Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Anyone consuming HD or Blu-ray?

my profile | my password | search | faq & rules | forum home

»	Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE » Community » The Afterlife » Anyone consuming HD or Blu-ray? (Page 79)

This topic comprises 105 pages: 1 2 3 ... 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 ... 103 104 105

Author

Topic: Anyone consuming HD or Blu-ray?

Larry Myers
Master Film Handler

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

posted 03-18-2008 05:58 PM

Best Buy is selling the rest of their HD DVD movies at 30% discount making them about $17 each. Most new ones go on ebay for more when that if you count shipping. The price was right so I purchased a few. One outstanding HD DVD is 2001 A Space Odyssey. At 2.20 ratio, it's looks great. A very sharp grainless nice color great looking 70mm image. Spartacus on the other hand looks very grainy so save your money. Not much better then a standard DVD. The manager says, buy up because everything goes back next Monday.

| IP: Logged

Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."

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

posted 03-18-2008 06:13 PM

quote: Larry Myers
A very sharp grainless nice color great looking 70mm image.

Larry, I'm wondering if you had a part in inspiring the movie title: Aqua Teen Hunger Force Colon Movie Film for Theaters.

I digress.

Back on the subject of music on Blu-ray Disc. While visiting the local Sam's Club warehouse/store I noticed copies of a Celine Dion concert in Blu-ray format mixed in with lots of other DVDs. I'm not really into her music, but I checked the box for the audio technical info and was kind of surprised to see what was listed in the fine print. The disc features the concert in two high resolution audio versions. One is an uncompressed LPCM 2.0 track in 24-bit/96kHz resolution. There's also a Dolby TrueHD lossless 5.1 track in 24-bit/96kHz resolution.

Hopefully this is already becoming a trend. The only concert disc I have on Blu-ray is Nine Inch Nails Beside You in Time. It also features a Dolby TrueHD 5.1 audio track, but I don't think it is a 24/96 encoding.

| IP: Logged

Larry Myers
Master Film Handler

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

posted 03-18-2008 07:56 PM

Well in simple terms. IT LOOKED GREAT!!! Much better then the reissue print that played at theaters some time back. That reissue was all discolored.

| IP: Logged

Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."

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

posted 03-18-2008 09:03 PM

The passing of Arthur C. Clarke has me thinking about getting the Blu-ray version of 2001. Reviews of the disc say the picture quality is great, which shouldn't be too much of a surprise considering the 65mm source material.

OTOH, I'm wondering how much better the image quality would be if Warner Bros. did a high bit rate AVC encode of the material rather than it being a VC-1 port of the HD-DVD material.

| IP: Logged

Mike Schindler
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1039
From: Oak Park, IL, USA
Registered: Jun 2002

posted 03-18-2008 09:21 PM

I've intentionally steered clear of info regarding how movies are encoded and such because, well, it's boring. But as an uninformed viewer, I can say that the 2001 BD looks awesome. Even my roommate, who watches 4:3 content in 16:9 and can't tell difference, commented on how good it looked.

| IP: Logged

Mike Blakesley
Film God

Posts: 12767
From: Forsyth, Montana
Registered: Jun 99

posted 03-18-2008 09:37 PM

quote: Joe Redifer
Every REAL man has a table full of remotes.

This got me to wondering how many remotes I do have. Maybe this should be its own thread.

My tally is:
5 in the "entertainment" room at home (tv, dvd, vcr, receiver, cd)
2 in the living room (dvd-r, tv)
2 in the bedroom (tv, dvd)
2 in my office that are never used (computer speakers, digital camera)
1 in my vehicle (cd)

And my wife has one in her office.

| IP: Logged

Joe Redifer
You need a beating today

Posts: 12859
From: Denver, Colorado
Registered: May 99

posted 03-18-2008 10:58 PM

None in the bathroom?

| IP: Logged

Rick Hunter
Master Film Handler

Posts: 452
From: Melbourne, Australia
Registered: Feb 2003

posted 03-18-2008 11:33 PM

quote: Joe Redifer
None in the bathroom?

No, everything there should be hands on...

| IP: Logged

Larry Myers
Master Film Handler

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

posted 03-19-2008 10:03 AM

It does look like the source material was the 65mm original negative. It was far better the the reissue done 15 years ago which was discolored and faded. If that was the best they could have done with a new strike, then I felt for sure the original negative was almost gone.

I was under the understanding that the studios were committed to do separation positives on all Eastman color for future 100 year storage. The source material might have been those positives.

| IP: Logged

Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."

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

posted 03-19-2008 01:41 PM

News Link

quote: Associated Press

Those stuck with HD-DVD players getting gift cards

MINNEAPOLIS, Minnesota (AP) -- Electronics retailer Best Buy Co. said Wednesday it will give gift cards to customers that bought HD-DVD players or HD-DVD attachments from its U.S. stores as the format goes away in favor of the Blu-ray standard.

The products had to be purchased at one of the company's stores prior to Feb. 23.

Best Buy said it will give a $50 gift card for each item, which will likely lead to the distribution of more than $10 million in U.S. gift cards.

The retailer said it will identify customers through its Reward Zone program, performance service plans and through online purchases and will mail out the gift cards to those individuals by May 1.

Customers that feel they won't be identified through these measures can call the company and provide a Best Buy receipt or credit card information for proof of purchase.

Best Buy also said customers that want to get rid of their HD-DVD players can do so by visiting their online trade-in center starting March 21.

Earlier this month rival Circuit City Stores Inc. instructed its stores to "take care of our customers" and accept returns of HD DVD players within 90 days of purchase.

The HD DVD players can be returned for store credit. The policy doesn't apply to HD DVD movie discs.

The biggest battle between two video formats since Betamax lost out to VHS in the 1980s was resolved after multiple movie studios, including Sony Pictures, Walt Disney Co. Warner Bros. Entertainment and News Corp.'s Twentieth Century Fox, pledged to support the Blu-ray format.

| IP: Logged

Mike Schindler
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1039
From: Oak Park, IL, USA
Registered: Jun 2002

posted 03-19-2008 07:51 PM

So theoretically I can trade in my first generation player for $500 store credit, get a new player for $125, and still have $375 credit left over? Sweet.

| IP: Logged

Carey Barber
Expert Film Handler

Posts: 143
From: Newport News, VA, USA
Registered: Jan 2003

posted 03-19-2008 09:26 PM

quote: Bobby Henderson
The disc features the concert in two high resolution audio versions. One is an uncompressed LPCM 2.0 track in 24-bit/96kHz resolution. There's also a Dolby TrueHD lossless 5.1 track in 24-bit/96kHz resolution

What is the relationship, if any, between lossy/lossless and compression? I have never really understood the relationship...

| IP: Logged

Chris Slycord
Film God

Posts: 2986
From: 청주시, 경북도, South Korea
Registered: Mar 2007

posted 03-19-2008 10:20 PM

A lossy compression method is one where compressing data and then decompressing it retrieves data that may well be different from the original, but is close enough to be useful in some way.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lossy

Lossless just means that decompressing results in a file identical to original.

edit:

Examples -
gif, png use lossless schemes for images
jpg uses lossy

mp3, ogg/vorbis are lossy for music
flac is lossless

zip is lossless (kinda bad to make an archiver that gives you back a different file).

Lossy is ok for video, pictures, sound since they don't HAVE to be identical to be recognizable. Lossless is necessary for stuff like archiving or compressing a word document.

| IP: Logged

Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."

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

posted 03-19-2008 10:44 PM

quote: Mike Schindler
So theoretically I can trade in my first generation player for $500 store credit, get a new player for $125, and still have $375 credit left over?

I strongly doubt they'll give you a full refund on some HD-DVD player around a year or more old. Usually a 30 to 90 day return policy applies for full refunds.

| IP: Logged

Mike Blakesley
Film God

Posts: 12767
From: Forsyth, Montana
Registered: Jun 99

posted 03-20-2008 12:45 AM

Yeah, I'll bet there are some strong "exceptions" at the Online Trade-in Center.

| IP: Logged

All times are Central (GMT -6:00)

This topic comprises 105 pages: 1 2 3 ... 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 ... 103 104 105

Printer-friendly view of this topic

The Film-Tech Forums are designed for various members related to the cinema industry to express their opinions, viewpoints and testimonials on various products, services and events based upon speculation, personal knowledge and factual information through use, therefore all views represented here allow no liability upon the publishers of this web site and the owners of said views assume no liability for any ill will resulting from these postings. The posts made here are for educational as well as entertainment purposes and as such anyone viewing this portion of the website must accept these views as statements of the author of that opinion and agrees to release the authors from any and all liability.