Lowry Digital Targets Wizard of Oz for Next Project (1 Viewer)

[Chris Farmer]

Link

It's at the very end of the article. While heavily full of Apple spin, it's at least slightly worth a read. Most interesting though is the last line where Lowry talks about what he'd like to do next

Asked what would make an ideal next project, the man who for more than 30 years has pulled the long levers behind a closed industry curtain, makes just the right call. “‘The Wizard of Oz,’ from separations.”

Can a Warner Two-Disc SE be on the menu for Oz? It's certainly a logical candidate for the treatment, although whether this is a Lowry dream or an announcement you can't really tell.

 

[Dan Hitchman]

Didn't some pro. restorers think Lowry was only as good as the direction the studio dictated on a project? If the studio had the wrong information on how the film should look, then Lowry proceeded to screw things up (like over filtering Citizen Kane to the point of deleting rain)?

Wasn't it Mr. Harris that said something to that effect?

Perhaps Lowry Digital Images isn't what it's totally cracked up to be.

Raiders was far from perfect, especially in color timing. The flesh tones were off, noticeably. Others have commented on this too.

Dan

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

Didn't some pro. restorers think Lowry was only as good as the direction the studio dictated on a project?

Isn't this always the case though? Like the first Lawerence of Arabia release; unless you know what the movie's supposed to looking like, the final project is always going to be an iffy approximation.

Still, Lowry seems to be the unparalleled leader in the technology behind restoration. Obviously, he doesn't have the background and expertise of a professional restorationist like Mr. Robert Harris. But if you match his technology with the expertise of a third party, the results will most likely be more spectacular than matching that third party with just the studio's technology.

And am I the only one excited by the news that Lowry restored THX-1131?

 

[greg_t]

Raiders was far from perfect, especially in color timing. The flesh tones were off, noticeably

The article referenced in the first post mentions how Steven Speilberg made the ultimate decision on how much grain to leave in, so this indiciates that Speilberg was involved in some level. I am assuming that Speilberg saw the final product and approved it. So if this is true, then it represents the directors intended look of the film.

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

I'm more excited about them restoring THX-1138!

Damn, damn, damn! You got me

 

[Patrick McCart]

Neat article... although, I still wish that a list would come out so we'd know which DVD's have the LDI processing.

Digital restoration has really come a long way... after seeing their restoration of Casablanca, I think they can do wonders for films without prime elements. However, it needs to be restored for FILM first. A 2K or 4K restoration is useless for a film unless new film elements are created from it.

 

[AndrewR]

I'm gaining a serious interest in Film Restoration lately. Anyone have any ideas as to how to pursue this as a career?

Andrew

 

[Brian Kidd]

Andrew,

I have a buddy who works at the Motion Picture Film Preservation Center for the Library of Congress. If you like, I'll see if it's okay to send you his email address. I got hooked up with them through Mr. Harris several years back and spent a lovely year volunteering in their vaults. It was dirty, smelly, and cold and I loved every second of it. You might contact RAH as well as he's always very helpful. I'll warn you ahead of time; the jobs are few and far between and getting scarcer. It's a very specialized field and difficult to break into. Good luck, though. I salute your desire!

 

[Brandon Conway]

I'll be graduating from Brigham Young University this upcoming April with a BA in Media Arts (Film), with an emphasis in critical studies. My main interest in film for the last 7 years has been archival, restoration, and preservation. Over the last six months I've contacted a good 10-15 people in the field trying to evaluate the work situation. Quite frankly, I've been rather put off by the brush offs and intelligence insulting responses. The majority of them were not even what I would be considered curteous (RAH was not one of the people I've contacted). Just recently I've decided that if such is the relationship amongst these people then I'd rather find a completely different career. Their loss, I say. It just frustrates me that, for example, one individual was quicker to label my email address "unprofessional" instead of answering a few simple inqueries. Of course, his assumption was completely wrong, since my email uses my film label name....

Anyway, in summary, perhaps I'll look into this career again, but not after I get this bitter taste out of my mouth.

 

[Brian Kidd]

Wow, Brandon! That's too bad. I guess I got lucky that I was able to hook up with the right folks. The people I got to know at the Library of Congress were super-nice and very passionate about their work.

Anyway AndrewR, check your private messages.

 

[Kristoffer]

Ok, do they create a new master, but not restsore the film print itself? So the restored version only "exsits" on the dvd??

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

Ok, do they create a new master, but not restsore the film print itself? So the restored version only "exsits" on the dvd??

Depends on the quality of the source material and the requirements of the studio. In general, if they restore it to a 2 or 4k master, that will transfer well to a film print; not as good as the original but still a huge improvement over the existing crappy prints. With HDTV on the horizon and storage capacities increasing immensely, more and more restorations will be done at the 2-4k level.
A step down from this is HD. The intermediary step, this refers to 720 and 1080 masters. If you go to a Regal theaters and watch The Twenty before the main feature, you're getting an appoximation of what the resolution is (though that may be higher resolution, i dunno) this is generall NOt suitable for making new film prints but will accommodate the next generation HT format. I haven't heard of this used too much on film restoration.
Then we have our current video formats, NTSC and PAL. Restorations done at this level are suitable for neither film prints or next generation HT formats. The source materials tend to be low quality, and only a low-def master can effectively hide the flaws. I'm fairly sure that North by Northwest falls in this catagory.

 

[AndrewR]

I got your PM, Brian.

Thanks again!

Andrew