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

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Originally Posted by Kris Deering

I Am Legend was smaller than that and had a TrueHD soundtrack and looked incredible.

Unlike other things in life, it isn't always about the size you guys.

What was that (in another thread) about a believe button?

Gary

[Kris Deering]

Originally Posted by blitz6speed

I Am Legend was a VERY poor representation of HD picture. Warner "Smoothie" DNR with low bitrates. Sad.

Sorry you feel that way. I haven't spoken with anyone who shares that opinion. Even Xylon's screen grabs showed INCREDIBLE detail and depth.

[patrick99]

Originally Posted by Kris Deering

Sorry you feel that way. I haven't spoken with anyone who shares that opinion. Even Xylon's screen grabs showed INCREDIBLE detail and depth.

You have three different posters here with the same opinion concerning the poor PQ in IAL.

[Kris Deering]

Originally Posted by patrick99

You have three different posters here with the same opinion concerning the poor PQ in IAL.

I realize that but I see a lot of people on this board and AVS complain about things that I just don't see, and most of them seem to care more about file size and bitrate than actual picture quality.

I talk with people that I know have systems that can make the most of the material and are setup properly. I also talk with people that do encode work and no what to look for more times than not. I don't tend to follow the flow of opinions of a mass of anonymous posters, you just don't know what they're looking at or even know what to look for. No offense to anyone intended, it is just a reality of anonymous boards.

[Alan Gordon]

Originally Posted by Kris Deering

I realize that but I see a lot of people on this board and AVS complain about things that I just don't see, and most of them seem to care more about file size and bitrate than actual picture quality.

While I do feel that higher bitrates help, I've seen Paramount and Universal HD DVDs that look really good in my opinion... so I don't really care about file size and bitrates as long as it looks good.

Originally Posted by Kris Deering

I talk with people that I know have systems that can make the most of the material and are setup properly. I also talk with people that do encode work and no what to look for more times than not.

I didn't see the movie in the theater, so it's possible that "I Am Legend" is identical to the master... and the master just doesn't have an impressive picture. All I know is, it looks mediocre...

I don't have the best setup... that's for sure! However, I have to wonder, if "I Am Legend" looks great on properly setup systems, how come so many other Blu-ray titles look so much BETTER than it does on improperly setup and/or "crappy" systems (like mine)?

Maybe the movie does have a unimpressive picture?

~Alan

[patrick99]

Originally Posted by Alan Gordon

While I do feel that higher bitrates help, I've seen Paramount and Universal HD DVDs that look really good in my opinion... so I don't really care about file size and bitrates as long as it looks good.



I didn't see the movie in the theater, so it's possible that "I Am Legend" is identical to the master... and the master just doesn't have an impressive picture. All I know is, it looks mediocre...

I don't have the best setup... that's for sure! However, I have to wonder, if "I Am Legend" looks great on properly setup systems, how come so many other Blu-ray titles look so much BETTER than it does on improperly setup and/or "crappy" systems (like mine)?

Maybe the movie does have a unimpressive picture?

~Alan

It looks mediocre to me, too.

But then I'm just an anonymous poster on an anonymous internet board. . .

[HeavyHitter]

I thought I am Legend looked quite good and much better than the theatrical viewing I saw (which looked out of focus and closer to 480p in actual resolution. I remember Penton stating to the effect of a study/survey of how many local theaters are lucky enough to even be showing at 1K because of projector focus issues, print wear, quality, etc.). But, I'm only viewing on an ISF'd 60" Sony SXRD A3000 at about 8 feet back. Maybe it's different for you guys with 100"+ screens.

[blu2]

Originally Posted by patrick99

You have three different posters here with the same opinion concerning the poor PQ in IAL.

Yet it received the highest possible rating in the review on this very site....

https://www.blu-ray.com/movies/movie...70&show=review

Warner Brother's effort for their Blu-ray release of I Am Legend is perhaps their best yet, providing viewers with a stunning image quality that is certainly befitting the film.

There were other sites that also gave similar ratings.

Clearly some divergance of opinion.

Regarding the size of the film, one wonders why they didn't make use of seemless branching rather than stick two complete versions of the film on the disc?

[Kris Deering]

Originally Posted by blu2

Yet it received the highest possible rating in the review on this very site....

https://www.blu-ray.com/movies/movie...70&show=review

Funny how that works huh

Opinions over every movie out there vary so much that honestly I don't really care at this point. I thought it looked great, others don't I guess. Anyone that has any credibility with me thought it looked great, which is good enough for me. Patrick you can take my comments however you want, I didn't mean anything personal at all.

For all of you guys that want to see what a bad BD transfer looks like, check out Gangs of New York. One of the worst examples of HD Video I've seen, despite very high bitrates

Makes what Warner, New Line and Fox have taken crap over look like some of the best encoding and clean up work ever done. I'll take I Am Legend, Pan's, Golden Compass and Patton all day compared to this turd.

[WickyWoo]

I am Legend is very shiny and unnaturally clean while the sun is up

The second that sun goes down is where it collapses

[degas]

Originally Posted by Kris Deering

For all of you guys that want to see what a bad BD transfer looks like, check out Gangs of New York. One of the worst examples of HD Video I've seen, despite very high bitrates

Makes what Warner, New Line and Fox have taken crap over look like some of the best encoding and clean up work ever done. I'll take I Am Legend, Pan's, Golden Compass and Patton all day compared to this turd.

Ouch! That is very sad news indeed.
I was really looking forward to this one...

[Alan Gordon]

Originally Posted by Kris Deering

For all of you guys that want to see what a bad BD transfer looks like, check out Gangs of New York. One of the worst examples of HD Video I've seen, despite very high bitrates

I can think of several Blu-ray movies with high bitrates that don't impress me. While the topic started from a comment about low bit-rates... I can't comment on them. As I said before, the Blu-ray could have looked "identical" to the master... I simply don't know! I'm sure the Blu-ray PQ is FAR above the DVD PQ... I just wasn't impressed!

Originally Posted by Kris Deering

Makes what Warner, New Line and Fox have taken crap over look like some of the best encoding and clean up work ever done. I'll take I Am Legend, Pan's, Golden Compass and Patton all day compared to this turd.

DNR aside, I felt TGC looked MUCH better than IAL, and judging from screen shots, would probably take the other two as well!

I haven't seen "10,000 B.C."... and just because it doesn't take much disc space won't bias my opinion against it... but I'm hoping the disc space comparison is where the similarities end!

I'm dropping my part of the discussion here... but I did want to add the above!

~Alan

[Kris Deering]

Originally Posted by WickyWoo

I am Legend is very shiny and unnaturally clean while the sun is up

The second that sun goes down is where it collapses

The elevated black levels bothered me a bit, but not much else. What were you're complaints here? Some people complain about lower IRE images but a lot of their issues stem from poor contrast displays. I didn't see any blocking or banding in the low light scenes and shadow detail wasn't too bad (despite the elevated blacks).

[WickyWoo]

That's because they DNR'd the crap out of it to keep the grain out of the dark parts

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Kris Deering

Funny how that works huh

Opinions over every movie out there vary so much that honestly I don't really care at this point. I thought it looked great, others don't I guess. Anyone that has any credibility with me thought it looked great, which is good enough for me. Patrick you can take my comments however you want, I didn't mean anything personal at all.

For all of you guys that want to see what a bad BD transfer looks like, check out Gangs of New York. One of the worst examples of HD Video I've seen, despite very high bitrates

Makes what Warner, New Line and Fox have taken crap over look like some of the best encoding and clean up work ever done. I'll take I Am Legend, Pan's, Golden Compass and Patton all day compared to this turd.

Careful Kris, regarding Gangs of New York -

You may be right or completely wrong, as I haven’t seen the Blu-ray edition. However, the theatrical presentation is coming up at the Academy in 3 weeks and there just may be a post-film panelist there that can confirm (during Q & A), that the DP used pro-mist or even fog filters during the entire primary photography………..not to mention the fact that they also used a lot of smoke (which I’ll speculate prompted a bunch of calls into the local Italian fire department by some residents that were unaware of the shoot).

Just a heads-up, like I said I haven't viewed the Blu-ray yet.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

at the Academy in 3 weeks......

Hey Tomlin-- I may just be able to clear my schedule that day and attend with you if the lady wearing the blindfold can do without your services for a Monday afternoon/evening and you drive “the babe magnet”.

[Penton-Man]

Oh, current temp on the Universal Backlot …………..108 degrees.
( I didn’t bring Maya ).
http://www.cinegearexpo.com/map.html

Have a good weekend everyone.
Later.

[blitz6speed]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

Oh, current temp on the Universal Backlot …………..108 degrees.
( I didn’t bring Maya ).
http://www.cinegearexpo.com/map.html

Have a good weekend everyone.
Later.

Its a fricken scortcher in so cal today.

[PeterTHX]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

Oh, current temp on the Universal Backlot …………..108 degrees.

So, a little bit cooler than when the fire was raging a few weeks ago.

Here inland in San Diego it's not much better.

[WickyWoo]

It's terrible when soCal remembers it's supposed to be a desert