AVATAR - FULL HD 3D - Panasonic Exclusive Version (No Panasonic Bashing Please)

[3DForLife]

I just bought the Panny 3dtv today. What does the mail in card look like?

[ascendedcobra]

It says how on the panasonic website.

[victors]

Will they really release the retail version for sure?

Coraline, Ice Age 3, Monsters vs. Aliens, etc..

[that1guystudios]

Bruisedemu, the Panasonic 2 Free Title was supposed to expire on 7/10 but was extended to 09/04!

Go to the following website to print off the coupon...
You will need to cut the UPC and serial number off the side of the TV box. If you've already thrown the box away, you're screwed.

http://www.panasonic.com/promos/3d-b...ovie-offer.asp

[STARSCREAM]

Avatar 3D Blu-ray Review


Details posted on the main page.

I don't care what anyone says, this 3D exclusivity bs is either gonna kill 3D all together or severely hinder it's adoption. Also, gotta love how they are releasing Avatar in 3D on December 1st. A whole one day after November so Fox can say they told the truth when they said "3D is in the conceptual stage and Avatar will not be out on 3D Blu-ray in November". They said the exclusivity deal for this is "unusually long"!

[bluflu]

Great news! I'm glad to see at least some will get to see Avatar 3D so soon. I hope Sony gets Toy Story 3 3D, else I bet no one will see it for a long time.

[Jimmy Smith]

I wonder if the exclusive 3D version will be the extended version or the theatrical cut. Really hope its extended

Ive held off purchase on Avatar until I can own it in 3D but Ill never base a television purchase soley on what movies are exclusive to it nor will I pay the ridiclous price its sure to sell for on ebay. If I end up getting a Panasonic 3D anyway Avatar 3D will be a nice addition to my collection

[dobyblue]

I wouldn't be surprised if it's a single disc bare bones theatrical cut.

[Jimmy Smith]

Originally Posted by dobyblue

I wouldn't be surprised if it's a single disc bare bones theatrical cut.

Giving that the 2D theatrical version of Avatar used just under 45 gigabytes fitting even the theatrical cut in 3D on one disc would be incredibly difficult. Many on this forum take the view that higher bitrates always improve quality and further compression always hurts the quality. I don't take this view. With AVC and VC-1 compression and by doing for working in comparing similar frames and throwing out data that doesn't contribute to quality bitrates can oftentimes be reduced without any noticeable quality loss. However only to a certain extent if bitrates are reduced too far quality will inevidibly suffer. Avatar is a full 16:9 feature filled with highley detailed visual shots and fast moving action. Basically if any feature needs the most of the Blu-Ray formats bitrates that movie would be Avatar. In order to fit Avatar in 3D on a single Blu-Ray bitrates would need to be reduced by around 40%. Maybe it is possible to do this without hurting quality but I frankly doubt it.

Fox devoted Ice Age Dawn of the Dinosaurs 3D an average bitrate of 43 megabits per second (Around 50% higher bitrate then Avatar 2D was encoded at) giving the 90 minute feature a whooping 37 gigabytes. Encoding the extended cut of Avatar at a similar bitrate would lead to the feature using 70 gigabytes. Having to switch discs would be a worthy consession to having the best quality 3D Avatar possible.

[MyBlu-rayBrotherEd]

Ugh! When are they going to start releasing 3D movies for the general public? Enough already with these exclusive package deals!

[Jimmy Smith]

Originally Posted by MyBlu-rayBrotherEd

Ugh! When are they going to start releasing 3D movies for the general public? Enough already with these exclusive package deals!

As much as I don't like these exclusive deals if the alternative is no 3D Avatar at all an hardware exclusive version is the preferable option for sure.

Panasonic probably paid Fox alot more money for exclusivity then they would have ever made from the limited 3D market.

Lets be honest pure greed motivates these deals. Im just hoping that James "DVDs are wasteful" Cameron continues his noble fight against greedy capitalists

[Jeff Kleist]

Someone asked me to comment on this-

Please keep some perspective in mind

The 3D market, best case scenario, will not be to a point where the general public even notices its existance for another year at least. You know all those studies you see that the public doesn't care about 3D? Just like they didn't care about a lot of other technologies. Once it's a- more affordable, and b- their friends start getting them they will care

By that time, the exclusivity windows will be over

And one can argue that these windows are GOOD for 3D. Why? Because most of these discs would not be getting made right now without the CEs paying for them. Do you really think Fox would have pressed Avatar 3D this year with two dips already planned? Hell no, they'd save it for the inevitable round 3 when there's a lot more customers to buy. Coraline? Nah. Disney is throwing Christmas Carol out there as much to feed the people who will buy anything to feed their 3D deck as anything else, and I hope that they fell the same way about Tron But I wouldn't be suprised if that ended up exclusive as well

The real 3D market is at least a year, and probably two away. All the current exclusives are going to end up in your local store before the end of next year (sans Avatar), so just be patient.

[MyBlu-rayBrotherEd]

Originally Posted by Jimmy Smith

As much as I don't like these exclusive deals if the alternative is no 3D Avatar at all an hardware exclusive version is the preferable option for sure.

Panasonic probably paid Fox alot more money for exclusivity then they would have ever made from the limited 3D market.

Lets be honest pure greed motivates these deals. Im just hoping that James "DVDs are wasteful" Cameron continues his noble fight against greedy capitalists

The 3D option may as well be non existant. I'm not going to buy a home theater set up for one movie, and you cannot get 3D Avatar unless you do, unless you buy it used on ebay or something. I'm not going to double dip either. I won't buy Avatar until it is released to the general public in 3D.

[dobyblue]

Originally Posted by Jimmy Smith

Given that the 2D theatrical version of Avatar used just under 45 gigabytes fitting even the theatrical cut in 3D on one disc would be incredibly difficult. Many on this forum take the view that higher bitrates always improve quality and further compression always hurts the quality. I don't take this view. With AVC and VC-1 compression and by doing for working in comparing similar frames and throwing out data that doesn't contribute to quality bitrates can oftentimes be reduced without any noticeable quality loss. However only to a certain extent if bitrates are reduced too far quality will inevidibly suffer. Avatar is a full 16:9 feature filled with highley detailed visual shots and fast moving action. Basically if any feature needs the most of the Blu-Ray formats bitrates that movie would be Avatar. In order to fit Avatar in 3D on a single Blu-Ray bitrates would need to be reduced by around 40%. Maybe it is possible to do this without hurting quality but I frankly doubt it.

Fox devoted Ice Age Dawn of the Dinosaurs 3D an average bitrate of 43 megabits per second (Around 50% higher bitrate then Avatar 2D was encoded at) giving the 90 minute feature a whooping 37 gigabytes. Encoding the extended cut of Avatar at a similar bitrate would lead to the feature using 70 gigabytes. Having to switch discs would be a worthy consession to having the best quality 3D Avatar possible.

The initial MVC/MPEG-4 encoder only added 50% headroom and they've been working on it consistently for the last year to make it even more efficient. I have no doubt when the 3D version of Avatar is released it will look remarkable and also don't doubt for a second that they can fit Avatar 2D in much less room if it were required.

Just because Fox (Panasonic really, as all Fox's discs are encoded at PHL) devoted 37GB to IA3 doesn't mean it couldn't have fit on a 25GB disc if they wanted to devote more time to the encoding process.

MVC/MPEG-4 encoders are being worked on all the time. They should have very little trouble making a 3D reference Avatar disc given the time they have to work on it, and they've probably been working on demos of it for months already at PHL.

[Jimmy Smith]

Originally Posted by dobyblue

The initial MVC/MPEG-4 encoder only added 50% headroom and they've been working on it consistently for the last year to make it even more efficient. I have no doubt when the 3D version of Avatar is released it will look remarkable and also don't doubt for a second that they can fit Avatar 2D in much less room if it were required.

Just because Fox (Panasonic really, as all Fox's discs are encoded at PHL) devoted 37GB to IA3 doesn't mean it couldn't have fit on a 25GB disc if they wanted to devote more time to the encoding process.

MVC/MPEG-4 encoders are being worked on all the time. They should have very little trouble making a 3D reference Avatar disc given the time they have to work on it, and they've probably been working on demos of it for months already at PHL.

Im really hoping this is the extended cut which runs nearly 3 hours

What you say is true that there are definutely ways to reduce the bitrate without hurting quailty. Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 3D version had the same bitrate as the previous 2D only (upper 20s). Meaning the video bitrate for the 2D version was reduced by 33%. Yet the quality didn't suffer at all and the 2D version on the 3D disc is very bit as great as the 2D only version. However Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs had a 2.39 aspect ratio (meaning it needs 26% less vertical resolution then a 16:9 movie would) and cartoony animation. Avatar with its highly detailed realitc animation and full 16:9 aspect ratio won't be nearly as easy to compress at such a low bitrate.

I hope your right about encoding but encoding a 3 hour, action filled, full 16:9, 3D movie on a single BD-50 without reducing detail and introducing compression artifacts will be a daunting task even for the best compression artist. I wish it can be done on one disc but if doing so will hurt quality Id rather have it spread over 2.

[fitprod]

Originally Posted by dobyblue

Just because Fox (Panasonic really, as all Fox's discs are encoded at PHL)

No... PHL is not the only one doing Fox discs.

fitprod

[Jeff Kleist]

Im really hoping this is the extended cut which runs nearly 3 hours

What you say is true that there are definutely ways to reduce the bitrate without hurting quailty. Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 3D version had the same bitrate as the previous 2D only (upper 20s). Meaning the video bitrate for the 2D version was reduced by 33%. Yet the quality didn't suffer at all and the 2D version on the 3D disc is very bit as great as the 2D only version. However Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs had a 2.39 aspect ratio (meaning it needs 26% less vertical resolution then a 16:9 movie would) and cartoony animation. Avatar with its highly detailed realitc animation and full 16:9 aspect ratio won't be nearly as easy to compress at such a low bitrate.

The hard edges of the black bars take up space too, don't worry so much about how much of the frame is being used, it's not a big factor

This is almost certainly the theatrical cut

Exceptionally clean, CG movies (which Avatar essentially is) are far easier to "cheat" with on the encode because randomness like film grain doesn't exist to give the encoder a hard time.

Also with stuff like Ice Age, they had the space to spare, so they used it, it meant less encoding passes to ensure quality. I think it might be a little tight, but they'll manage. Personally I think going to 2 discs is the best idea, but it's definately possible.

[Kurri]

Originally Posted by MyBlu-rayBrotherEd

Ugh! When are they going to start releasing 3D movies for the general public? Enough already with these exclusive package deals!

Does anyone know how long these exclusives are exclusive?

[3DForLife]

Originally Posted by Kurri

Does anyone know how long these exclusives are exclusive?

I maybe wrong. But I remember hearing the exclusives will stay that way for 1 year. Again I maybe wrong.

[Jimmy Smith]

Originally Posted by Jeff Kleist

This is almost certainly the theatrical cut

Exceptionally clean, CG movies (which Avatar essentially is) are far easier to "cheat" with on the encode because randomness like film grain doesn't exist to give the encoder a hard time.

Also with stuff like Ice Age, they had the space to spare, so they used it, it meant less encoding passes to ensure quality. I think it might be a little tight, but they'll manage. Personally I think going to 2 discs is the best idea, but it's definately possible.

Yes Avatar being a clean digital movie will certainly help compression. But its also one with lots of fast moving action. Action scenes have far more changes from frame to frame then still dialog filled movies making it more difficult to compress at a lower bitrate. The full 16:9 ratio, the highly detailed imagry, the multiple action sequences make Avatar a difficult movie to compress even with its digital cleanness.

Do you have insider sources saying this is the theatrical cut or are you just assuming such?