Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: DVD Problem

This is topic DVD Problem in forum The Afterlife at Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE.

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Posted by Betsie Beadling (Member # 591) on 02-24-2001, 05:00 PM:

I have 5 DVDs, and 2 of them dont seem to
want to work.one Tenchi Muyo Movie
and Princess Mononoke.

Ive Exchanegd Princess Mononoke 3Times
and it Still wont work.
What to do Cause i Really want to Wach that Movie???

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Posted by Paul G. Thompson (Member # 655) on 02-24-2001, 05:16 PM:

Betsie, did they work before? And, does the DVD player work ok with other DVD's?

Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 02-24-2001, 05:17 PM:

Try exchanging the DVD player itself instead of the discs. Those discs work fine on my machine, and since you have tried several different copies of the same movie, my bet is that it is your player.

Posted by James R. Hammonds, Jr (Member # 673) on 02-25-2001, 12:04 AM:

was your player made by GE?
it wouldnt suprise me if it was.
the one i bought for my family last christmas is a GE and it sucks.
it even skips on some new movies.
i bought a dvd lens cleaner and it wouldnt even read that properly.

but when i moved up to school, i got myself a good one.

also, having some no-name brand like apex or something like that is a bad idea.

Posted by Darryl Spicer (Member # 711) on 02-25-2001, 12:32 AM:

What is the brand and model of your player and how old is it. Some early tashiba models have been having problems reading discs do to the internal processor. This has since been corrected. Make sure you do not get any fingerprints on the disc. if finger prints get on the center area of the disc it can cause problems with the disc loading up. Also make sure that the player is well ventilated and nothing is placed on top of the unit. This can actualy cause the unit to stop working.

Posted by Scott Norwood (Member # 30) on 02-25-2001, 09:43 AM:

Yes, do post the make/model of the player. Some players have trouble with some disks. It's also possible that the alignment is off in your particular player.

Note that some DVD players also have trouble playing CD-Rs. I've only seen a couple of DVD-Rs, and those played fine in a Toshiba player, but I don't know if other players have trouble with them.

(Admittedly, I don't own a DVD player yet, so I probably can't help that much with the specifics of what make/model to buy or avoid.)

Posted by Betsie Beadling (Member # 591) on 02-25-2001, 10:00 AM:

My Fathers Computer

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Posted by Darryl Spicer (Member # 711) on 02-25-2001, 11:38 AM:

Dvd roms can be tricky with some types of DVD's. It could be a number of problems. How old is the dvd Rom. I would say it is no more than two years old. DVD roms run a little differently than regular dvd players. Do you have another cdrom drive on the computer. Sometimes the other drive can cause problems. If the DVD was an add on to a computer that has a cdrom. The dvd player must be set up as the master drive not the slave drive. Otherwise it will not run correctly. Some of the dvd's could have pretty large files on them that thr drive is having trouble loading. Make sure you have as minimum amount of programs running in the background otherwise the dvd will have trouble loading. Fingerprints play an even more important roll when it coms to cumputer drives. They can prevent the drive from loading. CD lens cleaners are not recomended in dvdroms and dvd rom lens cleaners will sometimes have trouble running.

Posted by Heyward Garner (Member # 722) on 02-26-2001, 12:22 AM:

Hmmmm....
Betsie, did you check the regional code? (aka United States is "1", etc.) The regional code of the disks and the regional code of your DVD-ROM must correspond. I have Tenchi, and it runs great on the PS2. Also, do you know if you use software or hardware decoding? One drawback to a DVD-ROM instead of a stand-alone DVD player is software decoding... NO GOOD. Always use a hardware decoder. Check those two items, and see if that doesn't help some... Good luck!

Posted by Betsie Beadling (Member # 591) on 02-26-2001, 01:43 AM:

Yes its region one

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Posted by Josh Jones (Member # 447) on 03-01-2001, 12:18 AM:

Speaking of DVD's, how many people out there watch letterboxed or widescreen formatted films at home. If I'm given the option, I always watch them in WS. Too bad Blue Submarine No. 6 is in Acadamy

Gundam Too

Josh

Posted by John Pytlak (Member # 331) on 03-01-2001, 08:10 AM:

IMHO,with DVDs and a good monitor, "letterbox" or "Widescreen" is ALWAYS the way to go. That's the format the cinematographer and director composed each shot for. "Pan and Scan" fills the screen of a 4:3 television set, but usually RUINS the composition and pacing of a movie. Unfortunately, many uninformed people still prefer "pan and scan", if only because their VHS tapes and old TVs are so unsharp that they need to fill the screen to see what is going on.

Two movies that clearly show the entire widescreen frame being used for creative composition are "The Graduate" and "The Sound of Music". They just are NOT the same movies with pan-and-scan.

Marty Hart's "American Widescreen Museum" website describes a wonderful new technique called "FlikFX" that tries to fit wide movies onto a small TV screen without pan-and-scan or letterbox. I think something will be released this April 1:
http://www.widescreenmuseum.com/flikfx/default.htm

On a more serious note, check out his feature on "Letterbox Lunacy":
http://www.widescreenmuseum.com/widescreen/lbx.htm

------------------
John P. Pytlak, Senior Technical Specialist
Worldwide Technical Services, Entertainment Imaging
Eastman Kodak Company
Research Labs, Building 69, Room 7419
Rochester, New York, 14650-1922 USA
Tel: 716-477-5325 Cell: 716-781-4036 Fax: 716-722-7243
E-Mail: john.pytlak@kodak.com
Web site: http://www.kodak.com/go/motion

Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 03-01-2001, 10:03 AM:

For those who haven't checked out Marty's link that John posted above, be sure and check out "exhibit #3" on Letterbox Lunacy. This is a nice visual explanation on yet another reason against curved screens. Curved screens kill the apparent width of the image, do in fact lose more image area (as anyone who has ever cut an aperture for a curved screen can attest) and distort the image. Anyone notice that the THX Broadway "blue box" never has straight lines on a curved screen? Sheeesch!

Too bad customers have been trained to look for "stadium seating" and "curved screens".

Posted by John Pytlak (Member # 331) on 03-01-2001, 10:20 AM:

Brad:

I agree that a deep curved screen combined with a steep projection angle results in very unacceptable geometric distortion and lost image area, clearly seen in Marty's example from "Patton".

But gain screens should be installed with a slight curve (per SMPTE RP95) to improve illumination uniformity. Usually, a curve with a radius of more than 80% of the projection throw distance won't have objectionable distortion, especially if the projection angle is within a few degrees of perpendicular to the center of the screen.

Again, trying various combinations using Schneider's Theatre Design Pro software is very useful to understanding the tradeoffs:
http://www.schneideroptics.com/theatre/desprodn.html

If you have enough light to use a matte white (gain = 1) screen, you should always install it flat so as not to have contrast killing cross-reflections.

Posted by Scott Norwood (Member # 30) on 03-01-2001, 04:50 PM:

I have mixed feelings about curved screens. I've seen some great theatres that use deep-curve (Uptown in DC), shallow-curve (lots of early '50s CinemaScope conversions were set up this way), and flat screens, as well as bad examples of each.

I think it depends a lot on the design and installation, as well as the movie itself. IMHO, Academy stuff does not look good on a deep-curve screen, since the picture appears to be square. I'd say that 1.66 can go either flat or curved. Shallow-curve is probably best for 1.85, although some films ("Starship Troopers" comes to mind, but there are others) are great on deep-curve screens. Deep-curve is great for scope action films, but probably not so great for "artsy" scope films, particularly if subtitles are involved ("Brother of Sleep," for example, was a great German film from a few years ago that used scope for good reasons, but which probably wouldn't look right on a curved screen, particularly with the resultant distortion to the subtitles).

Posted by George Roher (Member # 91) on 03-02-2001, 12:54 AM:

Scott,

I'd kind of like to see "Brother of Sleep" on the deep curve. The aerial shots of the Alps in the beginning would be most impressive.

Posted by Mike Beerbower (Member # 363) on 03-08-2001, 09:27 AM:

John -
Another movie that's far better in widescreen is "Ghostbusters". I just bought the DVD, and the difference is incredible, especially because "Ghostbusters" has some really ugly pans in the pan-&-scan version. I'm also really looking forward to the upcoming DVD release of "Tora! Tora! Tora!" That's got to be fantastic in full Cinemascope ratio.

-Mike
thespian99@hotmail.com