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The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction! - Page 4

post #91 of 246
12/17/07 at 8:56am

Re: The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction!

Quote:
Originally Posted by Mark Zimmer
This is probably why we didn't get an HD version of BARRY LYNDON---which uses the same technique except to the extreme of candlelight. I'm guessing the technology just isn't there yet to render this properly on home video without wiping out everything with DNR.
I think HD can reproduce these films beautifully. The studios, however, seem to be trying to please an unfortunately large audience of viewers who are unenlightened and believe that visible grain is undesirable. This too, shall pass, but there will be some collateral damage along the way. We just need to provide feedback to the studios (via chats, reviews, etc) that grain is more desirable than DNR.
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post #92 of 246
12/17/07 at 9:01am

Re: The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction!

just a FYI,

after learning their lessons with their horrid first-batch of BD titles, Sony has now become the *reference* studio with HD transfers/masters. Paidgeek has also said that Sony has a policy that they do NOT apply filtering to remove grain or HF detail to ease compression: they are committed to being transparent to the source as intended by the director. They actually took a huge hit of criticism for their BD of Dracula because of this... and even when the director himself said that the BD looked exactly like the film print which he wanted at AVS, no-nothing posters continued to criticize the Blu-ray Disc as having video problems because of the grain and soft-focus.



At least one studio is committed to doing it right. I think WB needs to be "brought on board" to the concept of "faithful to the source".
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post #93 of 246
12/17/07 at 10:01am

Re: The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction!

Quote:
Originally Posted by DaViD Boulet
just a FYI,

after learning their lessons with their horrid first-batch of BD titles, Sony has now become the *reference* studio with HD transfers/masters. Paidgeek has also said that Sony has a policy that they do NOT apply filtering to remove grain or HF detail to ease compression: they are committed to being transparent to the source as intended by the director. They actually took a huge hit of criticism for their BD of Dracula because of this... and even when the director himself said that the BD looked exactly like the film print which he wanted at AVS, no-nothing posters continued to criticize the Blu-ray Disc as having video problems because of the grain and soft-focus.



At least one studio is committed to doing it right. I think WB needs to be "brought on board" to the concept of "faithful to the source".
Great to hear re: Sony. Great hope for Lawrence and Kwai, Das Boot, Navarone, etc, etc. We should politely bring up this topic at the next WB chat. No reason they shouldn't be reference across the board too.
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post #94 of 246
12/17/07 at 3:55pm

Re: The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction!

Quote:
Originally Posted by DaViD Boulet
just a FYI,
They actually took a huge hit of criticism for their BD of Dracula because of this... and even when the director himself said that the BD looked exactly like the film print which he wanted at AVS, no-nothing posters continued to criticize the Blu-ray Disc as having video problems because of the grain and soft-focus.
I must have missed this-Francis Ford Coppola commented on the BD release of Dracula?
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post #95 of 246
12/17/07 at 3:56pm
Thread Starter 

Re: The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction!

Sony is without a doubt the best studio as of the past 6 -9 months, goes for either format, their latest releases new and catalog are mind blowing, Arlington Road = WOW!

combined with always PCM and/or TrueHD (without DN) and Mpeg4 at over 30 Mbps they are cerntainly getting things done, I just wish they would open the gates on catalog titles, I just ordered Air Force One and Starship Troopers from Amazon UK

Sony certainly gets my pick for best BD/HD studio of 2007 and anyone that knows me knows that I don't pick favs or have any bias

-Gary
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post #96 of 246
12/17/07 at 4:46pm

Re: The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction!

With all that Sony has invested in Blu Ray, it only makes sense for them to put out the best quality transfers.

And while I don't want to get too deep into the controversy, I do agree that this BD is darker than the DVD, but that said, on my monitor it doesn't look anywhere as dark as it does on Dave Mack's screenshots represented here on HTF. Now that could be the fault of a number of things (my monitor settings one of them). I will say that when watching Dracula on BD, I noticed nothing detracting or distracting as far as picture quality.

Just my .000002 cents (about all it's worth)
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post #97 of 246
12/17/07 at 9:58pm

Re: The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction!

Quote:
I must have missed this-Francis Ford Coppola commented on the BD release of Dracula?

I can't remember if he particpated directly, or if Paidgeek relayed his comments from his participation in the review of final product for Blu-ray authoring... but his comments about how the BD was being faithful were made clear, and many AVS members *still* complained about the lack of eye-candy factor.

It's one thing for consumers to have to swallow a pill when directors *change* things... like adding in a digital Jaba to their favorite film. But when a medium is being 100% faithful to the original source? For consumers to disregard that and continue to critize a disc for looking "bad" is a real head-scratcher. Shows just how much education is needed even on forums like these.
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post #98 of 246
12/18/07 at 3:20am

Re: The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction!

Quote:
Originally Posted by Mark Zimmer
This is probably why we didn't get an HD version of BARRY LYNDON---which uses the same technique except to the extreme of candlelight. I'm guessing the technology just isn't there yet to render this properly on home video without wiping out everything with DNR.
Technically there is no reason why HD can't cope with the grain. Parts of the audience apparently can't. :-)
High bit rate AVC can deal nicely with grainy pictures.
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post #99 of 246
12/18/07 at 3:26am

Re: The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction!

Quote:
Originally Posted by Douglas Monce
Yes David and of course today with most films using digital color timing, the DI becomes the source of all future copies of the film, be they on film or in some digital form. The interpositive and internegative will become a thing of the past as all prints are made from the DI via a film recorder.
Doug
For the time being prints are not made with film recorders because it's way too slow and expensive. The cheapest route is one negative from DI. One IP from the negative. As many negatives from the IP as you need and from these the (high speed) prints.
More expensive: Several negatives from the DI and from these all the prints. That looks better of course and is the current digital gold standard.
All prints from DI would cost millions and millons and take months to achieve (for a typical wide Hollywood release with thousands of prints).
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post #100 of 246
12/18/07 at 6:37am

Re: The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction!

Quote:
Originally Posted by Michel_Hafner
For the time being prints are not made with film recorders because it's way too slow and expensive. The cheapest route is one negative from DI. One IP from the negative. As many negatives from the IP as you need and from these the (high speed) prints.
More expensive: Several negatives from the DI and from these all the prints. That looks better of course and is the current digital gold standard.
All prints from DI would cost millions and millons and take months to achieve (for a typical wide Hollywood release with thousands of prints).

You are correct. I was talking more about the future with high speed film recorders. I understand that they are getting pretty fast, but no where near as fast as making prints the traditional way. Of course by the time they get the film recorders working that fast, it will be a moot point as theatrical projected film will be all but dead.

Doug
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post #101 of 246
12/18/07 at 11:25am

Re: The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction!

Quote:
It's one thing for consumers to have to swallow a pill when directors *change* things... like adding in a digital Jaba to their favorite film. But when a medium is being 100% faithful to the original source?
You're comparing apples and oranges. That example is not the typical "I don't like the look irrespective of how closely it matches the original film". The skepticism has to do with whether it does match the original film. You can say "Yes it does, because certain people said so", but that's a different contention than saying "I don't care if it matches what I saw in the theater, I don't like the looks of it".
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post #102 of 246
12/18/07 at 12:35pm

Re: The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction!

Quote:
Originally Posted by DaViD Boulet
I can't remember if he particpated directly, or if Paidgeek relayed his comments from his participation in the review of final product for Blu-ray authoring... but his comments about how the BD was being faithful were made clear, and many AVS members *still* complained about the lack of eye-candy factor.


Actually paidgeek said "a representative from Zoetrope relayed Coppola's wishes to the transfer people at Sony" (paraphrased)
I think Coppola has been pretty busy lately.

And, "Hearts Of Darkness" is finally out on DVD!
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post #103 of 246
12/18/07 at 12:50pm

Re: The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction!

Quote:
Actually paidgeek said "a representative from Zoetrope relayed Coppola's wishes to the transfer people at Sony" (paraphrased)
I think Coppola has been pretty busy lately.

Sorry if I was mistaken about that issue. I could have sworn it was more definitive than that... but it's been a while since I've read that thread (or been to AVS in general) and I had remembered his comments about the director's approval of the look to be more declarative.
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post #104 of 246
12/18/07 at 1:01pm

Re: The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction!

To actually contribute to this topic though, (as I do tend to ramble!)
I would rather see a grainy image anyday then a smoothed over and then artificially sharpened transfer. Ironic that while so many people want to remove all hints of grain, we have filmmakers shooting digitally, (300) or CGI films like Moster House where they ADD artificial grain!

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post #105 of 246
12/19/07 at 9:09am

Re: The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction!

Quote:
Originally Posted by Dave Mack
To actually contribute to this topic though, (as I do tend to ramble!)
I would rather see a grainy image anyday then a smoothed over and then artificially sharpened transfer. Ironic that while so many people want to remove all hints of grain, we have filmmakers shooting digitally, (300) or CGI films like Moster House where they ADD artificial grain!

I acutally had a few projects that I shot digitally, where I added specs of dirt and dust (very subtlety, if you didn't know to look for it you probably wouldn't see it) to give people the subconscious idea that they were looking at film and not video.

Doug
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post #106 of 246
12/22/07 at 8:09am

Re: The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction!

Quote:
Originally Posted by Michel_Hafner
Technically there is no reason why HD can't cope with the grain. Parts of the audience apparently can't. :-)
High bit rate AVC can deal nicely with grainy pictures.

VC1 seemed to do a good job with 300, too.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Dave Mack
...Ironic that while so many people want to remove all hints of grain, we have filmmakers shooting digitally, (300) or CGI films like Moster House where they ADD artificial grain!

Wasn't 300 shot on film?

Vincent
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post #107 of 246
12/22/07 at 11:49am

Re: The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction!

300 was shot on film (Super 35, to be precise), but entirely against green screen and composited digitally with digitally rendered backgrounds.
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post #108 of 246
12/22/07 at 3:47pm

Re: The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction!

Is it possible that the majority of people complaining about grain just have miscalibrated sets?

Haven't seen 300, but a brief glance at the HD Trailers makes me wonder why people are so anti-grain.
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post #109 of 246
12/22/07 at 7:05pm

Re: The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction!

Quote:
a brief glance at the HD Trailers makes me wonder why people are so anti-grain.
It's not a big mystery. Those people equate "HD" with "looks like Discovery HD theater". Film doesn't look like that, so it's labeled "bad".
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post #110 of 246
12/22/07 at 7:24pm

Re: The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction!

Quote:
VC1 seemed to do a good job with 300, too.

300 looks a little soft to me, despite the "grain". I didn't see it theatrically, so I don't know how sharp/detailed it was intended to appear. But when I saw the Blu-ray Disc (HD DVD equivilent VC-1 encode) I remember thinking "hmmm. not as sharp/detailed as other titles). I'm assuming that it either looks the way it should or that WB filtered it to ease compression... they've been known to filter HF detail on other transfers to ease compression demands so it wouldn't be unusual.
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post #111 of 246
12/22/07 at 7:38pm

Re: The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction!

I saw 300 in the theater and also on Blu-ray, via PS3, at a co-worker's house. To my eye, the theatrical presentation and the home presentation looked just about the same. The high frequency filtering that occurs with my HX81 TV annoys the hell out of me most times, but on 300 I actually preferred the filtered picture over the "original". All of that artificial grain just looked like so much noise, both theatrically and home video-wise.
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post #112 of 246
12/23/07 at 6:32pm

Re: The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction!

Sorry, why are video games being blamed for this?
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post #113 of 246
12/23/07 at 7:15pm

Re: The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction!

There's an psychological effect known as the uncanny valley: the more "photorealistic" the simulation, the more onlookers become aware that it's just a simulation. Perhaps gamers compensate for this, unconsciously training their eyes to appreciate grain free "perfect" images, devoid of the imperfections and spark of real human actors.
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post #114 of 246
12/25/07 at 2:58am

Re: The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction!

Latest DNR victim: US BD/HD-DVD Pan's Labyrinth.
Pans Labyrinth Pics & Impressions - AVS Forum
The European version does not have it. As always you can vote with your wallet.
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post #115 of 246
1/9/08 at 10:23am

Re: The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction!

Without mentioning names, there was an ISF calibrator on another forum claiming film grain can not be seen with 1920X1080 resolutions; he stated the grain in most cases it too small to be seen (excluding some titles like "300"). He claims people thinking they see film grain are seeing video noise. I think he's completely wrong. To my eyes, film grain has a finer, distinct, pattern look to it where as video noise (mosquite noise, artifacting, etc.) looks otherwise.

Anyone else's thoughts on this issue?
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post #116 of 246
1/9/08 at 12:08pm

Re: The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction!

I could easily see film grain on my old 480p setup, to say it's not visible in 1080p is ridiculous.
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post #117 of 246
1/9/08 at 12:19pm

Re: The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction!

Leaving specs and theory aside, if it looks like a duck it's a duck.

From a 1-screen-width distance, "film grain" in 1920 x 1080 HD looks like the film-grain in a 35mm release print, not video noise.

Now, if he's talking about the fine-film-grain in a 70mm camera negative... he might have a point. But that's not really what we're talking about for the most part when we say "film grain".
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post #118 of 246
1/9/08 at 12:38pm

Re: The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction!

Zodiac is a new offender. Heavy DNR, heavy, heavy, heavy EE. Very disappointing.
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post #119 of 246
1/9/08 at 12:54pm

Re: The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction!

Quote:
Originally Posted by Mark Zimmer
Zodiac is a new offender. Heavy DNR, heavy, heavy, heavy EE. Very disappointing.


D'OOOOH! Between this and the lack of lossless, I'm hoping they do a new encode for Blu. Upsetting as it is, it gives me a little more resolve in waiting to buy it.
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post #120 of 246
1/9/08 at 4:28pm

Re: The new enemy of the HD Formats is Noise Reduction!

Quote:
Originally Posted by Dave H
Without mentioning names, there was an ISF calibrator on another forum claiming film grain can not be seen with 1920X1080 resolutions; he stated the grain in most cases it too small to be seen (excluding some titles like "300"). He claims people thinking they see film grain are seeing video noise. I think he's completely wrong. To my eyes, film grain has a finer, distinct, pattern look to it where as video noise (mosquite noise, artifacting, etc.) looks otherwise.

Anyone else's thoughts on this issue?

I think I read that one though I don't recall that poster offering a good alternative explanation for the "grain" visible in certain samples posted there, eg. one capture of the Alcatraz battle scene in X-Men 3.

I don't really know myself, but I'd submit that his logic might be a bit faulty in practice. For instance, if I took a noisy, ISO1600, 10MP digital SLR photo and resize it a good deal down to say 2MP or even 1MP, the noise would still be quite visible even though that should not be the case if you follow his logic regarding the sampling of film grain.

_Man_
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