Why I think BluRay may be the future for CD-based music and HD video content... (1 Viewer)

[James Morrow]

Thanks John, and the more I look into AOD/HD-DVD, the less I like it. ...in the words of another John, "you cannot be serious!.." Then again, look what happened to Elcassette and then Betamax in the consumer world... I don't think that the MGM thing has gone through yet, but if it does it will certainly give BD a shot in the arm and current HD-DVD a kick in the pants.

 

[Michael St. Clair]

That's funny, with the Sony idiots pushing MPEG2 alone until recently, I have had a very, very hard time taking Blu-Ray seriously. Hopefully they get a clue on the audio aspect...

They should cancel the spruce goose of Hi-MD, and invest the savings of that inevitable loss into r&d and marketing of high-res audio for Blu-Ray...and also to reconcile with the HD-DVD group.

Sony has at least given me some hope with this latest news...I've got my fingers crossed...I'd also love to see a new high-res audio push and no video format war.

 

[Marc Colella]

I heard/read that Sony missed their window to make the acquisition (not sure how that works) and that Warner was back in the hunt. This could be interesting.
Can't remember where I heard/read that though.

 

[John Kotches]

Lee,

Would you mind telling us about the artifacts with MPEG-2 running the same bandwidth and resolution (8 Mb/second and 1080p)?

The fact that 1080p can be encoded with WM9 to a point where the discussion is on artifacts means that the codec is doing an awfully good job, even when starved for bandwidth.

Cheers,

 

[Michael St. Clair]

1080i MPEG2 is a complete joke at 15mbps, forget 8mbps.

(My local PBS and CBS throttles their HD to 15mbps for subchannels and WebHopper...the resulting picture quality is a joke, and I'd rather watch a good 480p DVD with no discernable artifacts)

Anybody who watches a lot of broadcast Hi-Def and has a critical eye knows that even the full broadcast 19.2mbps bitrate isn't sufficient for the most demanding 1080i...throw in some strobe lights and some smoke/fog (concert footage, anyone), and the ugly spectre of DCT blocking rears its head...

It is true that the only fair direct comparison is between codecs when they are running at the same bitrate...

 

[James Morrow]

So MPeg2 is state of the ark - we knew that, and WM9 has transparency and three-dimensionality issues at 8Mbps - hardly surprising. But given that we have access to at least three times that bandwidth on Blu-ray and HD-DVD, how does WM9 perform with 1080p at around twenty to thirty Mbps? I.e., does it show increased transparency and three-dimensionality, or has it been optimised purely for low data-rates at the expense of failing to address remaining artifacts at, say, 24Mbps? ...and how does the best current MPeg4 compare at 24Mbps? Is anyone actually optimising a codec for 1080p at 24Mbps - i.e. trying to maximise the HD quality available from blue-laser based discs? As 50GB BD using a 72Mbps head and disc could still provide around three hours of high definition at 32Mbps, has anyone tried optimising for that, and how does it compare with 24Mbps? Note that quad-layer 100GB discs are due in 2006 (with 100GB Professional Discs for Data [PDDs] due in 2007).

By the way, Sony are still in discussion with MGM, and appear to be the only ones at the moment prepared to offer around $5 billion - apparently they're still trying to get the finance in place. :frowning:

 

[PhilBoy]

Has anyone done codec comparisons with 720p ?

I expect DLP technology is going to revolutionize the display market and the near future. DMD's are a native 720p (at a consumer affordable level). Is this not high enough for HD ?...

Instead of downconverting, deinterlacing, digital to anolog, analog back to digital conversion (and their inherent artifacts along the way), why not focus on 720p as the BD, AOD, HD-DVD standard ?

1080p is too high a resolution for the constraints of broadcast bandwidth allotment. Even with newer codecs, a lossy compression, no matter how efficient, will have to eliminate a lot of the original information in order to make it fit.

Eventually 1080p displays will be affordable, but in order to realize the full bandwidth, they will have to bring out the Super High Definition Video Disc ( I'll call it SHoDy for short ).

Why don't we all focus on a realistic managable resolution and get this thing off the ground........

 

[John Kotches]

James,

The sweet spot for WM9 at 1080i is around 12-15 Mbits/second. I'm not sure what the sweet spot is for 1080p. Above the sweet spot, you won't get much in the way of improvements in picture quality.

MPEG-2 for 1080i is about 20-25 Mbits/second, again I don't know the figure for 1080p with MPEG-2.

HD-DVD doesn't need the storage space as a movie distribution format, assuming you are using WM-9 or MPEG-4. Both are provisionally accepted the last I heard for HD-DVD pending licensing cost information.

The only technical advantage Blu-ray has at this point is raw storage space. Should they adopt a more advanced video codec, then it's another matter altogether.

Cheers,

 

[John Kotches]

Philboy,

Why compromise from the start, when 1080p is where things are headed?

1080p RPTVs are coming to market, 1080p FPTVs are introduced. They will only get cheaper over time.

I would much rather have the format be ahead of the technology curve in the short term, than starting behind it from the start.

Just my opinion though!

Cheers,

 

[PhilBoy]

John,

True 1080p would be the ultimate, but is it managable ?

Compression constraints of broadcast and optical drives and DRM overhead will make 1080p over-compressed.

It seems like putting a Vette engine in an Echo...

Is there not a point of diminishing return ?

 

[Lee Scoggins]

I have not but the 720 displays in the Samsung room at HE2004 were quite good. Joe Kane was showing some material here as well and said some nice things about it. I think he would add to this discussion that often we don't see what each format is capable of due to deficiencies in the color accuracy and other parameters of the display device and the quality of film screen.

 

[John Kotches]

Lee,

Ok, now tell me Tom's opinion of MPEG-2 delivering 1080p at 8Mbits/second. Artifacts? It would be more like digging for an image within all the artifacts. You're providing less than half the story when you discuss artifacts in WM9 without comparing it to MPEG-2 at the same bit rate.

1080p @ 8 Mbits/second is at the very edge of WM9s encoding capability, so the artifacts are not at all surprising. Any codec pressed to its limits is going to exhibit artifacts, and I'm sorry that the subtlety of my point escaped you.

Let me be a little more clear this time.

If you compared MPEG-2 vs. WM9 @ 8 Mbits/second, you'd see a much larger breakdown from MPEG-2. Heck, MPEG-2 has issues with 1080i @ 19Mbits/second. At less than half that rate for 1080p, it will be substantially worse.

BTW, the 1080p material you saw was scripted demo material, so I'm sure it looked amazing. Every manufacturer shows their products under as ideal conditions as feasible for a show. There's nothing wrong with that, but you do need to bear that in mind.

Cheers,

 

[Lee Scoggins]

John, you don't need to be condescending. I'm a veteran audio/video show goer and I am well aware of the use of the best possible source material. In spite of this, it was quite clear that 1080P is something special.

You have previously stated that you want the best possible codec. That's all I am fighting for here.

If WM9 can do as well as the best possible MPEG formats, except maybe for some minor differences, then I think BluRay may do well.

My hope is that a compromise is reached and we avoid a format war.

 

[John Kotches]

Philboy asks:


Of course, but why set the bar low for the next generation of optical media's video performance?

Perosnally, I'd prefer "room to grow", but that's just my opinion.

Cheers,

 

[PhilBoy]

Alrighty then, 1080p 24fps it is.

I suppose with DRM the movie folk may allow it.

Since 1080p 24 fps is studio master quality anyway, we can let the 720p displays simply downconvert it onboard and loose nothing that we would have had with a 720p Blu release.

I'm in...

 

[John Milton]

I haven't seen anything displayed at 1080p but I can imagine it looking pretty incredible. However all this discussion is overplayed IMO. Does anyone actually think there's a realistic chance of Blu-ray or HD-DVD supporting 1080p resolution? I highly doubt we'll get better than 1080i but if I'm wrong let me know so I can start saving for a 1080p HDTV.

 

[John Kotches]

John,

1080i would work, but given the track record with DVD-Video and proper flagging I'm not holding out hope that this round gets done correctly from the start

Cheers,

 

[Lee Scoggins]

Well 1080i looks damn good...plus you have projectors like the Sony Qualia that upconvert to 1080P. That is what I saw at HE2004. Upconversion or not, it was like being at the studio during filming. The Spiderman 2 trailer was incredible. The special effect were so consistent they seemed more real. I could see no artifacts at all. Color rendition was dead accurate. Flesh tones were natural.

SXRD and other technologies will allow for 1080i at increasingly lower price points over time.

 

[James Morrow]

...but don't forget that the studio master is captured at 1080p24, and it makes a lot more sense to have progressive data on the HD disc and convert it on output to interlaced /720p if required. Note that a lot of manufacturers are demoing 1080p displays now, as interlace is always a compromise.

When Sony started working on it in the sixties, the whole point of high definition was to achieve similar image quality in the home to that achieved by 35mm film in cinemas after it has gone through capture, developing, copying and projection. The baseline measured then was around 2k by 1k pixels - of course, film has advanced significantly since then.

I'm glad were talking 1080p rather than 720p, as although 720 lines is much better than NTSC's 640 by 480, it is not quite as impressive compared to PAL's 768 by 576 (apart from the 50Hz flicker on a CRT), and is much the same as the original 800 line SECAM system (1024 by 768). Its major advantage over these systems is being progressive and 16 by 9 format.

Also, of course, 1080p24 is one of the standard HD resolutions, and involves less data than 1080i60, etc.. As the next generation discs can easily handle 20Mbps or so, it makes sense to look for codecs optimised for this level of compression. For example, if WM9 1080p24 appeared stable, transparent and three-dimensional at 8Mbps - like a (clean) window, that'd be great, but it doesn't. It's only by being critical and identifying where a codec is failing that we'll get improvements.

HD on WM9 appears to be extremely impressive at 8Mbps, but with three times that bandwidth available on BD etc., we have the right to expect significantly more realism and vibrancy - its only major failings at 8Mbps. Obviously MPeg2 is eighties technology and at data-rates below 20Mbps likes to thrust DCTs in your face at every opportunity, but as the 1080p24 standard has been defined and most of the manufacturers are converging on that (with 1080i/720p outputs readily achieved for early adopters), I feel that it would make a lot of sense to compare WM9, variants of MPeg4, etc., using the same 10780p24 source material at rates between 20 and 30Mbps. :star:

 

[Lee Scoggins]

That's good news but will we see the corresponding software with this much resolution?