My opinion on Willy Wonka in High-Def: What do you think of the transfer? (1 Viewer)

I just received my batch of the latest Warner HD-DVDs. These came
to me a week late -- my fault for selecting the wrong shipping option.

The first title I threw into my HD-A1 was Willy Wonka and The
Chocolate Factory. I was very excited that Warner made the
decision to get this title out as quickly as they did.

For reference purposes I went directly to the infamous Chocolate
Room scene where Wonka (Gene Wilder) sings Pure Imagination.

I can't say I was overly impressed with what I saw on my 65"
display. While the picture certainly looks clearer than ever before,
there just seems to be (for lack of better description) a noticeable
bit of mosquito/surface noise across the picture. Check out the top
of the scene where the group is standing on the steps down
to the chocolate room. You can see a bit of instability within Mr.
Beauregarde's checkered jacket. There also seems to be some
slight shifting of colors within the flesh tones and surrounding scenery.

Mind you, Willy Wonka doesn't look bad on this new format,
but I certainly expected it to look better than it does.

...and maybe I'm expecting too much. After all, this is a film made
nearly 36 years ago. It's my understanding that many of the films
made during the 70s were lensed on poor film stock. I also understand
that the a high defintion format will only amplify film grain and other
impurities found in older films. I also want to make it clear that I
am certainly not blaming Warner Bros. for a bad transfer, because
quite frankly, I have no idea if what I am watching should be
considered normal.

I'm certainly not attempting to raise a red flag that may not exist.
I am still becoming accustomed to how older films should look on
this new format.

I am certainly curious to see what others think of this transfer.

Look forward to your reply.

Well, my order just arrived also....

Finding WONKA last week at any retailer around my place was harder than finding a Golden Ticket...

This flick get's it's big screen run tonight (12 foot diag) at a backyard flick night.

With the comments above, I am hoping (after all I did run this at a theater recently) that it looks the way it is suppose to....

Would be very disappointed if I upgraded and got nothing short of a major improve over the SD....

Dugger

There are some signs something's awry. When the picture isn't moving much, it looks pretty good, but when it starts moving, then it becomes very smeary and ill-defined. I looked for aliasing problems such as were found on the handful of 1080i masters and didn't see any, however, so I'm not entirely sure what the source of the problem is.

How does the framing compare to the SD?

Sounds a lot like you have either a DLP or an LCD set with very slow response time. I didn't notice this effect night before last when I watched the HD DVD.

However, there is a fair amount of film grain that could be making the display have to work harder and/or makes the effect of slow pixel response time more obvious on the screen.

Ted

No, a CRT-based RPTV, the Toshiba 65H80. I hesitate to use the term "bit starvation" since the BDFB will jump all over it, but that's probably what I'd say if it were a SD DVD.

Watched it again last night and I just don't see this. Strange. Long persistence phosphers on projection CRT's can also cause it, but I would expect it to not be source dependent.

Ted