"Club Penton" - Ask questions to Hollywood insider "Penton-Man"

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Monkey

That is exactly what has happened many times at AVS.. An insider states a fact and Xylon and crew tell them they are wrong and personally attack them.

I don’t know about “personally” but they attack their judgment and expertise and since these people are professionals rather than hobbyists, it is one in the same.
Most recently being………..

RAH - by posts on AVS bashing some of his reviews on the Home Theater Forum, if they don’t agree with what they *think* a film should look like on Blu-ray.

Ender21 (spokesperson from Fotokem) for the Blu-ray Baraka

Torsten Kaiser (film restoration) who defended ender21’s statements regarding Baraka

Prior to that,
paidgeek – who chairs an ASC subcommittee dealing with technology.

[dialog_gvf]

Originally Posted by patrick99

In my opinion it is inaccurate to say that these controversies would not exist if they were not promoted by people with "a clear bias against Blu-ray in general." It is indisputably true that Xylon, for example, was a very committed HD DVD partisan, but I do not think it is at all accurate to say that the "vast majority" of those who see PQ issues in certain BD releases are in that category.

You'd have to explain why these perfectionistas game into being so coincidently with the fall of HD DVD.

Blu-ray folk were screaming about Warner DNR messups since the beginning, but the HD DVD folk just called it Blu-ray fanboy BS. And Universal was pumping out a lot of absolute HD DVD quota drivel using masters that Technicolor subsequently refused to turn into Blu-rays.

Where were the howls of outrage from these AVS "scientists" then?

Gary

[Alan Gordon]

I still post on AVSForum.com, but I stick to the local forums as well as some of the equipment forums... and try to stay away from the HDM forums. That being said, I have wandered from time to time in which I've read some pretty "wild" things being said over there. However, while I didn't care much for the way AVSForum was being run during the format war, I agree, AVSForum is pretty much non-existent for me as far as HDM goes.

That being said, the "screen shot" threads are ridiculous. I LOVE looking at screen shots of the releases, but I know to take them with a grain of salt. Some films look pretty much like what you see on the screen shots, but many look very different. Two releases mentioned above are "The Mummy" and "U-571". Are the releases flawed? Possibly, but I feel that MANY people will be VERY HAPPY with them (note that I received "U-571 last week, and I owned "The Mummy" on two different DVD releases, HD DVD, and Blu-ray, and I notice VERY little difference between the HD DVD and Blu-ray releases).

There are bad Blu-ray's out there (sorry Monkey, but "Dark City" looked pretty bad to me), but screen shots sometimes takes one little flaw, and "embiggens" ("The Simpsons" reference) the smallest flaw into a large one... and I've read many posters saying they weren't going to buy the Blu-ray because of that flaw, or saying they will stick to the DVD ()... when it's most certainly worse than the Blu-ray.

I'm all for criticism of bad Blu-ray titles, but level-headed criticism is needed more than "anal-retentiveness".

~Alan

[Blaumann]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

I don’t know about “personally” but they attack their judgment and expertise and since these people are professionals rather than hobbyists, it is one in the same.
Most recently being………..

RAH - by posts on AVS bashing some of his reviews on the Home Theater Forum, if they don’t agree with what they *think* a film should look like on Blu-ray.

Ender21 (spokesperson from Fotokem) for the Blu-ray Baraka

Torsten Kaiser (film restoration) who defended ender21’s statements regarding Baraka

Prior to that,
paidgeek – who chairs an ASC subcommittee dealing with technology.

Speaking of Thorsten Kaiser, it was refreshing to read his input in the controversial thread about the european Salo release in this thread here:
https://forum.blu-ray.com/showpost.p...&postcount=100

"Screenshot science" as it should be, at least imo.

[Monkey]

I'm not one to argue Dark City has its problems, it does... But you have people like Kram Sacul saying that it has no grain (simply due to looking at cherry picked shots, easy when every shot of Jennifer Connelly is blurry). when it does and that every scene is bad when there are scenes with tons of detail. It is a very inconsistant transfer. Like you said, level headed criticism is what I'm in favor of, just like the Baraka thread and many others..

Agreed on U-571, I did side by side.. Granted my A-3 is only 1080i but the difference is minimal.. I noticed a bigger difference in sound(in favor of the blu-ray version), though both sound great.

[dialog_gvf]

Originally Posted by Alan Gordon

I've read many posters saying they weren't going to buy the Blu-ray because of that flaw, or saying they will stick to the DVD ()... when it's most certainly worse than the Blu-ray.

And there is the point. How could they be seriously claiming to be interested in quality at all if they are so willing to recommend people settle for less?

Criticizing is right we all have. But, be real that it's nearly impossible for a BD not to be a signficant improvement over DVD as a minimum. And that while we want things to improve, poisoning the well isn't the answer.

Gary

[HeavyHitter]

Some parts of Dark City look very good; others quite soft. I think more than anything it was a film source issue or the way it was shot versus anything else IMO.

[HeavyHitter]

Originally Posted by dialog_gvf

But, be real that it's nearly impossible for a BD not to be a signficant improvement over DVD as a minimum. And that while we want things to improve, poisoning the well isn't the answer.

Gary

Yeah, but maybe with the Toshiba XDE SUC player it would make it just like HD as some of the AVS folks promised based on Toshiba's own screen comparisons?

By the way, does Toshiba even make the SUC player anymore?

[Alan Gordon]

Originally Posted by Monkey

I'm not one to argue Dark City has its problems, it does... But you have people like Kram Sacul saying that it has no grain (simply due to looking at cherry picked shots, easy when every shot of Jennifer Connelly is blurry). when it does and that every scene is bad when there are scenes with tons of detail. It is a very inconsistant transfer. Like you said, level headed criticism is what I'm in favor of, just like the Baraka thread and many others..

Agreed on U-571, I did side by side.. Granted my A-3 is only 1080i but the difference is minimal.. I noticed a bigger difference in sound(in favor of the blu-ray version), though both sound great.

I'm glad to have "Dark City" (I intended on buying it on DVD when it was first released on DVD, and never got around to it), so I'm very glad to have it in HD with "lossless" audio... but it was a case where the "issues" (EE, DNR, etc...) seen in the screen shots actually showed up in home viewing as well. Fortunately, those cases are few and far between....

Originally Posted by dialog_gvf

And there is the point. How could they be seriously claiming to be interested in quality at all if they are so willing to recommend people settle for less?

Criticizing is right we all have. But, be real that it's nearly impossible for a BD not to be a signficant improvement over DVD as a minimum. And that while we want things to improve, poisoning the well isn't the answer.

Exactly!

~Alan

[Monkey]

I have to give Xylon credit when do and he is posting the DVD caps as well again.. Man they are absolutely horrible on the DVD of TDK.

So Penton, I've read a theory tossed around a few times about the intentional dumbing down of DVD's quality. I just read it in the TDK thread at avs as well. I doubt it would be confirmed but TDK is horrible looking on DVD from those pics.

Though to be fair the complaints are still there about the blu-ray as well, and I don't hear the same theory's for not getting a perfect blu-ray..

[patrick99]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

Yes, you are misunderstanding.

Fact - there were some issues with playing some recently released James Bond Blu-rays on a Sony player.
Did I rebut anyone for bringing it to my attention?
On the contrary, I asked the poster to provide me with a concise report of the problem and I immediately (the next day) expedited a resolution by fast-tracking it to the top of the food chain.

What I don’t like are whiners who constantly gripe and scream incessantly about whatever minutia they can dream up next, based upon fictitious standards, because ………

1. They are often technically incorrect in their assumptions and conclusions.
2. They’re not going to get their way by trying to strong-arm content providers with futile internet campaigns.
3. In the meantime, they make life miserable for everyone else who passes by and happens to be reading their venomous accusations and exaggerations.

P.S.
And I’ll say that your persistent misunderstanding of what I say, (see one of your past posts on this thread) is bordering close to being antagonistic.

Penton, I believe it is accurate to say that in recent months, my views of certain issues have diverged from your views of those issues, and that, as a result, this thread is probably not an appropriate place for me to express my views.

[kpkelley]

Originally Posted by HeavyHitter

Some parts of Dark City look very good; others quite soft. I think more than anything it was a film source issue or the way it was shot versus anything else IMO.

The issues with Dark City is because Warner decided to put both the theatrical and director's cut on the same disc with seperate encodes rather than maximizing the Blu-ray technology by utilizing seamless branching. Considering the timing of the release, summer 2009, it was probably going to be released on hd-dvd as well which would explain the reasoning behind not investing the additional resources into the seamless branching technology as hd-dvd would not have been capable of it. The result is a disc that is bit-starved, a difficult situation for a film as dark as that one.

[Bobby Henderson]

The different editing schemes for the two cuts of Dark City made the use of seamless branching impossible.

What should have happened: the two different cuts of Dark City should have had their own respective, separate BD-50 discs. That would have made for a more expensive release. OTOH, it would have made it possible to release a less costly single disc standard version with the original theatrical cut too. Video quality would have been better.

Dark City may have been a victim of over-zealous DNR use. IMHO, the main culprit in the lack of fine, sharp detail is the higher video compression level. You have two cuts of a movie in BD-25 quality on a BD-50.

[Jeff Kleist]

Dark City was done by New Line before Warner took over. The standard DNR to 11 job so there was plenty of room for them to stuff 2 versions on there. same thing was done to golden compass and pan's labyrinth for PiP tracks

Originally Posted by kpkelley

The issues with Dark City is because Warner decided to put both the theatrical and director's cut on the same disc with seperate encodes rather than maximizing the Blu-ray technology by utilizing seamless branching. Considering the timing of the release, summer 2009, it was probably going to be released on hd-dvd as well which would explain the reasoning behind not investing the additional resources into the seamless branching technology as hd-dvd would not have been capable of it. The result is a disc that is bit-starved, a difficult situation for a film as dark as that one.

[coolmilo]

Why is Warner choosing to use BD25's with so many of their new releases instead of opimizing for BD50 with a higher bitrate? Examples: Appaloosa, Dumb and Dumber, The Mask, Wedding Crashers, etc. We can't blame this on the format war. Well, at least Warner is starting to use lossless audio more often now.

I think it's silly to study screen captures like they do at AVSForum. However, I always notice that Warner titles lack the pop that Disney, Paramount, Fox, and Sony have with their BD releases. IMO Universal is starting to get it right starting with Hellboy II.

[coolmilo]

By the way, one week and counting until The Dark Knight is released. I am very excited to receive this BD. I can finally retire "The Dark Knight IMAX Prologue Featurette" that I have been watching every week since I received Batman Begins.

But as excited as I am, I would feel 100% better about this release if Sony, Disney, Fox, or especially Paramount handled the encoding of the BD. I bet there are not too many people who would disagree with me.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by patrick99

Penton, I believe it is accurate to say that in recent months, my views of certain issues have diverged from your views of those issues, and that, as a result, this thread is probably not an appropriate place for me to express my views.

Respectfully Patrick,I think our views started to become divergent when you wouldn’t accept the explanation paidgeek gave as to Sony’s policy and procedures as to how they view AVC bitrates, and how much should be allocated for a particular Blu-ray movie……......despite the fact that I highly doubt you have ever seen a D5 or HDCAM SR master (which was not duped) running side by side with AVC encoded Blu-ray test material.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Jeff Kleist

Dark City was done by New Line

I think OneK did New Line's stuff.

[Anthony P]

You'd have to explain why these perfectionistas game into being so coincidently with the fall of HD DVD.

or how they never found fault with HD-DVDs and they where all rank 0 (or what ever they called it)

[DenonCI]

Originally Posted by Maxpower1987

It's not anything to do with using a BD25 or whatever, it is an internal decision at WB to make BDs to a "mass market" specification. That entails optimising PQ for 720p and using lossy audio on non-critical titles. The latter is changing, but too slowly. The former, well, there are many people working many angles, but none have been successful as of yet.

The simple fact is, if WB didn't have this stupid policy they would actually need BD50s, but at this time it would be a complete waste as half of the disc would go unused.

The problem is that some of their "non-critical" titles are day-and-date (Speed Racer) titles which would have shined with a TrueHD soundtrack!