Will TV shows on DVD ever go to a high definition format

Re: Will TV shows on DVD ever go to a high definition format

Several shows is already released, like Smallville and Sopranos. and i bet X-files will see a release within 2 years

Re: Will TV shows on DVD ever go to a high definition format

Well, there are already seasons of Smallville and The Sopranos out on HD DVD and BD, and Universal has all-but-announced Heroes and Galactica for HD DVD release. There's been rumors of 24 and Lost too.

I think it'll be a bit slow, though - adoption of the HD disc formats has been pretty sluggish and those relatively pricey boxed sets appeal to a smaller segment of a the niche audience. There's also little evidence that anyone will re-buy TV series; the only example I can think of where a show got a new edition for anything other than slimmer packages is Star Trek, and that's a special case.

I wouldn't be terribly surprised to see Fox start to put some of their more evergreen titles out sometime this year, though. They release on BD, and they have a number of titles that might appeal to PS3 owners(*) - I almost expect to see them test the waters with something like Firefly or Buffy's short first season (if a decent HD transfer can be made from its 16mm source).

I don't know about stuff like Frasier and Friends, if only because their early seasons were probably shot on tape and HD might not be an option. I think a lot of people are going to wind up watching Star Trek,Galactica, and those hypothetical Fox releases to see how much interest even the hard-core fans have in repurchasing for HD. I strongly suspect that the stuff with die-hard fanbases who traditionally buy a lot of merchandise will start coming out this fall, but more mainstream programs may wait for some kind of tie-in, and sell sluggishly then.


(*) I sort of get the feeling that the BD-only studios are leaning this way anyway, at least in the early days - lots of action movies from the last ten or so years coming out, not as many catalog or boutique titles as are showing up on HD DVD. But the number will probably say I'm wrong.

Re: Will TV shows on DVD ever go to a high definition format

Weeds has also been announced for BD, with a PM 7.1 track nontheless

Re: Will TV shows on DVD ever go to a high definition format

There was a rumor that 24: S5 was going to be released in HD last year. Obviously, that didn't happen and I'm sure that when/if Fox does release 24 in HD, it will only be the most current season instead of starting at S1.

All that being said, I see high def TV releases being a very small niche of the already small niche HD market for a good number of years.

Re: Will TV shows on DVD ever go to a high definition format

There's no reason studios can't release shows on HD DVD/Bluray, that were not shot in HD, in order to get an entire series on fewer discs.

Re: Will TV shows on DVD ever go to a high definition format

I thought this was not going to be the case. Since an HD signal would take up more room on a disc... isn't it a wash, or close to it?

Anyway, I would assume newer shows that were already shot in widescreen for HD broadcast probably have a better shot.

Re: Will TV shows on DVD ever go to a high definition format

All TV can be divided into the following categories:

—Shot and edited on film: Shows like I Love Lucy, Gunsmoke, Leave it to Beaver, The Twilight Zone, Bewitched, The Dick Van Dyke Show, Green Acres, Hawaii Five-O, The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Columbo, M*A*S*H, The Waltons, and Dallas (until 1986) to name a few would only require them to be remastered (and, if necessary, restored) from the original film elements. In theory these shows should gain something from HD transfer.

—Shot and edited on tape: Shows like Sesame Street, All in the Family, Sanford and Son, The Jeffersons, Welcome Back Kotter, The Facts of Life, Gimme a Break, Family Ties, The Cosby Show, The Golden Girls, Married with Children, Roseanne, and The Nanny, plus all soap operas and game shows and most news were shot on various formats of SD tape such as 2", 1", and Betacam. They will not gain picture info that is not there but they can fit more episodes onto an HD-DVD or Blu-Ray disc. These also have problems of the availability of machines to transfer the old tapes to a non-obsolete format.

—Shot on film, edited on SD tape: A recent development which covers shows like Matlock, post-1986 Dallas, post-1985 Cheers, Designing Women, Star Trek TNG, The Simpsons (at least the early years), Seinfeld, Mad About You, Frasier, and probably every filmed show from 1986 to the early 21st century. These will require going back to the original negatives, recreating the edit lists (unless the negatives were conformed at the time), and recreating the credits for HD. This was done for the Seinfeld DVDs.

—Kinescopes: Many live and taped shows only exist as 16mm or 35mm kinescopes. Since they were using film to capture SD material, I don't believe that mastering in HD would make much of a difference, but I have seen no examples of this.

Anything shot on HD would be no problem, nor something shot on film and edited on HD.

Re: Will TV shows on DVD ever go to a high definition format

There's not exactly much reason to do so, though. Even if it's on more discs, the multi-DVD version is just more useful to more people.

Re: Will TV shows on DVD ever go to a high definition format

Wasn't the idea that they would use the HD disc and put DV video on it since it can hold 10 times as much stuff - you can put an entire season of an hour long show on a single disc.

Re: Will TV shows on DVD ever go to a high definition format

I don't think the studios have shown any interest in doing this. It doesn't make sense financially since you're marketing an SD show to an HD audience which is a small fraction of the DVD audience. They wouldn't release new shows this way, and it's likely that people who wanted the show would have already bought the DVDs.

Gord