It's official: BOTH Blu-ray and HD-DVD downrez component (1 Viewer)

[Stephen Heath]

I can't see how this would work big picture.

Theoretically, you would want every single copy of a movie to have a unique watermark so you could pinpoint down to the person who let the original copy out of the bag. Except that really doesn't do anything because noone would be involved in tracing serial numbers from manufacturer to purchaser, especially since the purchases may resell the DVD to someone else.

That would also massively increase the costs to press the discs since you wouldn't be doing volume runs, but rather individual runs. Therefore it's most likely that they will mark them by categories. Ie, one watermark for ones going to rental outlets (assuming they are seperate press runs), one for screeners to academy awards, etc. Well, if you're only doing 5 or 6 different runs, if you mark all but one of them, the complete LACK of a watermark can tell you it comes from the last type. Make that the consumer DVD type mass-merchandise version, and consumers are happy.

As for a transparent watermark... maybe it's not an actual watermark at all, but the absence of a single frame? I'd have no complaint about that. The human eye can see what, 32 frames per second? And cameras record 65 or so? They could tell which frame was missing (or if none were, it came from the director =p), but again, how does that help them? The only time that is practical is oscar screeners, because then at least you have a record of who received which one.

 

[DaViD Boulet]

Right. Probably something more like this.

 

[ChrisWiggles]

I believe that is correct. it's 750 for 720p and 1125 for 1080

 

[ChristopherDAC]

DVD-A watermarking is intended to — and does — tag copies so that they do not play. I know a fellow who, for experimental purposes, recorded a DVD-A playback via a microphone to DAT in LP mode, 32 kHz, then imported that to his computer as a 48 kHz .MP3, and burned the file to an audio CD-R. In his DVD-A player, the disc would not play, with an error message reading something on the line of "Copy Protection". Do we know if the Blu-Ray players will be looking for something similar? As far as timing goes, yes, "1080" video has 1125 total lines, and at the standard clock-speed 2200 samples per line: the pixels you can't see are in the "horizontal blanking interval", just as the hidden lines are in the "vertical blanking interval". Without the "dead space" for sync signals and retrace, feeding component video to anything, and particularly to a CRT, would be next to impossible. Actually, the number of visible lines per frame used to be lower, 1035; the longer vertical interval makes CRT scan-synchronisation easier [I have heard of trouble with CRTs as regards syncing on some 1080i outputs]. "720" video uses 750 total lines, and the same clock frequency [at 60p] as 1080 [at 30i]; thus it has 1650 total samples per line.

 

[Jason Harbaugh]

I'm learning some interesting stuff in this thread, a lot of which I probably never would have found out otherwise. But then of course there is all the scary stuff they can/could do.

 

[JeremyErwin]

Jeremy picks up Heavenly Creatures. Notes "CC" symbol. Places DVD player in MacOSx machine. Turns on closed captioning. Reads along with the action. Smiles..

In this case, the Closed Captions, aside from being in all uppercase, mirror the english subtitles. On many other dvds, however, the english subtitle tracks omit descriptions of sound effects.

Some DVDs disable subtitles when audio commentaries are played, or lack english subtitles all together. Sometimes, however, it is useful to follow both commentary and script simultaneously, and a closed captioning system can be quite useful. As I have decent hearing, however, I find the descriptions of sound effects to be somewhat jarring, but then, I'm not part of the intended audience.

 

[DaViD Boulet]

Jeremy,

you're turning old-fashioned CC on, on the TV itself? (ie, not just a subtitle track on the DVD called "CC")?Interesting... I hadn't been aware that this would work with DVD. Would like to know more!

 

[JeremyErwin]

sort of. I have a Macintosh, and run Mac OX 10.4. The included DVD player decodes closed captions. My other "TV" is a simple LCD display, running from either a Samsung SIR-T165 TV tuner or an Oppo 971H, so naturally, it cannot decode closed captions.
As far as I know, it's the "old fashioned" closed captioning system. Incidentally, the ATSC implementation adds lowercase letters.

 

[ChristopherDAC]

Actually, standard Closed Captions support not only upper- and lower-case letters, but also several different text colours and positions. One doesn't usually see them except when a noisy broadcast signal triggers the decoder with random control codes (corrupted from the normal ones), because the people who do the encoding have no creativity, but I have LaserDiscs which actually make some use of the options.
I think, but amn not sure, that DVD players by default take the contents of some text-and-timing file and encode it on Line 21 in the CaptionVision format, to provide support for "legacy" decoders. This wouldn't seem to be necessary, given the presence of a subtitle track for the purpose, but so what?

 

[Ryan-G]

Depends on how it's done.

Scenario:

The watermarking is done in such a way that it translates into a serial number, by allowing the watermark to be something that the computer can alter on the fly. Any geometric pattern for example could be manipulated in such a way to generate serial numbers, and is well within the realm of computer's ability to manipulate in code.

Then when a Torrent appears and is downloaded 10,000,000 times, MPAA tracks back to the originator, and if he's foolish enough to have retained the original copy there's direct proof that is unshakeable in court. Equally important, even a rental would provide a record that would give a window that would readily show guilt.

Sub-Scenario:

The DVD Drive/Player retains the serial numbers of the last X discs placed into it in some form of Flash memory. Even if you tossed the disc, the drive/player would report that you had owned it.

Done correctly, it would allow the MPAA to legally and definitively prove guilt with ease. In the span of a few months, it'd probably prove to have a *drastic* impact on piracy, at least with High-Def DVDs...

Edit:

This wouldn't be any more invasive than what's currently in use for major software titles, would essentially be similiar to Windows for example, which is serialed and retains it's serial to show you owned and installed it. This one could certainly be well within the realm of what is already accepted as a security measure.

 

[DaViD Boulet]

But the watermarking on BD doesn't require an internet connection...it's just a way of tracing any later bootlegs to the batch of original DVDs.

Any computer-generated changed to something like an intra-picture serial # would have to happen prior to compression and authoring...so you couldn't feasably do that for each individual disc...you'd have to serialize by "runs" at the most specific.

At least that's they way it seems to me! I'd love to know more about the watermarking...

 

[AlexBC]

David,

I'd say about 80 to 90% of all US DVD movie releases have the old-fashioned CC, on the TV itself as you say. From the top of my head, all Warner, Sony, New Line, BV, Paramount and FOX titles I've ever tried carry them. Anchor Bay and Image Entertainment also use them on regular basis. From the majors, I believe only Universal and Dreamworks present Closed Caption on regular subtitle style.

On My Elite CRT display I've turned them on several times. And I'm positive that most discs include the logo or specification somewhere on the label, mostly on the spine (the new (accutaly rather old right now) logo, which looks like a small TV screen).

 

[DaViD Boulet]

Alex,

thanks for that info. I wasn't aware of any of that! I'd love to know how DVD handles the encoding of CC...is it enocoded in it's own meta-data stream (like subtitles) that the player then encodes into the added blanking lines of tha analog 525 signal proir to output? Anyone know?

 

[Marko Berg]

DaViD, depending on your DVD player and display device, Closed Captions may or may not work for you. I was recently told in another thread here at HTF that progressive scan playback interferes with the CC option which was apparently designed to rely on interlaced playback.

If you are using an HTPC, this will not be a problem as DVD playback software will get around the problem and you can turn on CC and still watch the content in progressive mode.