Star Trek TNG Remastered?

[barnaclelapse]

Costs and logistics aside, I'd rather not see TNG remastered. I watch the old episodes, and I don't the special effects are so awful as to warrant a second crack at what the special effects people may have wanted in a perfect world.

I'm sure it would look great, but I don't see it being as necessary as it was with TOS.

That's just me.

 

[LitmusDragon]

It's not the FX that make me want a TNG remastered, it's the concept of a clear, non-blurry picture.

I'm not sure if it's the videotape or what but TNG looks really bad when upscaled to high-def, at least in my opinion. I find it hard to watch without noticing how diffuse and soft the picture is.

Oddly DS9 and Voyager don't seem to suffer from this as much, though I understand the technology used was the same.

 

[Squiggy]

The only episode where I thought the synths were shit was The Outrageous Okona. But everything else in that episode was shit too, so it sort of fits the tone.

Maybe they can remaster Data saying "fish" instead of "amphibian" too.

 

[Cyrus]

Costs and logistics aside, I'd rather not see TNG remastered. I watch the old episodes, and I don't the special effects are so awful as to warrant a second crack at what the special effects people may have wanted in a perfect world.

If they do a remasterd TNG the primary objective would not be to improve the visual effects (though the may do that too). The objective would be to make it look half way decent on HDTVs.

As I mentioned earlier there is really no choice. Either they make an HD version of TNG or watch it fade into obscurity. I think what they are hoping for is for the upconversion/interpolation technology to improve to a point that they could use that instead of redoing the entire post prodcution.

 

[Malcolm Orr]

I've been tinkering for weeks with the PS3 settings and the Sony TV settings.

I have the PS3 set on normal upscale, but the other settings set to full (mosquito etc) and it gives a good picture. My custom TV setting required things like some contrast, black adjuster etc etc to get the right setting.

Anyway the worse scene so far has been Admiral Kennelly in Ensign Ro when he first meets Picard. The noise and grey flecks are a problem, however on some scenes, such as Gowron on the main viewer the picture is excellent.

Static pictures, especially Geordi's visor, look stunningly clear, whilst moving frames are poor.

Overall it's acceptable 90% of the time.

I think we'll see a Blu Ray sometime over the next 2 years, but whether it's an upscale of the best transfer they can get, or whether it's the full works, I'm not sure. I'd certainly settle for them doing the best transfer they possibly can even from the video originals.

Two questions...

1. 1080 is the current maximum for widescreen HD, but in 4:3 what is the pixel width within the black bands??? (ie a fraction of the 1080)

2. What do other shows that have been professionally upscaled look like?

 

[RAMA]

I'm still excited over the negatives existing. How is to say they are not doing some testing even now. The movie may prompt CBS to release the new "remastered" episodes.

RAMA

 

[trevanian]

Static pictures, especially Geordi's visor, look stunningly clear, whilst moving frames are poor.

I think the visor POV was shot on video, either that or on film at 30fps instead of 24, because if I remember correctly, it had that no-blur look, like a lot of stand-alone shots in the first couple years of TNG.

WHERE NO ONE HAS GONE BEFORE had some monitor burn-ins in engineering with that same crazy ultra clarity, so you'd be looking at this tiny part of the frame because it seemed like 3D compared to everything else in the scene (I think they learned how to cruddy up the image to avoid that later on.)

 

[Destructor]

They should just crowdsource the work- scan the original TNG prints at high res then release the scanned files to the fans- the fans would edit them together, for free, precisely how they appeared in the original airing (because fans are obsessive about that sort of thing) and return them to Paramount, who could then either add the effects themselves... or crowdsource that as well to budding CGI artists who would receive a credit for their work)

Paramount would never do this, of course (it would involve giving up the raw information to fans for free), but they COULD, and we WOULD do the work for them- they could essentially get the project completed for free, minus the cost of scanning the original film prints and the organizational effort (The Okudas could do this- and check the final edits to ensure they matched with the originals) to get the fans to work on the prints. And you are kidding yourself if you don't think there are DOZENS of fans with both the tech and the rapid fan drive to do that work for them- the kudos on saying: "I helped bring this into existence." alone would be worth it.

NIN did a similar thing with their tour footage recently.

 

[GalaxyX]

^^^ Yeah, I'm one of them lol.

 

[Frontier]

While the FX technology was lightyears ahead of the shoestring-budget FX seen in the original TOS 2 decades before, the FX technology seen in the first few seasons of TNG were kind of klunky when compared to even the remastered TOS FX.

Has anyone heard of a possible remastered edition of TNG?

J

Yes, there have been a few threads about this, and there's one huge hurdle which makes a remastered TNG extremely difficult. Unlike TOS, TNG was filmed and then edited on videotape. All the FX work was done on videotape, and the only completed, edited episodes are on videotape. There's no way to take that and do a high definition transfer.

Presumeably, the original film still exists, but there is no completed episode on film. Giving TNG the TOS-R treatment would be almost like taking the series back into production and re-editing every scene of episode with new special FX. This could be extremely expensive and impractical.

The producers basically f***ed themselves by trying to save money and edit the episodes on videotape.

I've heard this a lot before, and while I can certainly understand that for all the FX scenes involving actors -- view screen shots, on-set explosions, hand phaser fire, so on and so forth -- they could still remaster the exterior visual and transporter effects shots fairly easily, I'd imagine. Such would be a simple matter of splicing out from the video tape, and splicing in the new FX scene. When the big D fires phasers, such and so forth. Likewise, transporters - there are no doubt a few video frames of the actors standing stock still and a few frames of just the transporter pad or given environment -- again, they could use them as beginning and end and use digital tech to splice in a newer effect, if they chose too.

Really though, the big issue with the FX was only ever the exterior visuals. Replacing them shouldn't be terribly difficult. I'm sure someone with the know how could take a shot of the E-D from Enterprise's "These are the Voyages" and insert it seemlessly in between two scenes of TNG's "Pegasus" and slap it up on YouTube easy as pie. It would be little more than that.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f4vPK9W1-2U

 

[RAMA]

Costs and logistics aside, I'd rather not see TNG remastered. I watch the old episodes, and I don't the special effects are so awful as to warrant a second crack at what the special effects people may have wanted in a perfect world.

I'm sure it would look great, but I don't see it being as necessary as it was with TOS.

That's just me.

Its not about that, its about getting the best picture. The FX only have to be changed to upscale them to match the live action "remastering".

RAMA

 

[trevanian]

I'm sure someone with the know how could take a shot of the E-D from Enterprise's "These are the Voyages" and insert it seemlessly in between two scenes of TNG's "Pegasus" and slap it up on YouTube easy as pie. It would be little more than that.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f4vPK9W1-2U

You would prefer that? Seriously? Jesus.

 

[FalTorPan]

Yeah, but it's HD crappy, instead of SD decent.

 

[Mr. Adventure]

1. 1080 is the current maximum for widescreen HD, but in 4:3 what is the pixel width within the black bands??? (ie a fraction of the 1080)

It's 1920x1080, in 4:3 you still have 1080 lines of vertical resolution. At 4:3 resolution the horizontal component would use 1440 of the 1920 horizontal pixels if my math is right.

 

[cybersoldier]

After seeing this fan made TNG intro
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f4vPK9W1-2U&feature=channel

makes me want to see more and more TNG-R. I got all the seasons on TNG and I would hate for this series to fade into the shadows of trek past because of it sfx

 

[RAMA]

After seeing this fan made TNG intro
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f4vPK9W1-2U&feature=channel

makes me want to see more and more TNG-R. I got all the seasons on TNG and I would hate for this series to fade into the shadows of trek past because of it sfx

I'm not really impressed. Bad transitions and editing. Its not professional though so Iam sure the real thing would be better.

RAMA

 

[cybersoldier]

After seeing this fan made TNG intro
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f4vPK9W1-2U&feature=channel

makes me want to see more and more TNG-R. I got all the seasons on TNG and I would hate for this series to fade into the shadows of trek past because of it sfx

I'm not really impressed. Bad transitions and editing. Its not professional though so Iam sure the real thing would be better.

RAMA

True not the best ever made but its gives a good idea what improved sfx and cgi enterprise-d could look like. Im sure when Paramount does it, it will blow people's minds ala These are the voyages, or looks remotely like E-D in Generations

 

[Bonzo the Fifth]

Yeah, in this project, it's not at all about the FX, it's just about the appearance of the show in general. FX-wise, TNG can largely be left as is, with FX shots being essentially clones of the originals, with the occasional tweak here and there. The primary focus would the the live action quality, which, as TOS-R showed us, can be a dramatic improvement when done well and proper. It's not a 'what the hell, let's do it' kind of thing, but something essential to the continued existence of the show itself. It's just a far more daunting task than it was for TOS. Of course, maybe if Paramount were to just remaster and scan in the actual film, just to have it out there, we can sort out the editing and production issues later, maybe with the crowdsourcing idea posted earlier...

 

[Butters]

After seeing this fan made TNG intro
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f4vPK9W1-2U&feature=channel

makes me want to see more and more TNG-R. I got all the seasons on TNG and I would hate for this series to fade into the shadows of trek past because of it sfx

I'm not really impressed. Bad transitions and editing. Its not professional though so Iam sure the real thing would be better.

RAMA

True not the best ever made but its gives a good idea what improved sfx and cgi enterprise-d could look like. Im sure when Paramount does it, it will blow people's minds ala These are the voyages, or looks remotely like E-D in Generations

Sure its not the best fan vid but its a good effort and shows what might be done. The opening credits illustrated one of my points. The planets in the openning sequence look utterly terrible by today's standards. At the distance shown, we should be able to perceive the landmasses and the glistening oceans, not a vaguely familar blue ball.

When the ship flies by, we want to see the rooms inside. The final shot of BoBW that ends with Picard looking out the ready room window, which then cuts to the Enterprise in orbit with the Moon beyond, I'd fill in the middle as one continuous shot, pulling right out from Picard at the window, zooming out to match the original long shot.

Remastering TNG is most likely to be the last addition of new material to the Prime universe so any extra frame is to be cherished, not scorned. And the project should not be to merely upscale the picture quality to not look bad, it should upgrade it to look amazing, and to that end creative liberties are a must.

I don't see the point of a scene for scene rework, when some of the scenes are not that convincing anyway. Repetitive flybys, reused graphics, alien freighters and exploding Birds of Prey.

When you buy a new suit, do you pick the one that hides your lesser features or the one that makes you look amazing? On a congested highway, do want it resurfaced or an extra lane? If they have to rework the effects from scratch, they might as well inject some originality too.

 

[Tomalak]

It's not the FX that make me want a TNG remastered, it's the concept of a clear, non-blurry picture.

Nail on head. Just as with TOS, it's the remastered picture that I really want to see. It's not a case of just re-releasing the series with CGI effects, as some people seems to think - if the original TOS effects had stood up in HD, I doubt they would have gone to the expense of creating new ones. The new effects are just necessary window dressing.