Quote:
Originally Posted by amputd
These Criterion 4k releases are no longer automatic purchases for me. The use of HDR is just too conservative for my taste. I am aware there’s an argument that HDR should be used sparingly to preserve the original look of the film, but when I pay $30 to upgrade a title and there’s only a subtle difference in the picture quality it’s hard to justify the expense.
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If you're using HDR to make something candy-colored for the sake of the showy saturation boost, it kinda invalidates the whole point of the project. Now, if they did their job so well that there's only a slight difference between editions, absolutely and go with God. There are a good number of titles I didn't upgrade even WITH HDR. But the proper use of HDR is capturing something that wasn't available before - the original dynamic range of film.
(For me, 4k has two aspects - HDR, which is great, but also texture. The first one, sometimes BD gets pretty close. With the latter? UHD with a good bitrate absolutely smokes a BD transfer. Like, Shaft and The Last Waltz were *transformative* experiences bc of how the film grain was rendered into something that felt like a genuinely celluloid presentation.)