Why do some BD films look great, and others less so?

[DealsR4theDevil]

Howcome some Blu-ray movies look very very very good, and others not so much?

The Warriors, a movie that is 29 years old, looks perfect and in certain scenese it looks almost indistinguishable from movies made today. On the other hand, Reservoir Dogs and Goodfellas (the first two movies i bought), left me wondering why i spent all this money on Blu-ray. Dont get me wrong, they look good but not "$600 for a new player" good.

Kingdom of Heaven, Flags of Our Fathers, The Untouchables, Warriors, and Shooter look amazing. While The Departed, Goodfellas, Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, Superman, Superman 2, and Talledega Nights dont really come close to what Blu-ray can do.

I rented Pirates 2 from Blockbuster the other night, the trailers before the movie were amazing (especially the montage of Chicken Little, Cars, Invincible, and Pirates) and the movie was also as good as Shooter and Kingdom of Heaven.

What really bothers me is that highdefdigest.com and this sight seem to give the movies i am not impressed with 4s and 5s for video rating. Is there something im missing? can someone explain to me why some movies look so so so good and others dont? i mean my copy of Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back has a trailer for Beuna Vista movies a nd they all look amazing, and the Miramax logo lights up like a city and just blows me away (I know its a only logo), but then the movie doesnt look as good. Can someone please clarify why some of these movies look the way they look?

[MOONPHASE]

Originally Posted by BAND-AID

Howcome some Blu-ray movies look very very very good, and others not so much?

The Warriors, a movie that is 29 years old, looks perfect and in certain scenese it looks almost indistinguishable from movies made today. On the other hand, Reservoir Dogs and Goodfellas (the first two movies i bought), left me wondering why i spent all this money on Blu-ray. Dont get me wrong, they look good but not "$600 for a new player" good.

Kingdom of Heaven, Flags of Our Fathers, The Untouchables, Warriors, and Shooter look amazing. While The Departed, Goodfellas, Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, Superman, Superman 2, and Talledega Nights dont really come close to what Blu-ray can do.

I rented Pirates 2 from Blockbuster the other night, the trailers before the movie were amazing (especially the montage of Chicken Little, Cars, Invincible, and Pirates) and the movie was also as good as Shooter and Kingdom of Heaven.

What really bothers me is that highdefdigest.com and this sight seem to give the movies i am not impressed with 4s and 5s for video rating. Is there something im missing? can someone explain to me why some movies look so so so good and others dont? i mean my copy of Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back has a trailer for Beuna Vista movies a nd they all look amazing, and the Miramax logo lights up like a city and just blows me away (I know its a only logo), but then the movie doesnt look as good. Can someone please clarify why some of these movies look the way they look?

simply put either the remastering into 1080p might have been very hard to do for some of the movies that dont look so great or just not enough careful work was done and this included both hd-dvd and blu-ray because movies are shot in different kinds of film

[BStecke]

The Departed is one of the better titles out there. Superman looks about as good as it's ever going to, as it was shot with a soft comic style which won't change no matter what they do with it, cuz it's meant to be that way. At the end, it just comes down to how well the master was cleaned up, how well the compression was done . . . actually, quite a lot of factors.

[Manco]

You need to remember you are getting on-board with new technology in its infancy. There is lot to learn about this for directors, post production houses, Studios, etc... The visual impact of a film will be characterized by the film stock used, how good the transfer was done, compression of the transfer, grain or soft focus...many, many factors.

Also, trailers are sent back to the lab and are highly reprocessed for visual impact to get your attention. Coloring, saturation, lots of things are changed from the actual film. Ever watch a trailer and notice scenes that don't exist in the film?

[gvortex7]

I have Goodfellas, and I think it looks very good especially for being 17 years old. I definitely don't agree with you on that one.

[aygie]

Originally Posted by gvortex7

I have Goodfellas, and I think it looks very good especially for being 17 years old. I definitely don't agree with you on that one.

Yeah Goodfellas looked awesome, the detail in the close ups were outstanding.

[jccca]

Goodfellas looks amazing on some scenes (MOST of them). On some others you notice certain 'film' artifacts, which is still great, you're still getting that much detail!

[pedigree]

Originally Posted by gvortex7

I have Goodfellas, and I think it looks very good especially for being 17 years old. I definitely don't agree with you on that one.

WRONG AGAIN. thank god the first movie i watched was goodfellas so i had nothing else to compare it to. its now gathering dust in my collection

[so n so]

House Of Flying Daggers, one of my favorite movies and my first Blu Ray buy was very disappointing. That movie is inherently very 'beautiful' to watch but the HD version sucked IMO.

I was wondering to myself what was my purpose until I bought Apocalypto (sp) and Troy DC. The latter are AMAZING to watch... on my 32" TV. I can only imagine how they would look on a bigger (comparable) TV...

[Ashplisken]

Originally Posted by pedigree

WRONG AGAIN. thank god the first movie i watched was goodfellas so i had nothing else to compare it to. its now gathering dust in my collection

You do realize that there is a limit to what you can do with 17 year old film stock in the mastering process, right? It's not like they take fairy dust, sprinkle it on the film, and you have a 17 year old movie looking like it was shot yesterday...

[gvortex7]

Originally Posted by pedigree

WRONG AGAIN. thank god the first movie i watched was goodfellas so i had nothing else to compare it to. its now gathering dust in my collection

There is no right or wrong in this situation. Everyone has a different taste as to what constitutes a good looking image. For me Goodfellas has never looked better.

Can it look better? Maybe, possibly. But, as part of their initial wave of Blu-ray releases in 2006, WB did a pretty good job with this title especially for being as old is it is.

By the way, you can't make a direct comparison between two movies either, whether they were shot 2 or 20 years apart. There are way too many factors involved in determining the quality of the original masters. Not to mention that ultimately it is mostly up to the director to determine how the picture will look when released in the home video market. They can make it as sharp, vivid and colorful as they want, or make it as soft, faded or grainy as they want.

[MOONPHASE]

Originally Posted by BStecke

The Departed is one of the better titles out there. Superman looks about as good as it's ever going to, as it was shot with a soft comic style which won't change no matter what they do with it, cuz it's meant to be that way. At the end, it just comes down to how well the master was cleaned up, how well the compression was done . . . actually, quite a lot of factors.

Kind of like what i said but with more details