Panic Room - Is it Truely Superbit (1 Viewer)

[Steve_Tk]

I really enjoyed this movie. This DVD will do fine until a SE comes along.

 

[Bryant Trew]

I'd like an independant confirmation of that, methinks you're measuring the stereo track

And I'll try to refrain from responding to your insult. If the display on my DVD player is correct, then it is the simple truth.

With the full understanding that I could lose my account on this board for questioning the owner's integrity, I'd still like to know why they aren't raising holy hell about this. As much clout as HTF has, you would think that they would be using their influence to tell Sonypictures to stuff-it! Where's the review for Panic Room?

 

[Paul_D]

As much clout as HTF has, you would think that they would be using their influence to tell Sonypictures to stuff-it! Where's the review for Panic Room?

Is there any official word as to why the bitrate is so un-super?

 

[Damin J Toell]

And I'll try to refrain from responding to your insult. If the display on my DVD player is correct, then it is the simple truth.

But is it even possible to encode DD 5.1 at 192kbps? I thought DD 5.1 could only be done at 384 kbps or 448 kbps.

DJ

 

[David Ely]

And I'll try to refrain from responding to your insult.

There was no insult in his statement. I've never seen a 5.1 track that's 192k, and I'm sure Jeff hasn't either. I too would like confirmation of this fact from more members.

 

[Robert Crawford]

Let's stop with the hostility now because it really isn't necessary to be questioning one's integrity over this issue! As many of you know, several of the moderators just got back from vacation earlier this week which has caused many of us to fall behind in our dvd viewing. Since Monday, I received 28 dvds alone which caused me to really pick and choose which dvds I was going to view as I got back in the swing of things with my everyday life as well as my day job. I suspect Ron is having the same difficulty with him probably concentrating his reviews on dvds being released next week and the week after. Furthermore, Ron has stated on this forum that he sees little difference in video quality between superbit and regular dvds and since that opinion caused some minor controversy among the membership, I seriously doubt whether he will even watched the Panic Room dvd.
Crawdaddy

 

[JeremySt]

Bryant, the 192 bitrate you quoted for Panic Room is pretty much the norm for the 2 channel tracks on DVD. It's not like its a rare occasion. The DD 5.1 on Panic Room is NOT 192kbps, it IS 448. As for 384 and 448kbs, that is also the regular Dolby Digital practice, depending on the studio's choice. What's there to raise hell about?

 

[Michael Reuben]

For the record:

The DD 5.1 track on Panic Room is encoded at 448kbps, just as with most 5.1 DVDs from the last 3-4 years, superbit or otherwise (with the notable exception of Warner titles). The dialnorm is set at -31, resulting in no volume adjustment at the decoding stage.

The DD 2.0 track is encoded as 192kbps, which is the norm for 2.0 tracks. The dialnorm setting is -30, resulting in a -1db adjustment to the overall volume.

These readings are from a Lexicon MC-1, which provides a detailed readout on the status of whatever AC3 bitstream it's decoding.

M.

 

[Dave Mack]

No bragging here, but I have a pretty decent settup and Gladiator, Training Day, my SB BS Dracula and MANY others wipe the FLOOR aginst Panic room visually. I'm sorry, but I think it's a ruse...

I truly doubt this was a SB title...

D

 

[Gui A]

I'd like an independant confirmation of that, methinks you're measuring the stereo track

reading... reading again...
Jeff, your insults are lame.

 

[Malcolm R]

Ron said in another thread:

I have washed my hands of Superbit reviews.

So there you go.

 

[Bryant Trew]

I'm looking at the menu on my DVD player, while watching in 5.1 and it says 192. Maybe it just reads the first audio track, which may be 2ch ...So go figure.

In either case, Panic Room is horrid.

 

[James Reader]

It's not a 'Superbit' title, because it actually features additional English 2.0 and French 2.0 soundtracks as well - something previous 'Superbits' would never do (even the 'Superbit Deluxe' titles miss out of the DD 2.0 commentaries, and CTHD does not have an additional English soundtrack only Mandarin AFAIK). It is clear just from that simple fact that the transfer and encoding for the film were not done for a Superbit title.

 

[Gordon McMurphy]

In reply to Rob Lutter's "How It Went Down!" bit:
Ha ha ha! That was rather humourous, Rob! Nice one! Stick it to The Man!
Gordy

 

[Gordon McMurphy]

To be trusted: www.widescreenreview.com/newrelease/panicroom.html?
:frowning:
Gordy

 

[Ned]

192kbit is a DD 2.0 track. Do you guys have any clue what you're talking about?

I found the video quite sharp in still shots but there seems to be some visible compression on pan shots. It's most noticeable on large flat areas like the interior house walls with a "smearing" of pixels. This is definitely a digital compression artifact, not a property of the original film.

That complaint aside, it still looks better than 90% of the other DVD's coming out.

 

[Paul_D]

To be trusted: http://www.widescreenreview.com/newr...anicroom.html?
:frowning:

They give it a very favourable review. Why the unhappy smiley?

 

[Gordon McMurphy]

In reply to Paul Dalmaine:
The unhappy smiley was due to me hearing how BAD the transfer is at HTF and then seeing that she have it 5 for picture and 5 for DTS was kinda strange!
I don't own the DVD, but I'd really like to see it.
I think a s disc SE is inevetable.
Gordy
In a land full of Jocks!

 

[Bryant Trew]

Rent first! I'd mail you mine, but that's probably because I thought the film was lame as well. Especially with Fincher using his Fight Club techniques to death.

 

[Robert Harris]

I feel as if I'm jumping into the center of a can of worms.

One of the things that I haven't had time to do until recently, and will be discussing in the next column is a discussion of Sony's SuperBit compression technology.

I've just completed viewing Panic Room.

As mentioned, I have been comparing different compressions on a number of the Sony SuperBit titles and have come away with a very positive mind set.

Panic Room is a superb transfer.

It faithfully reproduces the theatrical densities and production values of the film as projected theatrically.

Some of the most difficult areas for transfer to home video and especially to digital video have been haze, smoke, rain and other more ethereal or translucent light values being transferred from film to video.

The transfer of Panic Room handles all of these anomalies beautifully, down to the last detail.

Shot in extremely low key, this is a film which should look downright awful on video.

But it doesn't.

While viewing I could not get past the thought of what this film might have looked like in a non-SB transfer and compression.

Please keep in mind as you view video -- and film -- that low densities can be quite sharp, but the lower the contrast levels, the lower the APPARENT sharpness and the higher the noise values.

Panic Room, while being extremely low contrast has full shadow detail and sharpness.

To my eye this is a superb transfer.

As a point of reference Panic Room was viewed projected on a 110" screen with 1.3x reflectance.

RAH