Ask questions to The Digital Bits team (Bill Hunt, Jeff Kleist et.al.)

[Jeff Kleist]

I wonder if in 10 years, technology will advance making it cheaper to do all that stuff that is now costly. I just hope that my favorite shows: Freaks & Geeks, Babylon 5, The Untouchables (not even released on VHS!) still have enough of a fan base in 10 years for it to be profitable to produce it. Maybe the BDA could subsidize it.

There is no possible way the BDA would subsidize it. Nothing short of Star Wars caiber would even tickle their radar for that kind of investment. It's the man-hours you have to pay for that make these things so expensive

Thousands ot tens of thousands of man hours were probably spent on the Babylon 5 Freespace 2 total conversion mod -- all without pay by fans. Why couldn't a company recruit these volunteers to help them with these shows?

Because big corporations don't even consider that kind of thing. While that may be unfortunate, one thing you have to consider is that free labor wouldn't come with guarantees on delivery or quality. Even if you did all 110 episodes for them, they probably wouldn't take it because it wasn't some exec's brilliant idea, and you'd still need the source elements for the live-action stuff.

There have been fan efforts in the past to raise money for new seasons of firefly or Enterprise. I got from somoene in the know that even if the fans had delivered a check for $40 million to Paramount or Fox pay for another season, they STILL wouldn't have taken it.

Yes it doesn't make sense, but Hollywood often doesn't make sense. It's the only place in the world where you can stand at the gates waving your wallet around and they still won't sell you something, or let you buy them lunch

In a way they may be right, I seriously doubt that you could find enough people with the tools, talent,hardware,time and dedication to deliver even one season a year. I've seen how long it takes The DAVE school, with people working in a professional environment to deliver on 1 episode of Star Trek New Voyages, I think that if you started tomorrow, you'd be lucky to see the crew waving goodbye by 2020. Not because there aren't passionate people, but because there simply aren't enough of them with the above tools and time to finish the work.

[MerrickG]

Originally Posted by Jeff Kleist

Buy it on DVD. You've got a very long wait, that I'd put at 80/20 is closer to 10 years if ever (and I'd put it on 60/40 or better on the never). That is unless they get a new TV channel sugar daddy to pay for it (unlikely, the only shows worth anything in repeats are TOS (already done) and TNG.

I'll be first in line with pompoms if I'm wrong, But the DVD sales numbers on TNG and TOS are the only ones that justify it. Enterprise may eventually hit Blu simply by virtue of them already having HD post done on it and they just have to throw the tapes in the encoder.

When they remaster something like Babylon 5, or even a movie, they almost always have to start from scratch on the FX work. Why? Because the software on the render farm literally changes from week to week, and even something you did 2 months back may not render correctly because of a tweak made to the engine. The time spent finding what's broken and what's not is in many way just as expensive as a do-over.

The good thing is that the film-based elements that were shot, ships at warp, beauty shots of DS9 and such can easily be scanned and/or recreated in HD. Phaser hits, transporters, all need to be redone, matte paintings re-scanned (who knows after the auction/purge of the archive how many of these are still around?)

I'd love for someone to show up with $50 million to put DS9 in HD. I'd really love an IMAX redo of those last 3-4 episodes Mmmmm, Defiant battling in 8k...................

Id kill for DS9 to be in HD and reformatted to 16:9. Will not happen though.

Im just glad that Paramount is putting out the first season of CSI on bluray, which will be the first time the first season has been avail in widescreen.

[NL197]

Originally Posted by merrick97

Im just glad that Paramount is putting out the first season of CSI on bluray, which will be the first time the first season has been avail in widescreen.

True story:

For the Christmas holidays of 2006, I did what I often do, which was buy a CSI boxset. It's something my mother and I enjoy and they're good for watching when there's nothing on. Anyway, I had resisted buying season 1 because I knew it was a cropped 4X3 presentation. The lack of 5.1 didn't matter nearly as much as that. I did pick it up, planning on watching it on Christmas Day, which we did - we watched the first disc.

Later that night, I tuned in to Showcase HD - it was the new HD upgrade to a Canadian cable channel owned by Alliance, which distributes CSI in Canada (until a year or so ago, anyway).

I'd noticed that they were airing SD versions of shows on their new HD channel, and I'd check the CSI broadcast each night to see if they'd ever switch, and they did.....the very day I watched that craptastic 4X3 version of CSI season one was the very day that damn channel started airing the HD version of the show - beginning with season one.

To say I was pissed is a massive understatement. I felt so ripped off.
I still have the DVD set, but I've never watched it since.

The channel had a lot of issues with audio - not true 5.1 sometimes, a missing center channel other times, so while it wasn't in surround sound, season one was indeed HD, 16X9 and totally glorious to watch.
The downside to it was that they never aired it again after that, as it ended up being the last nightly run of the series. They air one episode or so a week now, usually a season 5 or 6 episode.

Also, it wasn't a case of the image being less-than great due to it being the first season (as we all know, sometimes first seasons of shows don't match A/V wise to later seasons) - it was as good as it looks right now nine years later.

We're in for a great visual treat when it hits Blu-ray!

[Jeff Kleist]

Id kill for DS9 to be in HD and reformatted to 16:9. Will not happen though.

It won't be reformatted to 16:9. Hit zoom if you're desperite for a screen filler, but all you'll get is a lot of missing foreheads and background detail. The show is very much 4:3, and was never composed for widescreen

[NL197]

Originally Posted by Jeff Kleist

It won't be reformatted to 16:9. Hit zoom if you're desperite for a screen filler, but all you'll get is a lot of missing foreheads and background detail. The show is very much 4:3, and was never composed for widescreen

When I watch it on the plasma I use one of those cinema zoom features that gets close enough to avoid cutting the credits.

If you look at the season 4-7 title sequence on a computer (no overscan) when Terry Farrell's name comes up, the engines of a ship pass through frame from top right corner to bottom left corner. On the right side there are small black shapes that move with the frame and disappear, and when the ship passes that bottom corner, it doesn't actually reach the edge as it disappears instead. Must be the extreme edges of the optical compositing. I'll make a few screencaps of this.

[Jeff Kleist]

Sounds to me like you have overscan disabled Usually a good thing, but as you can see here, not always

[NL197]

Here are 4 screencaps I made:

http://i134.photobucket.com/albums/q89/NL197/1.jpg
http://i134.photobucket.com/albums/q89/NL197/2.jpg
http://i134.photobucket.com/albums/q89/NL197/3.jpg
http://i134.photobucket.com/albums/q89/NL197/4.jpg

[Jeff Kleist]

yeah, you're seeing the edge of the action safe areas

[MerrickG]

Originally Posted by Jeff Kleist

It won't be reformatted to 16:9. Hit zoom if you're desperite for a screen filler, but all you'll get is a lot of missing foreheads and background detail. The show is very much 4:3, and was never composed for widescreen

Oh I know, but I just HATE watching 4x3 material on my nice 16x9 screen, which probably means I will never get the show on blu even if it came out.

But I dunno, I might warm up to it.

[NL197]

Superior resolution Vs. Modified Aspect Ratio

No contest there: The former every time.

Even if the series wasn't fully restored, a simple upconversion would be an improvement.

[MerrickG]

Originally Posted by NL197

Superior resolution Vs. Modified Aspect Ratio

No contest there: The former every time.

Even if the series wasn't fully restored, a simple upconversion would be an improvement.

Yeah, DS9 probably wouldnt work with a 16x9 ratio, but it would be nice.

Nevertheless Im happy I have DS9 as it is.

Sisko was the best captain of all them. At least he was the toughest as he was the only guy who could intimidate Worf.

[SquidPuppet]

Jeff / Bill,

The FX TV show 'Damages' (Glen Close, Ted Danson et al) Received a Blu release for season one. The shows schedule was wacked out after that due to the writers strike, and they took time off similar to Fox's 24. Season two has finished airing earlier this month. Is there any chatter about season two receiving a Blu release, and when we might see it?

[Jeff Kleist]

TV titles are wonky right now, especially at Sony.

I'm personally really hoping they do a season 1/2 of Breaking Bad. The first season is what, 7 episodes? Pretty easy to toss in another disc or so.

Depends on how well Damages did on Blu the first time, Rescue me showed they have no problem cutting things off

[SquidPuppet]

Originally Posted by Jeff Kleist

TV titles are wonky right now, especially at Sony.

I'm personally really hoping they do a season 1/2 of Breaking Bad. The first season is what, 7 episodes? Pretty easy to toss in another disc or so.

Depends on how well Damages did on Blu the first time, Rescue me showed they have no problem cutting things off

Thanks. Its a great show, so here's hoping.

[Holographic]

I was wondering, since Jeff has seen the new ST-film, how would you describe the acting overall? Outside Nimoy of course...

Good, bad, average, something terrible?

[Doctorossi]

Originally Posted by Holographic

since Jeff has seen the new ST-film

He has? I thought he'd sworn against it?!

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Jeff Kleist

TV titles are wonky right now, especially at Sony.

I'm personally really hoping they do a season 1/2 of Breaking Bad. The first season is what, 7 episodes? Pretty easy to toss in another disc or so.

Okay, okay Jeff, I'll find out for you.
I picked up on both your PM and now the public hints.

You guys are relentless.

[Holographic]

Originally Posted by Doctorossi

He has? I thought he'd sworn against it?!

Well, I just considered it would be obvious since he seems to know a little bit here and there about the film.

Or maybe I just have missed the post that he tells something against this.

[Alan Gordon]

Originally Posted by SquidPuppet

Jeff / Bill,

The FX TV show 'Damages' (Glen Close, Ted Danson et al) Received a Blu release for season one. The shows schedule was wacked out after that due to the writers strike, and they took time off similar to Fox's 24. Season two has finished airing earlier this month. Is there any chatter about season two receiving a Blu release, and when we might see it?

I didn't get a chance to see S2, so I'm also hoping for a S2 Blu-ray.

Originally Posted by Jeff Kleist

TV titles are wonky right now, especially at Sony.

Depends on how well Damages did on Blu the first time, Rescue me showed they have no problem cutting things off

Jeff, "Damages: Season Two" is scheduled for August 31 in the UK. Since the encoding work will apparently be done for the UK release, what are the chances they'll decide to bring it over here as well?

~Alan

[SquidPuppet]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

Okay, okay Jeff, I'll find out for you.
I picked up on both your PM and now the public hints.

You guys are relentless.

He he. Thanks. Great show.