Archived: Insiders Thread

[Hussla]

Something in the air, my spider senses are tingling.

The lack of noise, announcements, etc from the BDA camps makes me thing they are quietly sitting on something big.

Would any insiders like to confirm or deny my psychic instincts?

[gand41f]

Hi Paidgeek,

I inserted Memoirs of the Geisha into my PS3 yesterday and noticed the little icon that shows up on the XMB instead of the blue disc. I like it very much and makes me feel that my BD movies are finally part of my "PS3 family" as everything else has that icon.

I don't know if it works on any other player but this is a very nice touch. Thanks a lot!

enjoy
gandalf

[CptGreedle]

Originally Posted by gand41f

Hi Paidgeek,

I inserted Memoirs of the Geisha into my PS3 yesterday and noticed the little icon that shows up on the XMB instead of the blue disc. I like it very much and makes me feel that my BD movies are finally part of my "PS3 family" as everything else has that icon.

I don't know if it works on any other player but this is a very nice touch. Thanks a lot!

enjoy
gandalf

I noticed that on the Dracula BD. I wonder why the others don't do this as well?

[BluOgre]

Originally Posted by mattym

appparently so...2 different sources have claimed such.

One of the reasons I thought it was a contract with HD/Universal was the fact Universal has everything ready to go to make Bluray movies (according to my sales rep). Obviously it's too late for this year but it's going to be very intresting early next year what happens with them. If they go neutral or exclusive with Bluray...I wonder if Paramount has an escape clause in that $150 mill deal.

[Nick Graham]

Segwaying from the Blood Diamond fiasco - even with the bandwidth limitations of HD DVD, why would the video bitrate EVER need to sink to that low of a level, be it an HD release or a BD release?

Is it just so the compressionist can show that he can, or is there some genuine technical reason to be dipping that low? Even with a TrueHD track running beside it, I'm not sure I understand how the bitrates get that low to begin with, even working within the limitations of HD DVD.

[kaliraver]

Originally Posted by Maxpower1987

Because they needed the space and bandwidth for the IME on the HD DVD so video bandwidth was sacrificed. Blu-ray was never going to have an IME, and the story goes that part of the compression team wanted to do a new encode for Blu-ray for titles with IME and TrueHD on HD DVD as 'perceptible' improvements could have been made with the greater bandwidth allowed on Blu-ray. WB seemed up for it, but in the end decided it would be too costly for the 10 or so titles to get new encodes, so anyone hoping for new encodes on BB, V or The Matrix should brace for a bit of disappointment.

The reason the bitrate got all the way to 6.5Mb/s is because the HD DVD didn't have enough space for IME+TrueHD on a movie longer than about 100-120mins. So they sacrificed bitrate to accomplish the goal.

God, how baddly do I hate HD-DEAD.

[gandley]

I always thought WB pre filtered the PQ or it was a VC-1 thing, as it just has a look to it that dosent seem right, the backgrounds never seem as detailed as blu rays non warner titles do, and the film grain just didnt seem correct either.

I often noticed that the main eye focus point of the shot was super detailed, but the rest of the image was not. would this then save Warner bitrate if less fine detail has to be resolved?

[patrick99]

Originally Posted by gandley

I always thought WB pre filtered the PQ or it was a VC-1 thing, as it just has a look to it that dosent seem right, the backgrounds never seem as detailed as blu rays non warner titles do, and the film grain just didnt seem correct either.

I often noticed that the main eye focus point of the shot was super detailed, but the rest of the image was not. would this then save Warner bitrate if less fine detail has to be resolved?

I have never seen any portion of any shot in a Warner high def release (other than the very early ones) that was "super detailed."

[L or S of Perfect?]

Originally Posted by gand41f

Hi Paidgeek,

I inserted Memoirs of the Geisha into my PS3 yesterday and noticed the little icon that shows up on the XMB instead of the blue disc. I like it very much and makes me feel that my BD movies are finally part of my "PS3 family" as everything else has that icon.

I don't know if it works on any other player but this is a very nice touch. Thanks a lot!

enjoy
gandalf

It would be awesome if there was a full screen wallpaper with some background music like the ps3 games.

[MerrickG]

Originally Posted by Hussla

Something in the air, my spider senses are tingling.

The lack of noise, announcements, etc from the BDA camps makes me thing they are quietly sitting on something big.

Would any insiders like to confirm or deny my psychic instincts?

Id like to know something, too!!

[Spankey]

Originally Posted by merrick97

Id like to know something, too!!

The only thing I can say is that Universal has been very quiet throughout all this. I can't believe Evan Almighty and Knocked Up are doing very well. At the same time Blu is sitting pretty on the Amazon charts.

[MerrickG]

Originally Posted by Spankey

The only thing I can say is that Universal has been very quiet throughout all this. I can't believe Evan Almighty and Knocked Up are doing very well. At the same time Blu is sitting pretty on the Amazon charts.

I have noticed that, too.

They used to announce movies at will and have all of the sudden gone silent. All of this could mean anything or nothing.

[DaViD Boulet]

Anybody catch over at the bits where Bill mentions the "missing" special features on Paramount's latest HD DVD discs (like Transformers)... and he was tipped by contacts at the studio that those features were dropped because there wasn't room on the 30GB HD DVD disc structure?



Any word of signs that Paramount might break their 18-month deal a tad early? What were those special "out" clauses in that exclusivity contract? do they get to keep their money if they do break it?

[Bullseye]

Could these Universal rumours be a red herring to encourage HD-DVD collectors to go out and purchase more of their films or are they genuinely interesting in BD?

[Dogdvr]

David,
I think you misread his statements
They left off hd audio because of disk space,
they have not made any comment regarding the special features

[Spankey]

Originally Posted by Dogdvr

David,
I think you misread his statements
They left off hd audio because of disk space,
they have not made any comment regarding the special features

Yes, but I think the extras were still dropped because of disc space. If these films get lossless tracks, then the extras get dropped. Bill was being sarcastic and saying that Blu has enough space for both. He's right..

[ckenisell]

Originally Posted by Bullseye

Could these Universal rumours be a red herring to encourage HD-DVD collectors to go out and purchase more of their films or are they genuinely interesting in BD?

Who wouldn't be "genuinely" interested in BD? That's where the sales numbers are.

If you ask me, Paramount is the smartest bunch of all of these groups. They'll sell their movies to the HD-DVD crowd and then turn around and sell them to the Blu-Ray crowd after the contract is up. Plus, they pocket 150 mill in the process. Pretty smart if you ask me.

Sucks for us Blu-ray supporters, but they already know we're a guaranteed sell. They are just taking advantage of the ignorant HD-DVD owners for now.

At least WB is finally starting to release those HD-DVD exclusive titles on BD now that profile v1.1 is finalized. They realize that now is the time.

Blu-Ray has this war won as of Jan. 1, 2008 in my book. Universal will be here (on the Blu-side) soon enough I think.

[paidgeek]

Originally Posted by Frode

Since we're on the subject of subtitles, what's the word on script based/raster based subtitles? Have anyone used them yet? If not - why aren't they being used? I would think that it would be a perfect candidate for movable subs, since you could let the player handle the positioning. Or am I barking up the wrong tree and no such capability exists?

We will probably look into the font based subs next year. One of the downsides is that they will not look quite as good as the raster based subs. This has to do with the level of anti-aliasing or outlining we can do.

[paidgeek]

Originally Posted by gand41f

Let me add my thanks as well. This is an excellent movie with a great transfer.

Sony has really distinguished themselves by bringing great foreign cinema to Blu-ray (others include Black Book, Volver and the assorted Chinese epics). Now please add these to the 1/2 off sale and I'll buy them all.

Also, let me reiterate Rob's request for two subtitle options. I only have a standard 16:9 TV, so I prefer to have the subtitles in the black bars, but I'd hate to take them away from constant-height projector people.

thanks
gandalf

Sony Pictures Classics has some talented people who have been able to find some "diamonds in the rough".

[dobyblue]

Originally Posted by Maxpower1987

Paramount are locked-in pretty tight, so I wouldn't count on any action on that front for a long time.

What about events like Universal going neutral or Warner going Blu-exclu? You think there's no notwithstanding clause even based on those two events happening?