent, and the audio will also need restoring to match the better print. This may be an option for some shows, but for several reasons, not all.

 

[Kevin/M]

And to those, uh, "Particular folks" who were quick to write me off with rabid chew-outs, i can understand that there are going to be circumstances where changes to TV Shows are inevitable and forgivable, but is being a little skeptical about some of the Studios' expliinations (or in some cases lack thereof) really that terrible? If So, Then i'd hate to discuss Politics on HTF.

 

[ChadP2k]

Not always... but if you aren't careful every missing bit of footage can turn into a conspiracy theory

Just remember studios are here to make a profit, not to make everybody happy. If they're selling DVDs they could care less if you're ticked off about a missing minute or two.

The only way to ensure a pristine DVD set is to have the involvement of those closely associated with the show participating and watching out for its interest (ala Seinfeld, I Love Lucy, etc)

 

[Robert Crawford]

Which is why such subject matter is prohibited on this forum.

If some of us would channel our comments on the issue at hand instead of each other, the discussion would be more rewarding for all of us. At times, this discussion was too personal in nature and it greatly detracted from the issues that should have been the focus of this thread. Hopefully, some of you have learned that lesson and will do better next time.







Crawdaddy

 

[JohnMor]

If I'm not mistaken, I believe this is what Paramount did with The Brady Bunch Season One where there is a relatively dramatic quality drop from scene to scene, and even from shot to shot within a scene. Once I acclimated myself to it, it wasn't too bad since I figured I was getting the whole episode that way. It's got to be time consuming, I imagine.

 

[Steve...O]

Since Brady Bunch and TAGS are both Paramount properties, does this mean that Paramount did not have an asset preservation system in place for their TV properties? Does this mean that complete master quality prints may not exist for certain episodes of Get Smart, the Fugitive, and other Viacom controlled shows? Ditto for Hawaii 5-0; the "digitally restored" episodes are all syndication length. Were the extra several minutes all discarded?

Please note I'm not picking on Paramount; I realize other studios have issues as well. When these shows aired in the 60s/70s almost nobody thought entire seasons would be available for home consumption.

Steve

 

[ChadP2k]

I don't think the fault is necessarily Paramount's but instead it exists from the Viacom days.

You've got to remember most of these shows like Lucy & Andy were produced in the '50's and '60's by production companies that controlled everything. (The Brady Bunch is newer, and IMO should have been better preserved).

Later "Lucy" was sold back to CBS and so the original negatives went back to them, I'm not sure how "Andy" evolved until Viacom ended up with those negatives. It is all the "changing hands" that leads to problems. Then Viacom bought Paramount, and merged their collection with Paramount's existing holdings.

Here are some articles on remastering TV shows ....

I Love Lucy Restoration (notice the damage to the original negatives shown)

Cheers Restored

Bewitched (THE JAPANSESE DVDs, this doesn't apply to the US Version)

 

[Robert Cruz]

Actually, such is NOT the case for Sanford and Son. The missing scene from "Blood is Thicker than Junk" can be found in tact on TV Land. If the original was indeed damaged during that scene, Sony could've easily taken the syndicated copy, and edit in the scene from the syndicated copy to the original. As for "A Matter of Silence", the uncut episode was released via the Columbia House tapes, yet was edited on the Season 6 DVD. There was also an edited episode on Season 3...not sure if TV Land shows the missing scene, or if Sony just used the syndicated version. It could be the ONLY case where the original was damaged/lost.

 

[Joe Lugoff]

"I Love Lucy" didn't go into syndication until 1966 and Desilu had long ago sold it back to CBS in order to raise the money to buy the RKO studio. Long before it went into syndication, it went into network weekday morning reruns -- that's when it got severely cut. It was even shown on Saturday mornings as a kiddie show during the 1959-60 season.

And prior to that, it was shown in network nighttime reruns for several years during and after the original run. I'd say that's when the sponsor references were removed and I'd guess that CBS did it, not Desilu.

 

[ChadP2k]

Gregg Oppenheimer in the past posted messages on the old I Love Lucy mailing list (circa 1997-98) indicating when & how the cuts were made.. many of them were made in the early years of the series of the show when several of the episodes were reruns during Lucy's pregnancy.

These are the ones with the "flashback" scenes added.

 

[Mike Emery]

Staying on (original) topic...

Regarding Time-Compression and the stand that it's invisible, not to me.

I hate watching that crap, because I see artifacts. I regularly see what looks like a skipped frame giving anything in motion a weird staccato look. A smooth pan turns into pan BUMP pan BUMP pan BUMP

Just my view.

 

[Jeff Ulmer]

I agree, but it depends how it was done. The kind you are talking about is what I found abhorant on the TNN broadcasts of The Waltons. Completely unwatchable as far as I'm concerned.

 

[JeffWld]

Warner Bros. is one of the absolute worst hacks at time compression. "The Waltons" was bad, but did you happen to catch TNN's broadcasts of "Alice"? Time compressing videotaped material is usually a disaster, and this fiasco was beyond appaling. The motion was so jerky, it looked like bad video streaming. Not to mention the audio suffered with underwater gurgle effect...and the dialogue was so accelerated, the timing of many of the jokes was completely destroyed.

 

[Steve...O]

ChadP2k - your comments and insights are very much appreciated. The linked articles were enlightening as well. Thank you.

Steve

 

[MatthewA]

Oh yeah. I'd tried to put that out of my mind.

Warner Bros. has also sent PAL-to-NTSC conversions of handfuls of episodes of "Dallas" and "Knots Landing" to SoapNet. Anyone can tell which ones they are because the theme songs are a half-tone higher than they should be.

 

[MatthewA]

While the originals of taped shows may or may not be damaged, who's to say there aren't dubs that are good? Perhaps a phone call to the Library of Congress might clear things up. All the Sanford and Son episodes are deposited for copyright at the LoC, with 3/4" Umatic tape copies. (The production company, however, has no tape deposits of their shows from 1978-1983 for some reason).

And in the case of "Soap," there are 2 cut episodes on the Columbia House VHS tapes, and they are not the ones that are cut on the DVDs. So uncut versions do exist.