Nightmare City (Incubo sulla città contaminata) is presented in its original aspect ratio of 2.35:1 with mono sound.
Nightmare City has been exclusively restored in 2K resolution for this release by Arrow Films.
The Original 2-perf Techniscope negative was scanned in 2K resolution on a pin-registered Arriscan at L'Immagine Ritrovata, Bologna. The film was graded on the Baselight grading system at Deluxe Restoration, London. Thousands of instances of dirt, debris and light scratches were removed through a combination of digital restoration tools.
Unfortunately at some point during their history the negative elements for Nightmare City were subjected to heavy damage and photochemical decay, resulting in regular instances of heavy density fluctuation/image flicker, colour fluctuation and chemical stains. These instances of damage appear intermittently throughout the film.
Alternative source elements were examined, but the only other existing pre-print element, a 4-perf reversal dupe negative, proved to be of unacceptable quality. As a result, this project relied completely on the damaged but complete original negative as its picture source. In doing so, although much of the worst instances of damage have been minimised, this presentation still shows the considerable problems with the material.
This release also provides the option of viewing Nightmare City from a High Definition Restored version produced by Minerva Films/Raro Video. This version used the aforementioned 35mm 4-perf reversal negative as its source element, and as such appears much softer overall in comparison with the 2-perf negative sourced Arrow restoration. This element was not subjected to the same damage as the negative and as a result, appears much cleaner overall. However, unlike the Arrow presentation, grain management and other DNR-type processing software tools were used to achieve the results of this presentation. (1)
Nightmare City and the limits of restoration featurette looking at the differences between the two transfers included on this release. (2)
FPS: 23.976
Aspect Ratio: 2.35
Region: B
Film
2-perf 35mm (Techniscope) Original Camera Negative.
Transfer
Pin-registered 2K Scan on an Arryscan at L'Immagine Ritrovata, Bologna, Italy.
Color Correction / Restoration
Color Correction and Restoration on Baselight at Deluxe, London, UK.
References:
2. Nightmare City and the limits of restoration featurette included on the Blu-ray.
Licensed by Variety Communications, Italy. (1)
FPS: 23.976
Aspect Ratio: 1.78
Region: A
Film
2010 Interpositive from the 16mm Original Camera Negative. (2)
Transfer
No official information but it's clearly a Telecine.
Color Correction / Restoration
Color Correction and Restoration at Heavy Light Digital, New York, US. (3)
Zombie Holocaust was transferred in HD from the Original Negative in Italy to .DPX files. These were shipped on hard drive to Pinewood Studios where they were conformed, the overcut splices were removed, graded, stabilized and extensive automated and hand clean up was performed. No Noise reduction was performed at any stage of this process. The English and Italian audio was transferred to 24 bit .wav and synced up in Pinewood. H264 Compression was at a constant bit rate of 35Mbps to achieve optimal quality. (1)
Licensed by Variety Communications, Italy. (2)
FPS: 23.976
Aspect Ratio: 1.85
Region: B
Film
2-perf 35mm (Techniscope) Original Camera Negative. (3)
Transfer
2K Telecine at Eurolab, Rome, Italy. (4)
- At least one scene is sourced from the old LVR Video Telecine.
Color Correction / Restoration
Color Correction and Restoration at Pinewood Studios, London, UK.
- This release has quite a huge grain structure which is normal since 2-perf (2.35) film stock was used to shoot this 1.85 movie. Basically, the left and right side of the exposed film was discarded in order to get an aspect ratio of 1.85, then the film was scalled by about 28% in order to fill the height of the destination resolution which in this case is 1080p.
FPS: 23.976
Aspect Ratio: 2.35
Region: A
Film
2-perf 35mm (Techniscope) Original Camera Negative.
- The following 2 frames appear one after the other in the movie showing that at least 2 different elements were used to create this release.
Transfer
Telecine on a Cintel DSX at LVR Video, Rome, Italy. (1)
Color Correction / Restoration
No information.
References:
Contamination is presented in it's original aspect of 1.85:1 with mono sound.
Contamination has been exclusively restored in 2K resolution for this release by Arrow Films. The original camera negative was scanned in 2K resolution on a pin-registered Arriscan at L'Immagine Ritrovata, Bologna. The film was graded on the Baselight grading system at Deluxe Restoration, London.
Thousands of instances of dirt, debris and light scratches were removed through a combination of digital restoration tools. Image stability and density fluctuation issues were also improved. (1)
FPS: 23.976
Aspect Ratio: 1.85
Region: A+B/1+2
Film
35mm Original Camera Negative.
Transfer
Pin-registered 2K Scan on an Arryscan at L'Immagine Ritrovata, Bologna, Italy.
Color Correction / Restoration
Color Correction and Restoration on Baselight at Deluxe, London, UK.
References:
1. Page 18-19 of included booklet.
The film was sourced from the original Techniscope 2-perf 35mm negative made available by Variety Communications, Italy. The pictures was scanned at 2K resolution and fully graded on a Nucoda Film Master at Deluxe Soho, London.
Restoration work was completed in 1080Psf HD resolution using a combination of software tools and techniques. Thousands of instances of dirt, scratches and debris were carefully removed frame by frame. Damaged or missing frames were repaired, and density and stability issues were significantly improved. Throughout the process, care was taken to ensure that the film's original details and grain structure remained unaffected by digital processing. Although every effort has been made to present Zombie Flesh Eaters at the highest quality possible, some minor picture issues remain, in keeping with the condition of the original materials.
Lastly, working from the original 2-perf negative has allowed for access to the entire exposed image area of the film, so we have chosen to retain as much of the original frame area possible for this restoration. (1)
FPS: 23.976
Aspect Ratio: 2.35
Region: B
Film
2-perf 35mm (Techniscope) Original Camera Negative.
Transfer
2K Pin-registered Scan at Technicolor, Italy. (2)
Color Correction / Restoration
Color Correction and Restoration on Nucoda Film Master at Deluxe, London, UK.
Encoding by Crawford Media Services, Atlanta, US. (3)
Note that all Arrow Video's Zombie Flesh Eaters Blu-ray releases offers that same encode (FCD704, FCD704B, FCD705).
References:
1. Page 39 of included booklet.
2. PM from Arrow Video.
3. Slate at the end of credits.
