Video format of SD extras on European BDs

Bruce Morrison · 09-03-2008, 02:10 PM

I've seen today that 'Sophie Scholl' is to be released on Blu-ray in the UK in October; it will be all-region, and the SD extras will be in NTSC rather than PAL.

This has prompted a general question about BDs released in Europe. If a European BD contains extras presented in standard definition, are these usually in PAL? If so, I'm assuming that, even if the BD is not region-locked, my US BD player would not be able to play the extras properly as US players only understand NTSC in standard definition.

I fear that the 'Sophie Scholl' release might be an exception in this respect, athough it would be great if I'm wrong!

ccfixx · 09-03-2008, 02:17 PM

From my experience with European imports, most standard defiition features are in the PAL format, and, of course, do not play on my American PS3. The movies, if non-region coded, will play perfectly fine. I guess it's all dependent on the company releasing the disc and the disc's country of origin, though.

CC

AppleSpider · 09-03-2008, 09:07 PM

If the extras are indeed in NTSC, then you'll have no problem.
If you wait until after it's released and then check...
Rewind @ www.dvdcompare.net - The Home of DVD Comparisons
you should be able to find out if the extras are really NTSC.

I own a handful of European Blu-Rays, of them, only 4 have
standard def bonus features, and of those 4, 3 have
their extras in NTSC and play fine, the other has extras in PAL,
and the extras won't play at all.

Of the 3 that would play, 2 were German Discs and 1 was British.
The one that wouldn't play was also British.

Cees Alons · 09-04-2008, 03:55 AM

Most often, they take the US material they are provided with and only add new audio tracks (language) and/or subtitles. If they add bonus material themselves, it might be PAL.
If they use what they got, they don't bother converting it to PAL, because 95% of the European setups can handle NTSC fine, and that figure is probably 100% of HiDef setups.

Cees

Jari K · 09-04-2008, 07:30 AM

I believe most (not all, though*) European DVD and Blu-ray-releases have (SD) extras in NTSC-format. That´s the case at least with the "major studios". 1080i-based extras are also in 60i (so also US-players can play them).

In Europe, all DVD/Blu-ray-players and TV-sets support both PAL and NTSC, so "NTSC extras" are not a problem.

More of my comments in the "Hulk"-thread...
http://www.hometheaterforum.com/htf/...footage-3.html

*Some e.g. UK BD-releases from the "smaller companies" have extras in PAL-format and some rare titles (e.g. Spanish BD-release of "Rec (2007)" and Euro-releases of "Tiësto - Copenhagen: Elements of Life World Tour" music BD) have the actual film in "1080/50i" (=US-players support only "60i").

**HTF Ads**

Arild · 09-04-2008, 11:34 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jari K

I believe most (not all, though*) European DVD and Blu-ray-releases have (SD) extras in NTSC-format. That´s the case at least with the "major studios". 1080i-based extras are also in 60i (so also US-players can play them).

Hm? Maybe that is the case with Blu-Ray, but I have never, EVER seen a European released DVD with any NTSC content whatsoever.

Kris Z. · 09-04-2008, 01:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Arild

Hm? Maybe that is the case with Blu-Ray, but I have never, EVER seen a European released DVD with any NTSC content whatsoever.

I have. Tartan released an NTSC DVD of Battle Royale in the UK way back, possibly to aid importing as Toei refused to have the movie released in the US. Incidentally it was also the best English-language version for years, and maybe still is, as the PAL releases all had bad ghosting due to the conversion.

I agree though, it is very, very rare on DVD. It is true that most PAL TV sets also support 60Hz/NTSC modes, but it wasn't always like that, and the possibility of someone still using such a set means NTSC content on DVD might not be a great idea. It shouldn't be a problem with Blu-ray though.

Roger_R · 09-04-2008, 04:22 PM

Quote:

1080i-based extras are also in 60i (so also US-players can play them).

That's also because some Blu-ray players can't play back 50i/25p content correctly even though it's part of the specification.

I believe BBC converted Torchwood from 50i to 60i for the Blu-ray release because of that.

Kris Z. · 09-05-2008, 06:43 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Roger_R

I believe BBC converted Torchwood from 50i to 60i for the Blu-ray release because of that.

Planet Earth as well.

Jari K · 09-05-2008, 04:16 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Arild

Hm? Maybe that is the case with Blu-Ray, but I have never, EVER seen a European released DVD with any NTSC content whatsoever.

Are you sure about that (SD DVD, I mean)? I mean at least I don´t really "double check" whether the extras are in PAL or NTSC (since all my players* and TV-set support both PAL and NTSC - so it doesn´t really matter).

Note, that I´m talking about the extras, not the actual "film" (which is of course in PAL in most cases).

*Except my US PS3, which is "NTSC only"..

Arild · 09-05-2008, 09:44 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jari K

Are you sure about that (SD DVD, I mean)?

Yes. As was pointed out by another poster, there are exceptions but I personally have never seen a European DVD release containing NTSC format video, be it the main feature or the extras. And I do tend to notice these things.

Personally I think releasing a DVD for sale in Europe in NTSC format would be sloppy and lazy. True, pretty much all newer TVs can handle it but many older TVs can't. And either way, NTSC is not a European standard so using it here would be bad practice, IMO.