Pointless releases for HD DVD/BD (1 Viewer)

[Shane Martin]

5th that!

 

[Stephen_J_H]

And I, for one, support this idea. I just don't want to see something touted as "now in High Definition" when it isn't going to look any better. To me, that kind of marketing is no better than the 3rd party cheapies who would ride on the coattails of Disney with lookalike releases.

 

[Tino]

I say release everything in HI-DEF and let us decide whether they are worthy purchases.

Ya know, no one is forcing you to buy these titles. And I seriously doubt that a HD release is NOT going to look better than an SD release of the same film.

 

[Peter Overduin]

I will disagree.

Particularly in what is a format war; it seems to me that all efforts should be expended on releasing those titles that best display the HD format be it HD DVD or BD.

I relaize that no one is forcing me to buy anything, however, certain films - like art - are better suited to a particular display. The Louvre will not display my daughter's art because, well, it is bad art even if I as her dad like it. The movies in the poster's initial comments are examples of bad art and do not merit a HD release over many other films that, not only merit the HD treatment but would in fact pave the way for more general release to HD of more films as consumers buy the hardware to play them.

So, no...as a matter of fact; every movie should NOT be released to the hi def format, esp at this point and time. Just my opinion of course

 

[ppltd]

And there is the problem. The quality of art is strictly in the eye of the beholder. What is bad art to you, may be what some consider good art. Release the movies in HD and let the buyers make their own determination.

As a side note, I am not one who consider movies anything more than entertainment. I will let the Ivy Leauge critics box it out on whether or not film is art, and sit back and enjoy getting lost in the film.

 

[Tino]

A completely subjective opinion that is not shared by all. Like Thomas said, art is in the eye of the beholder, and although I wear glasses, I can still see reasonably well.

I'll say it again, release them all and let us decide.

 

[Stephen_J_H]

I'm not even talking about the quality of the art; I'm talking about the choices that directors and cinematographers made when putting a film together. It is a waste of disc space to tout something as "Now In High Definition" when it clearly isn't. The closest comparison I can find is colorization, because it's something the original makers never intended. We can argue all we want about how "if such-and-such a process had been available, they would have used it," but such arguments are vain. Borat was shot on DV because the creative team knew it would give it the look of a low-budget Khazakhstani newscast. Open Water was shot on DV for budgetary reasons and portability (helluva lot easier to shoot out on the sea and be invisible to the audience when you have tiny cameras). Dogme 95 stipulated as one of its rules that films were to be shot on DV because of the immediacy of the format. Out of respect to artists' rights, these films should be released in their intended formats, because that's what proper home theatre presentation should be about. Borat is not going to be improved by Dolby TrueHD or lossless PCM 7.1, or by upscaling to 1080p, so why bother.


*Gets off soapbox*

 

[Tino]

So you are saying that these films will look exactly the same in 480p as they would in 720p or 1080I??

 

[Tino]

BTW, I don't want anyone deciding what warrants an HD release for any reason. How is it hurting you?

 

[TravisR]

How often has this happened?

 

[ChristopherDAC]

If the picture was made on DV, it's 480i at 29.94 frames per second, and that's that. The process of printing out to film at 24 frames per second produces some changes in the images, as do the further processes of scanning the film and (for most displays) converting the framerate once again to 30 or 60 fps ; although some of the changes in the video-to-film process may be classified as "artistic effects", in general, they are simply degradations.

The original 480i element will look about the same on your HDTV whether it is upscaled at the studio or in your home. If it is upscaled to 1080p in the studio and then downscaled in your home to 1080i, 720p, some computer scanrate, or possibly one of the 480s, the excess processing will probably cause it to look worse than if everything had been done as one step.

I'm not interested in saying which motion-pictures don't "deserve" a High Definition release due to "artistic" issues, but there are some pictures, and quite a bit of television material, which can't have a real HD release. I object to the creation of fake HD releases for these pictures. If I recall, the Criterion Mr. Arkadin was assembled mostly from a PAL videotape…

From my perspective, this is an issue similar to that of OAR presentations. If something was shot on film and edited on video, by all means, recreate the edit-decision-lists and give me a real high-definition version, but if it was shot on video, leave it as it is.

 

[Stephen_J_H]

Yup.

 

[Stephen_J_H]

It hasn't.... yet, but it's just a matter of time. Borat has already been announced. FWIW, ChristopherDAC hit the nail on the head.

 

[Shawn Perron]

I hope that they release all real 480 material in a 480i/p format. There is so much bandwidth available that we could actually get an image whose quality rivaled the original 480i master.

 

[Stephen_J_H]

True, and with advanced codecs, we could potentially see TV series originated on videotape have season discs instead of season sets.

 

[TonyD]

lol thats funny.

i wish it would happen.

also in at least one br i have seen a slip that touts the benifits of br.

there is a little picture of 5 or 6 dvds pointing to 1 blu-ray.

saying all that can fit on 1 blu-ray.

make it happen.
what did the sets of the sopranos save 1 disc?
from the sd dvd sets.

 

[Tino]

All of them?

 

[MatthewA]

I was wondering whether instead of whole seasons of SD taped material on 1 disc, could whole seasons fit, if the VC-1 codec was used?

Hopefully we won't see the cropping of 4x3 shows for 16x9 on disc.

 

[TravisR]

Borat hasn't been announced. That news was incorrect.

 

[Stephen_J_H]

Every last one, and in some cases, as mentioned above, they'll look worse because they'll be upscaled for disc, processed through whatever equipment you may have, and if your display isn't 1080p, downscaled to the resolution of your screen. Ever seen a plasma display with the DVNR cranked to the max? Pretty wretched.