Fox's evolution of "tv on dvd" to "tv on dvd-mod" (1 Viewer)

[jcroy]

Actually, the cost of mastering a Blu-ray is comparable to the cost of mastering a DVD in 2019, especially when the show in question has already been shot in hi-def, as conversion or up-conversion is not an issue. It's a one to one transfer process.

And, in a hi-def world, there really is no point to standard def releases any more. Samsung recently introduced their 8K sets with no content in 8K available to take full advantage of the technology. DVD serves none of the current models either in HD broadcast, Blu-ray or 4K format and looks terrible when viewed on any of these aforementioned hardware. Time for the studios to catch up to where the technology is. In the old days, the tech companies and the home media giants ran concurrent races. That hasn't happened since about 2006, with the entertainment industry continuing to lose ground as a result.

The most expensive part of the 'remastering' process is restoration, followed by the up-conversion process to bring a film-based product up to new digital standards. As virtually all of the Fox TV shows listed in this discussion are already in hi-def, the argument that it is more cost effective to release them to DVD than Blu-ray is moot. Period!

In the early days of releasing TV to Blu-ray, the discrepancy between the cost of the DVD and the cost of the Blu-ray for purchase often was beyond $10, leading all but the 'early adopters' of Blu to conclude they could 'be happy' with just their DVD's, since they were cheaper. Today, that price disparity has also leveled off with Blu-ray usually within a $1 to $5 dollar difference for which many are willing to pay the difference to get a superior product. The studios just looked at the numbers before the adjustment in mastering costs were actually in and decided they weren't interested in keeping two formats going. But instead of dropping DVD, they dropped Blu-ray, perhaps unaware that 4K was just around the corner. As 4K sets are fast becoming 'the norm' in households replacing their TV's, the mentality to continue on with DVD instead of Blu-ray now makes no sense.

But now, in some cases, you have hi-def TV programming that hasn't seen a hi-def home video release for several seasons, making the cost of going back and re-issuing Blu-rays of the DVD sets a little less cost effective.

I say, if the studios are unwilling to incur this cost, then they should at least be willing to 'farm out' their hi-def digital files to third party distributors to do 'complete series' Blu-ray reissues. This is already happening with vintage TV releases: Quantum Leap, Miami Vice, Damages, The Rockford Files, and the pending Blu of Charlies Angels coming from Mill Creek. Some studios are waking up. Warner will give us the original Scooby-Doo and The Jetsons very soon on Blu. They've already given us Johnny Quest.

If there's room for this vintage product in hi-def, then there is CERTAINLY room for already prepped hi-def TV on Blu-ray. Warner's archive is also busy pumping out series like Riverdale, Young Sheldon and Lethal Weapon on a MOD basis, but legitimately authored discs. So again, it can be done. At this late stage in the game, it most certainly SHOULD be done!!!

TLDR

All this means is that supply is not the problem.

Unfortunately the big problem is with the "demand" side of the equation. Unfortunately there is no easy way to increase demand, if all previous advertising / propaganda for bluray was a complete failure.

 

[jcroy]

There's no real polite way to say this, but that demographic will simply age away, and when they go, so will the demand for this type of content on physical media.

We might be waiting a very long time for this to eventually happen.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

We might be waiting a very long time for this to eventually happen.

If my technophobe/luddite mother could figure out that she could subscribe to the HBO Now app to watch the last season of Game Of Thrones instead of waiting for the disc to come out, it's only a matter of time before everyone else comes to a similar conclusion.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not against TV shows on Blu-ray. I think posts where I explain where the market has gone and why it's gone that way often get mistaken as endorsements of those trends when they're merely explanations.

But I think it's also true that for a long time, purchase decisions were tied up with needing access -- if you didn't purchase the physical object, you didn't have a method to access the content. That's simply no longer true, and the audience has gone with that adjustment. Ten years ago, if you missed an episode of something or wanted to revisit a previous season, you needed to pay money to acquire a physical object to accomplish that goal. But in 2019, if you miss an episode or want to revisit a previous season, for many people, it's as simple as touching a button on their remote.

 

[Nick*Z]

The problem with TV on Blu-Ray is the same problem with physical media generally: There are three formats co-existing and splitting a limited market. DVD should have been phased out when Blu-Ray phased in. Blu-Ray should have been phased out when UHD phased in.

I love TV on Blu-Ray, and spend a lot of money on TV on Blu-Ray to show my appreciation to the studios that support it. I much prefer physical media to digital copies stored on a server somewhere. But I refuse to buy TV on DVD for shows that aired in HD. I just can't justifying paying a premium price for a subpar product.

So the shows that only come out on DVD I either forgo buying or buy digital only.

Adam: My points exactly!

 

[jcroy]

DVD should have been phased out when Blu-Ray phased in.

Too little too late to do this now. Even if the dvd patent holders wanted to do this, they can't do it now.

Apparently just about all the patents for dvd-video and dvd-rom have already expired. So there's no way to legally "block" dvds from being manufactured anymore.

At this time, it is possible to make a computer dvd-rom drive which only reads pressed dvd-video and dvd-rom discs, without having to pay any dvd-specific royalties. (The patents for burnable dvdr, dvdrw, and dvdram discs will eventually expire over the next several years).

 

[jcroy]

In hindsight if the dvd patent holders wanted to "phase out" dvd, it should have been done back in the mid->late 2000s.

Though unfortunately this was never done for one big reason: the patent holders didn't want to give up that easy cash flow from patent royalties. (Most of the dvd patent holders are hardware / electronics companies, and not the movie companies).

 

[jcroy]

Though unfortunately this was never done for one big reason: the patent holders didn't want to give up that easy cash flow from patent royalties. (Most of the dvd patent holders are hardware / electronics companies, and not the movie companies).

To be more specific, these are the primary patent holders for dvd.

- LG
- Phillips
- Pioneer

- Sony

- Hitachi
- JVC Kenwood
- Mitsubishi
- Panasonic
- Samsung
- Sharp
- Toshiba
- Thomson (Technicolor)

- Warner Brothers


No way these hardware / electronics companies were willing to give up an easy cash flow of dvd royalties over the past 20+ years.

 

[jcroy]

@Adam Lenhardt
@Nick*Z

How would you increase the market demand for bluray/4Kbluray ?

(Excluding the case of lobbying the government to change the law in favor of bluray / 4Kbluray consumption).

 

[jcroy]

I love TV on Blu-Ray, and spend a lot of money on TV on Blu-Ray to show my appreciation to the studios that support it. I much prefer physical media to digital copies stored on a server somewhere. But I refuse to buy TV on DVD for shows that aired in HD. I just can't justifying paying a premium price for a subpar product.

So the shows that only come out on DVD I either forgo buying or buy digital only.

Many years ago I use to have similar sentiments as you.

Unfortunately for tv shows which I would have purchased on bluray, it turned out they had almost no rewatch value for me such as a lot of scifi / fantasy / superhero genre type stuff which turned to shit after season 1 (or other issues such as cliffhangers, lousy finales, etc ...). I discussed this quite extensively in my "jedi mindfuck" thread on here.

https://www.hometheaterforum.com/co...v-shows-do-you-still-buy-on-dvd.362179/page-3


As a recent example of this, it was tempting to buy the entire Falling Skies series on bluray for a low price. In the end, I decided this would be a complete waste of time and money for me. (Even if it is less expensive than going out for supper and attending the nearby multiplex theater to see a current movie). Back in the day I liked the first season or so of Falling Skies, but found the subsequent seasons to be really boring.

 

[jcroy]

(More generally).

For stuff which is not scifi / fantasy / superhero type stuff, I've found that my viewing patterns varies considerably. In a general sense, in practice I find that I can't bring myself to be watching generic procedurals, sitcoms, etc ... either as digital downloads or flat-rate vod streaming.

In the case of generic prodcedurals, in practice I've found that I can only really watch them either as current reruns (or new first-run episodes), or on dvd (or bluray).

For sitcoms, in pratice I've found that I can only really watch them either as current reruns or new first-run episodes. I find it very difficult to watch sitcoms (and comedy in general) as digital downloads/streaming and dvd/bluray. For example as much as I like watching The Big Bang Theory, I find that I have a difficult time watching Sheldon Cooper on dvd/bluray or vod streaming.

 

[WendyCR]

For Universal, it is very much a crapshot overall too but not as bad as Disney/Fox. For example, I suspect even the Chicago franchise is vulnerable to going dvd-mod at any time. (Law & Order SVU went dvd-mod for seasons 18 and 19, while Law & Order: Criminal Intent was outsourced to Shout Factory after season 6).

Region 1 US DVDs, yes. But overseas, Universal handled all 10. (I have a multi-region player.) I also purchased season 3 of Criminal Intent in Region 2 to avoid the damned flipper disc hell. Odd that was the only season to have that.

 

[jcroy]

I generally used whichever brands were readily available at my local retailers or that offered the best price if going by mail order. I never played the game of "Only discs from this one magical company are good, and all others are really bad" paranoia that was big among some enthusiasts at the time.

(Tangential rant).

Back in the day, I use to be one of those enthusiasts that was into all that. I use to buy various different brands of blank discs to do scanning type quality tests. In those days, there wasn't as many extremely horrible brands / manufacturers.

What really changed around 2010, was the "made in india" stuff becaming more common and nosediving significantly in quality. Too many coasters straight out of the "cake" case.

Due to too many bad experiences over the past decade or so, I refuse to buy any "made in india" blank discs regardless of the brand / manufacturer.

 

[jcroy]

I love TV on Blu-Ray, and spend a lot of money on TV on Blu-Ray to show my appreciation to the studios that support it.

(Without getting heavily into politics).

I don't want to sound too "offensive", but I prefer to not be a "chump" for the movie companies.

Imho, showing my "appreciation" for a faceless corporation/organization, is an exercise in naivety and future disappointments.

Without going into specifics, I use to show my "appreciation" for certain corporations / organizations back in the day. I learned the hard way that I was being taken as a fool or "useful idiot".

I much prefer physical media to digital copies stored on a server somewhere.

Same sentiments here too. Though my reasons are more technical, than emotional or economic.

I generally don't trust the folks who are running cloud server farms. In the past, i had too many bad experiences with engineers who were completely incompetent and/or outright ignorant, but who could "talk a good game". (ie. All talk, no follow through).

This comes from first hand experience. Once upon a time back in the day, personally I was exactly one of those incompetent engineers with very little substance or follow through. Too many of my previous peers were also cut from the same cloth. (Subsequent generations of engineers are even worse).

 

[Nick*Z]

@Adam Lenhardt
@Nick*Z

How would you increase the market demand for bluray/4Kbluray ?

(Excluding the case of lobbying the government to change the law in favor of bluray / 4Kbluray consumption).

Simple. Stop buy TV on DVD and voice your opinions clearly and concisely to the studios, also on forums like these, which are readily reviewed by some studio execs on an anonymous basis.

 

[jcroy]

Simple. Stop buying TV on DVD and voice your opinions clearly and concisely to the studios, also on forums like these, which are readily reviewed by some studio execs on an anonymous basis.

Imho, only the first item will work in large enough numbers. Hit them directly in the pocketbook.

All the other items in your list which involve "bloviating" online, is basically an exercise in "futile hypergraphia" which will elicit TLDR responses.

 

[jcroy]

On the other hand, starving the movie companies of revenue by NOT buying the dvd versions of movies and tv shows, will not always lead to the release of the same movies and tv shows on bluray (or 4Kbluray).

In the case of the original topic of this thread, there's the definitive possibility of a Disney/Fox tv show not being released at all on any dvd/bluray/4Kbluray disc format.

 

[Jenny Peerey]

The current Fox shows where there have been no announcements yet for season 2 dvd (or bluray) sets are:

- The Orville
- 9-1-1
- Mayans MC
- Lost In Space reboot

Under the Disney regime, in principle they're all vulnerable to going dvd-mod or outright discontinued for season 2.

I sure hope they release 9-1-1 on DVD soon. This is one of my very favorite shows. I have the Season 1 of it and the Season 1 of The Resident. These are my very favorite shows!

 

[Jenny Peerey]

I sure hope FOX does release the Second Season of 9-1-1 on DVD. I have 9-1-1 Season 1 and The Resident Season 1 on DVD and I wondered why Amazon has not said anything about these shows. I know that the NBC, ABC, and CBS shows have released theirs for the past season and FOX has not. I could not find out why these were not at Amazon, even for pre-order. I used to collect the DVDs of CSI Miami and NY and I always got an email from Amazon when the networks had discs available for pre-order. FOX hasn't.

 

[MatthewA]

These product categories are drying up because there is little audience demand for them. The way the general audience consumes television content has changed dramatically in the past ten years.

The sheer quantity of content has also exploded in the past 20 years beyond what cable or broadcast TV ever offered. In terms of audience shares, no individual network got more than 25% of the audience for a single show this past season. That used to get you cancelled.

 

[albert_m2]

Hardly. Practically all those shows are available for purchase in HD digital download.

Yes download. Not a disc.