A few words about...™ 2001: A Space Odyssey -- in BD & HD - Page 4

Re: A few words about...™ 2001: A Space Odyssey -- in BD & HD

Tell me about it. You know... that wouldn't be a bad idea. Not bad at all...

Re: A few words about...™ 2001: A Space Odyssey -- in BD & HD

I think that is an incredibly bad idea. It's bad enough to have every yahoo at the studio chiming it, but to have some self professed "videophile" weighing in on how a particular title should look is just laughable. First of all there are so many different opinions on what these things should look like, who are you going to send. Just because you think a film should look a particular way doesn't mean that I do.

Frankly I'll take the professionals who understand the strengths and limitations of the hardware and software over an armature who THINKS he knows.

Doug

Re: A few words about...™ 2001: A Space Odyssey -- in BD & HD

Doug,

I'm assuming that anyone evaluating would be given the opportunity to a/b against the original projected print.


Looking at discs like Mary Poppins and Ben-Hur, even high-profile releases often manage to get mangled despite all the "experts" at the helm.

Re: A few words about...™ 2001: A Space Odyssey -- in BD & HD

In spite of some mediocre releases I still say no. A layman has no business in a telecine room. Whats next the CNN audience voting on a military battle plan?

Doug

Re: A few words about...™ 2001: A Space Odyssey -- in BD & HD

Doug,

this brings this thread way off topic and out of respect to RAH and as it is me who started this I will open another thread and adress your questions there.

Oliver

Re: A few words about...™ 2001: A Space Odyssey -- in BD & HD

I am going tonight to see a 70mm print of 2001 at the Cinerama in Seattle. It will be the 12th time I have seen it in 70mm. I feel very fortunate right now! My favorite movie in my favorite theatre. I can hardly wait.
Brian

Re: A few words about...™ 2001: A Space Odyssey -- in BD & HD

I have to admit I was kind of disappointed in this one. I was expecting more. Don't get me wrong, I think the film looks really good in a lot of places, but it also looked soft in a lot of other areas. The meeting at the Clavius base looked pretty soft and detailess, at least on my set up. Unless it was supposed to look like that. I don't remember ever seeing a theatrical screening of this film.

Re: A few words about...™ 2001: A Space Odyssey -- in BD & HD

The difference between 70mm in the cinema and on HDM media is this:

In the cinema most movies shot in 70mm look superior to anything shot in 35mm. On HDM IMO no 70mm transfer comes close to the best 35mm transfers

I hope this will change with the upcoming Fox releases of The Longest Day and Patton. Please note that none of the large format based releases so far look really bad with the notable exception of Spartacus (RAH was polite neough not to comment on it) but IMO they do not look that stunning either.

Re: A few words about...™ 2001: A Space Odyssey -- in BD & HD

I just watched this about 2 weekends ago in Blu-Ray and I thought it looked stunning. I saw details I never saw before, specifically with the rotating space station section (first Blue Danube part).

I had absolutely no issues at all with the way it looked and was in awe with it at most times. The Stargate scene was breathtaking.

The sound was also the best I have heard on any home format. Beautiful sound!

The special features were decent for the most part. I could do without Keir Dullea reading from papers on screen, but aside from that they were good additions.

A masterful disc IMO.

Re: A few words about...™ 2001: A Space Odyssey -- in BD & HD

I guess that depends on what you call the best looking 35mm transfers. I think Grand Prix is probably the best looking film on HD right now. Of course it comes from a 35mm reduction print and not directly from 65mm.

If you are talking about actual 65mm transfered directly to HD then I agree with you. But then I've only seen one direct transfer of 65mm and thats the above mentioned Spartacus. I don't know of any others on HD that are direct from 65mm

To be honest, I'm not sure there is really enough resolution in HD to be able to see a dramatic difference between 35mm and 65mm anyway.

Doug

Re: A few words about...™ 2001: A Space Odyssey -- in BD & HD

Grand Prix is nice but is not as detailed as other stuff available on HDM.
It definitely is the best quality transfer of a movie shot in 70mm that is available on HDM.


I am pretty sure that Fox did at least 4k scans from 65mm elements with the movies I mentioned above, enough to look spectacular on HDM. These would NOT have been done in a moving telecine and the results hopefully will be spectacular.


I will gladly settle for as detailed as the best movies shot in 35mm

Oliver

Re: A few words about...™ 2001: A Space Odyssey -- in BD & HD

Blade Runner SFX is directly from 65mm 6K scan.

Re: A few words about...™ 2001: A Space Odyssey -- in BD & HD

Where did you guys get this information?

Doug

Edit: Never mind I found it. But I'm reading that it was an 8k scan according to Charles de Lauzirika.

Re: A few words about...™ 2001: A Space Odyssey -- in BD & HD

Specifically what films in 35mm do you think have better detail than Grand Prix? I don't think I've seen anything that tops it.

Doug

Re: A few words about...™ 2001: A Space Odyssey -- in BD & HD

There are a lot of closeups and medium shots that clearly do look rather soft, also the wide angle shots at the races that were probably done with a helicopter do not look as good as they could imo. I think it basically comes down to the fact high frequency detail and therefore edges are somewhat softened in this transfer, giving it that slightly soft look most of the times that looks almot odd with all the detail that comes with it. For significantly better performance in that regard you have to look no further than Casino Royale which I think is a title everybody knows. It might look like video but it is still superior under the conditions I described, indicating less rolloff at higher frequencies.

Now somebody might say that Grand Prix is film and not video and this is not how it is supposed to look but I saw a premiere release print myself and the whole time while watching the movie I thought to myself that I could not believe how sharp and yet artefactfree it looked - the amount of detail and the sharp edges were giving the movie a kind of HDcam sharpness if you want to say it that way but still with the look of film - it was stunning.

Oliver

Re: A few words about...™ 2001: A Space Odyssey -- in BD & HD

Well all I have to do is point to the close up shots of Toshirô Mifune in the scenes where he is hiring James Garner. The dots on his tie are razor sharp. You can even see the detail in his jacket.

Casino Royale is a bad example because although it was shot on film, the DI was artificially sharpened, edge enhancement added and grain reduced with the approval of the director before release prints were made. Now if you saw this film projected on film then the grain reduction wouldn't be noticeable because of the added grain of the release print. I understand that this is becoming a fairly common practice with films that use a DI.

Interestingly I thought that Zodiac, which was shot on the Thompson Viper, looks more like film than Casino Royale.

Doug

Re: A few words about...™ 2001: A Space Odyssey -- in BD & HD

That is a better shot but a lot of others don't look as good. That was not the case in the theater where in a festival spanning 3 days this was the most detailed movie, looking almost artificially sharp for film. My point is that theatrically Grand Prix looked as sharp as Casino Royale and then some but WITHOUT artificial sharpness added. Where is it gone ? I don't know.


Casino Royale is pretty grainy so I would not think that grain reduction in that movie was applied more than with most other movies.


I had very mixed feelings when watching Zodiac - some shots looked extremely artificial and only after I watched the movie I looked it up to see if it was shot with some sort of HD camera.

So while we agree to disagree let us hope that the new Fox releases will surpass the quality of Grand Prix - I certainly do

Oliver

Re: A few words about...™ 2001: A Space Odyssey -- in BD & HD

Oliver, which festival did you see it at? I saw it at the Lafayette theater in NY USA a few years back. It *was* the sharpest, most detailed 35mm print I'd seen... there and almost anywhere else. It was shocking. I remember thinking "even HD doesn't look this sharp, 3-D, or detailed".

The HD DVD/BD looks almost fuzzy by comparison. I'm not impressed given what I saw on the 35mm projected print.

Re: A few words about...™ 2001: A Space Odyssey -- in BD & HD

David,

I saw it at the Karlsruhe 70mm Festival in Germany. The VERY weird thing was that they showed Grand Prix, Spartacus and Mutiny on the Bounty in the exact order they were released in HD. Needless to say in the months after the festival I put in my HD-DVD'S and was very disappointed to see how soft they looked compared to what I saw there. Of the 7 large format movies that were shown the premiere copy of Grand Prix looked the best and IMO topped even the new prints of South Pacific and Cleopatra that were of course still looking spectacular and with non-faded colors to boot.

Oliver

Re: A few words about...™ 2001: A Space Odyssey -- in BD & HD

OK, finally got my Blu Ray player, so now it's on to the disks...

Can anyone tell me if the audio in the man-ape scenes is as horrible as it was on the DVD? That nasty tanky comb-filtered mess was enough to make me want to not listen.

I had the opportunity to see this film in 1997, it was a spanking-new print and was projected in a refurbed theater. The event was a sort of Birthday Party for Hal at the University of Illinois. I doubt that the high-def will come close to that experience, but hope it will be good enough!

I run a 70mm projector here at work, and have run the same films on 35mm equipment. The difference is astounding. I'm hoping that the upgrade from DVD to BD will be similar...

Re: A few words about...™ 2001: A Space Odyssey -- in BD & HD

Has there been any hint that this might be included in a Blu-ray version of the SD DVD Stanley Kubrick Collection? I was going to buy the latter, but would obviously prefer BD if available, while conversely I'd feel kinda dumb if I bought the 2001 BD standalone, only for a BD Collection to come out later. I guess I don't mind waiting if there are future plans for one, but the thing is I don't know if there are any?

Re: A few words about...™ 2001: A Space Odyssey -- in BD & HD

I don't think Warner will be revisiting these titles anytime soon on BD, so a 2001 purchase should be safe.

Re: A few words about...™ 2001: A Space Odyssey -- in BD & HD

If only it were so! That turned out to be wishful thinking TLD in particular looks godawful.