Were all 576i/50 film releases sourced from 480p masters? (1 Viewer)

[kabferls]

I don't have enough Region 1 releases to compare them meself, but for those knowledgeable posters here, did Region 2 film releases ever take advantage of the higher vertical resolution, or were they sourced from the same Region 1 masters?

 

[Robin9]

Your second question is easy to answer. No, they were not always from the same Region 1 master. There were often very obvious differences between the Region 1 and Region 2 DVDs

 

[Worth]

They almost always would have been separate versions. Some smaller distributors might have converted an NTSC master to PAL or vice-versa.

 

[smithbrad]

I would think most would start from film elements, thus having the opportunity to take full advantage of the increased vertical resolution. Of course that also means less frames per second to handle the higher motion scenes.

 

[kabferls]

Your second question is easy to answer. No, they were not always from the same Region 1 master. There were often very obvious differences between the Region 1 and Region 2 DVDs

Interesting.

Was one usually better than the other in terms of picture quality?

 

[Worth]

Not much difference. PAL is a hair sharper, but also runs at the wrong speed of 25fps. And if the audio wasn't pitch corrected, it was very noticeable.

 

[Robin9]

Interesting.

Was one usually better than the other in terms of picture quality?

The major difference is not picture quality although sometimes there was a difference there. The biggest difference was that on one side of the Atlantic a film might be presented in anamorphic widescreen but not on the other side. (This was the strongest objection to the Fox MOD series) Another big difference would be a film with deleted scenes included in one Region but not the other. For example Darling Lili in Region One had deleted scenes as extras, The U. K. disc has them within the film.