Excepting that it should not have been done, ther was some good work done.
Star Trek remastered- your opinions
- Thread starter Toban Kal
- Start date
We respect the opinions of those who prefer the original versions of the episodes, which is why we lobbied so strongly for CBS to include the original visual effects and soundtracks on the Blu-ray release of the remastered original series. As it happened, the "seamless branching" feature that makes this possible was a greater technical challenge (and was therefore more expensive) than we had originally thought. To their credit, CBS Home Video stuck with it, and the Blu-ray disks do indeed include both versions in glorious high definition. Surely, the best of both worlds.
-Mike
-Mike
I'm curious (and I own TOS Season 1 on Blu-Ray; and will be getting the other two sets when they are released); was any actual clean up work done for the original (1966 - 69) visual effects footage; and was it actually rescaned at 1080p resolution for the Blu-Ray Discs; or was it just upscaled from the original 'standard' (480p) DVD masters?
As can I..but geeze those old effects do look rather sad over HDTV..
I believe the original optical effects footage was retransferred at 1080p, along with the rest of the episodes. I don't know how much cleanup was done. It probably varied with each episode, depending on how much restoration work was required for the rest of that particular episode.
-Mike
Nardpuncher
Rear Admiral
I agree.
I'm in Taiwan and next time I go back home to Winnipeg I've got to buy some TOS as I haven't watched any in years.
So my problem is do I get the remasterd for the new visuals, or go nostalgic and get the DVDs that are untouched?
Maybe I'll go by price, if the price is widely different.
Star Trek remastered gets thumbs up from me.
And thanks for changing the chronometer Mike. That was my #1 requested change, so your hard work on that one is definitely appreciated by me.
It would be have been nice if they could have fixed the very obvious stunt doubles, but it probably would have been too costly and time consuming.
And thanks for changing the chronometer Mike. That was my #1 requested change, so your hard work on that one is definitely appreciated by me.
It would be have been nice if they could have fixed the very obvious stunt doubles, but it probably would have been too costly and time consuming.
Absolutely.
Out of curiosity, though: is the ommision of the original versions from the new DVD sets due to technical limitation of seamless branching with DVD, or was it just decided that the originals were already available on DVD so it wasn't necessary to include them again? Or, indeed, a bit of both?
I think the work has been excellent, overall. I've been watching these in full now and you just sort of forget that the effects are new after a while. They just seem like part of the episode as it was intented to look. To be honest, if the very least this project added was some different angle stock shots and planets that look real, the whole thing would still have been worth it. The rest is just delicious icing. And fixing some of the the continuity/production errors is the cherry. Good work! I'm sure it was tough, but I bet it was fun.
My $0.02:
Overall, I'm pleased with what Mike and Co. DID do. It's what they DIDN'T do that I get disappointed over.
Many times, the phaser shots are just the same "color in" effects as the original. Sometimes they spruced it up (quite nicely, I might add!), but often, they were just left alone.
I would've liked a new "vaporize" effect, too--something like what we saw in ST III: TSFS.
Now for the good stuff:
Love the new planets--and how they replaced the obvious matte paintings with real-looking CGI sets.
The new Enterprise is BEAUTIFUL--but I share the concerns of others over how it moves sometimes. The movement was awesome in Doomsday Machine--kinda pitiful in Immunity Syndrome.
My personal all-time fave: The new "wide shots" of the Mountains of Gol and the stadium in Amok Time. That one sequence gives the episode a real WOW factor, IMHO.
Overall, I give the project...a B+.
Overall, I'm pleased with what Mike and Co. DID do. It's what they DIDN'T do that I get disappointed over.
Many times, the phaser shots are just the same "color in" effects as the original. Sometimes they spruced it up (quite nicely, I might add!), but often, they were just left alone.
I would've liked a new "vaporize" effect, too--something like what we saw in ST III: TSFS.
Now for the good stuff:
Love the new planets--and how they replaced the obvious matte paintings with real-looking CGI sets.
The new Enterprise is BEAUTIFUL--but I share the concerns of others over how it moves sometimes. The movement was awesome in Doomsday Machine--kinda pitiful in Immunity Syndrome.
My personal all-time fave: The new "wide shots" of the Mountains of Gol and the stadium in Amok Time. That one sequence gives the episode a real WOW factor, IMHO.
Overall, I give the project...a B+.
Hi Mike. Thanks for all the work you, Denise, and the rest of the team did on this effort. I'm one of those who loudly complained about only the new effects being available on the HD-DVD set. I'm certainly glad to have both on the BDs.
And (much more quietly), I now admit that, after comparing old and new on the BDs, I've been watching only the new effects. Although they sometimes don't look as good as they could have (with a larger budget and more time?), they almost always look better than the original effects.
Cheers,
Doug
Mike, and Denise, thanks for all of your efforts for all of the remastered work.
I've only seen little clips of the remastered - they never played on TV up here in Canada, unfortunately. I think, having the series on DVD already, I'll just save up my pennies for the Blu-ray. I love that they did this!
To Ron, Rush, Botany, Doug, and everyone else here who enjoyed TOS-R: Thank you for your kind words. Fan support means a lot to all of us who worked on the project.
Cyrus: I remember when we started there were a number of requests on some Trek boards specifically mentioning the chronometer, pleading for us to change it. Perhaps you were one of them? In any case, Dave Rossi was the one who said that we should make those fans happy. The vast majority of the actual VFX work was done by Niel Wray and his team at CBS Digital, but the chronometer was a last-minute addition that they didn't have time to do, so I animated that myself. (It certainly wasn't a huge job, it's just that everyone already had so much to do on such a tight deadline.)
BTW: Here's a short clip of TOS-R visual effects that we showed at conventions:
http://web.me.com/michaelokuda/michael_okuda/Trek_remastered.html
(No chronometer, though.)
-Mike
Cyrus: I remember when we started there were a number of requests on some Trek boards specifically mentioning the chronometer, pleading for us to change it. Perhaps you were one of them? In any case, Dave Rossi was the one who said that we should make those fans happy. The vast majority of the actual VFX work was done by Niel Wray and his team at CBS Digital, but the chronometer was a last-minute addition that they didn't have time to do, so I animated that myself. (It certainly wasn't a huge job, it's just that everyone already had so much to do on such a tight deadline.)
BTW: Here's a short clip of TOS-R visual effects that we showed at conventions:
http://web.me.com/michaelokuda/michael_okuda/Trek_remastered.html
(No chronometer, though.)
-Mike
Mike, that was GREAT, and the TOS remastered is what got my 10 year old Son into the original Trek! There are no (terran) words to express how much I appreciate the work you & your colleagues put into this project- I just hope that the profits from it came your way (not that we care about that in this day & age
).*virtual bow*
I am so honoued to even address an artist of your calibur.
Now... what about fixing the crappy FX in STV?
Mike, I definitely was one of the people who pleaded very strongly for the change. In fact when I read this interview, in the part where Dave says "make that person happy" I assumed it was referring to me. It definitely made me happy, so thanks again for your hard work.
The first time I brought up the subject of the chronometer was when someone from CBS Digital was posting here under the handle "daquake" (I think he said his name was James Bolt) , so I stated my case for him.
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