Space History Footage In HD 92
The Discovery Channel has done a deal with NASA to enhance old film footage from the space program up to the standards of HD. Discovery will air, in HD, a 6-part special called "When We Left Earth," beginning June 8. Judging by the trailer it should be pretty spectacular, a good introduction to the wonders of space exploration for a new generation. After the show airs, NASA gets the improved footage for their archives.
Space may be the final frontier (Score:1, Funny)
So.... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:So.... (Score:5, Funny)
Sorry... (Score:3, Insightful)
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Thanks for reminding me it's time to check for the new episode. Time waits for no man, and this man waits not for the new season of Doctor Who to come to Canada, buddy.
Obligatory (Score:5, Funny)
Armstrong shot first!
30% less more like it! (Score:2, Interesting)
Right?
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in HD, will we finally be able to see the wires helping Armstrong look like he is on the moon?
Possibly, but I am just convinced the special effects will be better. After that I am just just waiting for a George Lucas style Director's cut
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After that I am just just waiting for a George Lucas style Director's cut
You don't want to see that:
Neil Armstrong: That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.
Jar Jar Aldrin: Meesa gonna go next! Woopsie...
Jar Jar tumbles down the ladder, landing on Armstrong.
Armstrong: Jar Jaaaarr!
and the answer to the ultimate question (Score:2)
Commercial venture for the greater good (Score:5, Insightful)
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I think not. Can anyone explain why we saw colour pictures in some fidelity, yet the sound was worse than CB quality? And still is, even from the latest projects?
Re:Commercial venture for the greater good (Score:5, Informative)
Because the pictures were mostly shot on 16mm film or better, while the sound was typically recorded on analogue tape after transmission over a low-bandwidth radio link from space to ground?
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So, no, that's not an explanation, is it?
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The original camera on Apollo 11 was black and white and had 212 x 218 resolution at 10 frames per second. (It could also do 4x the resolution in each dimension at 1.4 frames per second, but that wasn't used for the news broadcasts.)
See this description [honeysucklecreek.net] for more details, o
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I still think the audio from the space-station sounds crappy
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Clearly, I'm a novice in this area, otherwise it would be obvious to me, too.
I checked out this page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single-sideband_modulation [wikipedia.org] but I can't say I'm much the wiser on the reason, or where to go next. Got any useful references that might help?
It would seem to me that if the picture is of pretty good quality, then the sound should be too. Is my expectation of 'pretty good' set too high for the audio, then? Audio quality degrades much faste
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That said, the main reason it sounds like they're talking over CB is because that's more or less exactly wha
+1 ironic (Score:5, Informative)
So, in summary, the irony here is that for archiving purposes, the safest and cheapest way to store this material is probably on film. If this were my project, I would make redundant LTO-3/4 masters of all of the material, as well as print the digital scans to black and white film separations for each color channel. Of course, that assumption is based on this having received a proper scan (4k, pin registered) and not a cheap HDtelecine. Given the importance of the footage, I'd hope it would have.. but given my experience with the type of people who set budgets for these sort of projects (and their propensity to say things like "no one can tell the difference anyway, so we're using the cheaper option,"), my offhand guess would be this was telecined directly to compressed HD tape (ughhhhhh).
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If this were my project, I would make redundant LTO-3/4 masters of all of the material, as well as print the digital scans to black and white film separations for each color channel.
I don't really care if you have to print the digital content back down on film, but I think digital still beats analog. Yes, you got multiple copies that'll get worse if you need to make more copies, they can degrade and you don't have a definitive master. What do you do to recover a new master? Averaging? Best pick? What if they're all degraded by time? With digital you have it exact. You can make sure that the film is exactly the same, bit for bit as it was when you first put it in storage. Digital stori
Long term storage (Score:2)
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Not so much of the "benefits everyone" aspect, but still very cool to see the old films cleaned up and preserved.
"enhance?" (Score:5, Informative)
I just want to take a brief issue with the wording here. There is likely little "enhancement" done for this film to reach "HD standards." Of course it depends on the film format, and how it has been stored, but assuming it has been taken care of properly, and is 16mm or larger, there would be no enhancing required.
(A few lightly technical ramblings) Film is better than today's HD video, in virtually every regard, except cost (assuming we are talking about 35mm, not super8
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As another poster mentioned below, there's probably been a substantial amount of grading and cleanup done to footage that was shot in far from ideal conditions and probably hasn't been stored terribly well.
misleading wording. (Score:5, Informative)
My issue is that *NONE OF THAT STUFF* counts as "enhancing for HD standards." If this film was going to be shown in theatres (which would mean it would be mostly seen projected on film prints), all of that stuff would still take place. The "HD standards" statement implies that HD has "so much resolution" the film must be "up rezzed" or similar, and that was the implication I took issue with. They should have just said, "NASA has scanned and restored the original film negatives to be shown in breathtaking HD quality on the Discovery Channel" or something similar-- more technically correct than the original statement, and it still sells the whole "OMG HIGH DEF!!!" aspect.
Knowing the importance of this film, I should hope it was stored well.. but I recall vaguely that some of the original moon landing stuff is potentially lost forever [washingtonpost.com] so perhaps you are right and it hasn't been stored terribly well.
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Except, uh, NASA has done nothing of the kind; they let the Discovery Channel telecine the footage and restore it, just as they have with other organisations in the past.
I'd agree that 'restoring' is more accurate than 'enhancing', but arguing over that distinction is bordering on pedantry.
"Knowing the importance of this film, I should
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Looks like they did a great job on the footage... (Score:3, Interesting)
After you get used to seeing those clips from old, battered & faded prints, it's remarkable to see them cleaned up, corrected and smoothed out. Like getting used to seeing old faded color prints in an album, and then suddenly they look like recent shots. Almost like a time machine.
I'm really looking forward to this.
Re: Wow! Great Footage! (Score:1)
It's worth a couple minutes looking over the trailer for this. All the hair on my arms is standing up, and I forgot to breathe there for awhile. WOW!!!
-- Dave Small
Trailer (Score:1, Insightful)
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Meh, that's no longer a good excuse. The modern codecs are efficient enough that you can easily show 640x360 sized clips without busting the bandwidth.
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What Does That Mean? (Score:4, Insightful)
What does this mean? Is it not NASA's footage to begin with? Are you telling me that the Discovery Channel's people went back in time and refilmed the Apollo missions and created some sort of copyrighted work?
On top of this, the statement seems to imply that the Discovery Channel is being gracious by returning the footage to NASA. This is as if you borrow my shirt and imply that because you washed it, it is now yours and that you are doing me a favour by returning it to me.
It is nice to know the Discovery Channel is so gracious. :-/
Re:What Does That Mean? (Score:5, Informative)
Technically, yes. As I understand it, NASA footage is generally in the public domain, but if you pay to telecine that footage from film to tape and then clean it up, you have copyright over that specific copy of the footage; there's no legal responsibility to give NASA a copy.
It may sound silly, but that's copyright law for you.
Re:What Does That Mean? (Score:5, Insightful)
So, derivatives of copyrighted works remain copyrighted, but derivatives of Public Domain works do not remain in the Public Domain.
I think the Public is getting ripped off.
Re:What Does That Mean? (Score:5, Informative)
"Public Domain" means that the original work is 100% free from any claim of copyright, for any use whatsoever. NOBODY "owns" it.
However, in order to qualify for copyright, there has to be "substantially different" from another work. Merely "cleaning up" would likely not qualify. (That's why if you were to publish a photograph of a public domain painting, for example, if your photograph is EXACTLY of the painting, with no extra artistic work added, then your photograph is not copyrightable. But if you take it from an angle, then you can claim that your angle is an artistic addition, therefore placing your photograph under copyright.)
So the raw act of cleaning the footage probably didn't add copyright, but all of the other stuff did. (Performing color balancing and other tasks other than pure physical 'cleaning' of the film stock.)
Re:What Does That Mean? (Score:4, Interesting)
I've been wondering how this sort of thing affects audio recordings. Here in the UK, we're in the interesting position of having a 50 year limit on recording copyright, and there are several companies that do a very good job of restoring and re-releasing out of copyright material (often better than the major labels that continue to sell overpriced and poorly transferred CDs of 'their' artists). Some of this material is still very marketable (e.g. classical and jazz from the 50s), and will soon include major artists/cash cows from the 60s (early Beatles records in 2013). Reputable companies that lack access to the masters will usually try to get hold of the best preserved publicly released vinyl or shellac discs they can find and restore from them. Less reputable companies casually 'pirate' the CDs released by the restorers, avoiding the substantial amount of work that goes into a typical restoration. The legality of the latter seems to be something of a grey area, at least in the UK:
http://www.copyright.mediarights.co.uk/ [mediarights.co.uk]
'It is debatable as to whether merely removing "clicks and crackle" from an old record would [establish a new copyright claim]...It is possible, however, that the creative use of equalisation or special effects...or even the making of an analogue to digital transfer, might well be sufficient...Currently there is evidence that some commercial re-issues of restored public domain sound recordings are being openly pirated, perhaps on the assumption that no copyright can exist in these copies...[this] has yet to be tested in the courts.'
It'll be interesting to see how this pans out in a few years time, when people start openly posting mp3s of Beatles albums on UK sites, selling cheap compilations in Asda, and distributing lovingly restored audiophile transfers from the original vinyl (as already happens illegally). Will there be legal moves to block international distribution (e.g. to the US, where the recordings will still be in copyright)? Will (as I assume) the current CD transfers from the 80s still be judged to be in copyright? Is the recent (and yet to be released) remastering (/remixing?) project from the original masters basically a ploy to extend copyright on the 'definitive' versions by another 50 years?
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Re:What Does That Mean? (Score:4, Interesting)
The question is whether enhancing a work without adding any creative information makes it a new work. Obviously, in the case under discussion, the film footage was all taken by NASA. All the Discovery Channel is doing is running it through a few computers. Can this be considered art? If I write a computer program that makes random art, can I claim copyright on the art that the computer creates? Certainly, the computer has no rights, but is a creator of a program entitled to copyright the program's output?
My program [sourceforge.net] automagically turns Public Domain books into a collection of HTML documents. Am I entitled to copyright Public Domain works after they have been run through my program? I expended time and effort writing the program.
Re:What Does That Mean? (Score:5, Insightful)
Basically Discovery Channel, in return for access to all of the materials, will give NASA one or more copies of the final work.
NASA could do all of the restoration themselves but it would be very costly and I doubt, in this time of BushCo budget cuts, that NASA has the spare change to pay for the restoration.
This agreement allows both parties to benefit - a nice result.
Obviously nobody went back in time. DC used their extensive A/V resources to restore the NASA footage.
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Much like BearRanger said (up there ^) It's a win-win all around...
Minor correction.... (Score:1)
"Spacy," not "spacee"
Woah. this is strange... (Score:1)
Major Tom... (Score:1)
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Sountrack (Score:2)
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Gimme Shelter by The Rolling Stones.
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And Fox TV are also showing (Score:3, Funny)
Improved footage public domain? (Score:3, Interesting)
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The way I understand it, the majority of NASA's work is placed in the public domain. If the Discovery Channel is giving NASA a copy of their restored HD footage for their archives, will this copy be public domain as well, or will it remain under the copyright of the Discovery Channel?
If you use public domain photos to make a coffe-table book you own the copyright to the book. You do not own the copyright to the indvidual pictures even if you sharpen them up in Photoshop first. Anyone can photocopy one of those pictures and sell it, but they can't copy the entire book (or even large parts of it) and sell that.
Discovery Channel will not own the copyright to the NASA images, restored or not, but they will own the copyright to the "When We Left Earth" work and the creative arrangements o
Unfortunate line wrapping (Score:2)
What? But I thought you'd just said... So he's supposed to be some kind of zombie?
serious about the contrast...
Oh, never mind.
Nice errors in the Wired blog. (Score:2)
Doesn't Wired have copy editors to check these typos/grammar errors?
What about (Score:2)
"enhanced" audio? (Score:2)
And will they change the M16s to walkie talkies?
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*sighs* I was just watching something or another on (I think) NatGeo's HD channel last week. It was footage of the Challenger disaster and they had ADDED a white flash (i.e. the area where the explosion sta
restoration or enhancement (Score:3, Insightful)
It is impossible to restore lost information. Color can be corrected to what is probably was, lines can be completed, etc, but thats entirely new, best guess, information, and covers up the real information that was there before it. They should store the originals for longer term storage with the highest possible digital resolution, just as they are. If they want to enhanse things for a more attractive picture, fine, but don't store it for posterity. Posterity will be very angry.
Like you've never seen it before... (Score:2)
No, can't say as I ever saw it like that before.
How About FREE? (Score:2)
And how about NASA releases for download all their HD video they've shot? Let's see any American (or foreigner benefiting from our generosity) take a crack at editing these movies that we all paid to produce. I've seen a few HD NASA movies floating around the Net, s
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NASA are actually very good at giving stuff away to the public; look at the vast gigabytes of technical reports on ntrs.nasa.gov, for example. But they probably can't justify the cost of having a server with petabytes of HD footage and the huge pipes required to let people download it.
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NASA would have to pay for the server. You have to pay for copying tapes. See the difference?
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A NASA server would be paid by me and every taxpayer. And be much lower cost than the tape transfer process. And, with much wider distribution of that top-notch pro-American propaganda, be well worth every penny. I would hope it to scale up to become a significant cost, considering the return on that investment would be so high.
Where is the trailer in HD? (Score:2)
Trailer in HD (Score:2)
Watching a tiny little YouTube quality video on the OrlandoSentinel website sure is mighty impressive.