A Few Words About A few words about…™ The Deer Hunter - in 4k UHD Blu-ray (1 Viewer)

[john a hunter]

Thanks for your input Scott.
Will probably have to pick it up!!!

 

[cda1143]

...

I immediately saw what RAH mentions, the loss of shadow detail. Oppo 203D -> Sony XBR-65x900F TV. I've only seen this phenomenon as bad during WB's Unforgiven BD (which is sad given how much I love that film).
...

Your comments about the Blu-ray of Unforgiven caught my attention. I went back and re-read RAH's review of this release. For projection, he complained about the loss of shadow detail on the UHD disc, but he highly praised the BD version of that release. Are your problems with Unforgiven with the BD or the UHD?

 

[Robert Harris]

I’m finding an interesting technical aspect regarding HDR.

While I generally don’t expect it to play nicely with projectors, I was hopeful that at least with high-end panels, especially OLED, that certain parameters might simply work.

It seems that they do not, and multiple settings are necessary. HDR may function properly, but I’m finding that Dolby Vision, even being recognized by a panel, may not display properly, and will be in need of additional calibration.

Having reset parameters for Aurens, I’ll now revisit other DV titles such as Wonderful Life.

One size of HDR, even when recognized, does not seem to fit all.

I can see home theater enthusiasts getting frustrated with this,

 

[Carlo_M]

Your comments about the Blu-ray of Unforgiven caught my attention. I went back and re-read RAH's review of this release. For projection, he complained about the loss of shadow detail on the UHD disc, but he highly praised the BD version of that release. Are your problems with Unforgiven with the BD or the UHD?

UHD.

 

[Carlo_M]

I’m finding an interesting technical aspect regarding HDR.

While I generally don’t expect it to play nicely with projectors, I was hopeful that at least with high-end panels, especially OLED, that certain parameters might simply work.

It seems that they do not, and multiple settings are necessary. HDR may function properly, but I’m finding that Dolby Vision, even being recognized by a panel, may not display properly, and will be in need of additional calibration.

Having reset parameters for Aurens, I’ll now revisit other DV titles such as Wonderful Life.

One size of HDR, even when recognized, does not seem to fit all.

I can see home theater enthusiasts getting frustrated with this,

I just popped in Unforgiven 4K UHD and applied a similar adjustment (Oppo 203 -> Sony 65XBR-X900F) and applied a similar adjustment to the Black Level (increased from the defaulty 50 to 70) and found similar improvement to The Deer Hunter. Unforgiven is a standard HDR10 title, not DV. So it seems like the parameters can be misapplied to either format.

The good news is that the picture information is still there in the dark scenes once black level is adjusted, versus being lost by an improper compression onto disc. The bad news is that for these two titles in my library, I have to remember to adjust the settings back and forth so that my other HDR discs are at the proper black level.

I've found changing the Black Level does the "least harm" to the rest of the picture. Increasing Brightness does also bring out shadow detail, but it also blows out all the whites and lighter parts of the picture. The main harm of increasing black level for these two titles is that it lightens the black bars above/below the film since they're both ~2.35:1 aspect ratio on my 16x9 TV. But the whites/light parts of the image don't get blown out by the adjustment.

 

[Robert Harris]

I just popped in Unforgiven 4K UHD and applied a similar adjustment (Oppo 203 -> Sony 65XBR-X900F) and applied a similar adjustment to the Black Level (increased from the defaulty 50 to 70) and found similar improvement to The Deer Hunter. Unforgiven is a standard HDR10 title, not DV. So it seems like the parameters can be misapplied to either format.

The good news is that the picture information is still there in the dark scenes once black level is adjusted, versus being lost by an improper compression onto disc. The bad news is that for these two titles in my library, I have to remember to adjust the settings back and forth so that my other HDR discs are at the proper black level.

I've found changing the Black Level does the "least harm" to the rest of the picture. Increasing Brightness does also bring out shadow detail, but it also blows out all the whites and lighter parts of the picture. The main harm of increasing black level for these two titles is that it lightens the black bars above/below the film since they're both ~2.35:1 aspect ratio on my 16x9 TV. But the whites/light parts of the image don't get blown out by the adjustment.

Although there’s no mention in manuals I’m trying to find out if there’s a way to save the DV and secondary HDR settings.

I still believe that while civilization may be changing the Wild West aspect of HDR a bit, we’re still not in a situation in which it’s either automated or simple.

 

[Carlo_M]

Although there’s no mention in manuals I’m trying to find out if there’s a way to save the DV and secondary HDR settings.

I still believe that while civilization may be changing the Wild West aspect of HDR a bit, we’re still not in a situation in which it’s either automated or simple.

For my set (or maybe the Sony line in which my set falls in) it remembers your last settings for DV and HDR independently. But near as I can tell, there are no save-to-presets capability for my model. So I may just resort to putting a post-it on these two movies saying "remember to add +20 to Black Level".

PS, I'm at the prison / Duck of Death scene. I constantly forget how great this movie is.

 

[Robert Harris]

For my set (or maybe the Sony line in which my set falls in) it remembers your last settings for DV and HDR independently. But near as I can tell, there are no save-to-presets capability for my model. So I may just resort to putting a post-it on these two movies saying "remember to add +20 to Black Level".

PS, I'm at the prison / Duck of Death scene. I constantly forget how great this movie is.

I went far more into the weeds than + black level. If it remembers separate levels for HDR and DV without a formal save, I’d be thrilled. And then wait for the next power outage.

 

[Brian Husar]

I went far more into the weeds than + black level. If it remembers separate levels for HDR and DV without a formal save, I’d be thrilled. And then wait for the next power outage.

Now if I can find out the correct settings for DV on my Vizio.

 

[Carlo_M]

I went far more into the weeds than + black level. If it remembers separate levels for HDR and DV without a formal save, I’d be thrilled. And then wait for the next power outage.

Oh man. PTSD from back in the day when I had my first HD RPTV ISF calibrated by Michael Chen. I dutifully wrote down dozens of values and learned how to get into the service menu just in case a power outage undid his work.

 

[Neil S. Bulk]

I still believe that while civilization may be changing the Wild West aspect of HDR a bit, we’re still not in a situation in which it’s either automated or simple.

The nice thing about standards is that you have so many to choose from.
-Andrew S. Tanenbaum

 

[Sam Favate]

Well, I'm two years late to the party, but I finally watched this in 4k. (Yep, I have a two year backlog on my shelf.) I enjoyed the film, as I always do, but the blacks are way too dark. Even watching this in a completely darkened room, at night, it was hard to discern what was going on at times. By far, the worst scenes were near the end when Michael returns to Vietnam. Not being able to see what's happening kills the tension that should be mounting for the audience.

This is the first time I saw the film since it came to DVD. Next time, I watch the blu-ray.

Nevertheless, it's a classic and a worthy addition to any film library.

 

[RolandL]

I just popped in Unforgiven 4K UHD and applied a similar adjustment (Oppo 203 -> Sony 65XBR-X900F) and applied a similar adjustment to the Black Level (increased from the defaulty 50 to 70) and found similar improvement to The Deer Hunter. Unforgiven is a standard HDR10 title, not DV. So it seems like the parameters can be misapplied to either format.

The good news is that the picture information is still there in the dark scenes once black level is adjusted, versus being lost by an improper compression onto disc. The bad news is that for these two titles in my library, I have to remember to adjust the settings back and forth so that my other HDR discs are at the proper black level.

I've found changing the Black Level does the "least harm" to the rest of the picture. Increasing Brightness does also bring out shadow detail, but it also blows out all the whites and lighter parts of the picture. The main harm of increasing black level for these two titles is that it lightens the black bars above/below the film since they're both ~2.35:1 aspect ratio on my 16x9 TV. But the whites/light parts of the image don't get blown out by the adjustment.

This was just released on Netflix in DV. In some scenes it does appear very dark (I also have a Sony XBR-85X900F) but, I didn't feel I needed to adjust the settings. I changed the Black Level to 70 and it does improve the shadow detail but, the overall picture looks better at the 50 setting.

 

[Robert Harris]

4k disc releases should not entail “some assembly required.”