Aliens, The Abyss, True Lies and Titanic finally get digital and 4K Blu-Ray release dates

n111ck · 18 Dec 2023 at 15:55

Bigpig said:
When you say remaster do you mean new scan?

I don't believe Aliens got a new scan from lightstorm unlike True lies and Abyss. They used the scan from the old release.

I meant master in terms of what was on iTunes before - what's there now is clearly better.

hudson86 · 18 Dec 2023 at 16:18

The Aliens SE is 4k Hdr , believe it was updated on Prime US but not Itunes for whatever reason ( might have since changed ).

I watched the SE over the weekend and personally I thought it looked fantastic, however the grain removal is going to be rather devisive.

Aliens was shot on 35 mm photochemical film (specifically Eastman 400T 5294 and 5295) by cinematographer Adrian Biddle (The Princess Bride, 1492, V for Vendetta) using Arriflex 35-III and Moviecam SuperAmerica cameras with Canon K35 spherical lenses, and it was finished on film at the 1.85 flat aspect ratio for theaters. For its release on Ultra HD, Lightstorm, working with Park Road Post, appears to have utilized the best-available scan of the original camera negative (possibly new and 4K, but it’s also possible that the previous 2K Blu-ray scan was used; I haven’t been able to confirm that with Lightstorm yet in this particular case)—“optimized” by Park Road’s proprietary deep-learning algorithms—to create a new 4K Digital Intermediate. Photochemical grain has been greatly reduced, though not eliminated entirely, and it should be noted that this isn’t the usual Digital Noise Reduction with which people have long been familiar (a dreaded and blunt instrument). Unlike an image scrubbed with DNR, this process hasn’t removed all of the fine image detail. Not only does that detail remain, it too has been “enhanced” algorithmically. The image has then been graded for high dynamic range, with both Dolby Vision and HDR10 available.

Aliens (4K Digital Review)

More than half a century after the events of Ridley Scott’s original Alien (1979), Ellen Ripley (Sigourney Weaver), the sole survivor of the commercial towing vessel Nostromo, is rescued from hypersleep in her drifting escape shuttle. Upon returning to Earth, Ripley is made to face the wrath of...

thedigitalbits.com

cyclonus10 · 18 Dec 2023 at 16:38

Sirrel Squirrel said:
You know what, I read your comment and then tried to watch it knowing this. I had to turn it off as it drove me crazy lol

I've done a fair bit of messing about with Topaz AI and some bits of True Lies "4k" looks like just stuck it through one of the old Artemis' presets.

Tempted to get that Spanish bootleg bd-ray source and see if I can get better results with Proteus fine tune or even the incredibly slow Gaia preset.(does produce good results)

VincentHanna · 18 Dec 2023 at 17:26

Greebo said:
Aliens getting some poor reviews sadly. Seems its just a NR version of the 2010 Bluray that has been AI upgraded to 4k and the HDR version has peak brightness of 208 cd/m2. Disappointed

Wasn't it the same with Terminator 2? I remember watching it on 4k Blu-ray and there was no notable HDR at all, plus the actual 4k image was nothing special either.

Jim Cameron says he likes to oversee the transfers himself but I think we would all be better off if he didn't to be honest.

Bigpig · 18 Dec 2023 at 17:37

VincentHanna said:
Wasn't it the same with Terminator 2? I remember watching it on 4k Blu-ray and there was no notable HDR at all, plus the actual 4k image was nothing special either.

Jim Cameron says he likes to oversee the transfers himself but I think we would all be better off if he didn't to be honest.

the question you should be asking is what they dint **** up.

DNR/Color tinting/over sharpness

the shadow · 18 Dec 2023 at 17:58

hudson86 · 18 Dec 2023 at 20:10

James Cameron On 4K Restorations And The Importance Of Physical Media

The legendary filmmaker and producer Jon Landau have remastered a bunch of his classics with 'The Abyss' and 'Titanic' first out of the gate.

www.forbes.com

The remastering of those gems is a project on which the filmmaker and producer Jon Landau have been working for four years.

"Looking back and seeing we hadn't done 4K transfers of all these and, of course, the fans have been banging on about this for ages. it was like, 'When are we going to get around to this?'" Cameron recalled. "I think what people don't appreciate is that it is basically a week of my time to do a proper transfer, updating it every day as they go off and do color and power windows and all that sort of thing."

"We recompose, shot by shot, going through the film, and I'm pretty serious about this. I don't just let somebody else go through it because I have such a vivid memory of what the color was and what we fought for on the set and in post, maybe all the way back to when the color was done with photochemical film, which is when I rode my Stegosaurus to the studio. These restorations have been on top of our day job, which is called Avatar. Those movies are quite good."

The pair, who have been collaborating for 30 years, consider the 4K versions to be the definitive versions of the classic titles.

"It was important to get it just right because, theoretically, we shouldn't have to do it again," Cameron mused. "4K is sufficiently above the innate resolution of the photochemistry of that period. Are we going to do 8K? 12K? You're going to see the grain more clearly. I think this is it, so we wanted to do it and do it right, and that's taken some time."

VincentHanna · 18 Dec 2023 at 21:16

Doesn't really chime with reality though.

Cryfreeman · 18 Dec 2023 at 21:53

n111ck said:
On UK iTunes, although they aren't yet 4k, they are both clearly from the new master and both look the same so don't think that's true.

Strange, on my Uk iTunes the SE Edition is a massive upgrade over the normal version.

hudson86 · 18 Dec 2023 at 22:18

VincentHanna said:
Doesn't really chime with reality though.

I didnt watch it frame by frame / comparing to previous versions, but it was certainly very clean, very little grain, very bright and looked great.

I could see pores / skin imperfections in close ups, cant say how it compares to previous, didnt come across as waxy to me, but I really wasnt looking at it like that, just enjoying the film.

n111ck · 18 Dec 2023 at 22:51

Cryfreeman said:
Strange, on my Uk iTunes the SE Edition is a massive upgrade over the normal version.

The SE version, thats no longer for sale, is 4k DV but the normal version that is with it as an extra is still HD.

Bigpig · 19 Dec 2023 at 09:05

you got two sides of the coin here and that depends what you like better.

Do you like the clean ultra modern look?

or

Do you rate preservation more?

hudson86 · 19 Dec 2023 at 12:18

Bigpig said:
you got two sides of the coin here and that depends what you like better.

Do you like the clean ultra modern look?

or

Do you rate preservation more?

Besides the arguments over waxyness, the grain removal probably shows the model work up a little more , which isnt ideal.

Theres also plenty of scope to go further and sharpen up / add depth to the obvious back projection bits that dont quite blend with the foreground. But thats the full George Lucas and then you'll never stop fiddling.

ic1male · 19 Dec 2023 at 12:24

hudson86 said:
Besides the arguments over waxyness, the grain removal probably shows the model work up a little more , which isnt ideal.

Theres also plenty of scope to go further and sharpen up / add depth to the obvious back projection bits that dont quite blend with the foreground. But thats the full George Lucas and then you'll never stop fiddling.

Oh, I hate those bits. It's so jarring when you see the dropship crashing behind them and know it's on a big screen.

VincentHanna · 19 Dec 2023 at 12:44

I like the clean ultra modern look on movies that were filmed on decent digital cameras.

I don't like it on movies that were captured on film.

Bigpig · 19 Dec 2023 at 13:43

Could this be a case of Digital sucks?

Read the comments

https://twitter.com/x/status/1736741388975321204

https://twitter.com/x/status/1736812751614620069

Greebo · 19 Dec 2023 at 14:21

Definitely seems to be the itunes digital version which looks this bad. People are saying the digital version streamed on lossless suppliers looks fine. And like with titantic, I expect the disc versions will be a step above.

hudson86 · 19 Dec 2023 at 14:41

This is what mine looks like, its not the exact same frame ( not sure which one theyve got due to the crop etc ) , but all the bits with Burke sat in Ripleys room look the same to my eye from a lighting / resolution point of view .

Presume the screeny wont show any HDR ness as seen on the telly, but i'm looking at the TV right now and its virtually the same. (LG C9 Oled).

So either theres a very bad version on one of the streaming services / combined with that persons equipment. Or they are being a bit naughty and playing it up for clicks , but surely people wouldnt do that on social media..

hudson86 · 19 Dec 2023 at 14:50

Greebo said:
Definitely seems to be the itunes digital version which looks this bad. People are saying the digital version streamed on lossless suppliers looks fine. And like with titantic, I expect the disc versions will be a step above.

If its Itunes then thats disapointing, I was going to buy it on there ( if it ever came available ) as all their TV stuff seems very high bitrate. Have never purchased anything digitally and was going to make an exception for this until the UHD Disc comes out. Oh well.

Bigpig · 19 Dec 2023 at 15:02

hudson86 said:
If its Itunes then thats disapointing, I was going to buy it on there ( if it ever came available ) as all their TV stuff seems very high bitrate. Have never purchased anything digitally and was going to make an exception for this until the UHD Disc comes out. Oh well.

Digital gives me the hibbie jibbies!!

You don't own it as well as the other factors