Universal Preparing Titles for Blu-ray - Page 2  

Re: Universal Preparing Titles for Blu-ray

I'm sure they could license it, but I'm not sure its technically possible.

Doug

Re: Universal Preparing Titles for Blu-ray

I agree that there was quite a bit of hate of combos solely on the lack of disc art, and many more on the extra $5 price difference (which put the HD-DVD version at a sales disadvantage to the Blu-ray version).

Not me, I was a fan of the concept for the same reason as you, having the SD-DVD side is valuable to me since I'm the main source of movies for my parents (they never rent or buy), and I use movies on trips and during workouts.

But, the failure rate of combos was extraordinarily high, whether you had a problem or not, titles like Children of Men or Happy Feet failed at nearly 50% according to polls taken around here. Most of the combos would skip and stutter occasionally, and there are several movies of mine that seized up half way where I could only cut power to get my machine back, and these problems were almost always due to a combo disc, more than likely Universal combo discs. These problems occurred across different models and generations of HD-DVD players, so even upgrading my 1st gen player to a top of the line 2nd gen player didn't guarantee that I would make it through a movie (I couldn't even get Mr Bean to load at all on my XA2 even though it looked spotless).

Re: Universal Preparing Titles for Blu-ray

I HATE double-sided media.

Re: Universal Preparing Titles for Blu-ray

I don't know. Seemed like there were enough problems w/ combo discs that it's not all that desirable. Besides, I do prefer to have one side w/ silkscreen disc art -- and also have less to worry about w/ the kids handling discs and getting the "top" side dirty, etc.

If studios would come out w/ premium editions of BD titles w/ an extra barebones version of the DVD included, that'd be best, IMHO. Then I can optionally buy a title for both BD and DVD playback. Maybe we're not too far off from that since some studios are trying that "digital copy" thing while Disney's been trying out $10 rebates for DVD-to-BD upgrades.

_Man_

Re: Universal Preparing Titles for Blu-ray

Even a "managed copy" idea would be palatable on this front. My brother has a portable DVD player with a USB port and uses an external hard drive to play downloaded movies on it. Not my style, but I can see the advantages.

Re: Universal Preparing Titles for Blu-ray

I sure hope The Shadow is among Universal's first Blu Rays

that great movie has been ignored on DVD I refuse to buy the FS only DVD out there now

Re: Universal Preparing Titles for Blu-ray

I guess I've been lucky but I've got over 20 HD DVD combos and have never had a problem with any of them. I've actually never had a problem with a DVD 18 either.

As for the disc art, I see it for all of about 3 seconds when the disc is going from the case to the player.

I do like the idea of SOME kind of SD version included with blu-ray be it a disc or some kind of file.

Doug

Re: Universal Preparing Titles for Blu-ray

Yes, they should stop releasing these "DVD-18"-SD DVDs also. I can think of several DVD-18-discs that were loose in the case and as a result, some problems occurred. My "hate" towards HD DVD combo-disc originates from these experiences.. Double-sided media just doesn´t work.

Re: Universal Preparing Titles for Blu-ray

Some releases now include "Digital Copy" (for Portable Media Players only).

Re: Universal Preparing Titles for Blu-ray

We will never see it, but I wish there was a BD and DVD in a 2 disc case, or even have a coupon you could send in your POP and $5 and they would send you movie only disc for the DVD and it would fit in the BD case too (even a paper sleeve that fits in with the inserts).

Re: Universal Preparing Titles for Blu-ray

Disney's attempts w/ the $10 rebate and/or coupon is not too far off from that although they intended it as incentive to upgrade rather than to buy both. Only problem w/ their coupon offer is that the coupon seems to only work for local retail sales, not online, so it doesn't save you much unless you normally shop at local retail. Otherwise, you can probalby buy the DVD for like $15 or so and then get $10 off/back for the BD purchase. Someone just noted that the SD DVD of No Country for Old Men comes w/ just such a $10 coupon -- and I found the same for PotC 3 myself.

_Man_

Re: Universal Preparing Titles for Blu-ray

I am dying to find out what titles Universal will be releasing on Blu-ray now that they will be releasing movies on that format.

Has there been any news on what we might see coming from Universal for 2008 or maybe even the first part of 2009?


I would have to say that these are some of my top pics for Blu-ray releases for 2008 & 2009 Universal titles:

King Kong (rerelease to include lossless audio) HD-DVD Release
U-571 (rerelease to include lossless audio) HD-DVD Release
Jurassic Park
Back To The Future
The Kingdom (rerelease to include lossless audio) HD-DVD Release
Bourne Indentity Trilogy (rerelease to include lossless audio) HD-DVD Release
To Kill A Mockingbird
Harvey

Re: Universal Preparing Titles for Blu-ray

My hope for Universal is a nice batch of horror films right around October, with Halloween II and III, and the first three Psycho films.

Re: Universal Preparing Titles for Blu-ray

The general public wants silk-screen art on one side of the disc and dislikes double-sided disc media which requires them to read the hub to figure out which side to face up (and also doesn't give you a side safe from the worries of fingerprints etc. While enthusiasts like us don't general find issues like this to be obstacles, the average consumer does (lots of research by Disney on this topic).


Sure, but does that need really apply to *every* title or just a few select you wish to port around? If it's a matter of going to a friend's house... I take the Blu-ray player! It's easy... I have a back-pack that fits the machine perfectly and have an extra HDMI cable ready for the task. I had my PS3 hooked up to my friend's 40" 1080p plamsa and spinning the Blu-ray Disc of No Country For Old Men in about 3 minutes last night. I can assure you that it was an experience far, far superior than if we had watched the SD DVD (which he already owned) for everyone who watched the movie (ie, the host was thrilled and had no idea that his 1080p plasma could possibly look that good). Guess what: now he's buying a Blu-ray player.

Re: Universal Preparing Titles for Blu-ray

Hmm... I wonder how many of the people decrying combo discs for being double-sided were among those mocking Disney for advertising disc art as a feature ten years ago (or saying "it's a double-sided format, live with it!"). To be fair, I have come around the other way, myself.

I think the general approach Universal and Warner took with combos - using them on new releases while assuming that the people buying catalog titles already had DVD counterparts - made sense. As to taking the player with you being easy and convenient... That may be the biggest "you are not a representative sample (and may, in fact, be a crazy person)" moment of the year.

Re: Universal Preparing Titles for Blu-ray

Amen.

Folks. You want to convert your friends who own HDTVs to the truth of HDM? It couldn't be easier. Take your BD player to THEIR house to watch a movie and hook it up to THEIR HDTV.

Your friend who has been watching crappy upconverted cable, SD DVD, and over-compressed HD (thinking all the while that they were living good) will have to keep their jaw from hitting the floor when they see high-band-width 1080p native via HDMI right into their set.

My friend was literally giddy and couldn't believe that his TV could look that good.

Forget the crappy best-buy demos. When you friend sees pristine high-bit-rate HD right on his/her set, the battle is won. It sells itself. Next thing you'll be answering about 20 questions about which BD players to avoid or investigate.

After dropping $1500-2500 on a fancy new flatscreen HDTV, having something to watch on it for a few hundred dollars that actually makes the TV purchase worth while isn't rediculous.


p.s. it literally takes all of about 1.5 minutes to disconnect/reconnect the PS3 from my system and be out the door with the dufflebag over my shoulder. Not a big deal.

Re: Universal Preparing Titles for Blu-ray

True, I suppose, and I get the smiley... But if the idea is simply to watch a movie outside of your usual location rather than to evangelize, I think I'd prefer the combo disc.

Re: Universal Preparing Titles for Blu-ray

Now if we could just get some actuall release information from Universal on what Blu-ray titles we will be seeing released this year.

Re: Universal Preparing Titles for Blu-ray

Well YOUR blu-ray player may fit into a back pack, Mine doesn't. My blu-ray player is also in a rack and not easy to remove. Add to that I'm not sure I feel comfortable hauling around a machine that costs upwards of $1000, and was not designed to be portable.

Also I don't know anyone else who has an HDTV so taking the blu-ray player to someone else's house is pointless.

And yes pretty much every title I buy I watch in many different places, so I need an SD and HD version.

Doug

Re: Universal Preparing Titles for Blu-ray

since summer is the dead zone for this stuff, I'm guessing the earliest we'll see titles street is Sept. Personally I'm hoping for BSG seasons (or at least the first...with no QC issues this time). It would be nice to get Blues Brothers too, but I expect the new to catalog ratio to be skewed much heavier to new on Bd that it was on HD DVD. I'll be happy if I can get 2 or 3 unique (not on HD DVD) titles that I really want from Uni this year. Anything beyond that would feel like a windfall to me at this point.

Re: Universal Preparing Titles for Blu-ray

Off the record (meaning no link to an official source, not my post), I have been told the primary impediment to Universal publishing on Blu-ray at this time is production. Universal is having problems getting BD50 discs produced, and they are, I am told, none too happy about it.

Re: Universal Preparing Titles for Blu-ray

Has it occurred to anyone to actually invite the friend to YOUR house?

Re: Universal Preparing Titles for Blu-ray

do you know in what sense they say production? getting a slot in the queue for replication or problems within replication like yields or QC?

Re: Universal Preparing Titles for Blu-ray

From everything I have heard, Universal went to a prospective authoring company that shall remain nameless shortly after the Warner announcement, and brought some of the masters they were looking at for potential Blu-Ray releases. Said authoring company (though said company does far more than Blu-Ray authoring) has high standards, and told Universal in no uncertain terms that some of the catalog titles would have to be remastered before they would touch them. That has been one part of the delay. Bill Hunt, as well as some of the Blu-Ray insiders, have stated that the issues lie with Universal catching up on the ins and out of the technical side of Blu-Ray, specifically BD-J.

Everything I have heard in public and private indicates the issues at Universal aren't even to the point of dealing with any potential replication issues, or replication period for that matter. It may be a while before we see anything from Universal.

Re: Universal Preparing Titles for Blu-ray

As in, there is so little (relatively) BD50 capacity and what is there is taken by companies with higher priority (think Sony, Disney, Warner, and Fox, probably in that order). The production queue for BD50 is months long. You think Fox really wanted to put only the theatrical version of Die Hard 4 on Blu-ray?

Limited BD50 capacity is the natural result of two main factors. Very few commercially viable production lines for BD50, and terrible yields on most of the ones that do exist. Only Sony has been reported to get up to 80% yield on their BD50 lines, and even 80% is pretty bad compared to DVD, and even HD DVD. Cycle times are also much slower than DVD, meaning it takes something like twice the time to make a BD disc as a DVD disc. Multiplied by hundreds of thousands (we ain't even talking about the millions we have with DVD), long cycle times add up fast. End result, BD50 isn't nearly so rosy a picture as some would have people believe.

Re: Universal Preparing Titles for Blu-ray

Bullshit. Blu-ray propaganda. The quality of a transfer is of no consequence to an authoring house. There are plenty of crappy transfers on Blu-ray.

BD-J is a complete non-issue. Warner has never used it on Blu-ray, and even Fox has backed away from using it on some recent releases. Universal farms out their authoring, like most studios. Finding a post house that does BD-J is as hard as making a phone call.

Warner has been repurposing HD DVD masters for Blu-ray for nearly two years. Anyone that says this is a problem is covering something up.

Re: Universal Preparing Titles for Blu-ray

I have a hard time believing that every Universal title needs a BD 50 disc which makes me think they're other reasons for no Universal releases being announced so far.

Also, I keep hearing conflicting stories about BD 50 production being backed up or not. I guess we'll find out one way or another depending on how many BD 50 releases we get from every studio this year. If such releases are lacking in numbers then perhaps those rumors weren't far off. Anyhow, I'm keeping an open mind and will wait until I see the 2008 release results because too many individuals on the internet have their own axes to grind with all of their rumors which makes it difficult to distinguish a measure of truth from BS.






Crawdaddy

Re: Universal Preparing Titles for Blu-ray

Okay, so folks inside the Blu camp have lied to both myself and Bill Hunt (who granted, you have called an asshole on another forum, and thus might not have much faith in), and we have naively been spreading the word hither and yon. The authoring house in question is *removed by Nick at request of Maxpower1987*, and they apparently have higher standards than those who have produced the crappy transfers out there. Or I've taken the Blu bait hook, line, and sinker. The fact that I was told all of this right after the Warner announcement, and thus after the war was practically over and Universal had just gotten getting truly serious about going Blu, means nothing.

Obviously if you got your information from someone directly involved with Universal's Blu-Ray plans, then I have been taken for a ride along with Mr. Hunt. If that is where you got your information.

Truth be told, and no personal offense intended, but most people on here, AVS, and elsewhere have always made their preferences and agenda evident in their postings over the course of the war, myself being no exception. Yours has been such that I take any inside rumblings you report with the same grain of salt I take the inside rumblings from those who have made it known they are employed by or benefit from the success of any or all of the companies involved in HD DVD or Blu-Ray. I predict I will hear positive inside rumblings from you regarding Blu-Ray right around the same time I hear one of the BDA insiders say "Ya know, HD DVD wasn't really that bad of a product, and in fact in some respects had ours beat."

Crawdaddy also makes a fine point that a lot of Universal's best HD DVDs releases fit on 25 gigs or less, which does raise the question of
why they would need BD50s for much if any of their previously released high def material.

Re: Universal Preparing Titles for Blu-ray

Which shows how truly little you really know about me or my motivation. My postings here and elsewhere have always been my opinion based primarily on my personal experience with these products and formats, and secondarily, on information and opinions of a few people whose knowledge and judgment I trust and value. I have never based my opinions on marketing hype and bullshit.

Just for the record, professionally, Blu-ray is far more benefical to me than HD DVD. Personally, all I want is movies in high quality high definition. I support products I consider in MY best interest, not Sony's or Toshiba's or any other corporation's.


I predict you will hear positive rumbling from me regarding Blu-ray when there is something positive worth my time to say. I don't post in Internet forums to make myself seem important or just to "hear" myself talk. I prefer a productive, useful, and enlightening exchange of ideas, and the occasional game of grabass. Cheerleading I leave to others better suited to that sort of thing.