are the babylon 5 films available at HD?

Hi
are the babylon 5 films available at HD?
what about the series babylon 5 & crusade?
thanks

 

I'm pretty sure nothing of B5 was filmed or stored at that quality. There's a bit on the wikipedia page about how they'll never be on Blu Ray because the CGI was created at standard def and would have to be completely redone.

 

so only the lost tales are at hd?
too bad

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Babylon_5

 

I always find it funny that the elements weren't kept. If I were JMS I would've kept everything I possibly could've for future use.

 

WB seem to have a complete disdain for the property. From comments made by JMS, I believe TPTB there were somewhat shocked when the DVDs sold in much greater volumes than they expected, and yet they still couldn't seem to give two hoots. I'd love to see B5 released in HD, but I'll make do with what I've got.

 

Yep, WB has always treated Babylon 5 as something of an annoying gnat that they haven't bothered to squash because it still makes them money. It was WB who lost the original stock CGI for all the ships in Babylon 5 due to some kind of storage error. Basically it's WB own inept management which has hurt Babylon 5 every step of the way.

What's really annoying is that we've seen from the Lost Tales how gorgeous the show could be with updated CGI.

 

A while ago JMS gave a podcast interview where he basically laid out why B5 so often gets the short shift. Basically it comes down to the way the different internal division of WB are encouraged to actively compete with one another. So (as insane as it seems) Warner Bros Home Video has zero inclination to help out a show by Warner Bros. Domestic Television Distribution.

As for HD, as others have pointed out, it's just not financially feasible to go back and redo *every single vfx shot* for all 110 episodes. It *might* be doable for the movies (or one of them in the very least) but that'd require WB to be convinced it'd be worth the investment and even then they'd probably lowball the project.

On the other hand, a few cryptic comments by JMS indicate that something may or may not be announced sometime in April, so wait and see.

 

Funny, when I did a marathon of Season One a while back, I was surprised at how often the stock shots were recycled (establishing shots of the station, cargo or non-descript vessels waiting, etc).

If you managed to get enough decent stock shots then that'll take care of a third of the show right there.

 

The exterior establishing shots were definitely recycled over and over but every episode also had unique battle/ship scenes in it as well.

 

Too true. There was even one where the camera rotates around the station in the distance. Only problem is, somebody forgot to include that inner door that closes off the hangar area. As a result you can see right through the station.

 

Oh sure, that'd reduce the overall number of effects shots, but only so far. I don't have the numbers but one would imagine the number of "new" shots would outnumber the "stock" shots by quite a wide margin.

Also don't forget that at certain points the establishing shots had to change to reflect the change in the story arc. The sudden presence of Minbari and League warships after 'Severed Dreams' for example, or the gradual fleet build-up in early season 4.

So while it might have *some* impact overall, it won't be much and hardly any in the first season especially.

 

Obviously they'd need to create specific shots for episodes. I mentioned season one only as it had a large number of station-in-a-bottle episodes, but obviously when you get to episodes like Signs and Portents or Babylon Squared you'll need more.

 

It's not just exterior shots though. Any scene that takes place in the core shuttle, the sanctuary, Fresh Air or the rotunda will need to have the digital elements replaced and one assumes comp shots are more expensive than just a straight up CG render. Indeed, though it may not be immediately apparent, most of the sanctuary was a digital set. IIRC the only real parts were the floor and the green panels under the windows!

Additionally I'm pretty certain they even used CG for things usually (at the time) done optically like electrical discharges (pretty heavily used in 'Infection' and 'A Spider in the Web' to name just two), the PPG blasts, all the funky telekinetic business in 'Mind War' plus almost every time Kosh pops his lid there's a digitally enhanced light. On top of that you have the occasional CG critter like the grylor, na'kaleen, holo-demons and of course the Shadows. It'd all add up.

 

Just curious...is rotoscope work considered CGI? It seemed like JMS referred to CGI and roto work separately although they both needed rendering from what I could tell from the context.

Assuming the answer isn't too complex, that is.

Jan

 

I'm not an expert but as I understand it, rotoscoping is where you trace over live action plates. In the past it was used as a cheep shortcut for animation (think the old 'Lord of the Rings' animated film, or some of the old Hanna-Barbera cartoons) but in this context I'm assuming he's talking about creating matts with blue screens for compost shots; so mostly background replacement, general spacy stuff out the windows etc. So short answer; no. Long answer; not necessarily.

At the time the show was on I *think* the process was still done photochemically, but these days it can be (and probably is most often) done digitally. Still, once you have your rotoscoped matt you still need something to put something in it and in the case of B5 that'd usually require CG work.

In the context of this thread (i.e. would this need doing again) it'd most likely depend on what condition the original mats are in...if they still exist at all. If they're in poor condition or of inferior quality (like on video tape rather than film stock) then yeah, they'd probably have to redo the rotoscoping from the original plates. Which these days, would probably mean digital work.

In an ideal world (and with unlimited budget of course) I'd prefer that they do go and redo everything. Indeed, I'd like them to do a little extra rotoscoping so they can replace those fakey translights out the commander's office with a nice digital matt painting of the central core.

 

IIRC, when JMS refers to rotoscoping work, he refers to stuff that combines live-action with the CG, be it space out the windows, the core outside of Fresh Air, or PPG blasts flying back and forth. That was all done at video resolution (though I can't speak to whether or not it was done purely digitally), so that's why even 2D visual effects like PPG blasts and beams of telepathic light shooting out of Kosh's suit have the same resolution problem as the 3D stuff.

You know, I've thought from time to time about doing a redo of the visual effects of one scene or another from Babylon 5, a la TOS-R. The trouble is, I could only replace stuff that either wasn't a visual effect before (like adding in a moving starfield outside CnC) or was purely visual effect, like a space shot. Anything with a mix of live-action and visual effects would need the original film to redo in any way that was worth doing.

 

I assume the original film elements still exist (or is Warner Bros. really that stupid?) but they'll probably never see the light of day in the near future. Babylon 5 just appeals to too small an audience for redone effects to be worth doing.

It's too bad somebody like you can't their hands on those elements, though, David_cgc. The shots where computer animation and live action footage are composited look especially horrible on the widescreen DVDs we have right now.

 

One example is the hand reaching out of the star in Londo's dream.

 

I think the PPG blasts were the most common usage of rotoscoping in B5.