Original Trilogy DVD Petition

[Jedieb]

http://www.originaltrilogy.com/index.cfm

Let Lucas know you're cranky!:duel

[Darth Viscera]

Do they actually have original trilogy prints that were cleaned up in 1997 but had no special edition effects added to them? I thought the cleaning up and special edition process went hand in hand.

As a DVD person, I can say that it would not be possible to have both the original version and special edition on one red-ray DVD-9 dual layer disc. There are far too many special edition enhancements that it would be nearly impossible to just separate them into 2 angles. If George Lucas wants to sell the original version, he's going to have to commission the authoring of yet another DVD in addition to the special edition version, which costs money. I'd say that GL would have to pay somewhere around $100,000 per disc (considering how intricate the menus are, the THX optimizations, Dolby Digital 5.1 EX, Director's commentary, etc) for authoring, not counting the cost of replicating the DVDs.

Bottom line, GL would be looking at $300,000 for the content creation of a Special Edition trilogy DVD set, and another $300,000 for the content creation of an original version DVD set which would likely only be a limited release, not nearly as many units shipped. Do you think that he would be up for that kind of superfluous investment in a product which may or not be profitable?

This isn't Peter Jackson, who releases every single piece of footage that was ever shot, this is George Lucas. From my desk, it doesn't look very likely that he would release an original version, just considering the amount of work and money which would be involved.

[MasterPewter]

If your #'s are correct $300K per we are talking about $600,000 total. Not bad. if he sells just 1million copys at around $17.00 thats $17million on a $600,000 investment. I would do it. thats 1600% profit per episode. less distribution and advertising.

Just playing Devils advocate :)

[Darth Viscera]

no, that's just $600,000 for the files that are to be put onto the 6 DVDs to be created. The people who create hollywood DVDs charge about $200.00 per minute of film encoded, and more if you're doing something on the level of star wars with really nice menus and the like.

You then have to consider the cost of purchasing blank DVDs, stamping them, labeling them, purchasing DVD cases and printing DVD case labels. That cost alone is at least $2.50 per unit, I reckon.

[sirdizzy]

i was 14684

[sirdizzy]

my vt proffessor said his going rate is $1000 per finished minute of digital footage

[Marcus Telcontar]

Signature 14868

[Darth Viscera]

Originally posted by sirdizzy
my vt proffessor said his going rate is $1000 per finished minute of digital footage

In that case, I should hope he's doing it correctly. That's astonishingly expensive, though. It takes me (or anyone with a bit of experience) less than a minute to write an AVS script and process a minute of video in CCE. I'd love to get paid $60,000/hour for that!

[Jedi Master Carr]

I wouldn't bother signing, the petiton, as Lucas is going to do what ever he feels like. Not sure how the process would work, my guess is there would have to be either one disk for the SE and one disk for the OT, but what about ID4, they had a SE feature where you could watch the movie with some added scenes and that was only on one disk. I really can see how hard it would be to since it would be like 15 minutes of additional footage for ANH and virtually nothing for TESB and maybe 5-10 minutes for ROTJ. Still if he doesn't have cleaned up prints from the OT that doesn't include SE scenes it might be more difficult.

[JMK]

Lucas is a businessman first and foremost now. If someone can convince him that it is a profitable venture, he'll do it. protest or not.

[sirdizzy]

he does pretty awesome work though i have him for final cut pro right now and have had him for director, photoshop and illustrator

[Darth Viscera]

Originally posted by Jedi Master Carr
I wouldn't bother signing, the petiton, as Lucas is going to do what ever he feels like. Not sure how the process would work, my guess is there would have to be either one disk for the SE and one disk for the OT, but what about ID4, they had a SE feature where you could watch the movie with some added scenes and that was only on one disk. I really can see how hard it would be to since it would be like 15 minutes of additional footage for ANH and virtually nothing for TESB and maybe 5-10 minutes for ROTJ. Still if he doesn't have cleaned up prints from the OT that doesn't include SE scenes it might be more difficult.

ID4 uses multiple angles, which is impossible with the original version and the special version. ID4 is basically composed of 2 hours and 32 minutes of main movie footage, and just plugs in the special edition where it's needed in the film. There are so many fundamental differences between the original and special versions that doing this would be impossible. Every other scene is digitally retouched. The original version would need its own disc.

[JMK]

Yeah, they would have to be separate releases for sure.

[Jedi Master Carr]

Or the biggest box set ever, like 9 Discs. and this is just for 4-6.

[Shawn]

To be honest, the only thing about the SE that ever really bothered me was the Greedo shot (and only because it was so poorly done) and the Jabba scene in ANH (becuase it's almost a verbatim repeat of the conversation he just had 5 minutes ago). I don't mind the touched up special effects or any of the other, minor additions.

[Jedi Master Carr]

Those are the only two that bothered me as well. The touched up stuff to me is real good because its better quality and I am all for that. The Greedo thing just doesn't look right, is Greedo that bad of a shot?

[JMK]

Greedo, the look of Jabba and the extended musical number in Jabba's palace all bother me. :\

[Darth Viscera]

And the crappy musical number played in the ewok victory scene at the end. I liked the old sesame street version better.

[Jedieb]

Like Viscera, I actually miss the old Ewok number. But the one bit of OT magic I want restored more than any other is Han shooting first. I don't even care if we get a OT version that has Ties with black boxes around them. I just want to see what I grew up with.

BTW, they're over 17.300 sigs.

[ReaperFett]

Only thing Id really want back is some sort of Yub Yub song :)




What Id prefer is an IMPROVED special edition. I dont mind Han shooting second, but it looks so BAD! Ditto Jabba