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What can we do about Warner Bros? - Page 4

post #91 of 169
2/16/09 at 11:46pm
Thread Starter 

Re: What can we do about Warner Bros?

Oh well. I guess "put up and shut up" is the official stance then, much like it was when a "minority" kicked off over the flipped music channels on the Star Wars DVD and the colour/sound changes on the Bond UEs.

I'm glad that people can take these "inconveniences" and live with them (and yeah, even the folks here who "don't mind" carrying out an unnecessary setup change during the movie seem to admit to it being an inconvenience, albeit minor).

I for one will continue my "campaign" via my signature.

For those that don't care? Those that value a smaller number number of button pushes than a smoother, uninterrupted movie experience? Well you get the presentation that you deserve.

I'd be interested to know how WB handles its TV product. Would you have to configure the audio during every single episode? If that's the case count me out of ANY WB TV titles.
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post #92 of 169
2/17/09 at 2:49am

Re: What can we do about Warner Bros?

Quote:
Originally Posted by John H Ross
I'd be interested to know how WB handles its TV product. Would you have to configure the audio during every single episode?
Nope. All the episodes on a disc play automatically. Sort of like an automatic play all function, so you only have to set up the audio once (not that I had to do that yet since all the Warner TV shows I own on BD only have a lossy DD5.1 track to begin with).

Here's what annoys me about Supernatural on BD: You can sleect whether you want to watch the episodes with the "previously on Supernatural" segments on or off. The default is "off".

The problem with this is: Even if you turn this feature on while the first episode is playing, the change won't be applied unless you also manually select an episode from the pop-up menu. That means if I turn the previously segments on while the first episode is playing and decide to let it run, the upcoming episodes will still be missing the segment.

It's not a major inconvenience by any means (at least they do give you a choice at all), but still badly programmed.
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post #93 of 169
2/17/09 at 2:59am

Re: What can we do about Warner Bros?

Quote:
Originally Posted by John H Ross
Oh well. I guess "put up and shut up" is the official stance then, much like it was when a "minority" kicked off over the flipped music channels on the Star Wars DVD and the colour/sound changes on the Bond UEs.

I'm glad that people can take these "inconveniences" and live with them (and yeah, even the folks here who "don't mind" carrying out an unnecessary setup change during the movie seem to admit to it being an inconvenience, albeit minor).

I for one will continue my "campaign" via my signature.

For those that don't care? Those that value a smaller number number of button pushes than a smoother, uninterrupted movie experience? Well you get the presentation that you deserve.

I'd be interested to know how WB handles its TV product. Would you have to configure the audio during every single episode? If that's the case count me out of ANY WB TV titles.
I'm sorry you feel that way, but not everyone will agree with you on any matter despite how correct you might think your POV is.....
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post #94 of 169
2/17/09 at 4:14am

Re: What can we do about Warner Bros?

Quote:
Originally Posted by John H Ross
For those that don't care? Those that value a smaller number number of button pushes than a smoother, uninterrupted movie experience? Well you get the presentation that you deserve.
John, if Blu-rays simply started playing as soon as we thought about it, then I'd be sympathetic towards your "campaign". Yet my system doesn't work with psychic projections, funnily enough. I've got to turn on my display, my subwoofer, my amp, my Blu-ray deck, and then make sure that everything's set to the correct input with the correct post-processing before settling in to watch a flick. This is all hardly conducive to a "smoother" cinema-like experience, so one more button push after the thing has started is simply not a huge problem.

I love how you're interpreting people's replies too. As far as I can tell, none of the dissenters (with a suitable set-up, natch) is saying that they prefer to have to switch the audio, just that it's not a major issue for them. Hardly the same thing.
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post #95 of 169
2/17/09 at 5:30am

Re: What can we do about Warner Bros?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Geoff_D
John, if Blu-rays simply started playing as soon as we thought about it, then I'd be sympathetic towards your "campaign". Yet my system doesn't work with psychic projections, funnily enough. I've got to turn on my display, my subwoofer, my amp, my Blu-ray deck, and then make sure that everything's set to the correct input with the correct post-processing before settling in to watch a flick. This is all hardly conducive to a "smoother" cinema-like experience, so one more button push after the thing has started is simply not a huge problem.

I love how you're interpreting people's replies too. As far as I can tell, none of the dissenters (with a suitable set-up, natch) is saying that they prefer to have to switch the audio, just that it's not a major issue for them. Hardly the same thing.
That about sums it up for me too.
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post #96 of 169
2/17/09 at 6:35am

Re: What can we do about Warner Bros?

And me too
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post #97 of 169
2/17/09 at 6:38am

Re: What can we do about Warner Bros?

I've been a pretty vocal critic of Warner Bros since the early days of Blu-Ray. I was mainly concerned with :

1) The lack of any HD audio track on numerous releases. Every title should have a lossless track included, regardless of the age or sonics of the film. Sony, Fox and Disney have done this from Day 1. There's plenty of bandwidth and space available. We could debate the necessity of this all day long, but it should be always be included given the space and bandwidth of Blu-Ray. I don't see how cost could be an issue based on what I've read.

2) Some titles seemed to have heavy DNR (allegedly to keep the bitrate low for HD-DVD). This resulted in the infamous waxy, soft look on some titles.

It appears to me that both of these issues seem to have been addressed. Unless I'm mistaken, they are doing lossless on everything now and I haven't seen the DNR issues lately. I can't assign blame to Warner for the DNR issues with Amadeus because the master was likely done by Saul Zaentz, not Warner.

As far as the default audio track issue...it just doesn't seem to matter to me. I always set everything up through the menu before viewing, so it's a non-issue in my case.

While I was one of the first to complain about Warner Brothers, it's only fair that I point out the great product they've been putting out recently. I no longer wait for reviews before purchsaing Warner titles. I think they are hands-down, the most improved Blu-Ray studio.
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post #98 of 169
2/17/09 at 10:00am

Re: What can we do about Warner Bros?

Personally I think they ought to simply use 'DTS-HD Master Audio' on all Blu-Ray titles. This way all titles would automatically output lossless audio for those that have systems capable of handling it and for the rest it would automatically output the core 1.5 mbps DTS audio. This would also do away with the need for any legacy DD track taking up space on the disc. Ofcourse knowing Warner they would never go for this, after all how can they deviate from their long standing legacy of mediocre audio at best.

By the way, count me in as one of those who simply cannot understand the logic of defaulting to a low resolution audio track when there is a lossless track present. Also, it's not "that much trouble" or "it's not that big a deal" are no excuse for it either.
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post #99 of 169
2/17/09 at 10:04am

Re: What can we do about Warner Bros?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Sanjay Gupta
Personally I think they ought to simply use 'DTS-HD Master Audio' on all Blu-Ray titles. This way all titles would automatically output lossless audio for those that have systems capable of handling it and for the rest it would automatically output the core 1.5 mbps DTS audio. This would also do away with the need for any legacy DD track taking up space on the disc. Ofcourse knowing Warner they would never go for this, after all how can they deviate from their long standing legacy of mediocre audio at best.

The problem with this solution is there may still be a lot of people with players that do not decode DTS HD MA.
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post #100 of 169
2/17/09 at 10:12am
Thread Starter 

Re: What can we do about Warner Bros?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Geoff_D
I love how you're interpreting people's replies too. As far as I can tell, none of the dissenters (with a suitable set-up, natch) is saying that they prefer to have to switch the audio, just that it's not a major issue for them. Hardly the same thing.

No, this is exactly my point. Nobody here would complain if Warner BDs defaulted to the HD track. It would make everybody's life easier.

So why the opposition?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Sanjay Gupta
By the way, count me in as one of those who simply cannot understand the logic of defaulting to a low resolution audio track when there is a lossless track present. Also, it's not "that much trouble" or "it's not that big a deal" are no excuse for it either.

Thank you!
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post #101 of 169
2/17/09 at 10:15am
Thread Starter 

Re: What can we do about Warner Bros?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Christian Preischl
Here's what annoys me about Supernatural on BD: You can sleect whether you want to watch the episodes with the "previously on Supernatural" segments on or off. The default is "off".

The problem with this is: Even if you turn this feature on while the first episode is playing, the change won't be applied unless you also manually select an episode from the pop-up menu. That means if I turn the previously segments on while the first episode is playing and decide to let it run, the upcoming episodes will still be missing the segment.

So you have to decide whether to watch an integral (i.e. as broadcast!) segment of the show WHILE THE SHOW IS PLAYING and reset it for each and every episode?

That's almost... comical.

Remind me not to buy any WB shows until they sort out THAT little fiasco!
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post #102 of 169
2/17/09 at 10:58am

Re: What can we do about Warner Bros?

Quote:
Originally Posted by John H Ross
So you have to decide whether to watch bits of the show WHILE THE SHOW IS PLAYING? Figures!! :-/ On paper it's oh so convenient. In practice it's just stupid.

Defaulting standard features to OFF and audio tracks to the second best. It's just ridiculous.
Did you ever consider that there's a possibility that defaulting to TrueHD would mean anyone who can't decode it hears nothing at all? As some have pointed out, it's easy to do with DTS-HD:MA because it has an automatically-decoded core.

If the TrueHD issue is correct, you'd be asking Warner to break functionality to appease a micro-minority of users, even amongst HT enthusiasts, all because of a remote/menu issue that takes all of 15 seconds to fix.
Quote:
I'm sticking to my original points.
Even when (as pointed out by others) all but one of those points have been proven to be factually wrong or exaggerated, and even that last point may have a huge mitigating factor?
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post #103 of 169
2/17/09 at 11:06am

Re: What can we do about Warner Bros?

Everyone can apparently hear sound with SONY's TrueHD only tracks.

Why not Warner if they followed suit just like other studios?

Answer THAT question.

Jonathan has a valid point, backed up by real data.
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post #104 of 169
2/17/09 at 11:17am

Re: What can we do about Warner Bros?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Yumbo
Answer THAT question.
It's been answered. Multiple times.
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post #105 of 169
2/17/09 at 11:21am
Thread Starter 

Re: What can we do about Warner Bros?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Jesse Blacklow
Did you ever consider that there's a possibility that defaulting to TrueHD would mean anyone who can't decode it hears nothing at all? As some have pointed out, it's easy to do with DTS-HD:MA because it has an automatically-decoded core.

But come on. All the other studios manage it.

Is there a DD5.1 track on Paramount titles? (There isn't on The Duchess, one of their latest releases, Dolby TrueHD only)

Or Dreamworks? (There isn't on Ghost Town, Dolby TrueHD only)

Or Sony? (There isn't on In The Line Of Fire, Dolby TrueHD only)

Or Anchor Bay? (There isn't on Heathers, Dolby TrueHD only)

Or Fox? (there isn't on the new X-Files, DTS-MA)

Or Universal? (There isn't on Burn After Reading, DTS-MA)

I guess there are no complaints from people not being able to hear sound from THOSE studios!!

No, the truth is that the DD5.1 track is completely unnecessary. Warners don't need to use it. They certainly don't need to DEFAULT to it.

Paramount DVDs used to default to the 2.0 track. They quickly learned the error of their ways. I hope Warner Bros does too!
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post #106 of 169
2/17/09 at 11:23am
Thread Starter 

Re: What can we do about Warner Bros?

Double post.
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post #107 of 169
2/17/09 at 11:25am

Re: What can we do about Warner Bros?

There hasn't been a valid answer as far as I can see.
I'm with J on this.
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post #108 of 169
2/17/09 at 11:32am

Re: What can we do about Warner Bros?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Yumbo
There hasn't been a valid answer as far as I can see.
Emphasis added.
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post #109 of 169
2/17/09 at 11:34am

Re: What can we do about Warner Bros?

Show me (and many others).
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post #110 of 169
2/17/09 at 11:44am
Thread Starter 

Re: What can we do about Warner Bros?

This is truly ludicrous.

Okay, if I were to put this in basic terms and ask, given the choice, what would everybody prefer?

a) You insert the disc. The movie starts with the HD track automatically selected. The end.

or

b) You insert the disc. The movie starts with the DD5.1 track selected, you pick up the remote control, press "audio" or "menu\setup\audio\DolbyTrueHD\menu" (there's a momentary sound dropout during which music or dialogue is clipped), you put the remote control down having missed a couple of seconds of the movie.

or

c) You insert the disc. The movie starts with the DD5.1 track selected, you pick up the remote control, press "audio" or "menu\setup\audio\DolbyTrueHD\menu" (there's a momentary sound dropout etc) you press CHAPTER BACK to return to the start, you put the remote down having lost the "wow factor" that you get (or at least I get) when a movie starts.

Go on, given the choice, who would really choose options B or C? (bearing in mind that this is a forum for people who love movies!!) And if not, ask yourselves why you're so willing to put up with it when option A is so easily achievable with one small (and fairly logical!) tweak at WB!
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post #111 of 169
2/17/09 at 11:48am

Re: What can we do about Warner Bros?

Pick A! I like 'em apples.
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post #112 of 169
2/17/09 at 12:05pm

Re: What can we do about Warner Bros?

Quote:
Originally Posted by John H Ross
But come on. All the other studios manage it.

Is there a DD5.1 track on Paramount titles? (There isn't on The Duchess, one of their latest releases, Dolby TrueHD only)

Or Dreamworks? (There isn't on Ghost Town, Dolby TrueHD only)

Or Sony? (There isn't on In The Line Of Fire, Dolby TrueHD only)

Or Anchor Bay? (There isn't on Heathers, Dolby TrueHD only)
Are you sure? Because that's not what Dolby engineers say.

Courtesy of Roger Dressler at AVS:
Quote:
I heard from my contact at Warner, who confirmed that when the disc info lists both TrueHD and DD, then they included an extra DD track on the disc for direct access, as in The Polar Express 3D. Whereas, Amadeus just has the TrueHD track with embedded DD for compatibility.
I'd be interested to see what happens on the titles you mentioned when TrueHD isn't an option in the player and/or receiever.
Quote:
Or Fox? (there isn't on the new X-Files, DTS-MA)

Or Universal? (There isn't on Burn After Reading, DTS-MA)

I guess there are no complaints from people not being able to hear sound from THOSE studios!!
Please, look up the concept of the DTS "core" track before comparing DTS-HD:MA to TrueHD.
Quote:
No, the truth is that the DD5.1 track is completely unnecessary. Warners don't need to use it. They certainly don't need to DEFAULT to it.
I'd love to see you telling this to anyone who is required to use a Blu-ray setup with SPDIF, and then following it up with the rationalization of the inability to pick up a remote and/or recreate the mythical theater experience, which others here have pointed out is unrealistic no matter how you attempt to frame it. I'm sure you'd get quite a response.
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post #113 of 169
2/17/09 at 12:12pm

Re: What can we do about Warner Bros?

I use a TOSLINK rig in my lunchtime theatre.

Frozen River (TrueHD only) sounded just fine, with good old plain vanilla DD 5.1 coming through.

Does that answer your Q?
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post #114 of 169
2/17/09 at 12:15pm
Thread Starter 

Re: What can we do about Warner Bros?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Jesse Blacklow
I'd love to see you telling this to anyone who is required to use a Blu-ray setup with SPDIF, and then following it up with the rationalization of the inability to pick up a remote and/or recreate the mythical theater experience, which others here have pointed out is unrealistic no matter how you attempt to frame it. I'm sure you'd get quite a response.

So what you're suggesting (I think) is that Warners are getting this right while every single other studio is getting it wrong?

Funny, I seem to have missed the 10,000 complaints from people who aren't getting sound!!!
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post #115 of 169
2/17/09 at 12:20pm

Re: What can we do about Warner Bros?

Chris and John, what we've learned is that, in regards to TrueHD audio, Warner and Sony are encoding the discs the same way. If you have TrueHD selected, and can't get TrueHD, you get the AC3 track.

What Warner is doing different than Sony is allowing for the AC3 track to appear on the disc via the menus, and via Audio Track 1, as a selectable option, and as the default audio. This is, as I tried to say initially but was thwarted by my faulty technical term mumbo-jumbo, unnecessary and redundant programming.
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post #116 of 169
2/17/09 at 12:32pm
Thread Starter 

Re: What can we do about Warner Bros?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Brandon Conway
Chris and John, what we've learned is that, in regards to TrueHD audio, Warner and Sony are encoding the discs the same way. If you have TrueHD selected, and can't get TrueHD, you get the AC3 track.

What Warner is doing different than Sony is allowing for the AC3 track to appear on the disc via the menus, and via Audio Track 1, as a selectable option, and as the default audio. This is, as I tried to say initially but was thwarted by my faulty technical term mumbo-jumbo, unnecessary and redundant programming.

Excellent. Right. So Warner could remove the DD5.1 option from the menu (but leave it encoded on the disc), and then default to the DolbyHD track, and nobody would be any the wiser. The discreet DD5.1 (AC3) track would just kick in if it was needed, as it does on Sony discs.

So Warner Bros CAN default to the HD track after all. No more unnecessary fiddling with the audio settings while the movie is playing!!

Point proven I guess!

Now all they have to do is implement it! (D'OH!)
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post #117 of 169
2/17/09 at 12:40pm

Re: What can we do about Warner Bros?

Quote:
Originally Posted by John H Ross
Excellent. Right. So Warner could remove the DD5.1 option from the menu (but leave it encoded on the disc), and then default to the DolbyHD track, and nobody would be any the wiser. The discreet DD5.1 track would just kick in if it was needed, as it does on Sony discs.

So Warner Bros CAN default to the HD track after all. Point proven I guess!
Yes! (Even if it took much more typing and clarification than I expected going in. )
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post #118 of 169
2/17/09 at 12:41pm

Re: What can we do about Warner Bros?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Yumbo
I use a TOSLINK rig in my lunchtime theatre.

Frozen River (TrueHD only) sounded just fine, with good old plain vanilla DD 5.1 coming through.

Does that answer your Q?
Yes. If this is indeed the case, then to the extent that one could call it a problem, it is extremely minor for almost everybody. According to the links posted here, this seems to be due to how they author discs. If one dares to give an iota of charitability to Warner (shocking!), one could assume that their method is a fool-proof way to ensure audio comes through no matter what.
Quote:
Originally Posted by John H Ross
So what you're suggesting (I think) is that Warners are getting this right while every single other studio is getting it wrong?
Not even remotely.

What I was suggesting was that you've inflated one minor issue into no less than four major issues. Three of those issues were irrelevant, and the fourth is a minor annoyance that, while fixable, requires almost zero effort on the user's part to fix. The whole factually untenable "theatrical experience" red herring aside, you've made what seems to be an authoring preference into something that is (and I'm using your words here) a "totally unacceptable" decision.
Quote:
Funny, I seem to have missed the 10,000 complaints from people who aren't getting sound!!!
Funny, I wasn't aware that everybody who bought Blu-rays posted here. I asked the question, and at least someone was willing to do some research before flipping out.

That, more than anything, seems to be the point of this thread.
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post #119 of 169
2/17/09 at 1:05pm
Thread Starter 

Re: What can we do about Warner Bros?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Jesse Blacklow
That, more than anything, seems to be the point of this thread.

The point of the thread was to raise 4 issues that I have with Warner Bros Blu-ray Discs. And I stick by all 4 of those issues.

The fact that other studios are guilty of the same things (particularly points 2 and 3) is irrelevant. Warner Bros. is guilty of them.

The reason I singled Warner Bros out is because of their ridiculous habit of forcing movie watchers to interrupt movies to change the most basic of settings while every other studio makes the process seamless and separate to the movie-watching experience. This is the biggest gripe I have about the functionality of ANY studio's Blu-ray Discs.

I think it's now been established that they don't need to force the lossy DD5.1 track upon us as default.

I've given up pursuing the other 3 issues because I'm tired of banging my head against a wall of Warner Bros apologists for whom "almost zero effort" is just as acceptable as "zero effort".
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post #120 of 169
2/17/09 at 1:21pm

Re: What can we do about Warner Bros?

Quote:
Originally Posted by John H Ross
So you have to decide whether to watch an integral (i.e. as broadcast!) segment of the show WHILE THE SHOW IS PLAYING
Yes.

Quote:
and reset it for each and every episode?
No. You select "recap on" in the pop-up menu and then select an episode manually (or restart the one you are currently watching). If you don't do this last part your selection won't stick. But after that all episodes will play with the recaps on. You don't have to reset it for each episode manually.
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