Sony's Blu-Ray accepts WM9 (1 Viewer)

[PhilipG]

I agree, with the caveat that 1080p should be the minimum. Otherwise I can just see Columbia releasing a full season of TV product at DVD resolution on one disc.

I'd love to see a minimum bandwidth rule on transfers too, but I doubt that'll happen.

 

[Ben_DH]

I just hope that a manufacturer produces CRT's with HiDef capabilities.
At the moment, I think the current Plasma's and LCD TVs look dreadful.

Hmm, maybe time to get a grade 1 monitor...

 

[Dan Rudolph]

Since a lot of TV shows, if not most, are either shot or finished on video, you won't gain anything by going over SD resolution. That was the idea behind my suggestion.

 

[PhilipG]

Provided they're mastered properly...

And it won't be the norm for much longer either.

 

[Gary Palmer]

A couple of questions about HD for those on these boards who are more knowledgeable about such things than I'll ever be:

Does HD finally eliminate the current frame-rate/picture quality discrepancy between NTSC and PAL? In other words, can all film-based material be reproduced at 24fps on HD worldwide, and does HD retain the same number of lines of resolution from country to country? I only ask because Europe is slowly beginning to wake up to the possibilities of HD, and satellite broadcaster Sky is reported to be gearing up for HD transmissions in the UK very soon.

Secondly, if someone in a country outside the US buys a player capable of playing back HD discs, but views the material on a standard TV set, will they still be able to reproduce the images on their TV set?

Pardon my naivety, but I'm only just waking up to the possibilities of HD myself...

 

[Mike Wadkins]

i love my laserdiscs

 

[Mike Wadkins]

yes because dolby and dts with there deep pockets will ever let the studios dare pass them over, i just want what i hear at the flicks the full power of a well mixed soundtrack.

Also is there any chance of sdds at home ?.
i will take that over dts or dolby any day and before anyone says a new format launch wouldnt take 5.1 did and 8.2 should the tech-heads will lead the way

 

[ChristopherDAC]

The "standard" for HDTV is 1125 scan lines, 1080 visible [it used to be 1035, and that's what the old Japanese HiVision LaserDisc standard is based from], 30 frames per second, 2:1 interlace. Many powers-that-be in Europe, however, particularly France and Italy, have been militating for 1250:25:2, basically because they don't want compatibility with American and Japanese equipment or programmes [a form of protectionism which I am afraid the WTO will let them get away with]. Never mind that the current European 625:25:2 standard has motion-rendering and flicker problems, and at the large sizes and high brightnesses HD is supposed to make possible would be largely intolerable. The gain in static resolution is really null but it allows them to claim that their idea is better.

Nobody using a non-High Definition set can view High Definition content without a transcoder which filters down the picture information into a number of scanlines and a bandwidth of horizontal resolution which his set can accept. Not in the United States, Canada, Japan, England, South africa, or the Moon. By definition [as it were]. Such transcoders are available, and have been for some time; they have been available in Japanese VCRs to allow NTSC recordings from MUSE HiVision broadcasts for years.
I don't understand the animosity toward interlaced video which is being displayed. 1080i30 uses half the bandwidth of 1080p60, which seems to be what you are proposing, and there is very little visible difference, whereas 1080p30 would flicker like the very devil. Maybe you are using some kind of digital projector, in which case it needs to be set up to refresh alternate scanlines at 60hz in order to view interlaced video properly. I don't know how many do this, it seems obvious to me.
Mr. Wadkins: have you been to http://lddb.com ? Well worth your time.

 

[Mike Wadkins]

i live there lol
i love dvd (got over 1000) but now i have a reference monitor to watch them on i am so disappointed

 

[Dan Hitchman]

If what these "golden eyes" are saying is true then a CBR (constant bit rate) of ~16 Megabits/sec using MPEG-4 AVC High Profile (better than the previous H.264 standard using similar techniques in high frequency video extensions to Microsoft's VC-1) is visually equal to a lightly (usually 4:1) compressed D-5 production master tape at 1080p resolution and using a heavily grainy film stock (I'm assuming they were looking at 1080p/24 source material). D-5 is a minimum standard telecine digital tape storage technology.

If they do use bitrates at around 16 or so Megabits/sec just for video then I would assume the problems seen with MPEG-2 even at higher bitrates (it's a noisier codec than these newer advanced types) could be virtually eliminated. Granted, these telecine operators would have to leave their grubby hands off the edge enhancement and high frequency filter buttons or there could still be transfer issues even on High Definition.

I'd still love to see authentic 21:9 anamorphic enhancement for movies above and beyond 1.85:1 ratios to get actual higher resolutions and the ability to use a wide-screen front projector and anamorphic lens and shooting onto a constant height/variable width 2.35:1 screen.

Easily done with today's digital technology. It just takes extra effort on the part of the studios.

 

[Moe*A]

One thing that I am still concerned on here that has not been mentioned is content, Blueray may well have a number of the big boys from the manufacturing world making players but is the content on from Sony. Have any other studios pledged support for Blueray or is it assumed that they will all follow HD-DVD standard as they have profited so much from the current DVD spec?

 

[Shane Martin]

I just hope that whatever format wins, we still get OAR. I'm afraid that what we'll get is a bunch of reformatted "family friendly" widescreen movies. All of the new HDTV owners will be screaming for their black bars are their new set to go away. Basicaly I'm hoping OAR 2.35:1 dvd's stay that way and are not cropped to 1.78:1.

 

[Mike Wadkins]

i really want to see what pre-recorded blu-ray looks like i use it so i can have my pc in another room just using my pc to transfer content its a shame my recorder cant record off air or play back the pre-recorded discs its serves my right for being an early adopter

 

[Dan Hitchman]

The studios will have to be pressured like they were never pressured before. OAR at all times!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

However, since this will start out as a niche product, I doubt we will have much in the way of foolscreen stuff. They probably want to get us picky early adopters hooked first and then the transfer problems may start once J6P is snatching these HD discs up. It won't be for a while I would think. Unless they start off with high A/V quality players and discs at about the same price as most regular DVD stuff I'd think Blu-Ray and/or HD-DVD will be the new laserdisc for at least a couple years.

Dan

 

[Richard Paul]

Christopher, interlace causes several problems among them the fact that the horizontal resolution has to be decreased on average by about 33% to avoid interlace artifacts. In other words instead of getting 1080 by 1920 you get around 720 by 1920 in actual resolution with interlace. Also there would be no flicker with 1080p at 30 fps since each frame would be shown twice. This is something that has been done for over 10 years and is both cheap and easy to do. Also 1080p at 24 fps could be shown in a 2-3 pattern with one frame shown 2 times and the next frame shown 3 times. Currently the cheapest 1080p HDTV over 30" is the LT-P468W which is a 46" LCD that costs $9000. Within 5 years though 1080p displays will become considerably cheaper. Since 1080p can be downconverted to 1080i there is no good reason not to use 1080p.

 

[KylePete]

I strongly suggest that everyone participating in this thread read the following .pdf file:

Blu-Ray Presentation

It gives a very good description of what Blu-Ray will probably be.....especially towards the end.

And yes, DTS will be included in the BD-ROM spec.




Kyle

 

[David Forbes]

Hmmm, I'm kind of surprised that DTS would be included, since other specs would make it seem superfluous at best. Also, the lossless DTS system is for commercial theatrical use only, not home use (thought it may later be used for that, we'll see).

 

[KylePete]

David, they are keeping DTS around for the same reason they are keeping MPEG-2.....backwards compatibility. I can guarantee you that not all movies released on Blu-Ray will have lossless or uncompressed soundtracks.

 

[Lewis Besze]

Why not,the studio masters are uncompressed,but I see your point,i'm sure at the beginning backward compatibility will be an issue,but it will fade out in time.

 

[Jean-Michel]

Here's a question: what kind of standard definition support does Blu-Ray offer? That PDF shows that the format can store 4-9 hours of "Digital broadcast SD" material and anywhere from 10 1/2 to 63 hours of "Terrestrial" material, but I'm not really sure exactly what those refer to. I'm just wondering if, in the case of something like a TV show that was shot for standard resolution televisions, it would be possible to store that on a Blu-Ray disc at standard resolution rather than HD and fit four or five seasons on a single disc and sell it that way instead of as multi-disc single-season collections (not that the studios would really want to do that).