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Topic: Anyone consuming HD or Blu-ray?

Charles Caron
Expert Film Handler

Posts: 188
From: Billings MT, USA
Registered: Jul 2005

posted 12-16-2007 04:59 PM

You guys need to get more serious about your choice of automobiles.... buggati veyron
You'd have to win the lottery... twice

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Mark Gulbrandsen
Resident Trollmaster

Posts: 16657
From: Music City
Registered: Jun 99

posted 12-16-2007 06:52 PM

Charles.... I'd still take the DBS over the Bugatti.... I've always been an Aston Martin fan and always will be.

BTW are any of those surround speakers working in that complex at all?

Mark

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Frank Dubrois
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 896
From: Cleveland, OH
Registered: Mar 2005

posted 12-17-2007 09:21 AM

How did this go from Blu-ray and HD-DVD to cars??

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Kurt Zupin
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 989
From: Maricopa, Arizona
Registered: Oct 2004

posted 12-17-2007 11:22 AM

Joe, of course the PS3 is the best BLU-RAY player on the planet!! [Big Grin]

I can tell you if I didn't have the PS3 I would still be using my Pioneer DVD Recorder. Which I still do when I watch regular DVDs.

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Scott Jentsch
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1061
From: New Berlin, WI, USA
Registered: Apr 2003

posted 12-17-2007 01:05 PM

quote: Frank Dubrois
How did this go from Blu-ray and HD-DVD to cars??

Most likely because we've probably completely exhausted the topic, at least until new players or new firmware releases are announced that changes the landscape.

Here's my try at an executive summary for those just coming in:

There are two HD disc formats, HD DVD and Blu-ray.
The formats are capable of equivalent audio and video performance, which eclipse SD DVD in both respects (although audio differences can be slight).
Each format has exclusive movie studios which do not produce on the other format
All HD DVD players can connect to the Internet for firmware updates and online-enabled features. Some, but not all, Blu-ray players have the former ability, but no Blu-ray discs currently utilize the latter yet.
Blu-ray players have varying feature-sets in regards to core functionality. Some have ethernet jacks, some do not. Some are capable of supporting Profile 1.1 / Bonus View, which provides for more internal memory and secondary video decoder support, but many do not at this time. Profile 2.0, which dictates more internal memory than 1.1 and online-connectivity, is not supported by any Blu-ray players at this time, but no discs utilize 2.0 features so far.
All Blu-ray players support 1080p, at either 24, 30, and/or 60 fps.
HD DVD players have similar core functionality, but differ on analog audio outputs and 1080p capability.
All standalone HD DVD players are made by Toshiba or using Toshiba's platform. Venturer, RCA, and other manufacturers appear to be using Toshiba's design.
Microsoft makes an add-on drive for the Xbox 360 that provides HD DVD support for the gaming system.
Many manufacturers have released stand-alone Blu-ray players.
Sony's PlayStation 3 game system supports Blu-ray playback. It represents 2.5 million of the 2.7 million Blu-ray capable players so far.
Blu-ray software titles (totals since inception) have outsold HD DVD titles approximately 67% to 33%
Total sales of Blu-ray and HD DVD software combined are very very small in comparison to DVD.
Total sales of Blu-ray and HD DVD hardware combined are very small in comparison (10%) to DVD.

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Larry Myers
Master Film Handler

Posts: 371
From: Herndon, VA, USA
Registered: Jan 2001

posted 12-17-2007 02:10 PM

I want to add that at least with Digital Projectors priced under $1500, that 720p resolution is about all you need. I just purchased a 12 ft optical cable for $25 so I think I might try the HD DVD setup within the next week.

I have viewed 3 Blu Ray features projected 3 ft by 7.5 ft viewed at 10 ft away and they all looked great. My guests thought the presentation looked as good as or better then film.

We started on expensive cars because of comments about cheap shitty equipment. Some people don't mind spending big bucks on high quality digital equipment and some people don't mind spending big bucks on fast cars. A few can spend big bucks on both but they seem not to be on this thread so one must make a choice.

[ 12-17-2007, 07:02 PM: Message edited by: Larry Myers ]

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Bill Gabel
Film God

Posts: 3873
From: Technicolor / Postworks NY, USA
Registered: Jan 2002

posted 12-17-2007 02:37 PM

quote: Scott Jentsch
There are two HD disc formats, HD DVD and Blu-ray.

There is a third HD disc format available. It's the HD VMD format. It's fast becoming available in Asia and surrounding areas. The 1080P images looks incredible.

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Mike Heenan
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1896
From: Scottsdale, AZ, USA
Registered: Mar 2000

posted 12-17-2007 06:24 PM

I saw ABBA the movie and Casino Royale projected in Blu Ray on a 720p projector while in Amsterdam a few weeks ago, and they were impressive but still didn't beat a high quality film print. We had access to a reel 1 of Casino royale in 35mm, and we did a back and forth comparison and it was interesting to see the differences, the opening scene of Casino in 35mm was yellow (this was projected with Xenon), while the Blu Ray was black and white. ABBA the movie looked more "film-ish" to me than did Casino, I'm guessing it had somethign to do with the overall photography of each film. I'm hoping next time I get back there they'll have a 1080p projector and we can do a better comparison.

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Larry Myers
Master Film Handler

Posts: 371
From: Herndon, VA, USA
Registered: Jan 2001

posted 12-17-2007 07:01 PM

Generally I agree with you. A Blu-ray projected at 720p will not be as good as a high quality 35mm print projected on high quality 35mm system. Then again is that the point? Or is it the point that a Blu-ray projection system will be as good as any high speed 35mm print you might find for $250.

Lawrence of Arabia is coming in Blu-ray. One of the discs has a preview. The color and sharpness look perfect and at 2.20 ratio, the projection magnification will not be as great which should improve quality by another 20%.

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Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."

Posts: 10973
From: Lawton, OK, USA
Registered: Apr 2001

posted 12-17-2007 07:38 PM

I'm just going to throw in my vote of disagreement with 720p being "good enough." For me, the only time 720p hardware is good enough is when the native video signal being fed into it is 720p. If that's what you have in hardware and you're happy with it, then there's nothing wrong with that. I'm still looking to buy a new HDTV, and I'm absolutely getting something with native 1920 X 1080 resolution.

Maybe I've missed a title or two, but every HD-DVD and Blu-Ray movie disc I have examined has been encoded with 1080p video. Not 720p.

The 720p format has a total pixel count of 921,600.
The 1080p format has a total pixel count of 2,073,600.
That's a pretty big difference.

Using an analogy of computer monitors, that's like comparing the difference of a smaller 19" monitor with 1440 X 900 resolution with a 30" unit sporting 2560 X 1600. You're just going to see a lot more detail on one product versus the other.

Or better yet, just go to Apple's Quicktime movie trailer site and visually compare what you see between 720p and 1080p movie trailers. I'm definitely seeing quite a bit more stuff in the 1080p version.

It should be mentioned there are other differences going on. A Blu-Ray or HD-DVD movie disc is going to have a pixel count fairly close to 2K digital projection. But the video on those discs is much more severely data compressed than the video playing from a digital cinema server. We're talking bandwidths up to 8 times as high as Blu-Ray's 30Mb/sec rate. I also don't think for one second 2K resolution is equivalent to 35mm -certainly not the detail present on the 35mm original negative.

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Mike Heenan
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1896
From: Scottsdale, AZ, USA
Registered: Mar 2000

posted 12-17-2007 08:36 PM

Actually, the Abba the Movie Blu ray disc is encoded at 1080i as it says on the back. So I'm wondering if I need to buy it or not (when I get a player in the future) or should I be fine with the dvd I have now, which can be upscaled?

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Larry Myers
Master Film Handler

Posts: 371
From: Herndon, VA, USA
Registered: Jan 2001

posted 12-17-2007 09:11 PM

I believe view distance plays into this. A am at 3 times height in view distance which helps with the resolution to the eye. Again like cars, it's how fast must you go. I am trying to get a balance between what I have and what is available and keep the price in the $2000 range. If you must have a 1920 x1080 projector you might describe to all of us the name of the projector and how much it might cost.

To say a projector just doesn't make it with that 720p resolution is really not enough info.

Same with Corvettes. The new 2008 436 HP version at $44,000 will do 190MPH is really not good enough for some people so the $70,000 505 HP version that will do 195mph might be. It's a choice that has to be made. That's what this whole discussion is about. Cost and choice.

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Mike Heenan
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1896
From: Scottsdale, AZ, USA
Registered: Mar 2000

posted 12-17-2007 10:59 PM

Although I understand what you're saying, I think you're overcomplicating things. I'm just curious if a disc that's 1080i (abba blu ray) is higher quality than a SD upconverted disc. I'm sure that "joe six pack" wouldn't notice the difference but if the difference is notable to a geek like me, then I'd like to own the higher quality release.

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Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."

Posts: 10973
From: Lawton, OK, USA
Registered: Apr 2001

posted 12-17-2007 11:15 PM

1080i video, while compromised for the interlacing, is still probably going to look quite a bit better for the much greater abundance of image detail than a 480p image from standard DVD -even if that DVD is upscaled artificially to 1080p.

There simply is no getting around the issue of native image detail. Resizing a digital image does not add more detail. It only makes the native detail more blurry on a larger scale. This is something I repeat frequently to people who want to take some low-res JPEG-thingie from their MySpace page and blast it up onto a billboard. Sorry. It's going to look like shit unless you give me the original 10-megapixel image from the D-SLR camera that photographed it. Then it will look good.

quote: Larry Myers
The new 2008 436 HP version at $44,000 will do 190MPH is really not good enough for some people so the $70,000 505 HP version that will do 195mph might be. It's a choice that has to be made.

The choice between 720p native resolution and 1080p native resolution is more like the difference in a 6-cylinder Chevy Malibu that tops out at under 100mph versus a Ferrari that tops out at over 200mph.

The standards difference is between one format that does less than 1 million pixels of native resolution versus another that weighs in at more than 2 million pixels of native resolution. That difference cannot be described as a 190mph vs. 195mph contest. To insist on such a thing is just plain ridiculous.

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Larry Myers
Master Film Handler

Posts: 371
From: Herndon, VA, USA
Registered: Jan 2001

posted 12-18-2007 08:28 AM

Actually the difference is really between 100mph to 150mph because travel is 1D. For a 2D image, that has height and width, the difference between 1k and 2k is not twice but rather 50%. In order for the image to be twice the resolution, you must section the projected image in 1/4's. That is, you need 1K for the top left quarter. Then 1K for the top right and 1K for the bottom left and 1K for the bottom right. It has to do with the Inverse Square Law. So a jump of 1k to 4k is twice the resolution or 100%.

Another way to look at it is take a 2 times magnification of a 4x5 inch image. Two times a 4x5 image will result in an 8x10 image. That is 2 times 4 for one side and 2 times 5 for the other side. If it's 2 times only one side or (1D), it becomes anamorphic which is exactly how CinemaScope works.

[ 12-18-2007, 11:46 AM: Message edited by: Larry Myers ]

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