iTunes new Dark Knight/DK Rises master

[TomArrow]

I heard from a few sources that US iTunes now has the new Dark Knight and Dark Knight Rises master. Someone also said that the Batman Begins master on iTunes has slightly different colors now and as opposed to initial speculation, the new BB Blu Ray is only a reencode of the old master.

Does anyone have access to these iTunes masters? I'd be very interested in watching those. And who knows how long they will stay up.

From the little I read, the new masters (at least the 4K Blu Rays) also have VAR, with the 1,77:1 AR for the IMAX shots.

Edit: I realize I could wait for the 4K Blu Ray, but the SD version will likely have it's own adjusted color grading that will likely not be the same as a blanket conversion of the HDR to SDR.

[zoidberg]

The standard blu rays in the Dark Knight trilogy are all old masters. Only Batman Begins has received a new AVC encode but as Tom pointed out it is the same master as the VC-1 encode.
These are on iTunes UK in UHD as well.

[TomArrow]

These are on iTunes UK in UHD as well.

You mean the new masters?

That would be even better to have - but those may not be possible to rip I don't know

[TomArrow]

Do you know why is there so much differences between HDR and the regular Blu?
I thought based on online reading, that exporting HDR to SDR is just a matter of adjusting gamma and contrast.
It seems they go overboard on many 4K HDR sourced master. Maybe it's hard to reconfigure hence maybe why they opt for using old encodes on the regular blu?

There are various methods of converting HDR to SDR - some just play arund with curves basically while others are more sophisticated like tone mapping - but theoretically there's no limit how far you can go to make a good HDR to SDR conversion - hence why I think these may be worth preserving - the process they used may be something completely random

No idea why they went with the old ones on the blus - they did the same with the Mummy trilogy tho - probably saved some cost? Dunno

[TomArrow]

I don't think there's a best one and it's a matter of aesthetics/what fits a particular shot/movie. The only physically/mathematically accurate way would probably be to simply clip the whites and crush the blacks when fitting into the smaller colorspace, which is not really pleasant.

Setting up the color space would probably not be an issue when working with a LUT. You just give it the raw source color data, apply the LUT and then tag it with the new color space.

Anyway, I have an update. I'll probably have the iTunes versions in a week or two.

[TomArrow]

I now have a Batman Begins 720p iTunes version. It does definitely have different colors, and in a very positive way. For example, that very ugly extreme green/teal/cyan of the mountain scenes is now relatively neutral in the highlights and the brightness altogether pushed up and contrast improved (in those scenes). Skin colors are mostly nice now and sometimes really beautiful. Altogether it feels much more balanced and harmonic and actually shows some colors instead of some blanket color tint. Really happy about it.

[Beber]

I now have a Batman Begins 720p iTunes version. It does definitely have different colors, and in a very positive way. For example, that very ugly extreme green/teal/cyan of the mountain scenes is now relatively neutral in the highlights and the brightness altogether pushed up and contrast improved (in those scenes). Skin colors are mostly nice now and sometimes really beautiful. Altogether it feels much more balanced and harmonic and actually shows some colors instead of some blanket color tint. Really happy about it.

I haven't seen the video you're talking about, however I've seen a 35mm print and compared to the Blu-ray right after, and I was not shocked, like, at all by its looks. The Blu-ray is quite faithfull (and looks way better and accurate than the one of The Dark Knight), and what you call very ugly extreme cyan is actually more cyan on a photochemical print than it is on Blu-ray, as expected. I'm thinking notably of the night blue sky during the campfire between Bale and Neeson.

[TomArrow]

I now have a Batman Begins 720p iTunes version. It does definitely have different colors, and in a very positive way. For example, that very ugly extreme green/teal/cyan of the mountain scenes is now relatively neutral in the highlights and the brightness altogether pushed up and contrast improved (in those scenes). Skin colors are mostly nice now and sometimes really beautiful. Altogether it feels much more balanced and harmonic and actually shows some colors instead of some blanket color tint. Really happy about it.

I haven't seen the video your talking about, however I've seen a 35mm print and compared to the Blu-ray right after, and I was not shocked, like, at all by its looks. The Blu-ray is quite faithfull (and looks way better and accurate than the one of The Dark Knight), and what you call very ugly extreme cyan is actually more cyan on a photochemical print than it is on Blu-ray, as expected. I'm thinking notably of the night blue sky during the campfire between Bale and Neeson.

Oh, the campfire definitely still has extreme cyan. But not the more "normal" daylight scenes. 

See here for campfire:
   

And here for the fight before:
   

In the old one, they were both pretty cyan, now only the campfire is, which seems more right to me. 

Many have said that the iTunes one is the new master for all 3, which is why I was/am after them. There was some talk about it being straight from some kind of so-called "interpositive", so it should be fairly accurate me thinks. But I could be wrong.

[Beber]

I'd like to see all 3 of them, too. The Dark Knight Blu-ray is just not agreeable to watch.

[TomArrow]

Yup! I only have BB yet, but I should be getting the other ones soon.