Refurbishing Blondie's Music Video Collection using Continuum Technology
Bill Randolph, a skilled video artist, recently undertook the task of remastering the full music video catalog of the legendary band, Blondie, fronted by Debbie Harry. Randolph's dedication to preserving the original integrity of the videos while enhancing their quality was evident in every frame.
Randolph put a significant amount of effort into making the videos look pristine. He used Continuum, a plugin suite by Boris FX, which he discovered during his research. The integrated Mocha planar tracking and masking in Continuum made the compositing process extremely easy for Randolph.
One of the challenges he faced was upscaling the videos from standard definition (SD) to high definition (HD) using an AI enhancement tool. However, this tool often introduced artifacts and flaws. To overcome this, Randolph utilized various image restoration tools from Continuum, such as BCC+DeBand, Flicker Fixer, and BCC+Beauty Studio.
Randolph's unique workflow involved rendering Debbie Harry's hair with aggressive AI settings, then her face with gentle AI settings. This approach resulted in a balanced and natural look for the videos. For instance, in the video for 'Heart of Glass,' he discovered a unique workflow using Continuum's AlphaKey effect for compositing.
In the dream-like video for 'Sound Asleep,' the Beauty Studio plugin was used to improve the unpleasant-looking results. Randolph avoided digital skin or make-up fixes on the upscaled videos to remain faithful to the original sources.
Randolph worked on the 23 videos in his spare time as a labor of love. His hard work paid off, as both Universal Music and the band's manager expressed their satisfaction with the results of the project. Randolph considers '(I'm Always Touched By Your) Presence, Dear' as his favorite video from the project.
Randolph has been using Continuum inside an Adobe-based workflow for about two years. However, the specific details about his workflow, such as the steps involved in importing footage, color correction, and exporting the restored videos, remain undisclosed.
If you're interested in learning more about Randolph's video restoration workflow, I suggest consulting interviews, tutorials, or official presentations directly from Bill Randolph or Boris FX.
Bill Randolph, in his home-and-garden office, spent countless hours on his technology-driven home-and-garden project – the remastering of Blondie's music video catalog – using data-and-cloud-computing tools like Continuum, merging lifestyle elements with advanced technology. The resulting videos, with their pristine quality and faithful preservation of the original source, showcased Randolph's seamless blend of traditional craftsmanship and modern techniques in the home-and-garden of video artistry.
