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

[Mike2060]

Penton-Man, somebody wanted me to ask you:

Please give me the name of a bluray that looked terrible in screen caps but turned out to be fantastic when in motion.

[captveg]

Originally Posted by Mike2060

Penton-Man, somebody wanted me to ask you:

Please give me the name of a bluray that looked terrible in screen caps but turned out to be fantastic when in motion.

I already said this in the other thread: Contact. Screen caps were questionable, the disc is fine.

[Q?]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

You “ guess” correct …….specifically in 10bit log Cineon colour space.
Q, think of it in simple terms as I mentioned a couple days ago on my thread that FOTR was a hybrid post. This necessitated an extra step(s) which obviously resulted in a slight generational loss in clarity or sharpness of the overall product FOTR compared to TTT or ROTK.

The real fly in the ointment here is (if the screenshots can indeed be trusted as accurate), why does the broadcast version of FOTR ‘look better’ than the Blu-ray edition of FOTR. I would really like Robert Harris to ask the guys at MPI on the WB lot to run the broadcast HD master side-by-side with the HD master used for the recent Blu-ray movie. Shouldn’t be difficult.

If the new HD master used for the Blu-ray edition is indeed better or at least on par with the old broadcast master, well, I think you can “guess” what happened further on down the pipeline during the encoding process………….if the screenshots are to be trusted and the broadcast encode wasn't sharpened.

I'm sorry, but I have no idea who Robert Harris is, but the name rings a bell though.
Are you going to get to "review" LOTR yourself?
And all this screenshot talk is getting tiring too, and thanks

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Mike2060

Penton-Man, somebody wanted me to ask you:

Please give me the name of a bluray that looked terrible in screen caps but turned out to be fantastic when in motion.

I really shouldn’t answer a question posed by you either directly or via proxy as you claim, i.e. ”Somebody wanted me ask you” since your online public posting behavior leaves quite a lot to be desired and does a disservice to this forum but, I’ll take this one query from you just to make it clear that I am not a WB apologist….nor for the Blu-ray format in general. I would actually like to see the broadcast FOTR screenshot vs. the Blu-ray FOTR screenshot discrepancy be transparently addressed and resolved by a reliable real-time movie reviewer with close connections to WB such as Robert Harris.

First of all, you’re presupposing that I actually read and follow the AVS *screenshot science* threads.

I DON’T.

Heck, I didn’t even know that we had a general screenshot science thread here on this forum up until about 6 months ago but, at least those folks don’t seem to abuse the *science*. I think I’ve read only portions of something like 5 screenshot threads altogether since I’ve entered the wild and willy web so, I personally can’t answer your question. You would have to ask a *screenshot science* follower who routinely reads AVS (or has so in the past) and also believes that screenshots are misleading…..like Josh Z from HDD. He may be able to cite some specific examples for you, so I’ll refer you to him. Up until the announcement of a remaster for GoNY, I believe Robert Harris’s sentiment of screenshots was, and I think I’m quoting him just about word for word correctly…“I’m not actually sure what they are good for.” So, you may also want to ask Robert.

Let’s just say, since I’m a nice guy, I’ll outright concede to you that the screenshots were accurately captured and displayed by the *screenshot scientist* and people are viewing them on a calibrated computer display. (Just keep in mind the possible consequences of viewing screenshots on an uncalibrated computer monitor with your eyeballs next to the screen compared to watching on a calibrated display in your home theater at normal viewing distances).

In general, you can’t stare at one or a few screenshots and get an accurate impression of what the movie looks like in motion. It’s like going out on a date with your girlfriend and staring at a cold sore on her lip for 30 min. rather than having a normal 30 min. conversation with her as you’re eating your meal, giving her direct eye-to-eye contact, etc. Don’t you think she will look more “fantastic” that way rather than some 30 min. preoccupation with staring at her lip?

Technically, visual-cognitive function ^ aside, a *screenshot scientist* could either intentionally or unintentionally *cherry pick* screenshots to give a false sense of the overall picture quality of the movie.

Suppose screenshots are chosen from only one or the following categories and then posted –
They only post several screenshots in which the cinematographer used a diffusion filter or net for those particular scenes? Suppose they only post several screenshots where the cinematographer pushed the dynamic range of the camera to its limits or beyond? Suppose they only post several screenshots in which the D.P. and digital colorist decided to use the Defocus app during the post production? Many believe you lose as much as 1k of resolution when the camera moves, suppose they only post those shots? Suppose they only post screenshots of lower resolution frames (see p. 16 here - http://www.m4if.org/resources/techre...2/Gaggioni.pdf). The trick to compression is you are supposed to watch it playing in real time, ask Stacey Spears.

And even if the *screenshot scientists* post a technically accurate sample or sample(s) of a motion picture they often reach inaccurate conclusions, not to mention hype the perceived *deficiency*, way, WAY out of proportion.

For example, “Xylon” claimed that Baraka was DNR’ed – Nope, he was just clueless to the trade-offs of a downcoversion filter and that you bias it to avoid aliasing artifacts on one end and softening on the other but, you can’t have your cake and eat it too. The colors and ‘darkness’ of Bram Stoker’s Dracula went down by the *screenshot scientists* as a complete screw-up by the technical personnel at SPE because they didn’t understand what a Director selected and approved Answer Print meant or, they just believed this respected professional (read #3 under Miscellaneous Crew) to be an outright liar……….http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0041447/
To this day the *screenshot scientists* and many others believe the problem with Gladiator was DNR gone wild when the real issue was excessive, unmonitored DRS.

So, you can relay the above to your friend.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by captveg

I already said this in the other thread: Contact. Screen caps were questionable, the disc is fine.

Thank you Capt.
Anyone else?
Like I said, I don't read the *screenshot science* threads.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Q!

I'm sorry, but I have no idea who Robert Harris is, but the name rings a bell though.
Are you going to get to "review" LOTR yourself?
And all this screenshot talk is getting tiring too, and thanks

lol, review it?
Dude, I'm lucky if I'll be able to find the time to even watch it on Blu-ray sometime during the next two years or so.

Thanks for your sentiment.

[Mike2060]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

I really shouldn’t answer a question posed by you either directly or via proxy as you claim, i.e. ”Somebody wanted me ask you” since your online public posting behavior leaves quite a lot to be desired and does a disservice to this forum but, I’ll take this one query from you just to make it clear that I am not a WB apologist….nor for the Blu-ray format in general. I would actually like to see the broadcast FOTR screenshot vs. the Blu-ray FOTR screenshot discrepancy be transparently addressed and resolved by a reliable real-time movie reviewer with close connections to WB such as Robert Harris.

First of all, you’re presupposing that I actually read and follow the AVS *screenshot science* threads.

I DON’T.

Heck, I didn’t even know that we had a general screenshot science thread here on this forum up until about 6 months ago but, at least those folks don’t seem to abuse the *science*. I think I’ve read only portions of something like 5 screenshot threads altogether since I’ve entered the wild and willy web so, I personally can’t answer your question. You would have to ask a *screenshot science* follower who routinely reads AVS (or has so in the past) and also believes that screenshots are misleading…..like Josh Z from HDD. He may be able to cite some specific examples for you, so I’ll refer you to him. Up until the announcement of a remaster for GoNY, I believe Robert Harris’s sentiment of screenshots was, and I think I’m quoting him just about word for word correctly…“I’m not actually sure what they are good for.” So, you may also want to ask Robert.

Let’s just say, since I’m a nice guy, I’ll outright concede to you that the screenshots were accurately captured and displayed by the *screenshot scientist* and people are viewing them on a calibrated computer display. (Just keep in mind the possible consequences of viewing screenshots on an uncalibrated computer monitor with your eyeballs next to the screen compared to watching on a calibrated display in your home theater at normal viewing distances).

In general, you can’t stare at one or a few screenshots and get an accurate impression of what the movie looks like in motion. It’s like going out on a date with your girlfriend and staring at a cold sore on her lip for 30 min. rather than having a normal 30 min. conversation with her as you’re eating your meal, giving her direct eye-to-eye contact, etc. Don’t you think she will look more “fantastic” that way rather than some 30 min. preoccupation with staring at her lip?

Technically, visual-cognitive function ^ aside, a *screenshot scientist* could either intentionally or unintentionally *cherry pick* screenshots to give a false sense of the overall picture quality of the movie.

Suppose screenshots are chosen from only one or the following categories and then posted –
They only post several screenshots in which the cinematographer used a diffusion filter or net for those particular scenes? Suppose they only post several screenshots where the cinematographer pushed the dynamic range of the camera to its limits or beyond? Suppose they only post several screenshots in which the D.P. and digital colorist decided to use the Defocus app during the post production? Many believe you lose as much as 1k of resolution when the camera moves, suppose they only post those shots? Suppose they only post screenshots of lower resolution frames (see p. 16 here - http://www.m4if.org/resources/techre...2/Gaggioni.pdf). The trick to compression is you are supposed to watch it playing in real time, ask Stacey Spears.

And even if the *screenshot scientists* post a technically accurate sample or sample(s) of a motion picture they often reach inaccurate conclusions, not to mention hype the perceived *deficiency*, way, WAY out of proportion.

For example, “Xylon” claimed that Baraka was DNR’ed – Nope, he was just clueless to the trade-offs of a downcoversion filter and that you bias it to avoid aliasing artifacts on one end and softening on the other but, you can’t have your cake and eat it too. The colors and ‘darkness’ of Bram Stoker’s Dracula went down by the *screenshot scientists* as a complete screw-up by the technical personnel at SPE because they didn’t understand what a Director selected and approved Answer Print meant or, they just believed this respected professional (read #3 under Miscellaneous Crew) to be an outright liar……….http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0041447/
To this day the *screenshot scientists* and many others believe the problem with Gladiator was DNR gone wild when the real issue was excessive, unmonitored DRS.

So, you can relay the above to your friend.

Unfortunately some of these movies are like a huge pimple right on the tip of your girlfriend's nose, and in some cases your girlfriend is Angelina Jolie

I believe what you say in the last few paragraphs but isn't that stuff more about the movie just looking bad and not a bad transfer? The screen caps are accurate, but what we think is a bad job is just "the director's intent" (for lack of a better term). It completely makes sense if people criticize a BD because it doesn't look good and there's no way for us to know that they made it look bad on purpose because of technical reasons. So you can't blame the "screenshot scientists" for finding perceived flaws in a source whether is was intentional or not.

Thank you for your insight though.

[Jeff Kleist]

\But you can blame them for spending years whipping themselves up into microscopic examiners of everything looking for something to ***** about. These were the same people after all, who were running around pixel counting like a video game to determine "actual resolution"

[wallendo]

Why isn't everyone up in arms about the sharpening applied to the DI's of the last two films. The first is DNR'd to death, and yet no one complains about the last two being EE'd to death.

I have preordered the set, and do not plan to cancel the order. I will enjoy their films for their content, in what will surely be it's best available presentation. I will not worry about whether or not noise reduction techniques have been used. And I will not look for signs of sharpening on the last two movies. The problem with this whole issue is that a handful of people are continuously harping on this. In fact, after reading through multiple pages of the LOTR thread, people were giving the same arguments verbatim they were using 5 pages earlier. I can't wait to see the threads started when Star Wars finally comes to blu.

Maybe, I'll ask Peter Jackson to bring a few 35mm prints to my house so I can compare my BD's to an original 35 mm viewing (Of course, Mr. Jackson will need to bring 35mm projection equipment with him also, I can provide the popcorn)

[captveg]

Originally Posted by wallendo

Maybe, I'll ask Peter Jackson to bring a few 35mm prints to my house so I can compare my BD's to an original 35 mm viewing (Of course, Mr. Jackson will need to bring 35mm projection equipment with him also, I can provide the popcorn)

Nah, you can't trust that man. He obviously didn't *actually* approve this LOTR Blu-ray set like he said. Or maybe it was that he doesn't know how an approval should work, at least as efficiently as random forum members do. In fact, I wouldn't trust this man's (clearly shoddy) opinion and final say on anything. Especially Oscar winning films as important as LOTR. Maybe he never even *directed* the films in the first place. I mean, if we can't trust his statement that he made of the discs being "fantastic" and receiving of his approval, how can we trust that he actually deserved that directing Oscar? And how can you trust that the 35mm film he brings to your house will be to your standards?

[42041]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

Anyone else?.

I do find screencaps useful for my needs, but some of the color/contrast nitpicking goes WAY over the top. Contact was already mentioned, but the Chasing Amy thread was fairly amusing. Many declared it ruined by a color alteration... until someone contacted a certain David Klein, ASC who personally confirmed the new transfer was correct

[Doctorossi]

Originally Posted by Jeff Kleist

\But you can blame them for spending years whipping themselves up into microscopic examiners of everything looking for something to ***** about.

And you can blame them for leaping to ignorant conclusions about the "causes" of various perceived defects and spreading the word about those "causes", like gospel, far and wide and at the tops of their lungs.

A little humility and self-awareness would go a long way to cutting down the noise level of misinformation out there.

[sharkshark]

So, what we've learned from the (lovely) post above is that Penton would rather have a woman that he could talk to for thirty minutes while ignoring the patent fact that she has herpes.

At least, that's what I'm choosing to take out of that post.




OK, I'll admit it publicly - I've got no idea what "DRS" is, other than a bunch of PhDs.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Mike2060

Unfortunately some of these movies are like a huge pimple right on the tip of your girlfriend's nose, and in some cases your girlfriend is Angelina Jolie

Salt received a 4k DI and I guarantee you the HD master nor Blu-ray edition will be “DNR’ed”, so don’t worry about it.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Mike2060

I believe what you say in the last few paragraphs but isn't that stuff more about the movie just looking bad and not a bad transfer? The screen caps are accurate, but what we think is a bad job is just "the director's intent" (for lack of a better term). It completely makes sense if people criticize a BD because it doesn't look good and there's no way for us to know that they made it look bad on purpose because of technical reasons. So you can't blame the "screenshot scientists" for finding perceived flaws in a source whether is was intentional or not.

No, on the contrary, that is the point that I was trying to make to you, I can blame them because *they* often don’t know the difference. They see ‘soft’ via solitary screenshot or a few screenshots and automatically they think ‘DNR’, when in fact, it can be a whole host of other possibilities which can only be ruled out with a thorough knowledge and understanding of the principal photography and the post production process or, by watching the scene in motion, and even then many of them would be fooled by telecine artifact, deblocking filter in the compression codec, normal motion blur on the film, shooting with the shutter at 360 degrees using a digital camera, etc

And I don’t think that for critical evaluation, or for how this *science* is often being utilized in the *screenshot* capital of the world that they are an accurate tool. “I” and “B” frames are quantized differently and thusly will ‘handle’ grain or noise differently. Do you see discrete “I” and “B” frames when you watch a motion picture at 24fps? Hell no. You’re watching a stream of frames in real time. So yes, to answer one of your questions on the LOTR thread, it is possible for a Blu-ray movie to appear better looking at home in motion if only the ‘lower quality’ frames are selected and posted as screenshot samples.

Now behave yourself back over there in the LOTR thread and no more WB ‘back door’ comments!

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by 42041

I do find screencaps useful for my needs, but some of the color/contrast nitpicking goes WAY over the top. Contact was already mentioned, but the Chasing Amy thread was fairly amusing. Many declared it ruined by a color alteration... until someone contacted a certain David Klein, ASC who personally confirmed the new transfer was correct

Wasn’t there also some sort of screenshot fiasco with Gremlins regarding the colors/contrast or sharpness which got shot done once some folks actually viewed the Blu-ray in motion at home and responded to the vocal critics going on knee-jerk reactions to viewing the posted screenshots?

Anyone?
For some reason Gremlins stands out in my mind as yet another screenshot science fubar.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by sharkshark

So, what we've learned from the (lovely) post above is that Penton would rather have a woman that he could talk to for thirty minutes while ignoring the patent fact that she has herpes.

At least, that's what I'm choosing to take out of that post.



OK, I'll admit it publicly - I've got no idea what "DRS" is, other than a bunch of PhDs.

They've got meds for that now.
Anyway, it's a dust buster, i.e. Dirt and Scratch Removal. (I know the letters don't match up in order).

[Beta Man]

I appreciate the lengthy explanation Penton......

I personally have found screen shots extremely useful, but understand that you can't determine how well you'll perceive the movie when in motion......

A couple of thoughts I had during Gladiator, and now during this upcoming release:

1) I didn't find a problem with "missing arrows" in Gladiator..... because you really have to look for it, and also anyone who has ever seen something that was on fire move at a high rate of speed, knows that the flame may be barely visible at times..... it's basically 'almost' going out, but the catalyst (oil in this case I believe) is enough to keep it going...... So either way, I didn't concern myself with that. I was a little disappointed by the DNR or whatever tool used that made the figures look waxy.... It's been my theory that the "anti-grain" general public perception that everything should look like an animated film, has lead to the studios' increased use of post production tools to try to "over correct" films, when sometimes a speck of dirt, or noise is better than the 'corrected' alternative....... (I'd love your thoughts on that)

2) So not being able to completely determine how one would perceive the PQ by screenshots alone is one thing, but when I look at screen shots of Gladiator, or Patton, etc.... I notice a lot of waxy looking people (DNR DRS, whatever....) and this look has been translated to the Blu-rays of these films I own...... I'm in the "The colors of Patton still make the Blu-ray a preferred version over the DVD" camp...... but would I like a better version??? of course..... So my point I guess, is for every case I can think of, if I see a lot of DNR/DRS/EE/whatever in the screen-shots, although the potential for them to be "cherry-picked" scenes as you put it is there...... I find that quite often they give reason to be skeptical about the merits of the release...... This isn't an issue for things like Patton, because I'm gonna want to own another version of it no matter what...... but for movies like LOTR, which I don't own already, and don't really care for myself.... my only motivation for purchasing them would be friends/family who enjoy them have already asked me if I own it on Blu-ray (they don't have Blu-ray, nor follow release dates) because they say "It must look amazing" and I would buy it for their benefit to watch with them..... but with them having lofty expectations, I wonder if I would find it best to tell them to simply enjoy their DVDs at home on their 32" T.V. because the Blu-ray on a 106" screen may not be the "wow" experience they were expecting..... I often buy films for others to enjoy, and although this is certainly an upgrade from the DVD on all accounts (and reviews are out now) I just don't think I can add this to the collection based on this, and other site's reviews..... maybe the EE will get reference quality reviews, and I'll pick those up.

[Show spoiler] apologies for going on a tangent

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Beta Man

It's been my theory that the "anti-grain" general public perception that everything should look like an animated film, has lead to the studios' increased use of post production tools to try to "over correct" films, when sometimes a speck of dirt, or noise is better than the 'corrected' alternative....... (I'd love your thoughts on that)

Yeah, and it’s my theory that Amir is somehow behind all of this, between flipping burgers on his barbecue because he doesn’t like salt or grain.

Read this post I made several days ago and concentrate on the last paragraph…….
https://forum.blu-ray.com/insider-di...ml#post3028264
There is one and only one major that has an old history (first initiated at the highest executive rank) in terms of tainted focus groups that consciously believed a grainless or less grainy packaged home media movie product would be ‘better’ or more appealing to the consumer. ONE.

I’ll let you figure that one out, possibly with Jeff Kleist’s help/input……and it’s not Fox, just so we’re clear. What I personally find frustrating about the whole situation is that every time a ‘DNR’ issue arises (and it is indeed legitimate) and the ‘Word’ does make its way back to the particular content provider…..nothing ever gets resolved because it keeps happening haphazardly with future releases. I’m told the compressionists over there blame the mastering technicians for de-graining the HD masters and the mastering folks claim the compressionists are applying the ‘DNR’ in order to make the encoding process easier and fit some pre-determined bitrate budget. Well, if the marketing folks are really interested in finding out the truth, as I mentioned several pages back and if the posted screenshots are indeed accurate, it appears they may have material (HD masters) to synch and run side-by-side to truly get to the bottom of all the internal finger pointing….if indeed they desire to.

Which reminds me, why aren’t you ‘moderating’ over there in that LOTR thread? How on earth can you let comments from Mike 2060 (which I linked “hopefully” to bring to Deci’s attention), let stand like that without being deleted? George F. claims he reads everything on the forums, how do you think he felt after reading those comments and how do you think Blu-ray.com appeared to the professional community? Please tell me you just missed those two posts regarding Mike’s infatuation with the lower GI tract and that it was some kind of oversight.

[DaViD Boulet]

Sigh... a reasoned and informed discussion of the possible issues affecting the LOTR BD release? I thought it couldn't be done?

Seriously, I don’t like the negative hyperbole spouted about the picture quality of LOTR over the internet but, the FOTR broadcast vs Blu-ray comparison screenshots (if they are accurate) does concern me given the cinematic importance of this Trilogy. I hope we get a clear resolution of that issue esp. since Andrew Lesnie won the Oscar for Best Cinematography with FOTR that year and this Trilogy essentially pioneered the modern day feature film post production process as we know it today……with a handful of photochemical finishing holdouts remaining < but that’s quickly becoming a lost art anyway.

Penton, this is *precisely* the way most of us feel.

We're not expecting $$$$ miracles performed on a newly rendered Fellowship downconverted from 4K files or anything... it's just a bit perplexing that a low-bit-rate MPEG2 HDTV broadcast has more visible detail than a high-bit-rate VC1 Blu-ray Disc.

Also, bear in mind that when most folks on forums like use terms like "same master" they really mean that both images were derived from the same telecine prior to subsequent digital cleanup manipulation and compression. Naturally, by definition, the VC1 compressed blu-ray would utilize a different master than the MPEG2 file for the HDTV broadcast if by "master" one means the compressed master. Or if "master" means uncompressed, were the two compressed files derived from the same uncompressed master without any differing manipulation between the two? Or was an uncompressed video file given some addition DNR/DRS scrubbing before being compressed for Blu-ray, but left unmanipulated for HDTV, so that two different uncompressed "masters" exist between the two, but both still sharing the same original digital source?

I say all of this only because when Warner assured the bits that "a new master" was used, without an explanation of what that really means, it may or may not change the fundamental of what's being proposed by folks who are seeing surprising similarity of the BD and HDTV image (indicating that the two in some way share a common source), noticing that the BD image appears to suffer however from some unfriendly DNR/DRS that's removed visible fine picture detail.