A few words about...™ Patton -- in Blu-Ray - Page 2

Re: A few words about...™ Patton -- in Blu-Ray

Edwin-S, Vincent_P and others...

Here's where I'm coming from.

This isn't simply about a blu-ray disc.

This is about people.

We're dealing with probably dozens of people, beginning with those that go through the inventories to pull elements, to the vault people -- who somehow know where everything is around the world -- to those who inspect the elements that potentially will be master material, onward to those who do the mastering or harvesting of an image, and finally...

to the folks who take that image and, based upon what the studio has told them to do, creates what we see on DVD.

And this is precisely why I cannot give a project that has made its way through this long line of studio workers, and which may or may not have met a problematic fate with one individual...

a bad review.

While DNR, or whatever the programs might be called, can have a negative affect on the final look, the film has made its way along a long line, being handled respectfully and cautiously by many people.

And it is their work that I also respect.

What we are seeing is affected at the final point, which to my eye is unfortunate, but everything up to that point has been handled meticulously and sometimes, lovingly, by a group of people.

Somewhere there is a HD master of Patton without the DNR, and it is this "artifact" that I would welcome on Blu-Ray -- a system that has the capability to take an image -- grain and all -- and send it to a high end home theater.

Blu-Ray is here, and it is or can be -- in the right hands -- nirvana for home theater aficionados.

All that we need to do is treat it well and use it properly.

That is the trick.

I hope this helps in understanding where I'm coming from, and why I tend to look at the larger picture.

RAH

Re: A few words about...™ Patton -- in Blu-Ray

By High Frequency Information (HFI) I'm referring to a part of the image which would contain minute detail information...

Information which reproduces not only on Blu, but on SD.

Stubble on an actor's face, along with facial details such as tiny scars or marks seen in close-ups -- look at the worst of it and skin becomes "plastic" as in The Untouchables. Patton has this problem. Flesh has imperfections, even if heavily made up;

Detail in hair;

Detail on the walls of buildings, which when DNR'd looks smooth; Look at an exterior wall, be it stucco or brick and you'll see heavy detail. Look at the buildings in Patton and there is nothing.

Grass, and not just a mass of green, but the ability via BD to differentiate;

Trees, and not just trees, but the leaves moving, rather than being mass of green;

In Patton...

Dirt on a Mercedes staff car, a Jeep or a motorcycle; not just an overlay of beige dirty color -- DIRT!

Blu-Ray allows this.

Leather that isn't simply shiny black, but shows imperfections, grain and wear;

And lastly, background information that isn't simply a mass of color.

The point here is that the Blu-Ray process has the capacity and the ability to reproduce fine detail magnificently.

Remove grain incorrectly, or use the wrong process, and you lose every bit of detail that has been captured within those bits of grain, and things become, well...

pretty and clean...

and not only totally non-representative of film.

But no longer representative of the work that some might attempt to replicate.

This isn't simply about grain, which DONE PROPERLY as I've explained, can be totally removed without losing a single bit of detail, or lowered to replicate any film stock ever produced. Had Warner wanted their high def of Bullitt to look like it had been shot on early '90s 5247 rather than late '60s 5254, they could have done it. They chose not to, and the proper -- original -- look of Bullitt is there in high definition.

This is about making something look clean and wrong concurrently.

This is something exceedingly easy to do correctly.

Two appended final points:

1. This cannot be seen in screen grabs.

2. On smaller screens, for example anything under around 35", this is almost moot, as the image with or without heavily applied DNR will look very similar unless one knows what they are looking for. On my 30" Sony HD CRT, Patton looked fabulous.

And this presents yet another problem. If someone is working on a project and using a smaller professional monitor as opposed to viewing on a large screen, they may not see the damage that is being done.

RAH

Re: A few words about...™ Patton -- in Blu-Ray

Please, make no mistake. There is a high level of detail in Patton, and the BD disc is beautifully done. As I've noted, it is my opinion that the huge majority of the potential audience for this disc will be thrilled.

My problem is not what it is, but rather, what it could have been.

Re: A few words about...™ Patton -- in Blu-Ray

It actually becomes more difficult than that. As a guess, I would think that one would notice a difference above 42" or thereabouts, but if one doesn't know what it could or should like it, the difference may be moot.

I can tell you that at 30", the image was beautiful, with little real ability to make a determination.

I cannot make this point enough. To most people this simply isn't going to matter.

Many people will review this disc, give it raves, and will not be incorrect. If you don't know that something is missing...