A Few Words About Poll: What parameters do you seek for 4k UHD releases? (1 Viewer)

[Peter Neski]

I guess it all depends on how good a job they do, that's why we have guys like Robert Harris who will warn us when they overdo it,,I personally find they screw up the color more I always prefer a View camera direct print to a 35mm blow up
so am surprised that many films show little grain when the negative is so small

 

[ShellOilJunior]

Any chance the results of this poll will be passed on to Paramount (hey, a man can dream)?

Yes, preferably before a potential Chinatown UHD is released.

 

[Robert Harris]

Yes, preferably before a potential Chinatown UHD is released.

Yes, and others.

 

[Robert Crawford]

Yes, preferably before a potential Chinatown UHD is released.

It's too late, a 4K/Dolby Vision stream already exists so the work has already been done. TBH, I don't think this poll's results is going to change a thing at Paramount for various reasons.

 

[JediFonger]

re: the look of film. even though i did spend most of my life watching 35mm/70mm physical films projected in commercial cinema, i gotta say Robert, that does not make me an expert. i dont even mean like you, i dont think it makes me ANY sort of expert watching film. i never owned any 8mm/16mm home projectors and threaded film and aren't as intimately familiar with it as if any hobbyist who collects are more hands on. i'd venture to say my experience is probably (at this point) 99% of the consumers out there. even if they've owned small collections or if they've grown up watching 35mm/70mm features in commercial cinema, doesn't mean that they are going to be able to tell between 35mm/70mm vs. digital projection or anything about what mosquito noise means.

now if you are asking the HTF audiences themselves, well sure. i feel like all of the HTF members here... are probably less than .0001% of the gen-pop out there. we're kind of a niche of a niche at this point. some might be able to discern grain or noise or what films ought to look like.

but i still posit that dangit unless you worked as a projectionist, or physically handled film... i'm not sure that would qualify anyone to make any discernments on what ought to be, you know what i mean?

when the initial pressing of patton 1080p blu-ray came out, i watched it (before i read about the DNR issues), i was like this looks GREAT! when played in motion the video seemed ok.

it's only after people started to perform side by side comparisons... that you notice, oh wait... the waxy nature of it the grain is gone, and so on. and of course i purchased the replacement blu-ray WITHOUT all the DNR. in fact... i might even still have both copies of the blu-ray laying around.

but my point remains. unless you are physically with your hands have handled film, it makes everyone else armchair critics.

i work in IT, unless someone's cabled or stood in the datacenter, i'm not sure if they are qualified to figure out anything in commercial computer support, etc. you know what i mean? there is a vast world of difference between pros vs. even the best amateurs.

 

[Bartman]

Hm, a lot of talk about grain. For me, as long as the grain is a faithful reproduction of the negative, it's OK. On poor DVDs and earlier video formats grain often looked unnatural or boosted. On Blu-ray grain can look natural, witness the many excellent Warner B&W releases compared with the previous DVDs. 4K UHD has aproximately four times the bandwidth of Blu-ray, so if the negative contains grain filling that bandwidth, the resulting picture will look grainier than Blu-ray.
Nobody has mentioned color registration. For me, the greatest advantage of HD & UHD formats is the necessity of perfect registration of three strip Technicolor prints to justify the increased resolution. Again Warner leads the way here, I'm unsure how many other companies are doing similar work.

 

[JediFonger]

Hm, a lot of talk about grain. For me, as long as the grain is a faithful reproduction of the negative, it's OK. On poor DVDs and earlier video formats grain often looked unnatural or boosted. On Blu-ray grain can look natural, witness the many excellent Warner B&W releases compared with the previous DVDs. 4K UHD has aproximately four times the bandwidth of Blu-ray, so if the negative contains grain filling that bandwidth, the resulting picture will look grainier than Blu-ray.
Nobody has mentioned color registration. For me, the greatest advantage of HD & UHD formats is the necessity of perfect registration of three strip Technicolor prints to justify the increased resolution. Again Warner leads the way here, I'm unsure how many other companies are doing similar work.

i’ve picked people’s brains about this and never got any super clear answers except film v digital is “apples and oranges” when it comes to colors.

my question is whats the max color film is capable of? is it 8bit, 10bit 16bit , etc? there are general resolutions resolved based in pixels but analogue film color vs digital appears to not have any mapping and same thing with how many nits is possible on analogue film to digital

 

[Robert Harris]

i’ve picked people’s brains about this and never got any super clear answers except film v digital is “apples and oranges” when it comes to colors.

my question is whats the max color film is capable of? is it 8bit, 10bit 16bit , etc? there are general resolutions resolved based in pixels but analogue film color vs digital appears to not have any mapping and same thing with how many nits is possible on analogue film to digital

Nits, if one were to attempt to reproduce in projection is almost unlimited, as it would be based upon the lamphouse, optics, size of screen/ throw and amperage. I have a feeling I’m missing something. Most films were struck to run with 14 footlamberts reflected from the screen.

Nits, via a flat panel, can be headache inducing.

Two different worlds.

When the lighthouse beam in a logo temporarily blinds you, there’s too much light on the screen.

 

[JediFonger]

Nits, if one were to attempt to reproduce in projection is almost unlimited, as it would be based upon the lamphouse, optics, size of screen/ throw and amperage. I have a feeling I’m missing something. Most films were struck to run with 14 footlamberts reflected from the screen.

Nits, via a flat panel, can be headache inducing.

Two different worlds.

When the lighthouse beam in a logo temporarily blinds you, there’s too much light on the screen.

neither film / digital can replicate real world nits, right? someone used ls100 and measured 50k nits in the real world:

i cant remember ever watching anything in film nor digital that made me shield my eyes… vs real life sun yet.

 

[Stephen_J_H]

This might not be the place, but will we see “A Few Words About…. Licorice Pizza”? Started watching it last night and it feels like watching a pristine film print, which I think is the highest compliment I can pay.

 

[HDMS Carl Mulder]

Thanks for the poll, very interesting to see what people want. I'm glad to be with the majority on this one.

 

[Vern Dias]

my current choices made on FHD/UHD BD buying are based on aspect ratio origins of the movies which determines the “Ks” of resolution my eyes see on a standard sized screen.
Aspect Ratio 2.2 and slimmer picture height movies in UHD.
Aspect Ratio 2.1 and lower values that produce slimmer black bars in 2k blurays.

I'll likely an odd one in this community with such OCD...

I have a very simple criteria that I generally apply (exceptions made for ****, highly reviewed, large format, or Cinerama films):

When a UHD is released, I look at the blue ray (if I have it in my library). If it looks like film with no obvious video or audio issues, I'll likely skip the UHD release unless it's one of my extreme favorite titles (1776, for example).

Since I run a 2.66:1 54" x 144" curved screen using an Isco Cinema DLP 1.5x anamorphic lens and my viewing distance is ~ 8 feet, with MadVR upscaling to BD to 4K feeding my JVC RS3100, any warts in the BD image are obvious.

 

[Robert Harris]

This might not be the place, but will we see “A Few Words About…. Licorice Pizza”? Started watching it last night and it feels like watching a pristine film print, which I think is the highest compliment I can pay.

Lovely film, and yes.

 

[AnthonyClarke]

If the results are to be passed onto 'others', please delete my poll response as I suspect I may have been hacked.....

 

[YANG]

......Since I run a 2.66:1 54" x 144" curved screen using an Isco Cinema DLP 1.5x anamorphic lens and my viewing distance is ~ 8 feet, with MadVR upscaling to BD to 4K feeding my JVC RS3100, any warts in the BD image are obvious.

144inch in width? WOW! that's roughly about 2 86inch TVs cojoined... and with that height(and width) presenting upscaled 2K transfer of movies with 2.2~2.6:1 which technically speaking gets 1.2~1.3K natively in picture resolution detail before any post upscaling... lots of video artifacts will be exposed.

 

[Vern Dias]

144inch in width? WOW! that's roughly about 2 86inch TVs cojoined... and with that height(and width) presenting upscaled 2K transfer of movies with 2.2~2.6:1 which technically speaking gets 1.2~1.3K natively in picture resolution detail before any post upscaling... lots of video artifacts will be exposed.

Actually it's 2 72" TVs conjoined. And no, I don't normally see lots of video artifacts on a good transfer. Once in a while I'll see an occasional stair step on a diagonal line in a main title, but that's about it.

Here's a screen photo of an up-scaled blu ray:

and a another one:

both taken with a Pixel 6 Pro of "National Velvet" (a film released in 1944).

Feel free to zoom in on them. (The pixel very slightly over exposed them.)

 

[YANG]

for audiophiles, there are lot of options for them to rectify whatever that would sound odd. as cheap as tilting speaker angles, to changing of cables, eventually to the most expensive component in a setup.

however, on the video part, once a projection system or monitor is set up, its going to be costly or heavy to replace when the native source is not consistent to what our eyes can see... since you couldn't notice much artifacts from the upscaled resolution on a 2.2~2.6:1 wide image from a 2K disc, its good for your sense. however, for me being technical, i might do a 2 screen face to face setup in my upcoming apartment, where the large 70inch TV will strictly limited to play 2.2~2.6:1 wider screen image movies, while a smaller 50inch TV to play 1.66~4:3 movies or series to achieve consistent picture height on those wider screen films...

 

[Lord Dalek]

Yes, preferably before a potential Chinatown UHD is released.

That master already exists. It was on Amazon Video and looked very good actually.

 

[Stephen_J_H]

That master already exists. It was on Amazon Video and looked very goid actually.

And now it's on Paramount+.

 

[Robert Harris]

The original prints were quite warm.