Steve Canyon (1958) (2 Viewers)

[Eric Huffstutler]

I also received my copy last week but haven't had a chance to look it over completely.
The source materials look gorgeous but the DVD authoring has a couple compression artifacts attributed to having 3-hours+ of materials on each disc resulting in banding in some scenes. A shame when so much work went into this! Otherwise a solid presentation and a must for any Cold War fanatic like me! Looking forward to Vol 2.
Eric

 

[John Sparks]

Received my STEVE CANYON, V.1 set in the mail this week and I'm thrilled. The quality is fantastic and the shows are a real treat to watch. I highly recommend this set to everyone!!! Thanks to John Ellis and the rest of the crew for making this wonderful series available on dvd.
Gary "you can tell a lot of TLC went into this set" O.

Couldn"t have said it better myself!

 

[Bob Gu]

Ditto.

I marathoned the extras tracks and found them to be a lot of fun and informative. Marion Ross was very enthusiastic, and Morgan Woodward was very candid in his assessment of Dean Frederick's acting style in playing Steve Canyon. It's too bad Russell Johnson could not have talked longer during his segment. I would have liked to hear his firsthand account of his own WWII aviation adventures which included surviving a plane crash in the water.

Another treat on the DVDs are the original commercials, especially the ones made with an Air Force setting just for use on Steve Canyon. And the ABC promos featuring shows like 77 Sunset Strip, Oh Susannah, and Love That Bob looked great and make me continue to hope for their release on DVD sooner than later.

 

[Eric Huffstutler]

John and Bob... true, the source materials and overall package is terrific but have either of you noted the errors the disc itself has by craming too much data on it? The posterization banding in certain scenes or the reduced audio range where the sampler was 448Kbps while only 256Kbps on Vol 1?
In other words how does it look and sound on a big screen setup?

 

[John Sparks]

John and Bob... true, the source materials and overall package is terrific but have either of you noted the errors the disc itself has by craming too much data on it? The posterization banding in certain scenes or the reduced audio range where the sampler was 448Kbps while only 256Kbps on Vol 1?
In other words how does it look and sound on a big screen setup?

Hi Eric,
I'm watching it on a 65" 16x9 CRT RPTV professionall ISF'd and it looks beautiful!!!
I watch a lot of b&w TV shows and this is by far the cleanest looking.
I'm a happy camper.

 

[Eric Huffstutler]

Hi Eric,
I'm watching it on a 65" 16x9 CRT RPTV professionall ISF'd and it looks beautiful!!!
I watch a lot of b&w TV shows and this is by far the cleanest looking.
I'm a happy camper.

John, I sat through a Steve Canyon marathon yesterday and viewed all 12 episodes in one sitting. I never tired of it, each episode had something different to keep my attention and the acting was top notch.
The original source on Beta tape is excellent but once again, I am having issues with the DVD authoring itself - nothing that John Ellis or the people at Caniff did.
Eric
I will have to post a couple of screen grabs to see if what I am speaking of is specific to my disc? I am at work, will post later on this evening.

 

[Eric Huffstutler]

Post removed per Mr. Ellis. See post #57 below.
Eric

 

[Brent Avery]

As Eric mentioned those artifacts do show themselves as I too noticed them and are a bit annoying - still, overall the video quality is pretty good, actually outstanding at times. Hopefully Volume 2 will address this, if possible.

 

[Bob Gu]

I noticed the posterization banding Eric mentions. Usually on long shots of planes landing. I checked the Operation Diplomat episode on both the Vol 1 and the sampler Disc and the sampler also has that slight bluing effect shown in Eric's screens and the posterization is not really noticeable until the plane landing picture begins to fade to the commercial.

I see Eric and some other HTF posters are listed in the acknowledgements on the end of the Discs.

 

[Eric Huffstutler]

I noticed the posterization banding Eric mentions. Usually on long shots of planes landing. I checked the Operation Diplomat episode on both the Vol 1 and the sampler Disc and the sampler also has that slight bluing effect shown in Eric's screens and the posterization is not really noticeable until the plane landing picture begins to fade to the commercial.
I see Eric and some other HTF posters are listed in the acknowledgements on the end of the Discs.

Yes Bob... my name is in the credits because I was an early advocate of this series, made positive reviews of the sampler, offered to look for related materials, and pre-ordered Vol 1 early. Again I am not whining about the series or the source material. All complaints stem from the DVD manufacturing end. I feel if they would have used DVD-9 discs or spread the episodes over 4 discs, it would have helped with the compression issues and there wouldn't be ANY complaints! I thought at one point it was supposed to be on DVD-9?
Eric

 

[John Ellis]

Hmmm...

 

[Gary OS]

I'm not trying to be mean or anything, but my honest opinion is that this issue of artifacts is much ado about nothing. Is there a very, very scant amount of it in the scenes in question? Yes, but you really have to be looking hard to notice it that much, IMHO. I'm not the videophile that others are, but I just think this is nitpicking a bit much. And I am watching the dvds on a 48 inch Sony, with an upconverting progressive scan Pioneer dvd player. The show looks wonderful to me! Frankly, I'm shocked it looks as beautiful as it does considering it's age and the fact that it's been out of circulation for so long. In my humble opinion, we should be accentuating the positives (of which there are many), not focusing on a minuscule issue such as this one about artifacts. And to be honest, nothing on my screen ever looked as bad as a couple of those pictures above. Not even close.
My many thanks to John Ellis and the rest of the crew that have given us all the pleasure of watching STEVE CANYON once again! Oh, and the classic commercials are worth the price of admission all by themselves. What a great way to add extras! Thanks a bunch, fellows!
Gary "everyone that's a vintage fan needs to pick this set up - it's that good" O.

 

[Eric Huffstutler]

Gary, the pics on the left are untouched so is what I see on my screens and can be hard to see in these smaller scaled down shots. It is in every flyover scene, clouds, and in shadows in corners of a room. The usual places. Maybe your eye isn't tuned into such things? Maybe your set compensates where mine doesn't? Or possibly I have a bad disc? Yet others have seen what I do and yes, for the most part, it is gorgeous but still when your eye has zeroed in on details like mine does, it can be distracting and fixed at the factory end. The effects are similar to when someone burns a gray disc.
Let this be a major new release and people would be all over it like white on rice!

 

[Gary OS]

Ok, here's one thing that's probably the key distinction between the way some of us are viewing these episodes: our default settings on our TV sets. I watch all my shows on what is called "Movie" mode which has certain settings for brightness, color, hue, etc. It gives me the best picture for my viewing pleasure whether I'm watching something in color or in b/w. When I viewed the episode in question in this mode again it looked fine to me. If I squinted I could see some artifacts, but no "blueing" at all. When I switched my setting to "Vivid" mode, which of course completely changes all my individual visual settings, then my picture looked much closer to what you posted. But then I popped in a CBS/P offering (The Andy Griffith Show in this case) and I saw some artifacts with that too. Switched my mode back to "Movie" and things looked beautiful again. So I believe that adjusting some of the settings will help things, but if one is looking to keep the sharpness all the way up (as one example) or other portions of the visuals to certain levels, then the show isn't going to look as nice and clean because the tv is accentuating things to our eyes that could be pulled back if we would adjust our settings. I'll bet I'd be a lot more critical of all my dvds if I watched them on the "Vivid" mode my set offers.
Anyhow, that's what I believe we are dealing with. Settings are a big part of the key, IMHO.
Gary "still say this set is great and well, well worth the price" O.

 

[Eric Huffstutler]

Gary, even my 20" Phillips flat tube set has these various "modes" including movie but with mine the picture ends up looking brownish, dark, and soft. I prefer sharpness and lots of details and once again, in the more busy scenes you get that. It is the variable compression bitrate ratios that is the problem. On the sampler they average between 4.0-4.5M while on Vol. 1 they are all over the place between "less than" 1.0 to as high as 10.0 depending on the scene. It is in the lower numbers that you end up with the artifacts and the sky is pretty consistently across the board but they used such a wide variable bitrate to squeeze so much on the disc. Shots running in that range have the banding issue. Optimumly it should be in the range of 5.0 or above all the time and nothing lower.

 

[John Ellis]

You've made your points Eric and I'm certain we all understand here. As I told you in our email dated November 28, Harry and I have taken your suggestions under advisement in the event of any re-pressings and/or future releases. We thank you for your input.

 

[Eric Huffstutler]

John, my post has been removed per your request. The photos were only used as a visual reference.
Eric

 

[John Ellis]

Thanks Eric, Harry and I appreciate your assistance and good humor in this matter
We hope that everyone's enjoying the holiday season and we look forward to further comments on Volume 1!

 

[Bob Gu]

Steve Canyon Vol.2 is up for pre-order, at the Steve Canyon blog for $19.95, which includes First Class shipping. Scheduled to ship about March 9, 2009.

And Vol 1 is still available for $19.95 post paid. To order, click on the Steve Canyon On Dvd link on Canyon DVD Producer John Ellis's post above, #58.

 

[cajunhillbilly]

It will be out around my birthday