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

[sharkshark]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

:their real purchasing-power influence over any title in Blu-ray software ranks up there with how many people in the world hear a small tree fall over in the remotest jungle of the Amazon.

uh, "Amazon.com", please.

[Monkey]

AVS can be great on some of the sections. The HDM boards however don't fall into that area..

[sharkshark]

Originally Posted by Constitution 101

I've an account over at AVS for several years now(although I don't frequent it very often unless I've got a technical question). I get the impression over here there's some sort of ongoing disdain for it. Can somebody clue me in or am I just nuts??? I(like yourselves I assume) don't like to waste my time on unreliable sources. If they're uninformed or whatever I'd like to know. Any insight is appreciated...

(puts on flamesuit, and takes Penton's bait to answer this as fully as I can, knowing full well that I'm bound to be attacked for some of this).

There's lots of history, but suffice it to say that there are a lot of disaffected AVS posters on BluRay.com (including, naturally, Penton) that felt that the discourse at the "other" forum became increasingly swayed by the alternative form of HD shiny disc. Essentially, in the early days, this forum was a "breakaway" place where proponents of one form of High Def media could discuss their format of choice without, well, dissenting opinions. Proponents would see it as a respite from draconian rules at AVS, others saw it as nothing more than sycophantic ramblings by a bunch of format zealots, many of whom were quick to ban anybody with a point of view that differed from the accepted one. Within this forum, an "insiders" section developed, modeled in part on one that had existed at AVS, with the notable absence of a very loquacious HD-DVD insider from Microsoft. With much more control over their sections, and a more homogeneous group to type to, the sections here flourished, while similar sections on AVS were drowned out by incessant bickering, format dogmatism, and, often, downright rudeness.


Additionally, it's suggested by Penton above that the old battles above have merely reshaped from HD-DVD vs. Blu Ray to nitpicking about this or that release, using static screenshots to obsessively (and counterproductively) determine the qualities of a given transfer.

You will find some tremendous threads at AVS, regarding certain technical issues about a given product and so on, but you might want to avoid, if you follow the BluRay.com sentiment, the High Def disc section of the fora.


I couldn't care less about screencap threads for the most part, let alone much of the "crisis" threads, save for those (extremely important) times where those members have crusaded on my behalf regarding particularly egregious examples, such as Patton, the misframing on the Disney POTC disc, the missing audio on Inside Man, etc. [Regarding the latter, it is important to note that when brought up here (https://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread.php?t=99459) the poster was banned from this forum for a time for causing a ruckuss. This was, to BluRay.com's credit, eventually reversed, but it does show the latent sensitivity here regarding any particularly disparaging elements that may dull the luster of Blu Ray in general]

For what it's worth, excepting a few reactionary threads, I find the discourse on a general AVS thread to be far more conciliatory than the average title discussion =here=, but, again, that's my (seemingly corrupted) opinion. I go to AVS for almost every other part of Home Theatre discourse, be it discussion of the Neil Young set to the extensive posts about the new Oppo player, from threads I've created about my Nevo remote to having pleasant conversations about the latest Criterion release.

Frankly, at this forum, I spend my time either in Penton's sandbox, or occasionally reading dear Mr. Harris' views. But, again, your kilometrage may vary.

So, yeah. There's a long history, no doubt others will see it as more cut-and-dry ("THEY'RE ALL SHILLS AND LIARS!"), but I think that'll give you a good refresher on the state of affairs. Or, of course, go visit the other forum and make up your own mind. It's free to visit.

[Jeff Kleist]

Long story short it was Cobra Command for the HD DVD camp's propaganda campaign that produced many a religious zealot that through their spread of lies, half truths and other shennigans made the life of people hell on earth just stomping out their BS. Just search for "amir" between 2006 and January 2008 for your answers

[quote[It’s not always as simple as the application of “excessive EE” at one step by one technician. If sharpening is applied on multiple parts of the post production chain, the results can create objectionable artifacts because the sharpening becomes cumulative. Additionally, many current consumer displays also apply sharpening which can exaggerate the problem.[/quote]

In my experience, LCD displays exasserbate(sp?) such things as well. LCD projectors not as much, but still more than DLP or plasma.

[Constitution 101]

[QUOTE=Jeff Kleist;2241892]Long story short it was Cobra Command for the HD DVD camp's propaganda campaign that produced many a religious zealot that through their spread of lies, half truths and other shennigans made the life of people hell on earth just stomping out their BS. Just search for "amir" between 2006 and January 2008 for your answers


OK, it all makes sense now. Sour grapes over the Blu-ray eliminating HD-DVD thing. I get it. No offense, but they need to get over it & move on w/ their lives. So now what do they say? Let me guess, Blu-ray is dead due Apple TV, Netflix, etc. I've seen the PQ of HD streaming and it can't touch Blu...

[DenonCI]

[QUOTE=Constitution 101;2241982][QUOTE=Jeff Kleist;2241892]

. I've seen the PQ of HD streaming and it can't touch Blu...

Understatement of the year

[HeavyHitter]

I'm just glad that HD DVD was buried before the financial crisis/meltdown came to full order (Sept 2008) because I seriously think both formats would be in jeopardy today if the format war was still happening.

Timing can be everything sometimes.

[Jeff Kleist]

OK, it all makes sense now. Sour grapes over the Blu-ray eliminating HD-DVD thing. I get it. No offense, but they need to get over it & move on w/ their lives. So now what do they say? Let me guess, Blu-ray is dead due Apple TV, Netflix, etc. I've seen the PQ of HD streaming and it can't touch Blu...

Just go over to HighDefDigest and search "Lee Stewart" "mike morel"

That should give you a complete education

It's not sour grapes, their grapes were sour day one because bacteria like amir, RDJam and the bunch had already broken their structure down

[Bobby Henderson]

I don't participate at AVS because certain parts of that website have no credibility. When the moderators routinely delete posts that don't tow the party line in lock step fashion the censorship ruins any credibility the site is trying to gain.

I don't see the same destructive behavior taking place here. The only time I see any text from a post being removed is when it is a pretty nasty personal attack or something else flaming rude. Mere differences in opinion don't get deleted, unlike what takes place at AVS.

[PeterTHX]

Originally Posted by HeavyHitter

I'm just glad that HD DVD was buried before the financial crisis/meltdown came to full order (Sept 2008) because I seriously think both formats would be in jeopardy today if the format war was still happening.

Timing can be everything sometimes.

Funny this should be posted today.

Swear to God, I was going through some older Home Theater magazines to throw out this morning, ones from early 2008. Toshiba had surrendered and Joshua Zyber's column that issue waxed poetic (blech) about HD DVD and how he wished the war could continue because he felt the competition would make for better features and accelerate cheaper hardware.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Constitution 101

OK, it all makes sense now. Sour grapes over the Blu-ray eliminating HD-DVD thing. I get it. No offense, but they need to get over it & move on w/ their lives. So now what do they say? Let me guess, Blu-ray is dead due Apple TV, Netflix, etc. I've seen the PQ of HD streaming and it can't touch Blu...

The greatest hypocrisy in my view is that many of the same HD DVD supporters have now evolved into ‘grain gurus’ or ‘dnr experts’.

Knowing full well that with the inferior bandwidth and capacity of HD DVD compared to Blu-ray, it would have predisposed movies encoded/authored in that dead format to have even MORE dnr and concomitant EE than what you currently see happening with some studios/content providers these days.

It’s quite funny that they weren’t such ‘grain purists’ given the inherent capacity restrictions of HD DVD or the practice of pushing those VC-1 bitrates as looooow as you could go back in the days of Amir. But, oh boy, now that Blu-ray is thee high definition packaged media, they count dem individual grain particles with fervor! ! !
Luckily, at least SPHE has no dnr issue or aversion to grain philosophy.

If Dave Vaughn ever does decide to post here using his real name, he will tell you flat out that the supposed TL51 discs were only in the concept stage for HD DVD and Kevin Collins will do the same if he ever desires to speak candidly about the subject now.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by sharkshark

Frankly, at this forum, I spend my time either in Penton's sandbox, or occasionally reading dear Mr. Harris' views. But, again, your kilometrage may vary.

You're too kind.
You do know that we have a slew of fine Insiders on this forum other than number crunching RAH and hair-stylin Penton…………..
https://forum.blu-ray.com/forumdisplay.php?f=61

Dem's ^ good qualified folks too!

[Penton-Man]

Hey Ice, wake up!
I want some kind of gift.

I just noticed that this thread went over the ¾ million viewership mark!

[Vincent Pereira]

Originally Posted by Bobby Henderson

I don't participate at AVS because certain parts of that website have no credibility. When the moderators routinely delete posts that don't tow the party line in lock step fashion the censorship ruins any credibility the site is trying to gain.

I don't see the same destructive behavior taking place here. The only time I see any text from a post being removed is when it is a pretty nasty personal attack or something else flaming rude. Mere differences in opinion don't get deleted, unlike what takes place at AVS.

I stopped posting there because I just couldn't take it anymore. There ARE good folks who post there, but then you also have tools like Kram Sacul and his ilk, and they unfortunately dominate the place. The breaking point for me this response from AVS member "oink" to me in a thread over there about THE GODFATHER Blu-rays:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...4#post16595274

I literally couldn't believe that something so assinine was posted there and not challenged by anybody until I entered my own flabbergasted response to that idiot (which was deleted), and I swore off AVS (although I did post there one time since a couple weeks ago).

Vincent

[Oliver K]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

What’s with all the numbers!
Been attentively listening to John Galt over the weekend?

As an unbiased attendee of………
http://www.amianet.org/events/theree...program09.html -are you planning on doing a report on what you personally found to be the highlight(s) of the Symposium?

THAT was a great event !

Is it usually possible to get some of the presentations as a PDF or something similar ?
Probably a slim chance of that to happen but it cannot hurt to ask

And did I mention that the screenshots of Gladiator look real bad
Just kidding , I will wait for my copy from the Germany equivalent of blockbuster to see it for myself

[pro-bassoonist]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

The greatest hypocrisy in my view is that many of the same HD DVD supporters have now evolved into ‘grain gurus’ or ‘dnr experts’.

Pro-B

[bt12483]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

The greatest hypocrisy in my view is that many of the same HD DVD supporters have now evolved into ‘grain gurus’ or ‘dnr experts’.

Knowing full well that with the inferior bandwidth and capacity of HD DVD compared to Blu-ray, it would have predisposed movies encoded/authored in that dead format to have even MORE dnr and concomitant EE than what you currently see happening with some studios/content providers these days.

It’s quite funny that they weren’t such ‘grain purists’ given the inherent capacity restrictions of HD DVD or the practice of pushing those VC-1 bitrates as looooow as you could go back in the days of Amir. But, oh boy, now that Blu-ray is thee high definition packaged media, they count dem individual grain particles with fervor! ! !
Luckily, at least SPHE has no dnr issue or aversion to grain philosophy.

Nope. Every HD DVD had "perfect" video (just like their slogan implied). All I know is it would have been just awesome to have had The Dark Knight with a 9mbps VC-1 bitrate. Way to aim high guys! Amir was like a never ending limbo match.

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

If Dave Vaughn ever does decide to post here using his real name, he will tell you flat out that the supposed TL51 discs were only in the concept stage for HD DVD and Kevin Collins will do the same if he ever desires to speak candidly about the subject now.

He kind of did on HDD:

Originally Posted by David Vaughn

My statement has to do with all of the rumors that title "so and so" would be the first on a TL disc. That was complete fabrication (according to two different sources). The TL discs was a concept that as you say, they were exploring, but it was not on the immediate horizon towards the end of the format war.

Originally Posted by David Vaughn

By the way, here's a direct quote from a source on the status of TL51 discs as of 12/23/2007 (near the end). My question was if the TL51 discs were dead:

"No, they will go through testing processes and if there is demand into replication process. After testing process, they will be used to see if there are issues with existing players.

Then the studios have to actually have demand for replicators to actually utilize them and upgrade lines."

Originally Posted by David Vaughn

The TL discs were mythical...according to two of my sources, they were nothing but hogwash and they didn't have a working prototype.

I guess that's why at CES they were only shown in those pretty glass cases? Was there ever a working demo shown to anyone? I mean, after all, Disney was *this* close to going HD DVD b/c of the amazing TL51? Just like Fox, right?

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Oliver K

THAT was a great event !

Is it usually possible to get some of the presentations as a PDF or something similar ?
Probably a slim chance of that to happen but it cannot hurt to ask

And did I mention that the screenshots of Gladiator look real bad
Just kidding , I will wait for my copy from the Germany equivalent of blockbuster to see it for myself

Oliver’s back!
Did you have a good summer holiday?
Renting, hah, a novel idea!

I do get a kick out of all these people who spend so much of their time and energy posting screenshots to convince others (and themselves) from purchasing or even watching any particular Blu-ray movie when if they used that same time to mow one extra lawn in the neighborhood, they would have the cash to add the best available high definition packaged media video rendition of the motion picture to their collection, and at the same time getting a little exercise and Vitamin D.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Oliver K

THAT was a great event !

Is it usually possible to get some of the presentations as a PDF or something similar ?
Probably a slim chance of that to happen......

Slim indeed for access to that as a public record.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

Hey Ice, wake up!
I want some kind of gift.

I just noticed that this thread went over the ¾ million viewership mark!

I received my “gift” from Ice……..I think.
It appears that Insider Discussion will remain a bit higher on the totem poll than “Today’s Birthdays”, “What’s Going On”, “Feedback Forum”, etc.

https://forum.blu-ray.com/