CED VideoDisc and Player Discussion

[Beetlescott]

I just watched a clip on YouTube stating that the first 2 Star Wars movies released on CED were "sped up" by 3% just so Fox could get the movie on 1 disc. As you will see on the clip, he said Return of the Jedi was released so late in the game, they didn't care what it cost. I have watced Star Wars on CED since 1982 and I never noticed the voices were "hi pitched" Anyoe ever heard this????

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QE-qo1a34xY&feature=related
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[deantjeep]

From what I understand, time compressed movies have their soundtracks adjusted for pitch.

[Beetlescott]

[deantjeep]

Time compression is when the movie plays back at a faster frame rate, thus compressing the time it takes to view the complete movie. This allows a movie to fit on a two sided disc such as a CED. Depending on the compression rate, you may or may not notice the movie is slightly speeded up. The soundtrack and namely the voices are adjusted for their pitch, so that the voices sound normal, although they are talking slightly faster. Most people don't notice the difference.

[Rixrex]

The original theatrical release of Star Wars ran 121 min (special edition is 125) and the runtime of Empire Strike Back was 124 min (sp ed at 127).

One way to do time compression uses the european film standard of running at 25 frames per second (FPS) instead of 24. Since 25 and 30 (TV FPS) are easily divided by 5 and are divisible into 150, transfer to video is pretty easy with the right shutter and pulldown ratio.

That would give you a decrease in relative film time to real time of 4.2%, or 4 min & 12 sec per 100 actual min, this being a reduction to 95 min & 48 sec instead of 100 min. The original Star Wars would have run about 116 mins this way.

Another way is to adjust the 3:2 pulldown system so that it that it does 3 frames on one 5 blade shutter pulldown (a 2:1:2 pulldown) every so often to speed up the overall time. This is the method used to get a 3% decrease in relative film time to actual time, and less pitch change than the other method. Stars Wars runs almost 118 min this way.

The slight pitch change is adjusted by processing all sound through a device that lowers all pitch by the same correct percentage of frequency, that's all.

All this ends up being unnoticable to average viewers. Unfortunately, experienced film and video viewers can notice it, just as the 3:2 pulldown effect can be noticed as motion judder unless you use a 72 hz or even better, a 120 hz refresh rate screen.

Pretty much high school level mathematics.

[deantjeep]

Impressive explanation!

[Jesse Skeen]

This was done with a number of movies on CED and also laserdisc in its early years. I read that HBO has also done this for a long time, one of several reasons I've never subscribed to it. I've heard "That's Entertainment" is one of the worst time-compressed movies on CED; I'll have to watch that alongside the HD-DVD some day. I've heard some of the first VHS movies were also time-compressed as tapes running longer than 2 hours on the SP speed were rare.

Image Entertainment started out releasing X-rated movies on laserdisc, back when they were still real MOVIES and not the direct-to-video stuff it's been since the late 80s. They figured being able to use the all the laserdisc player's controls on these movies would be a big selling point, so several of their movies were cut for time so that they ran under 90 minutes so one side could be in CAV format.
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[Rixrex]

Yeah, time compression has been around a longtime.

It was used inadvertently in the early days of film when the first silent films made were filmed at 16 FPS. Later when the standard became 24 FPS and reduced the effect of flicker and also produced better sound quality when sound came in, the old silent 16 FPS silents were shown at 24 FPS in theaters and that's why you see the Keystone Cops scrambling about so quickly. Originally, the earliest slapstick films were not that frantic. This was a tremendous compression, as theaters could show the older films in 1/3 less time than before.

Another method of 'time compression' was a really simple one, and that was to just cut out shots and scenes considered less than important in order to fit into a scheduled period or time slot. We all know about this, and it's stated so on the start of many films shown on TV, meaning the warning blurb about "edited to fit your screen and the time allotted', ha ha.

Imagine if Star Wars had 3 mins cut out of it to fit on a CED, if the studio and Lucas had okayed it? What kind of complaints would there have been? Also what should be cut? Who'd have the nerve to even suggest it?

The whole notion of creating a format, then designing it to fit a two-hour limit has always struck me as a bit short sighted, and a kind of surprise to me from RCA. This is the same foresighted RCA who reasonably wanted Sony to go longer on the ridiculously short 1 hr Betamax and who convinced JVC to agree to extend VHS to 4 hrs and beyond.

Basing a design on the 12" LP size is logical initially, but then when you realize you won't press or jacket a videodisc like a 12" LP, why not move on up to a size that would give you a record time up to almost 2.5 hrs, since more than 10% of film releases run more than 2 hrs, but less than 1% run more than 2 hrs and 20 mins.

Of course a reasonable size would have to be decided upon no matter what, but a 13" CED would have had almost 20% more record time counting both sides, which would have been another 24 mins with a minimal size increase. (remember as the linear diameter increases slightly, the surface area increases greatly exponentially)

But to be thinking this way would have required a person with the great imagination and analytical mental foresight of Tesla, not the trial and error methods of Edison, also of great imagination yet not quite as mentally analytical as Tesla. (Don't be upset, Edison fans, I agree that he was a great intellect even though he often took a long road to discovery.)

Wouldn't it have made sense to incude that additional 10% of film releases on single disc pressings, and let that 1% of over 2.5 hr films go the blockbuster 2 disc status? I think so.

Or if the old King of England of ages ago had just had a one inch bigger foot, he'd have done us a favor.

[CEDatum]

The first CED pressings of Star Wars were a full length 2 disc set. This was a limited test run for evaluation purposes. After the samples were evaluated by Fox and RCA management it was decided to issue the production version of Star Wars on one disc and hence the time compression down to 118 minutes.
I have set of the 2 prepro discs. John at CEDatum.

[Beetlescott]

Cool John!!!! That is a very nice & extremely rare disc! I would LOVE to play both versions side by side.
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[Rixrex]

If you have the older laserdisc version and an LD player, you could play it against the CED to see the time compression effect, using PIP if possible.

[Jesse Skeen]

The pan and scan laserdisc of "Star Wars" was always time compressed- from its first 1982 release on 20th Century Fox Video up to when the label had been changed to Fox Video (I don't know if they added digital sound or not to later issues.) The letterboxed version, issued in 1989, was a 2-disc set with no time compression. That sold for $69.99 while the pan and scan discs sold for $34.99.
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[Beetlescott]

[Rixrex]

Yeah, I was talking about the letterbox version, not the P&S, as the LB one is the one I have. Should have made that clear.

I just opened one of the non-working parts players I have and found a disc still in it. Got a spare caddy and took it out to put in a good player. Turns out it's Return of the Jedi, 1st disc. No idea where disc 2 is.

[Beetlescott]