[opendtv] Re: Legacy Broadcast of 'The Ten Commandments'

  • From: Cliff Benham <flyback1@xxxxxxxxxxx>
  • To: opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
  • Date: Sun, 23 Mar 2008 20:36:04 -0400

Manfredi, Albert E wrote:

Or perhaps the contract for playing the old analog-mono version
runs through 2015?

I really can't fathom these contracts. Why would any content owner have
a contract to deliberately transmit an inferior version of its product?
Unless it was being simulcast on a premium tier of some sort? Makes no
sense.

Are the owners trying to scrape up all they can from this old version before they produce a new one for the digital age?


I get a kick out of reruns of the original, campy, Star Trek. The
picture is boxy 4:3, probably because that's how these were shot. But at
least, the image is perfectly sharp, and the colors are really good.

Only because it was originally shot in Hollywood on 35 mm film.

But the sound is that atrocious, AM-radio-sounding, band limited mono.
Totally inconsistent with the picture. Yuck.

Bert

When the 'restored original Startrek' series began playing on TV again in the 1980s, the shows came in on 1 inch tape. The station I worked for at the time played them. They looked much better having been transferred to tape with a 'then current technology' flying spot scanner telecine, and as you say, the sound was apparently from the optical soundtracks on those films. Good, but certainly not as clean and clear as it might have been.

The sound and images on the Startrek DVD set are very good, much better than when viewed from a broadcast over the air in analog or digital.

Again Why?

Apparently because the DVD producers went back and used the original magnetic film work parts, as well as the 35 mm color film negatives, [either original, or first internegative] to create a much better looking and sounding DVD version.

Why can't the stations play these versions if the content is the same?

Maybe the producers *feel* the content IS 'new and much improved' [like the colorized versions of old B&W films?] and therefore worthy of a new and higher priced 'play to air' contract?

Yeah, it must be the contracts again. :^(

Cliff



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