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yoloswegmaster wrote: Sun Aug 28, 2022 3:22 pm November titles have leaked:

Used Cars 4K UHD

agnamaracs wrote: Fri Sep 16, 2022 4:38 pm I'm still dreaming that they will bring Death Race 2000 back. I can't fathom how it's been OOP for so long. Who owns the rights?

dwk wrote: Fri Sep 16, 2022 4:16 pm Oh, two more limited editions (1500) are now available to order from their site
The Hot Box
The Warrior And The Sorceress

And the Gravity Falls: The Complete Series set is going OOP.

When I was asked if I would restore the audio for this film I was just as excited as I was intimidated. Black Christmas is one of my favorite films and of course I would do it, but I was familiar with it's history on video and the state of the audio.

So first things first, there is no mag elements for this film, at least that could be located so yes, the mono was restored using the 35mm optical track. The DVD tracks were too heavily compressed, I wanted a true lossless starting point.
So before anyone starts with the woulda, shoulda routine, I had to move quickly to be able to pull this off and get it done in the time I had and the work is done, let's move on.

The optical track was in bad shape, age related wear and tear and sibilance baked in so hot that no de-esser currently available would put a dent in it.
I cleaned up and repaired all the damage and manually went in one word at a time and erased and repaired the dialogue waveforms. Since optical mono is rolled off in the high frequencies, I figured out a way to essentially rebuild the lost range via, equalization against the other best available source, the 5.1. I am not going into specifics of what I did, that remains with me, but my approach was to bring it back to what it should actually sound like. The end result will stand up against a mag transfer, that I am sure about. It was not easy, I have restored many tracks, but this was taking a different approach to restoring optical based audio.

While I was working on the mono, the idea just popped into my head that, maybe I should try to re-do the 5.1. Big problem there, all I have is a 5.1 track that is wildly out of synch and a beat up optical track of the final mix, no separate stems.

The 5.1 track is pretty infamous for the reason that it replaced almost every single sound effect in the film and the ones it did not replace were heavily altered, some were even missing entirely. Dialogue was missing and changed as was the music score. The timing of music/effects/dialogue was altered to make way for longer or shorter newly recorded effects. How much it was changed, I discovered very quickly when I launched into this track.

Some are probably thinking why bother when you have the original audio?
The answer is simple, working off the knowledge that this is it for the audio and 4K could really be the last call for this film on physical media, I wanted a stereo remix more in line with the mono mix and I was curious if all the latest software was up to the task and including myself.

First things first, I needed a clean source for the original audio, I restored the mono track. Secondly, I had to fix and re-align the 5.1 audio that was out of synch. It went off the rails in the last half, but to my mind, it was off throughout the entire film from scene to scene.
I literally re-aligned the track 5 seconds at a time, matching to the mono track. This had to be done so that all the changes that were about to take place lined up, otherwise you are in all sorts of trouble and no real way of fixing it after the fact.

Most 5.1 remixes from mono track films including this one are the final mix with a pseudo-stereo style spread and pan out to the other channels. Meaning it's the entire mix being spread to all 6 channels and in this case with new stereo sound effects overlaid straight over the top to give stereo separation. This practice is even done with remixes from separate DME tracks and I am not a fan of it. If you want the mono just spread out to all channels, just listen to the original track.

Now the next part is where it was challenging, I had to break apart the 5.1 into separate layers, remove everything that did not belong and re-instate all the original audio back seamlessly into the 5.1 channels and I don't mean just piecing. Since all the audio information was carried in all channels in this mix, every change had to be repeated 6 times. I had to isolate and separate the mono into basically new stems for dialogue, music and effects so the audio could be edited into the 5.1. I went this way so I could get true stereo separation and channel mapping with the original audio. As good as the tools are in 2022, they are still not quite up to this task when it comes to isolation. I was able to get so far and then it was all about problem solving and finding workarounds in isolating the mono mix and blending those elements into the 5.1 audio seamlessly.

There were sections of music that needed replacing and they may have been two seconds in length. I had to isolate those from the mono, remix those sections into stereo and they had to match the 5.1 either side, so a lot of editing and EQ matching was required to blend all this together. Some of these bits were so difficult to do, they may be 30 second sequences in the film and they took 2-3 days to finally figure out how they could be achieved.
My idea was for it to be a true stereo remix from original audio and I wanted the sonic character to actually sound like a film from 1974, not something from the 2000s.

I could right a book about how difficult this was to do and it would be like a phonebook. So much involved, I stopped counting changes after I reached the 400 point! all done over six channels each time with no stems and an optical track to work with.

I spent 18 hour days over a period of two and a half months fighting the battle on these tracks. Some of the work done for the 5.1 remix is pretty innovative and it could quite possibly be one of the biggest audio overhauls ever done for a video release. I am proud I was able to finally get there, but it was not fun working on this at the time. I thank Cliff Macmillin over at Shout with trusting me to pull this off and dealing with my crazy audio ideas.

I hope everyone likes the final result.

DISC ONE (4K UHD):

NEW 2022 4K Scan Of The Original Camera Negative
In Dolby Vision (HDR 10 Compatible)
Audio: DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0
NEW Audio Commentary With Producer Chris Brown And Actors Micha Bergese And Kathryn Pogson
Audio Commentary With Director Neil Jordan

DISC TWO (BLU-RAY):

NEW 2022 4K Scan Of The Original Camera Negative
Audio: DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0
NEW Audio Commentary With Producer Chris Brown And Actors Micha Bergese And Kathryn Pogson
Audio Commentary With Director Neil Jordan
NEW Where The Fairy Tales End: Scoring The Company Of Wolves – An Interview With Composer George Fenton
NEW Alice In Dreamland – An interview With Actress Georgia Slowe
Theatrical Trailer
TV spot
Still Gallery

Finch wrote: Mon Oct 10, 2022 4:32 pm Finalised specs for In The Company of Wolves UHD

DISC ONE (4K UHD):

NEW 2022 4K Scan Of The Original Camera Negative
In Dolby Vision (HDR 10 Compatible)
Audio: DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0
NEW Audio Commentary With Producer Chris Brown And Actors Micha Bergese And Kathryn Pogson
Audio Commentary With Director Neil Jordan

DISC TWO (BLU-RAY):

NEW 2022 4K Scan Of The Original Camera Negative
Audio: DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0
NEW Audio Commentary With Producer Chris Brown And Actors Micha Bergese And Kathryn Pogson
Audio Commentary With Director Neil Jordan
NEW Where The Fairy Tales End: Scoring The Company Of Wolves – An Interview With Composer George Fenton
NEW Alice In Dreamland – An interview With Actress Georgia Slowe
Theatrical Trailer
TV spot
Still Gallery

beamish14 wrote: Mon Oct 10, 2022 6:54 pm A solid set of new features, but I really would have enjoyed more on the late Angela Carter.

ianthemovie wrote: Mon Oct 10, 2022 8:24 pm

beamish14 wrote: Mon Oct 10, 2022 6:54 pm A solid set of new features, but I really would have enjoyed more on the late Angela Carter.

Whole-heartedly agree--the BBC did a nice documentary on her in 2018 and it would have been great to see that included here.

I also regret that Shout wasn't able to get an interview with Sarah Patterson, or with Angela Lansbury for that matter, though I believe Patterson is somewhat reclusive and I imagine it's probably difficult to sit down with Lansbury these days due to her advanced age. In spite of that I will be picking this up right away as it's long been one of my favorite films.

therewillbeblus wrote: Thu Oct 27, 2022 7:56 pm I loved it even more and think it may be the best zombie anything ever

jazzo wrote: Thu Oct 27, 2022 8:05 pm It’s Snyder’s only good film.

black&huge wrote: Thu Oct 27, 2022 7:57 pm

therewillbeblus wrote: Thu Oct 27, 2022 7:56 pm I loved it even more and think it may be the best zombie anything ever

we have James Gunn's script to thank for that.

It's a 7 disc set, so presumably at least 7 films, and if they covered each year, then these would be my guesses

The Killer Meteors (1976)
To Kill With Intrigue (1977)
Snake and Crane Arts of Shaolin (1978)
Dragon Fist (1979)
The Young Master (1980)
The Cannonball Run (1981)
Dragon Lord (1982)

1976 and 1978 were busy years for him so it could be a couple other titles

yoloswegmaster wrote: Thu Oct 27, 2022 7:09 pm The Live 4K UHD Steelbook