smile forever, and cry forever sadness.
"Farewell My Concubine" 4K restored version will be re-screened in South Korea, the most beautiful is not the butterfly clothes, a few simple actions and a glance, it shows the impermanence and helplessness of the world.
In the Chinese film market in recent years, there has been a special phenomenon brought about by technological progress: the re-screening of high-definition repair movies. From the recent "Farewell My Concubine" to the 4K restored version of "Life is Beautiful" released last year, a large number of classic films such as "Sea Pianist", "My Neighbor Totoro", "Western Journey" and "Founding Ceremony" have been digitally restored. The release greatly satisfied the fans' feelings of "tribute to classic movies".
The joint force of feelings, capital and technology
old movies are popular
Although the quality of domestic films has made great progress in recent years, it is still difficult to meet the audience's demand for high-quality films. Old films have satisfied the audience with excellent quality. Movie demand.
Carefully analyze the phenomenon of renewal of old films, and it can be found that most of the time points of the old films are concentrated in unpopular schedules. For example, "The Pianist on the Sea" chose to be released on November 15th, and the volume of the films released on the same day was very small. Poor reputation.
old films, except for the cost of re-release, restoration and announcement, the production cost is negligible. With a large number of fans based on the popularity of IP alone, the box office is even better than the new film.
Hayao Miyazaki's two classic cartoons "My Neighbor Totoro" and "Spirited Away". The mainland introduction of these two films, Fang Guangguang Media, has benefited a lot from the box office of over 660 million. At the same time, it stimulated other film and television companies to follow suit, and then formed a trend.
Of course, technological progress brings the possibility of film restoration. Whether it is the 3D version of "Titanic" that started the re-screening, or the 4K restoration version of "Farewell My Concubine", which will be released immediately, they are all based on technological progress.
Repair 1.0 era:
's "manual rescue" race against time
For restorers, film restoration is even a "rescue job" that races against time. Because as time goes by, more and more films will have various problems. If they are not repaired in time, they may face the regret of loss.
In the past, the media used to store movies was mainly film, but early films used nitric acid base, which is a more flammable substance than paper. Although it was basically replaced by acetate base and polyester base after 1960, no matter which is These film bases are difficult to store for a long time at room temperature.
It is said that the film can be stored for nearly a thousand years in an environment where the temperature is not higher than -18℃ and the humidity is not higher than 30%. However, the storage environment of the early film is poor, and its life span has been greatly shortened. In addition, the social environment is turbulent in the past. Physical and chemical damage caused during use and handling, a large number of early film films were lost or seriously damaged.
In order to save old movies more safely, rescue and restore damaged films. The state began to implement the "Film Archives and Film Digital Restoration Project" in 2006, and plans to invest 35 million yuan annually to digitally restore and archive 20,000 old movie films.
Generally speaking, film restoration is divided into three steps: physical restoration, digital restoration and artistic restoration. Old films of old movies often have surface problems such as dust and dirt. Physical restoration, that is, repairing and cleaning the old film for subsequent digital scanning.
The original film material that has been physically restored is transported by rail to the Film Archive for the next digital restoration, that is, after the film is digitally scanned, mold spots, color fading, image jitter, scratches, Various problems such as flicker, noise, discoloration, blurring, etc.
artistic restoration is a process gradually explored during the restoration process. Many viewers will think that restoring a film is to allow it to appear on the big screen with a "new" appearance, but in fact, the highest principle of film restoration is to "repair the old as the old", which is to keep the film in its original film The texture. There is no difference in the basic steps between
4k repair and ordinary 2k repair, and the reason why it has not been fully popularized is that it requires more manpower and financial resources. Ordinary 2k repair (resolution2048*1556) A film can be completed in about two weeks, and the cost is about 300,000 yuan. For 4k repair (resolution 4096*3112), the workload is ordinary 4, so at least two months, or even three months, half a year, can complete a film repair.
Repair 2.0 era:
AI-driven repair revolution
With the development of technology, film repair work is becoming more and more intelligent. At present, China Film Digital Restoration Center, iQiyi, etc. have all used their technological advantages to launch their own old movie restoration plans.
The Xiaobo team of the Digital Restoration Center introduced AI technology to shorten the restoration time of a movie by three-quarters and reduce the cost by half. It has successfully restored classic film and television works such as "Angels on the Road", "Blood Romance" and "Bright Sword".
iQiyi has taken a different approach, applying AI technology to the restoration and enhancement of video quality on a large scale and in many ways. Take a 2-hour movie as an example. It only takes 12 hours to complete the repair and enhancement of the 4K version and launch it online using iQiyi’s AI technology. Previously, manual repair required nearly 20 days of work for a 10-person team.
iQiyi has also developed a special AI algorithm specifically for black and white images. There are a lot of noise and scratches on the film. The general denoising and sharpening module cannot solve the repair problem. The iQiyi technical team automatically detects the location of the scratches according to the frames before and after the film and performs intelligent filling, which can significantly weaken and remove the scratches. mark.
is different from other art forms such as literature and music. The technological advancement of film and television art is very significant. The rapid iteration from early silent films to color films, from 720P to 4K, has caused many classic films to fail to meet the current viewing needs. With the advent of
5G, 4K and even 8K ultra-high-definition video will become the mainstream in the near future. However, due to the current limited 4K and 8K video media, a large number of old media will be more blurred in the 5G environment. In the future, more and more old films will gain lasting value through technical restoration and enter the public's field of vision. In addition to the hit content, they will also become a new territory for competition.
(pictures are from the Internet)
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