Kung Fu - Season 1 (March 16th) is not OAR - Page 6

David Stone · 06-26-2004, 04:54 PM

I would have bought it also so that makes two additional sales. Anyone else?

Make that 3, 4 & 5 here. (Myself plus two friends that I warned in time about the incorrect hard-matting.)

I simply cannot enjoy any film that has been incorrectly hard-matted to fit a 16:9 screen. I feel a sort of couch-like road rage when I see tops of heads (especially the friggin eyes) matted out of top of the frame.

Randy A Salas · 06-26-2004, 05:58 PM

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I think the decision to mix K.F. in DD 5.1 was a bit daft- why not just mix it in mono, with the centre only?

I'm not sure what you're talking about. The R1 DVD is mono.

JohnSmith · 06-26-2004, 06:09 PM

My mistake (just played back on PC as Dolby Digital Mono)..but it DOES say 5.1 Logic 7, and 3/2.1 but only from centre. Strange.

MattHR · 06-26-2004, 08:38 PM

I still don't understand Warner's explanation for why "Kung Fu" was released matted. Were there fans of "Kung Fu" campaigning for a matted version? They said it's a "title-by-title" decision. Does that mean there will be more MAR shows coming? Why did they not matte "Dukes of Hazzard" or "Wonder Woman"? Will "Dallas" be matted? I just can't figure out their logic.

Warner has otherwise been one of the best studios when it comes to OAR and transfer quality.

Jeff® · 06-26-2004, 09:23 PM

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I just can't figure out their logic.

I don't think that there is any logic. They probably just wanted to test the idea and this series unfortunately was the one which was victimized. But why this one was selected - who knows.. I'm curious to find out what they will do to season 2, and if season 2 is not franken-widescreen-ized, will that mean that they realize that they made a mistake, leading to a re-issue of the first season in it's proper aspect ratio.

Jeff

Randy A Salas · 06-26-2004, 10:22 PM

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There is no precedent for Warner to offer separate TV DVDs of the same title with their aspect ratios as the only difference--as there is with the film side.

I wanted to amend this earlier statement by me. I was just watching the upcoming DVD of Justice League: Starcrossed the Movie, and it offers a choice between full-screen (OAR) and a widescreen presentation that has been cropped (hard-matted, like Kung Fu) and enhanced for 16x9 displays. Now, that's not a separate release--it's all on one disc--but I believe it is the first time that the TV DVD division of Warner Home Video has offered that choice.

Keep in mind that Starcrossed is just a feature cobbled together from three episodes. There's room on one disc to offer the choice between presentations. A complete-season set for something like Kung Fu would be much more daunting because of the amount of material to be duplicated and the number of discs involved.

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They probably just wanted to test the idea and this series unfortunately was the one which was victimized.

I think that's exactly what happened, based on Warner's statement about Kung Fu.

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But why this one was selected - who knows..

I think it was just the timing. The series had been newly transferred for HDTV broadcasts, and the property was hot after Kill Bill.

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I'm curious to find out what they will do to season 2

So am I. I would say it depends on if the entire run of Kung Fu was transferred for HDTV at once, or if just the first season was done. If the former, it would seem likely that Season 2 will be modified, too, when it hits DVD.

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if season 2 is not franken-widescreen-ized, will that mean that they realize that they made a mistake, leading to a re-issue of the first season in it's proper aspect ratio.

I'd be amazed if that ever happened. Kung Fu sold incredibly well, but not enough that re-releasing an OAR presentation will sell enough to merit the costs, time and energy.

Broken record...

george kaplan · 06-26-2004, 11:52 PM

You're probably right Randy, but I for one am not going to buy Season 2 (even if it is OAR) since I don't have Season 1. So, frankly, unless they redo season 1 OAR (which I'll concede is unlikely), they'll continue to lose sales on following seasons, at least from people like me.

Rick P · 06-27-2004, 01:16 AM

Randy - FYI the 'Justice League' discs...

the people that actually produced the JL series WANTED it in LBX, and Visually COMPOSED it for LBX. Cartoon Network WANTED the full screen version (guess they think kids watch cartoons). The producers finally got them to accept showings BOTH ways. Rather than pan/scan the LBX version they did the animation equivalent of 'open matte' to make the 4:3 version..

the LBX is the OAR and 'director/producers choice'.

ADDENDUM.. you can find a little more info here http://jl.toonzone.net/widescreen/widescreen.htm

and this-

"There has been some debate, however, on whether or not these widescreen airings of Justice League are considered the “true” version of the show. Some people believe that the version preferred by the creative team is the right one, while others believe that the version showing the most picture is correct. Ultimately it is a matter of personal preference, but Justice League producer Bruce Timm had this to say on the matter:

"Please watch the letterbox airing! It was a major battle to get Cartoon Network to agree to a regularly scheduled widescreen airing. We prepared the show with the widescreen ratio in mind—in anticipation of HDTV—and we feel the show just plain looks better that way: the compositions are tighter, more focused, etc. It also helps give the show that “epic movie” look we were trying to achieve. Certainly the full-frame version works well too, [but] we just prefer the widescreen version. If the ratings just plummet for the widescreen airings, I guess Cartoon Network will just stop airing ‘em that way. The best of all possible worlds would be for folks to watch the show both ways, but I realize that’s a lot to ask!"

Randy A Salas · 06-27-2004, 10:47 AM

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Randy - FYI the 'Justice League' discs...

the people that actually produced the JL series WANTED it in LBX, and Visually COMPOSED it for LBX. Cartoon Network WANTED the full screen version (guess they think kids watch cartoons). The producers finally got them to accept showings BOTH ways. Rather than pan/scan the LBX version they did the animation equivalent of 'open matte' to make the 4:3 version..

Rick, thanks for providing the info. I thought something like this was up but hadn't take the time to track down all the particulars. I appreciate your doing so.

But here's the funny thing: The DVD is not open matte at all. Despite the wording on the DVD package (the same as Kung Fu, implying a hard-matted letterbox presentation), JL: Starcrossed clearly shows more image in the widescreen version:

(These are resized and heavily compressed to reduce the burden on HTF. Please don't use these to judge image quality.)

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"There has been some debate, however, on whether or not these widescreen airings of Justice League are considered the “true” version of the show. Some people believe that the version preferred by the creative team is the right one, while others believe that the version showing the most picture is correct.

So what to make of the JL DVD? The widescreen version shows the most picture here. So did Warner crop the widescreen image to create the full-screen image for the DVD?

To bring this back to Kung Fu, JL: Starcrossed isn't a good comparison anymore because of the differences in its MAR and OAR images--unlike Kung Fu, which was obviously cropped to create the faux widescreen presentation. Kung Fu also is lacking any creative vision behind its presentation, unlike JL: Starcrossed; KF seems to have been modified merely at the studio's whim.

Rick P · 06-27-2004, 02:44 PM

Well... isn't that special? Looks like the DVD Production managed to screw up? Instead of taking the OPEN MATTE masters and the WIDESCREEN masters to make the disc.. they cropped the WIDESCREEN? If you look back at the link I gave, they show shots that CLEARLY show the full frame version SHOULD be open matte.

That's something that warrants investigation.... David? Gord?

Jeff Jacobson · 06-27-2004, 02:48 PM

But here's the funny thing: The DVD is not open matte at all. Despite the wording on the DVD package (the same as Kung Fu, implying a hard-matted letterbox presentation), JL: Starcrossed clearly shows more image in the widescreen version

I read that only the first season of JL was shot 4:3, open-matte. The rest were shot at 16:9. (I think I got this info from an article on toonzon