A few words about...™ Bram Stoker's Dracula -- in BD - Page 7

Ronald Epstein · 10-10-2007, 01:50 PM

I'm like a kid at Christmas.

I received my very first Blu-Ray player today

I christened my new player by immediately watching
Bram Stoker's Dracula.

Despite all the controversy in this thread regarding colors and
otherwise, I thought this film looked fantastic in high definition.

There was noticeable natural film grain but that didn't hamper
some of the scenes from looking absolutely breathtaking. I will
agree that black levels are very rich.

I also enjoyed the surround mix which is so much better than
what I have previously heard. I am certain this is due to the
increased bandwidth of Blu-Ray along with the fact I am using
a brand new Denon 3808 receiver with direct HDMI connections.

Very happy with the look of this film, and even moreso, I am
estatic about being part of the Blu-Ray membership here.

Kenneth Lee · 10-10-2007, 04:56 PM

Hey Ronald,

Congrats on your first Blu-Ray Player!

And "Thank You!" for your quick review of Dracula on Blu-Ray. Hearing it from you and RAH (and many others), I'm definitely excited about getting my copy of Dracula this week, and checking it out for myself.

Regardless of the result, I wanted to thank you for HTF! This has been a great, insightful thread (minus the Star Wars talk

).

Dave Mack · 10-10-2007, 08:21 PM

Indeed, Ron.
Congrats and welcome to neutral land!

d

RickER · 10-10-2007, 09:10 PM

Thanks for your thoughts Ron. I cant wait to see this thing myself. Waiting, and waiting for the mail. Curious why some people see the blacks as dark, deep and rich. Others see the blacks as washed out, no contrast, and with to much grain. Such a difference in our settings would be amazing.

Shane Martin · 10-10-2007, 09:49 PM

Quote:

I also enjoyed the surround mix which is so much better than
what I have previously heard. I am certain this is due to the
increased bandwidth of Blu-Ray along with the fact I am using
a brand new Denon 3808 receiver with direct HDMI connections.

You're hearing uncompressed audio my friend. There is no going back. I don't know if you had a LD player but it harkens back to those days when all we had for the longest time was uncompressed PCM audio.

Grant H · 10-10-2007, 10:09 PM

I'd consider buying this BD even with the new, digital color palette that goes against the red "the blood is the life" of prior versions, if this transfer wasn't so overly dark that it actually wipes out some of the optical effects and greatly obscures others. Even if you like the new colors and believe since someone with a high pay grade says this is the first correct version of the film in history, I don't know how you get past the fact that FX like Harker's writing superimposed over the image are completely lost (unless maybe you have your brigthness cranked or your setup doesn't produce blacks), other FX like the bottle dripping up could almost be overlooked, Elizabetha plummeting to her death in her note reads very poorly (I only knew what it was since I'd seen the movie before), pulsating walls are unnoticeable, and makeup and set details (like the hair on Drac's palms) can also go unnoticed.

I can buy that former versions were gamma's up past the original intent, but this new version is too dark. And maybe the original colors were more subtle than what we had on NTSC, but I don't believe the new version is indicative of the film's original intended look. I want the old-school horror film Dracula I saw in theaters, with organic colors and detailed blacks, as opposed to 21st century tweaked colors and a sea of black. Films (and HD releases) today seem preoccupied with how easily they'll render on a digital display (particularly digital-looking plasmas, LCDs, and DLPs), instead of looking like something projected in a cinema.

Those of you seeing grain in the BD (unless you're just talking about during optical dissolves where it can't help but be obvious) are surely running much larger displays than mine, but I can see film grain in many other films quite easily. So the fact I didn't notice any in what I expected to be a dark, grainy, detailed presentation is what surprised me so much. I expected a lot of gripes from the grain haters, but it just looked soft to me, like something shot digitally, on par with Once Upon a Time in Mexico maybe (same goes for color quality), not grainy.

Obviously, we've found a new film to polarize forum members (when Star Wars gets thrown into it in a big way you know that's happened), but not only do I not like this new version, I believe that even for what it is the transfer is flawed in that it was over-darkened to the point of destroying black detail.

Hopefully Sony will live up to their legend of releasing 3 or 4 versions of a film in a few years' time, and I'll eventually find an HD version I find worthy of buying.

Douglas Monce · 10-10-2007, 11:28 PM

I find it interesting that some of us seem to be seeing very different things with this release. Some of us are having trouble reading the text from the various diaries and some aren't.

I for one have no trouble seeing the text. I have my display calibrated using the Digital Video Essentials. The black level on my setup seems to be accurate based on the test patterns on that disc.

Doug

Dave H · 10-10-2007, 11:35 PM

I'm not trying to sound pompous or anything, but I think A LOT of this Dracula issue has to do with display types and more likely proper display calibration - and I'm not talking just basic user settings (brightness, color, contrast which can be done with the Sony BD patterns as the display should be calibrated to the source/player). I'm also talking proper gamma setting, grayscale, room lighting (or lack of), etc., etc.

After spending a second night with this release and going through a number of scenes, I am not finding this too dark at all. Yes, it is a darker movie, but not too dark. There is plenty of shadow detail and fades to rich blacks. The colors in many scenes just pop off the screen - even in some of the daytime scenes. There is fine film grain present throughout (some scenes more than others), but this disc definitely looks and feels "HD" and very filmlike.

While I don't have the Superbit by my side any longer for comparison, I watched it enough to remember that in comparison the gamma and coloring were overblown and overly-exaggerated in many shots, the print seemed to be dirty, and compression artifacts were still present - and the BD does have more detail and depth than the DVD despite it being a soft movie in general.

Now, Dracula certainly doesn't have anywhere near the razor sharp detail and resolution of something like Crank, King Kong, or Black Hawk Down (a few that come immediately to mind) for reasons previously discussed, but it is a beautiful looking transfer and clearly treated with care.

RickER · 10-12-2007, 10:35 AM

I got this in yesterday, watched it last night. I am watching on a 50" Toshiba Plasma. I have the Sony S300 Blu-ray player. The only calibration i have done is from one of those THX set up screens.

The disc looks great.

Dave H says it better than me, but my 2 cents.
Yes it is dark, no it does not lack detail. I still see color, just not the way it was on the SuperBit. You know the screen grab Dave Mack has of one of the vampire chicks? On my display it does not look like a bad make-up job. It looks like an undead vampire. I can see the overlapped letter too. Their are shots that all you can see is someones face in a sea of black, but those are very few. I see detail in most every shot. I see the hairy palms, the drop that falls up, i can see bouncing breasts... It HAS to be the types of displays, or the rooms. If i watched this movie in my living room, full of windows during the day i wouldnt see Jack!

I was very happy with this Blu-ray rental, so now i bought it.

Thanks again to Dave Mack, and Mr Harris.
I got the BD in the mail today, gonna watch it again tonight.

Carlo Medina · 10-14-2007, 11:26 PM

I just screened this, and here are my quick thoughts:

First of all, I saw this once in the theaters in 1992, hardly reliable memory.

Secondly, despite owning both the original and SB DVD, I have watched both probably a total of three times over the 10 years I've been in DVD.

Third, I just received my new Sony SXRD KDS-60A3000 and did some personal calibration on it (using test discs, patterns and my own eyeballing of settings) but I know it's not up to ISF snuff. That said, it's certainly not on torch mode since my last set was ISF'd by Michael Chen and I grew accustomed to looking at that kind of picture over the years.

All that aside: I have zero problems with the transfer.

This is not to negate anything either side has already said. I tried to go into it with fresh eyes. I haven't screened the SB DVD since the week I bought it (most likely on release week) several years ago. So my memory on this movie is not photographic (unlike say Star Wars OOT

).

Nothing jumped out at me as "wrong" or "incorrect". Yes it was different, I know this because Dave has provided ample proof of it. But while watching it on my PS3/SXRD setup, nothing screamed "this has been tampered with" or "this isn't how this scene is supposed to look".

Also, I got to watching quite a few of the extras. It really does seem that a lot of effort went into this disc and the supplements. I'd be really surprised is something subpar "slipped past" FFC (who was involved in the supplements I saw) or American Zoetrope.

Like I said, I'm not out to invalidate anyone else's opinion. My personal opinion, to my untrained eye (in all things Dracula) it looked (and sounded) exceptional.