King Kong (1933) Colorized: Kong vs. Planes in 4K 🏙️

Update on my remaster of Turner Home Entertainment's 1989 colorization of "King Kong"

Over the last few years after my intial colorization test of the T. rex fight, I've pursued the idea of reimagining Ted Turner's entire "King Kong in Color" in high definition using the 2K scan of the original black and white film in conjunction with a Laserdisc—the best version available—of Turner's team's work, which I had scanned to the highest fidelity possible using a Domesday Duplicator.

By meticulously lining up every shot between both versions of the film (a process which has taken me months), adding extra color dimension by layering (at very low-opacity) DeOldify's colorization of the material, adding motion blur and pan-and-scan for a "wider" aspect ratio (I lose a good amount of the original image from this—sorry), and upscaling to 4K using the Topaz Labs Video Enhance suite, I've created a fun new way to experience the film.

Since this process will still take months to complete, I wanted to share a seminal sequence of the film that I have fully completed.

Again, like I mentioned in my original colorization experiment back in 2023, this is by no means "better" than the original 1933 film's presentation. As an artist, technician, and fan of monster cinema, it's fun to play around with these creations to see what new joys can be conjured.

Until next time,

Nick