Is There An Issue With Kino's HDR encoding?

[Mose Harper]

It's not every Kino 4K, but with Prophecy and now Xanadu, what I'm seeing looks off.
Dull , slightly desaturated color on both, an overall dim image on Xanadu and what looked like a wonky gamma curve on Prophecy. Both are watchable, but a disappointment from a PQ standpoint for me.

So after spinning Xanadu last night, I went into the Oppo's picture settings to see if could tweak anything to eek out a more vibrant image. It wasn't until I switched the HDR off and set it to output bt.2020 that the images I'd been expecting finally snapped into place.
Not a massive change on Xanadu, but definitely a brighter image with more vibrant colors.
The difference was even starker with Prophecy. No more sickly, ashen looking skin tones on Jarvis and Foxworth at the D.C. beginning of the film. Every sampled scene now looks vibrant and clear.

Tone mapping on both the Oppo and the display (JVC NP5 pj) are admittedly not the ne plus ultra- but I've rarely been as off-put with any other 4K content so far, as I have with these two.

I pulled a bunch of other lable's product out to see if disabling HDR is what I should be doing from now on. While some images on other film's did dim a bit with HDR engaged (no DV on this pj, only HDR 10) nothing looked as off as it did with the two Kino titles. And at least in one case (Wild Things/ Arrow) the image was clearly more inaccurate when HDR was turned off.

So I can't help but wonder. Especially given how badly Kino borked the Blu ray encoding on Xanadu, just how many of their 4Ks are mis-encoded?
I recall people complaining about the one reel or scene with SotL. Is that likely what I'm seeing with these two as well?

[CreasyBear]

There's a lot of issues with Kino...

[Infallible Presence]

The main issue with Kino, as others have said before, is they're more about quantity than quality.

[CreasyBear]

Early Shout and Kino 4K's had similar issues with encoding, such as brightness flucuations on DV, and just in general poor handling of the format. The difference is Shout got their shit together by and large and they have been doing an excellent job with encodes for the last couple of years.

Kino... has gotten worse.

[hanshotfirst1138]

Originally Posted by CreasyBear

There's a lot of issues with Kino...

Chief among them their propensity for passing off a downmix as the “original mono” .

[Mose Harper]

One thing that is perplexing me is that earlier feedback on Prophecy here seemed to be overwhelmingly positive about the PQ. I figured I'd come across like a fart in the wind chiming in with any negative comments so I kept my mouth shut.
Now, with the HDR bypassed, the image really does look spectacular. I'm hugely satisfied with what I'm seeing now.
Xanadu not as much, but it's a film that is dominated by opticals, so the potential to stun is never going to be there.

Also got a say that prior to these two I haven't really been disappointed with Kino. If anything, they've usually been an improvement on the Imprint releases, and the delta between some of the Kino's and their Arrow counterparts hasn't been as discernible as I'd expected, for the extra trouble and expense.

[nicwood]

You’re probably one of the first regulars of the KL fan thread who dares questioning Kino’s quality, Mose, even though you’re not looking in the right direction. Their HDR itself isn’t really the problem - but the pixelation / macroblocking and smearing of image detail "underneath" the HDR. Whichever party Kino commission to do their mastering probably takes care of the HDR grading and that’s what’s being delivered to Kino - for better or worse. If the image is "dull", the party who did the grading is to blame. If Arrow or others license that master, they usually present the exact same HDR grade but better encoded.

What’s at fault though with KL themselves is the aforementioned encoding of the finished masters among other things. There are sadly way, way too many negative examples to list here as virtually every Kino 4K HDR release since they switched to Compound, which is their encoder, in 2022 has problematic encodes - some more, some less.

For one of the most drastic examples, see Fear and Desire here: https://forum.blu-ray.com/showpost.p...1&postcount=43

[meremortal]

Originally Posted by Infallible Presence

The main issue with Kino, as others have said before, is they're more about quantity than quality.

They release so much stuff that I fell off the KL wagon a few years ago. I already have hundreds of their blu catalog but haven't really bought much in at least the last 2-3 years and had trouble keeping up with their release schedule pace.

[Infallible Presence]

Originally Posted by meremortal

They release so much stuff that I fell off the KL wagon a few years ago. I already have hundreds of their blu catalog but haven't really bought much in at least the last 2-3 years and had trouble keeping up with their release schedule pace.

In many ways they're just another Mill Creek or Echo Bridge, but with higher prices. Some may get special treatment here and there. But otherwise they just technically reprinting catalog titles. On the positive side, they're getting titles out on BD. On the negative side, they're taking titles that could be better served by other companies.

[meremortal]

Originally Posted by Infallible Presence

In many ways they're just another Mill Creek or Echo Bridge, but with higher prices. Some may get special treatment here and there. But otherwise they just technically reprinting catalog titles. On the positive side, they're getting titles out on BD. On the negative side, they're taking titles that could be better served by other companies.

I don't want to bash KL or anything as I I'm appreciative of their getting so much out there on physical media over the years. But I agree that they put minimal effort into so many titles. For example, they had a nice licensing deal with both Disney and many former Mill Creek titles and only a few had new extras added. A decent few they somehow managed to mess the audio up where stereo tracks were in fact mono. And some titles have better a/v on streaming than blu ray. Maybe it was just what they were given, but these kinds of issues are frustrating with physical media where problems remain as the discs are final unless they actually do a recall.

[HeavyHitter]

Does a bear sh*t in the woods?

[JRcanReid]

This thread needs a trigger warning.

[PonyoBellanote]

Originally Posted by Infallible Presence

In many ways they're just another Mill Creek or Echo Bridge, but with higher prices. Some may get special treatment here and there. But otherwise they just technically reprinting catalog titles. On the positive side, they're getting titles out on BD. On the negative side, they're taking titles that could be better served by other companies.

No way. Mill Creek/Echo Bride don't pull out garbage DVD-HDTV transfers on Blu ray and take it a day. Kino might have bad encodes, but their 4K transfers are genuine quality, the problem might be their encodes.

This is making me fear for their eventual Babe 1 & 2..

[LSK]

I quite enjoy Death Wish, The Great Escape, Eastern Promises, Nobody’s Fool, Hard Target, To Live And Die In L.A., 3 Days Of The Condor, Paths Of Glory, No Way Out, Leviathan, The Train and Staying Alive. Great looking UHD releases.

[Infallible Presence]

Originally Posted by PonyoBellanote

No way. Mill Creek/Echo Bride don't pull out garbage DVD-HDTV transfers on Blu ray and take it a day. Kino might have bad encodes, but their 4K transfers are genuine quality, the problem might be their encodes.

This is making me fear for their eventual Babe 1 & 2..

Their 4Ks seem to be a toss in the air. Some appear decent, but there are those with crushed blacks as many have pointed out. Than we have releases like "MouseHunt" that surpasses expectations. Though, that may be due to Paramount or DreamWorks. After all the Paramount's 2021 BD was top notch.

[PonyoBellanote]

Originally Posted by Infallible Presence

Their 4Ks seem to be a toss in the air. Some appear decent, but there are those with crushed blacks as many have pointed out. Than we have releases like "MouseHunt" that surpasses expectations. Though, that may be due to Paramount or DreamWorks. After all the Paramount's 2021 BD was top notch.

No, Paramount had nothing to do with that. Studios don't do anything with the licensees. Kino did the job on that one. We were just lucky

Don't get me wrong, I'm not acting like Kino doesn't do anything wrong, they do. But comparing them to Mill Creek/Echo Bridge is stupid, because again, bad encodes, yes, but still quality 4K masters. The latter two was all just plain garbage on discs.

[CreasyBear]

Originally Posted by PonyoBellanote

No way. Mill Creek/Echo Bride don't pull out garbage DVD-HDTV transfers on Blu ray and take it a day. Kino might have bad encodes, but their 4K transfers are genuine quality, the problem might be their encodes.

This is making me fear for their eventual Babe 1 & 2..

Some Kino Blu-ray's have absolutely been ancient DVD era HD masters.

[JohnCarpenterFan]

I don't own the titles in question, but what you've described sounds similar to what others observed on the SF UHD of Ace Ventura: Pet Detective. I don't own that disc either but the caps gave the impression that it suffered from some kind of error, if not just an incompetent grade. The reason I bring that example up is because I believe Kino and SF were both using the same post house for their new masters (I'm not sure if that's still the case). For a while I was blown away because the grading work looked much more professional than the usual home video job, so this is pretty sad to hear if accurate.

Unfortunately more and more talented colorists are out of work, and the decline in quality grades is really starting to show on home video. Just look at what's happening with a number of the recent Warner UHDs, where it seems like we've stepped back into the CRT era.

[Infallible Presence]

Originally Posted by PonyoBellanote

No, Paramount had nothing to do with that. Studios don't do anything with the licensees. Kino did the job on that one. We were just lucky

Don't get me wrong, I'm not acting like Kino doesn't do anything wrong, they do. But comparing them to Mill Creek/Echo Bridge is stupid, because again, bad encodes, yes, but still quality 4K masters. The latter two was all just plain garbage on discs.

What I was trying to point out is sometime the studios do handle the masters and the licensees can't change anything or use another. Like how Shout! couldn't use the UK cut of "Frankenstein and the Monster from Hell" or Arrow having to use only the masters that Sony provides.

[Kyle15]

Originally Posted by PonyoBellanote

No, Paramount had nothing to do with that. Studios don't do anything with the licensees. Kino did the job on that one. We were just lucky

Don't get me wrong, I'm not acting like Kino doesn't do anything wrong, they do. But comparing them to Mill Creek/Echo Bridge is stupid, because again, bad encodes, yes, but still quality 4K masters. The latter two was all just plain garbage on discs.

Originally Posted by Infallible Presence

What I was trying to point out is sometime the studios do handle the masters and the licensees can't change anything or use another. Like how Shout! couldn't use the UK cut of "Frankenstein and the Monster from Hell" or Arrow having to use only the masters that Sony provides.

Paramount has totally handed-off obvious in-house 4k masters to Kino. Stayin' Alive is a great example. It's typical Paramount woowoo, yet the likes of anything else confirmed to be outsourced boutique restorations (namely, everything VS and others have put out) look nothing like that. What gives me pause is Kino usually just has bad encoding. Their in-house work doesn't usually have Paramount's greasy DNR stick look.