I just got the new Weta newsletter, which is online here. (If you don’t get it regularly via email, you can sign up.) It features a new environment, the tower of Orthanc. Tolkien described Orthanc vividly in the book–more so than most of the other places where major events occurred. Alan Lee caught the description perfectly in his original book-jacket painting and the design he later did for the film based on that painting. Pre-orders start on July 31.

The newsletter also contains a link to the first part of an article by David Tremont, the designer of the Orthanc environment. He’s a senior model maker at Weta.

This would be a good opportunity to mention the new Gandalf statue recently announced. It’s not in the newsletter, but check it out on the Weta site. And for me, the most interesting new offer, a collector’s guide listing all the collectibles created by Weta Workshop over the past decade (including those done in co-partnership with Sideshow Collectibles). This includes items made for other films, of course, and the Dr. Grordbort’s weapons series. So now there is a book that is, in a way, about the franchise and yet part of the ongoing franchise itself.

Bill Hunt over at Digital Bits has a lengthy review of the forthcoming Blu-ray box of the extended version of the trilogy (due out June 28). It’s mainly a lengthy description, going disc by disc, with comments on the visual quality. For example:

The most important thing to know here is that the HD image quality for this film is vastly improved from the theatrical Blu-ray. It’s actually a new presentation, remastered from the film’s original 2K digital files. In fact, it’s breathtaking. There are significant gains in fine detail and overall contrast. The image is delicately textured and refined. You can actually see the very light grain structure of the image, which results in a far less digital and far more film-like presentation. Contrast is excellent, with deep, true blacks. Colors are pleasing too, though it’s worth noting that the color timing for these films has been redone. I’ve confirmed with production-related sources that Jackson and cinematographer Andrew Lesnie were directly involved in all decisions related to this new transfer and approved it personally. So to the extent that there are changes to the color-timing, they were made at Jackson and Lesnie’s direction–the films look exactly as they want them to.

And so on. Very helpful if you’re still deciding whether to acquire yet another set of discs of the trilogy. As I’ve already pointed out, the supplements on this set are the same as the ones on the original extended-edition DVDs.

Variety has a story announcing upcoming concert tours in 2011, 2012, and 2013:

“The Lord of the Rings in Concert: The Fellowship of the Ring,” which had its American preem in Gotham in 2009, will play a handful of states in the western U.S. beginning in Glendale, Ariz.

Film will be projected on a 60-foot screen while the Munich Symphony Orchestra, Pacific Chorale and the Phoenix Boys Choir — all conducted by Ludwig Wicki — performs the movie’s score.

Tour kicks off a three-year program that will see a similar live-music version of the trilogy’s other two films, “The Two Towers” and “The Return of the King,” hit the road in 2012 and 2013, respectively. Tours are timed to the 10th anniversaries of the releases of the three films.

The story does not give a complete list of the concert venues for Fellowship, but they will include  San Diego, Las Vegas, Anaheim, Seattle, and, as mentioned above, Glendale.

[Added the same day: Here’s the official website and schedule.]

[More on the same day: Loyal reader Mary Norton tells me she attended a concert screening of The Fellowship of the Ring, with Ludwig Wicki conducting, at Wolf Trap on May 22, 2008, which would mean that the 2009 premiere date given by Variety is incorrect. Which probably means the press release is incorrect; that’s most likely where Variety got that info. Thanks, Mary!]

I don’t post announcements about every single licensed product that expands the LOTR franchise. Still, with news rather slow lately, I’ll point out that Sideshow (which during the making and release of the trilogy partnered with Weta Workshop to make collectible figures) has just opened pre-orders for its “Gollum Premium Format” statue.

The fact that Weta and Sideshow both continue to produce high-end collectibles presumably shows how much demand there still is for such things.

Even with The Hobbit looming on the horizon, the Lord of the Rings franchise marches on. Weta has just released a new art print, “Disturber of the Peace.” It’s a “long shot” view of The Hill, where Bag End is located, and the fields beyond. Gandalf is just arriving at the gate, adding a hint of trouble to come into the peaceful scene. (If you don’t already receive Weta’s newsletter, you can sign up for it at the bottom of the page.)

The original on which the print is based was painted by Ben Wootten, who was one of the main designers at Weta Workshop during the production of LOTR, though he went freelance about five years ago. Back in the very early days of my research on The Frodo Franchise, I made my first visit to Wellington to conduct interviews. That was October, 2003. Among the earliest interviews was the first of two conversations with Richard Taylor. Not only was he incredibly cooperative (as were all the team members I interviewed), but he had asked Daniel Falconer and Ben to join us. Needless to say, it was a wonderful and fruitful interview, providing lots of information and quotations I used in the book. more »

So far I have not managed to catch up with any of the live performances of Howard Shore’s music accompanying a projection of one of the parts of the LOTR trilogy. This review of a performance of Fellowship at the Sydney Opera House, of all places, makes me wish I had been there for this one. I had the pleasure of taking a tour of the Opera House during my first visit to Australia way back in 1985, but I’ve never seen anything performed there. What a venue it would be for the film!

I’ve always been curious as to how the audience hears the dialogue and sound effects of the film with a live orchestra playing away in the foreground. This particular performance used subtitles, and maybe others do as well. Anyway, these concerts/screenings are all part of the franchise as it continues to exist and delight fans. Maybe someday I’ll see–and hear–one.

TheOneRing.net has announced that in June there will be theatrical screenings of the three extended versions of the LOTR trilogy. These will be one-time-only screenings as opposed to regular runs. They’re playing in AMC theaters in major cities. To check if there’s one near you, search on something like “AMC Fellowship of the Rings Director’s Cut Event.”

FOTR will play on June 14, TTT on June 21, and ROTK on June 28. That’s all we know so far.

This is a surprising announcement, since up to now there have been no 35mm prints of the extended ROTK. Those of you who remember Trilogy Tuesday will know that we saw the extended versions of the first two films, on 35mm film, and the premiere of the theatrical version of ROTK. (FOTR and TTT played for a week each in 35mm extended versions, as a lead-up to the release of ROTK.)

It seems odd that that many 35mm prints (which cost thousands of dollars each to make) would be struck for a single screening. AMC is notorious for its lack of attention to good projection. (The last time I tried to watch a film in an AMC house, the projection was so bad that my husband and I asked for our money back, and I haven’t patronized that multiplex since.) I wonder if they’re just showing the DVDs, or perhaps 2K digital prints that were struck off the DVD masters. If either of these scenarios is the case, then this isn’t quite such a big deal as it might seem.

Russell Hammond, writing on The Digital Bits website has gathered some invaluable information on the tech specs for the forthcoming Blu-ray extended LOTR box set.

First, for those unfamiliar with digital recording technology, let me quote from Film Art: An Introduction, a textbook my husband David Bordwell and I wrote together:

Digital recording capacities are measured in pixels (short for “picture elements”), the tiny dots that make up the electronic image on TVs and monitors. There are now four commonly used levels of resolution in professional digital recording: 720p, 1080p, 2K, and 4K. Since the information carried on each image increases both vertically and horizontally, each stop up multiples the resolution: 4K carries not twice, but four times the amount of information as 2K.

Here’s what Hammond has learned about the resolution for the LOTR Blu-ray release:

We’ve confirmed that 2K was the resolution of the final post-production/editorial master for the film. So unless and until someone goes in and rescans all the film elements at higher resolution, then rebuilds the edit and re-renders all the visual effects at the higher resolution, 2K is the highest resolution element available to master a Blu-ray from.

What this means is that the filmmakers would have to go back and do much of the huge post-production process again to get to 4K images. (I suspect that the sound would not have to be re-done.) This is obviously not feasible, either financially or logistically. (Much of the team who would have to do the work are currently working on the first Tintin movie and presumably now The Hobbit as well.) Since the Blu-ray captures LOTR as it was made and shown in theaters, I suspect not too many fans will object. (Besides, if you were watching a digitally projected copy of LOTR in a theater, if you sat further back than the sixth row, your eye wouldn’t be able to detect the difference between 2K and 4K.)

Perhaps of more concern are the supplements, which were shot on video cameras to begin with. Hammond explains why all the supplements will be in the DVD rather than the Blu-ray format. (In the following, HD stands for high definition and SD for standard definition.)

Surely they were shot in HD? And the answer is no, they weren’t. We’ve confirmed that all of the material was shot in 16X9 SD and the finished documentaries were in that resolution and aspect ratio. What’s more, the Costa Botes documentaries were 4X2 letterboxed SD. You have to remember, from post-production to finished DVDs, this material was produced in the 1989-2003 timeframe. The HD transition had ony just begun, and studios weren’t in the habit of paying for HD behind-the-scenes material yet.

Hammond says that it wasn’t until about 2005 that the studios saw HD televisions coming down the pike and decided to pay extra for better-looking video for the supplements. So what you will get if you buy the Blu-ray extended set will be what those documentaries originally looked like, and I for one have no complaints about that.

Finally, Hammond says that “The set will include a collectible map of Middle Earth [sic], and the booklets for each film will include a chapter listing and guide to all the extras.”

For more details, check out Hammond’s article here.

[Many thanks to Lee Tsiantis of Turner Classic Movies for alerting me to this fascinating entry!]

The Blu-ray edition of LOTR now has a release date: June 28. You can read the entire press release on TheOneRing.net. As I noted in an earlier entry, there are no new supplements, though plenty of old ones.

Amazon has opened pre-orders for the Blu-ray edition of The Lord of the Rings. It includes the extended editions, along with their original supplements, along with the three Costa Botes behind-the-scenes documentaries that previously have only been available as part of the “Original Theatrical and Extended Limited Edition.” As is now customary, the set includes a digital copy of the film, though only online, for those who want to watch the trilogy on a very small screen. The new set will be called the “Limited Extended Edition [Blu-ray].” The Amazon page has a convenient chart that allows the prospective purchaser to compare the features of all the complete boxed sets of the trilogy issued so far. In short, the difference between this set and those you probably already own is that the visuals will be sharper and clearer. We still await the “ultimate” set.

No date is given for the release of the new set, and the number of discs involves is TBA.