Stefan Andersson
Second Unit
- Joined
- May 12, 2001
- Messages
- 379
Universal is doing a new restoration of the Lon Chaney Hunchback of Notre Dame (1923):
Jon Mirsalis is involved (see post Sep. 06, 2020)
Rodney Sauer,The Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra, has posted a relevant video, Sep. 06, 2020. The Orchestra "will not actually be involved in the Universal video release. We will be providing the accompaniment at the San Francisco Silent Film Festival next May" (see post Sep. 09, 2020).
JonChaneyFan posted this on Sep. 07, 2020:
"'m not really "working with Universal" as indicated above, but I did provide my original Show-at-Home print which is the source for about 99% of the image, and I also sent them the original cutting continuity. I saw an early scan in April of 2019 that had been image-stabilized, but not yet digitally cleaned, and it was pretty stunning. What they do is "de-grain" the film by digitally removing all the grain, then they do the digital cleanup, and finally they put all the grain back. I don't know where the clip in Rodney's presentation is in that process, but I suspect it is pre-cleanup. If you saw their restoration of THE LAST WARNING you know what they can do with mediocre material.
I got a tour of the Universal restoration unit last year and the stuff they can do is pretty amazing. They scan every frame five times (cyan, yellow, magenta, b/w registration, infrared); they use the infrared to remove dust later. The scan rate is about 2 sec per frame, so it takes a day to do one reel. The image stabilization alone was astonishing. I saw this projected full-frame, and the sprocket holes were bouncing around like crazy on the edges, but the image was rock-solid. The version I saw was definitely pre-cleaning as it had a lot of scratches and dirt.
This was supposed to premiere this year in May at the SFSFFF, but that got COVID-cancelled. I wrote the program notes for it, and I assume it will show next year at the 2021 event, assuming that doesn't get cancelled as well."
Jon Mirsalis is involved (see post Sep. 06, 2020)
Rodney Sauer,The Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra, has posted a relevant video, Sep. 06, 2020. The Orchestra "will not actually be involved in the Universal video release. We will be providing the accompaniment at the San Francisco Silent Film Festival next May" (see post Sep. 09, 2020).
JonChaneyFan posted this on Sep. 07, 2020:
"'m not really "working with Universal" as indicated above, but I did provide my original Show-at-Home print which is the source for about 99% of the image, and I also sent them the original cutting continuity. I saw an early scan in April of 2019 that had been image-stabilized, but not yet digitally cleaned, and it was pretty stunning. What they do is "de-grain" the film by digitally removing all the grain, then they do the digital cleanup, and finally they put all the grain back. I don't know where the clip in Rodney's presentation is in that process, but I suspect it is pre-cleanup. If you saw their restoration of THE LAST WARNING you know what they can do with mediocre material.
I got a tour of the Universal restoration unit last year and the stuff they can do is pretty amazing. They scan every frame five times (cyan, yellow, magenta, b/w registration, infrared); they use the infrared to remove dust later. The scan rate is about 2 sec per frame, so it takes a day to do one reel. The image stabilization alone was astonishing. I saw this projected full-frame, and the sprocket holes were bouncing around like crazy on the edges, but the image was rock-solid. The version I saw was definitely pre-cleaning as it had a lot of scratches and dirt.
This was supposed to premiere this year in May at the SFSFFF, but that got COVID-cancelled. I wrote the program notes for it, and I assume it will show next year at the 2021 event, assuming that doesn't get cancelled as well."
