Planet Earth DVD's (1 Viewer)

[Oswald Pascual]

Has anyone tried these Planet Earth DVD's yet? I was thinking of getting one if it has a real nice Hi Resolution to use as a CRT warmer while I figure out what to watch. I think they come in DTS also, but have not seen any user comments yet. I did a search on the forum, but the search engine was down. Some screen caps would be nice if anyone has one.
Thanks

 

[Oswald Pascual]

Bump

 

[Wallace Mason]

I haven't seen these videos but they sound interesting. Are they in DTS?

 

[Oswald Pascual]

Wallace my understanding is that the newest ones also come in DTS, I even read somewhere that they are native 480p, but did not trust that source.

 

[DaViD Boulet]

If it's film-source material then "native 480P" becomes more a matter of semantics as in some sense *all* properly flagged DVDs mastered from film-source material are 480P in nature.

In my mind, the thing that should set apart "good native 480P" from "normal 480P" is that the video should not have undergone any vertical-pass filtering to minimize aliasing on interlaced displays...thereby preserving full 480P resolution in the final image.

I'm also very curious about these discs. Are they 16x9? Any links to them on amazon?

-dave

 

[Oswald Pascual]

Not all are 16:9 but it appears that all the newer ones are and DTS to boot!They are claiming the Format as 480P 30 and here is there explanation;

Progressive Scan and the 480P(30) Format
There are two basic methods used to display video: interlaced scan and progressive scan. Progressive scan, which is used in computer monitors and digital televisions, displays all horizontal lines of a picture at one time, as a single frame. Interlaced scan, which is used in standard television formats such as NTSC and PAL, displays half the horizontal lines at a time (the first field, containing the odd-numbered lines, is displayed, followed by the second field, containing the even-numbered lines).
DVD is specifically designed to be displayed on interlaced-scan displays, which covers 99.9% of the television sets worldwide. However, most DVD content comes from film, which is inherently progressive. To make film content work in interlaced form, the video from each film frame is split into two video fields -240 lines in one field, and 240 lines in the other- and encoded as separate fields in an MPEG-2 stream. Since film runs at 24 frames per second, while TV runs at 30 frames (60 fields) per second, the 24 frames are spread across 60 fields by alternating the display of the first film frame for 2 video fields and the next film frame for 3 video fields. This is called 2-3 pulldown.
There are a couple of problems inherent in 2-3 pulldown:
1) Some film frames are shown for a longer period of time than others, causing judder, or jerkiness, that shows up especially in smooth pans.
2) If you freeze the video on the third or fourth video frame when there is motion in the picture you will see two separate images combined in a flickering mess.
When progressive scan content that originates from film is stored on a DVD disc it can be called a 480P(24) title, which means that the MPEG-2 video has been encoded as 480 line progressive scan material, with a frame rate of 24 frames per second.
It is also possible to create progressive scan content at a frame rate of 30 frames per second. Many new Digital Video (DV) cameras are capable of recording progressive scan video at 30 frames/second, and computer generated animation can also be created in this format. When progressive scan content that originated as video or computer animation is stored on a DVD disc it can be called a 480P(30) title, which means that the MPEG-2 video has been encoded as 480 line progressive scan material, with a frame rate of 30 frames per second.
The major difference between 480P(24) and 480P(30) content is that there are six additional frames of content per second in the 480P(30) format. This provides additional temporal resolution resulting in a smoother look, particularly when high motion content is displayed. It also avoids both of the problems mentioned above that can occur with 480P(24) content, that is juddering or jerkiness during motion sequences, or flicker when the DVD is paused.
Thus the 480P(30) format offers the consumer the best of both worlds as far as high quality video display is concerned. Since it is a progressive scan format all 480 scan lines are displayed simultaneously, resulting in a crystal clear picture on computer screens or digital televisions. The additional 6 frames per second of content that can be included in the 480P(30) format allow the incorporation of fast action content into the program with a smoother look on the display.
As with the 480P(24) format, 480P(30) content can be displayed on traditional interlaced monitors connected to a DVD-Video player. In this case the DVD-Video player converts each frame of video into two interlaced fields, and generates a video signal in NTSC (or PAL) format that gets sent to the display. All DVD-Video players on the market today are capable of playing titles that use either the 480P(24) or 480P(30) formats.

Here are a few links of these DVD's;
Planet Earth Oceana Planet Earth The Outback

 

[DaViD Boulet]

So it's not a film-based DVD...it's live 480P 30-frame-per-second video.

That might very well be a first on DVD. 30 frame-per-second 480P is part of the DVD spec and I've been waiting for someone to do something with it. I'll have to check it out!

-dave

p.s. it would still be important that no additional vertical filtering had been applied to make it more "interlaced friendly" by minimizing aliasing in 480I playback.

 

[Oswald Pascual]

Hey DaViD, if you find any new info on this share it with us. I have been trying to see if anyone actually owned one of these DVD's yet, but no such luck. I have read some reviews on it, but they really did not have good information. Remember that not all of there DVD's are made like this, but it appears that there newer releases are. They come in multiple aspect ratios as as well.

 

[Oswald Pascual]

Anyone?

 

[Oswald Pascual]

Bump