Any news/rumors of Ken Burns' docs coming to Blu-ray? (1 Viewer)

[ManW_TheUncool]

I'm (again) considering picking up his series on Baseball and maybe Civil War on DVD given some great prices of late, especially for Baseball. But I'd hate to get the DVD set(s) and then find out shortly afterward that the BD versions are coming say later in 2011 (or even early 2012).

Anyone have any news or reasonably reliable rumors about BD versions coming sometime soon?

Thanks much.

_Man_

 

[ChrisALM]

I have not heard anything, but the the Burns' baseball doc has a lot of older footage. I am not sure BD is going to make a huge difference. And then you would need to make sure they don't try to crop for widescreen. (Although the Tenth Inning portion on DVD appears to have been originally done in widescreen, some of the clips, I would imagine, are from full screen prints and thus cropped).

I would not be surprised to eventually see this out on Bluray, but I am happy with the DVD set.

 

[Albert_M]

I doubt it and don't see it as necessary. Blu is just not as significant as an upgrade as dvd was to vhs.

 

[ManW_TheUncool]

Thanks for the comments so far, guys.

Originally Posted by Albert_M
I doubt it and don't see it as necessary. Blu is just not as significant as an upgrade as dvd was to vhs.

Not sure if you meant this just for the Ken Burns docs or for films in general, but that is not true for high quality source content that can take full advantage of Blu -- you do need a large enough FOV/viewing angle to take full advantage of Blu, which may be larger than what most people have in practice.

But yeah, I'm wondering how much diff Blu would make for the Ken Burns docs as well. I don't doubt some substantial portions of the docs will make little use of Blu's higher fidelity presentation.

How's the compression quality of the DVD set? Even if the eventual BD version doesn't add much in terms of resolution/detail, compression quality might still make a significant diff.

Thanks...

_Man_

 

[mattCR]

I will say, if they were on blu, and they used the right way to have branching and content pop-ups, they could be incredible teaching tools.. burns options through the websites of "see more" and full text of many of the soldiers letters, etc. that they use in "Civil War" etc. would have me pausing, reading, skimming, going through content.. it would be an absolute encyclopedia of it.
I've often thought the same of why I'd love to see "Shoah" on Bluray.. would the quality improve? Maybe not, but outside of the fact it'd likely be 2 BDs instead of 4 DVDs, you'd have a chance using branching to extend, add new content, text, information, pop-ups, etc.
I think Blu has a more natural use as an educational tool for documentaries then anything before it, just no one tries.

 

[MattAlbie60]

Originally Posted by Albert_M
I doubt it and don't see it as necessary. Blu is just not as significant as an upgrade as dvd was to vhs.

I completely disagree with this. If you've got the proper equipment and a disc with a high quality transfer, the differences are shocking.

 

[Lord Dalek]

I would imagine it should be easy for Burns' docs up to Empire of the Air to be ported to Blu-ray. Not so much Baseball on.

 

[ManW_TheUncool]

Originally Posted by Lord Dalek
I would imagine it should be easy for Burns' docs up to Empire of the Air to be ported to Blu-ray. Not so much Baseball on.

Why's that?

_Man_

 

[ManW_TheUncool]

BTW, I'm not too sure this thread actually belongs in the TV programs on media section of HTF though the docs were originally produced for TV presentation.

If the mods feel this belongs in the BD for Films/Docs section instead, please feel free to relocate. Thanks.

_Man_

 

[mattCR]

I don't know, they were produced for PBS.. I'm not sure where else they should go but TV

 

[ChrisALM]

On the TVShowsonDVD.com website, it is listed as a mini-series.

 

[ScottJH]

Anything new on a possible Blu-Ray release of The Civil War? There was a 150th Commemorative Edition of The Civil War released on DVD end of last month. Looks like it's the original set with a 6th disc with more interviews/outtakes of Burns & Foote. Wonder if the lip-sync issue has been fixed?

 

[MatthewA]

I would gladly buy The Civil War on BD if they can fix that ghastly lip-sync problem. And Baseball, for my Dad.

 

[Noel Aguirre]

Great deal at Amazon today on Baseball- one day only, Gold Box. DVD only still.