4K Blu-ray Confirmed, Coming in

[raygendreau]

Originally Posted by Geoff D

What's far more worrying is the disc makers were/are getting cold feet over the 100GB production lines, none of which even existed as of July 2014. As I suspected, the 100GB discs aren't gonna be ready for prime time because no-one wants to make the huge investment needed to make it happen, though the BDA 45 document does make mention of Sony developing their own production line which would not be made commercially available to other replicators, as hinted at by Penton above.

The BDA is fully aware that being restricted to 66GB discs will cause compromises in terms of HDR further down the road, as well as being able to fit on additional languages and bonus content (or lack thereof), which would lead to multi-disc releases (as I mentioned in the linked post above) being much more common. The investment required for a single 100GB production line capable of 100,000 units per day is a cool $17M (as opposed to a 'mere' $1.75M for a new 66GB line), all for a format that could have a very limited appeal and thus a limited shelf life in general, so it's no wonder no-one wants to take the plunge.

Add on the DRM - the document makes another mention of time release keys - to a possible prevalence of 66GB discs (meaning compromised presentations more often than not) and UHD BD is heading for disaster, especially if they persist with three new types of presentation on different discs because the market will become so fractured and piecemeal that it'll hardly be worth bothering with.

I see you have read the BD 45 final report. I haven't found the report for BDA 46 (Oct 2014 Okinawa) HDR peak luminance was supposed to be settled at that meeting.

The most interesting info I found in the BDA 45 report is on pages 197. 218-219, 230, 233,234, 245,265,266

[reanimator]

Originally Posted by bailey1987

I'm predicting that VR will figure into UHD somehow

Certainly. When you're wearing a screen literally inches from your eyeballs, added pixel density (4K and 8K) will be of great benefit.

I also suspect VR will save 3D.

[raygendreau]

Originally Posted by bruceames.

Jeez, no wonder why the studios still aren't saying anything. Too much stuff still up in the air.

I agree 4k streaming = 2k BD. But that's actually saying a lot, and when they add HDR it will look better. I think for UHD in the digital world that downloads will be for owning and streaming for renting. And that the Digital Bridge feature in UHD BD players will be able to download movies as well, to own (and perhaps even rent), as well as copy movies from discs. At least I think the studios will want that kind of integration, in order to appeal to a wider market and to make more movies available (much easier to make a movie available by download than by disc, and many will not be feasible via disc due to low sales potential).

Have you looked at page 230 of the BDA 45 Final Report? The new UHD BD player will down-convert UHD BD, UHD BD+HDR and HD+HDR physical discs to HD HDMI 1.4. This would allow connection and play on a HD TV.

It doesn't say if this is optional or not. I would imagine that most home entertainment consumers first UHD purchase will be a UHD Display, but it does offer flexibility, given that you might somehow use the digital bridge with a HD TV. Since the DB is going to use SFF it is possible that the same storage for UHD content could be used for BD content.

[Anthony P]

Originally Posted by bruceames.

Format wars are irrelevant.

not ata all they affect growth potential

You can't pull the plug on a legacy format that still pulls in 70 percent of the sales revenue.

I did not talk about pulling the plug on DVD I talked about offering a BD SKU

How many TV shows came out on DVD after 2006 but there was no BD release for those seasons? was it 0, then you can say the studios did all they could in that respect. Was it very very few? (the exception) then you could say they did for the most part in that respect. The real answer is way too many and so I find ridiculous to say they did all they could, when joe spends 200$ on a TV collection on DVD that is not available on BD it obviously helps the DVD numbers a lot and hurts the BD numbers a lot if he would have been willing to spend 300$ for the BD collection but it was not available.

Besides, home video 3D is generally seen to be a failure so I don't see why you're using that as evidence that my theory is BS.

because it is

If you think they should have done more, then what should they have done?

easy (like I mentioned before) give the consumer the option they are clamoring for, nothing more.

what I mean is this, if I go to amazon, TV shows released on DVD http://www.amazon.com/s?fst=as%3Aoff...nid=2693522011

they say there was 878 for DVD and only 87 for BD, that is less then 1/10h of the titles and TV series are expensive (the mentalist is 200$ on DVD and in-existent on BD so there might be people that would have spent more then a 200$ on the BD set if it existed that were strong armed by availability to buy the DVD set to watch their show)

I already gave Frozen 3D as an example of a none-existent choice in films. It is available in every market expect NA on 3D BD, it was shown in 3D in the theatres, it is available on Vudu in 3D (who's sales are abysmal) and Disney released GOTG in 3D in the US on BD a title with much smaller sales numbers, so you dismissing it by "3D is a failure" excuse is just more of your BS and Disney could have easily released it in 3D BD in the US and made more money with BD sales

[HeavyHitter]

Originally Posted by Geoff D

Another thing mentioned in the document was how streamed 4K was basically equivalent to 2K BD in terms of picture quality with much better audio (natch) for the latter. I've been very sceptical of 4K streaming in general and that just confirms it. If UHD BD is a bust then there's no way I'm turning to 4K VOD, so it looks as if upscaled 2K BD and 4K satellite TV transmissions is about as good as it's gonna get for mah 4K TV.

Some people over at AVS with Sony UHD projectors have said the same and in motion, the BD can look better as it won't show the motion artifacts often accompanied by dark or fast action scenes with streaming.

I would suppose if they can stream UHD with 10 bit and P3, that might be of benefit, but I would plan on the lowest common denominator for a long time (8 bit and rec 709) but we'll see.

[HeavyHitter]

Originally Posted by Geoff D

What's far more worrying is the disc makers were/are getting cold feet over the 100GB production lines, none of which even existed as of July 2014. As I suspected, the 100GB discs aren't gonna be ready for prime time because no-one wants to make the huge investment needed to make it happen, though the BDA 45 document does make mention of Sony developing their own production line which would not be made commercially available to other replicators, as hinted at by Penton above.

The BDA is fully aware that being restricted to 66GB discs will cause compromises in terms of HDR further down the road, as well as being able to fit on additional languages and bonus content (or lack thereof), which would lead to multi-disc releases (as I mentioned in the linked post above) being much more common. The investment required for a single 100GB production line capable of 100,000 units per day is a cool $17M (as opposed to a 'mere' $1.75M for a new 66GB line), all for a format that could have a very limited appeal and thus a limited shelf life in general, so it's no wonder no-one wants to take the plunge.

Add on the DRM - the document makes another mention of time release keys - to a possible prevalence of 66GB discs (meaning compromised presentations more often than not) and UHD BD is heading for disaster, especially if they persist with three new types of presentation on different discs because the market will become so fractured and piecemeal that it'll hardly be worth bothering with.

They might end up crashing and burning UHD BD before it even can launch the more I read about it IMO.

[Anthony P]

Originally Posted by PenguinMaster

First of all I'd like to clarify that discmakers does offer CSS protection and I checked that option (it costs about 2 cents per disc for 5000 discs).

OK cool, I just asked you because CSS and macrovison are not required with DVD but do exist on legitimate disks

I'm not sure what you're really arguing with the rest of your statement. My main point was that Blu-ray will always be more expensive to manufacture than DVD

agree, but you said it is around 3$ , my point is that it is around 3$ at 5000 disk and 4$ at 1000 at that place, when you are talking millions of disks the difference will not be anywhere near as big because BD decreases a lot faster with larger numbers. Look at ACCS for example, every BD needs it. so you need an ACCS content provider license 500/year, an AACS title key 500$ per key and .04$ per disk if you are makinga single run of 1000 disks that means 500$+500$+ (0.04*1000) = 1040 or 1.04 per disk, but if you are replicating 5000 you have 500+500+(0.04 *5000)=0.24 per disk and that is why at 5000 the two are much closer but if a studio (instead of a single run) wants 1M copies of one of the 10 films that year AACS will be (500/10)+500+ (0.4 *1M)=40,550 or 0.0455/film

it is around 3$ difference because the quantities are so small and it is one title the same way that AACS is huge for small quantities but becomes small when you bet to big ones the same is true with the other BD costs.

Even if Blu-ray was the same price as DVD to manufacture, the studios would still make more money by retaining both formats.

agree Look at VHS, it was more expensive to produce for the studios then DVD and they sold the VHS copies for less. They also continued selling VHS tapes until 2006 when HD disks came out. Having two price points make sense, cheap people think they get a deal while people looking for a premium product are willing to pay more and say OOH that X$ more is worth it because I get more of what I want. If that was your point why bring in some wrong assumptions on the price difference of replication costs for studios.

[Anthony P]

Originally Posted by Geoff D

Call me crazy but I'd love to see some public announcements from Sony re: their work on UHD BD and to have a bit more cheerleading of the format. It's clear from the various leaked documents that they've been working on it for a while - as befits a major player in the BDA - but their public stance has been one of utter indifference, if not outright negativity to the idea of 4K on disc (what with them having their own 4K VOD delivery platform, in the US anyway).

If it comes to fruition and actually makes some headway in the market then I'll give Sony all the credit in the world, but not yet.

I am sure many companies have been working on it for a while (companies are always working on the next format even before the new one comes out) Except in the Flash TV series new fancy tech does not pop up over night it takes years of design, testing and waiting (can we build part X cheap enough). But when something is not proprietary and it is a group format it is hard to talk too much. For example (since we have the Japanese pseudo-BD PVRs) in 2003 Sony launched a 23GB disk recorder http://www.cnn.com/2003/TECH/ptech/03/04/blue.dvd.reut/
in 2004 Panasonic launched a 25/50GB recorder http://www.trustedreviews.com/news/P...u-ray-Recorder

the BD did not go with the 23GB disk (or any of the other formats) but the 25/50 that Panasonic developed.

so any "I have tech X" can lead to confusion and so I think it is better to wait and get the real info from the BDA then a lot of noise on everything every one of the companies has developed and is pushing for in the BDA work groups.

[bruceames]

Originally Posted by raygendreau

Have you looked at page 230 of the BDA 45 Final Report? The new UHD BD player will down-convert UHD BD, UHD BD+HDR and HD+HDR physical discs to HD HDMI 1.4. This would allow connection and play on a HD TV.

It doesn't say if this is optional or not. I would imagine that most home entertainment consumers first UHD purchase will be a UHD Display, but it does offer flexibility, given that you might somehow use the digital bridge with a HD TV. Since the DB is going to use SFF it is possible that the same storage for UHD content could be used for BD content.

Yeah that makes sense (just like you can watch BDs on a SDTV), although I don't think many people will use UHD BD players with 1080 HDTVs.

[Anthony P]

Originally Posted by moviedude 2K15

Do you guys think 4K Blu-ray will have blue cases like the current releases or will they change the case color to differentiate the new format from regular Blu-ray? Also what color would you want to see the cases be if it matters at all to you?

I think the color needs to be different to make it easy for consumers, as for what it will be, don't care as long as it is not black (DVD), blue(BD), transparent (3D BD), I am interested in the movies.

[Anthony P]

Originally Posted by Geoff D

I hope that the talk of three formats is more of a branding exercise than a taste of things to come, because the market simply won't be able to support six competing disc versions of any one movie (DVD, BD, 3D BD, HDR BD, UHD, HDR UHD).

agree

[Anthony P]

Originally Posted by bruceames.

Yeah that makes sense (just like you can watch BDs on a SDTV), although I don't think many people will use UHD BD players with 1080 HDTVs.

why not? I used my BD player early on a few times with SD TVs. (I used to bring my player to peoples cottages/cabins/chalet..... because I bought BDs and all they had there was SD TVs with DVD player - and some VHS for the first few years). Today they all have HD TVs but none of them have 4K TVs.

[raygendreau]

Originally Posted by Geoff D

I hope that the talk of three formats is more of a branding exercise than a taste of things to come, because the market simply won't be able to support six competing disc versions of any one movie (DVD, BD, 3D BD, HDR BD, UHD, HDR UHD). For example, a UHD film mastered in HDR and branded as such should be a single release because it's also carrying the metadata to enable playback on legacy SDR screens, whereas something mastered solely in SDR would naturally be branded with the standard UHD rating.

Originally Posted by bruceames.

Yeah that makes sense (just like you can watch BDs on a SDTV), although I don't think many people will use UHD BD players with 1080 HDTVs.

Look at this from a marketing perspective. Little value is added with the increased resolution from HD to UHD. The hope is that there will be sufficient increase in perceived value from the addition of HDR and the convenience of the Digital Bridge to cause the Average Home Entertainment Consumer to purchase a UHD BD player. The AHEC, faced with a high cost of entry, (need to replace display, player and AVR for UHD+HDR) is highly unlikely to adopt UHD BD at a rate that comes anywhere near the adoption of BD, which, after nearly 10 years is not that noteworthy.

HD TV was introduced in 1999, six years before Blu-ray in 2006. By 2006, there were around 40 million HD households (80 million units). For UHD TV, introduced a couple of years ago, the forecast is for around 4 million units for 2015. That is not a very favorable environment for the UHD BD intro perhaps later this year or in 2016.

To prevent UHD BD from arriving DOA, you have to offer a reasonable transition for the AHEC whose prime motivation for upgrading to a UHD TV is the convenience of accessing streaming and downloading of UHD content currently available from Netflix, Amazon, Sony and others.

Manufacturers need to produce HD TVs capable of processing and displaying HDR and, as planned, Digital Bridge Export Function needs to apply to digital downloads from the internet. That is about the only way you will get the AHEC to buy a BD+HDR disc and offer an easier pathway for the adoption of UHD BD+HDR, since this functionality will only reside in the future UHD BD player and not current BD players.

I see no other way to entice the AHEC to make his first UHD purchase a UHD BD player rather than a UHD display. If that is what the BDA has in mind by offering BD+HDR, UHD, UHD+HDR with down conversion to HD, it has merit, in my opinion.

https://www.ce.org/News/News-Release...dustry-Re.aspx

http://coax.tv/EXEC_NAB2014.pdf

[Geoff D]

Originally Posted by Anthony P

I am sure many companies have been working on it for a while (companies are always working on the next format even before the new one comes out) Except in the Flash TV series new fancy tech does not pop up over night it takes years of design, testing and waiting (can we build part X cheap enough). But when something is not proprietary and it is a group format it is hard to talk too much. For example (since we have the Japanese pseudo-BD PVRs) in 2003 Sony launched a 23GB disk recorder http://www.cnn.com/2003/TECH/ptech/03/04/blue.dvd.reut/
in 2004 Panasonic launched a 25/50GB recorder http://www.trustedreviews.com/news/P...u-ray-Recorder

the BD did not go with the 23GB disk (or any of the other formats) but the 25/50 that Panasonic developed.

so any "I have tech X" can lead to confusion and so I think it is better to wait and get the real info from the BDA then a lot of noise on everything every one of the companies has developed and is pushing for in the BDA work groups.

I understand having to keep schtum because of the developing tech or whatever, but when the chairman of Sony himself said of 4K distribution in 2013 “I don’t see that as being physical media” that's a whole different ball game, and that was partly my point. They haven't just kept quiet, they've publicly tried to downplay suggestions of it ever happening - and all the while the BDA (including Sony) was sounding out the preliminary stages of UHD BD, with Sony's own internal memos suggesting that they should get the format out as soon as possible to combat VOD 4K! It's all a bit odd.

[Geoff D]

Originally Posted by raygendreau

Look at this from a marketing perspective.
*SNIP*

Sure, I understand the need for the branding so that people are aware of more than just UHD's spatial resolution. But I hope that's all it is, i.e. that each UHD BD release will be of a singular 'version' that's branded according to whatever 'level' of the UHD experience that it provides, and NOT that we're gonna have up to six different formats of one movie floating around which will confuse the living shit out of consumers. That sort of indecision and confusion will kill UHD BD stone dead, if it ever gets that far.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Geoff D

I understand having to keep schtum because of the developing tech or whatever, but when the chairman of Sony himself said of 4K distribution in 2013 “I don’t see that as being physical media” that's a whole different ball game, and that was partly my point. They haven't just kept quiet, they've publicly tried to downplay suggestions of it ever happening - and all the while the BDA (including Sony) was sounding out the preliminary stages of UHD BD, with Sony's own internal memos suggesting that they should get the format out as soon as possible to combat VOD 4K! It's all a bit odd.

I'm not sure if Anthony debates on weekdays.

[Geoff D]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

I'm not sure if Anthony debates on weekdays.

Perhaps he tires himself out so much with his lengthy missives that it takes him days to recover?

[bruceames]

Originally Posted by raygendreau

Look at this from a marketing perspective. Little value is added with the increased resolution from HD to UHD. The hope is that there will be sufficient increase in perceived value from the addition of HDR and the convenience of the Digital Bridge to cause the Average Home Entertainment Consumer to purchase a UHD BD player. The AHEC, faced with a high cost of entry, (need to replace display, player and AVR for UHD+HDR) is highly unlikely to adopt UHD BD at a rate that comes anywhere near the adoption of BD, which, after nearly 10 years is not that noteworthy.

HD TV was introduced in 1999, six years before Blu-ray in 2006. By 2006, there were around 40 million HD households (80 million units). For UHD TV, introduced a couple of years ago, the forecast is for around 4 million units for 2015. That is not a very favorable environment for the UHD BD intro perhaps later this year or in 2016.

To prevent UHD BD from arriving DOA, you have to offer a reasonable transition for the AHEC whose prime motivation for upgrading to a UHD TV is the convenience of accessing streaming and downloading of UHD content currently available from Netflix, Amazon, Sony and others.

Manufacturers need to produce HD TVs capable of processing and displaying HDR and, as planned, Digital Bridge Export Function needs to apply to digital downloads from the internet. That is about the only way you will get the AHEC to buy a BD+HDR disc and offer an easier pathway for the adoption of UHD BD+HDR, since this functionality will only reside in the future UHD BD player and not current BD players.

I see no other way to entice the AHEC to make his first UHD purchase a UHD BD player rather than a UHD display. If that is what the BDA has in mind by offering BD+HDR, UHD, UHD+HDR with down conversion to HD, it has merit, in my opinion.

https://www.ce.org/News/News-Release...dustry-Re.aspx

http://coax.tv/EXEC_NAB2014.pdf

I agree the UHD BD digital bridge feature needs to add convenience over and beyond what BLu-ray (and DVD) offers now. And that doesn't mean having to have the disc in the tray after you copy it to your (likely internal) hard drive.

The DB needs to work also with internet downloads and ideally rentals as well (for those who want greater quality than streaming, they can download a higher bit rate movie and watch it later.)

[bruceames]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

I'm not sure if Anthony debates on weekdays.

Originally Posted by Geoff D

Perhaps he tires himself out so much with his lengthy missives that it takes him days to recover?

I knew I would be a prime target after my Friday outburst, but I don't have that multi-quote debating mindset, so I'll just let it go.

[joie]

Originally Posted by Kirsty_Mc

Unfortunately no. I have argued for a while that UHD Blu-ray should be true 17:9 DCI 4K Blu-Ray so that the Blu-ray copy would a 1:1 pixel map of the studio master. For an enthusiast format this would have made sense. We will be getting a 16:9 conversion unless someone has a Damascene conversion.[...]

With 4096-3840 = 256, could 128 pixels be dropped from each side of the image?