Lawrence of Arabia 4K UHD (1962)

[HeavyHitter]

Originally Posted by Mosley likes BFDI

I hope we get a standard 4K release soon.

That's what I had been waiting on when the steelbook came out as I didn't like art, but it will be a day one purchase this time.

[Doctorossi]

I'm presuming the reprint will continue to be a Best Buy retailer exclusive in the US... ?

[MifuneFan]

Originally Posted by Doctorossi

I'm presuming the reprint will continue to be a Best Buy retailer exclusive in the US... ?

The first release was a wide release,

[matbezlima]

Originally Posted by Egbert Souse

I've seen the 4K DCP twice, once in 2012 and again last year, and it doesn't look grainy at all. Best way to describe how it looks is a fine mist. Looked on par with 15/70 IMAX to my eyes, just gorgeous.

So, what happened to the disc? I don't think the HDR brightness alone could set off the grain so much in the disc, it's clearly grainy in conversion to SDR too.

Maybe it ultimately is what the comment below said:

Originally Posted by Fang Zei

My glass half-full take is that it’s almost as if fate intervened to keep this disc from looking as perfect as it could just so there’d be one more reason to see a repertoire screening of this film in a cinema.

Perhaps it's this.

Originally Posted by Pans

I've owned the UHD since near release. It wasn't disappointing, however we know what the iTunes SDR version is like from screenshots posted here—which objectively has more fine detail (this also isn't some effect that can be achieved from sharpening the UHD BD version, I've tested this myself with my own UHD caps). Not sure what the Kaleidescape version is like which is over 100GB.

It's because of knowing what it could have been that I wish we could have had the SDR version's detail but without its compression. Instead we got disc-quality compression but without the same very fine details.

I think there are some that have a difficult time reconciling that a streaming version could have finer detail (albeit with poorer compression, obviously) and especially for such a flagship title. It is what it is.

I'd re-buy should such a new UHD version be released with the fine detail intact and with disc-quality compression, even an SDR version.

Could you share links to all the ITunes screenshots? This thread is huge, it's not easy to find them all. It would be helpful to everyone.

[Pans]

Originally Posted by matbezlima

Could you share links to all the ITunes screenshots? This thread is huge, it's not easy to find them all. It would be helpful to everyone.

It was post 601. However apparently that screenshot comparison site 404s now.

Luckily I saved copies (IIRC Imgur which I'm using for hosting here compresses files over a certain filesize but eh).

Here are some of them. Note: click images for full size versions:

UHD BD (200 nits)


iTunes SDR:


UHD BD:


iTunes SDR:


UHD BD:


iTunes SDR:


UHD BD:


iTunes SDR:

[matbezlima]

Fantastic! Indeed, a new UHD without the filter would be palpably sharper!

I can only imagine how the Kaleidescape version would look.

[Pans]

I have to think that it was the film's runtime + the fine details in the larger format film and a decision to prioritize a single disc release (rather than splitting it across two discs).

I know the SDR Kaleidescape release is 113GB, which came out years before the UHD BD release. So one might guess they left the detail intact for the iTunes version but due to streaming filesizes the compression suffers, while for the UHD BD they needed to do something to reduce the filesize so they went with some filter to balance the compression vs detail.

Pity Kaleidescape is so DRM locked down with the (absurdly) expensive playback hardware.

[Mking78]

Buy it in a plain paper wrapper if you must. It is simply the best home presentation I have ever seen of any movie or show. ….or wait 9 years for a “better scan.”

[matbezlima]

I took a look at some of the very old pages in this thread, and I will never look at them again. There are some nutjobs in the very old discussions. I don't want to get into the can of worms of users like Noremac. There are always those extreme hardcore purists who believe that unless a film looks EXACTLY like a 35m print being projected, with the soft look of a print and all, then it looks wrong, horrible, it was digitally sharpened, and so on.

Home Theater Forum also has some of these types of users (I've even seen hate against the perfect blacks of OLEDs there, not that lack of perfect blacks is a deal-breaker by any means, don't get me wrong). And they dare to think they are actually better than this forum. Just like any forum in the internet, there are lots of people talking total bullshit.

[HeavyHitter]

Originally Posted by matbezlima

I took a look at some of the very old pages in this thread, and I will never look at them again. There are some nutjobs in the very old discussions. I don't want to get into the can of worms of users like Noremac. There are always those extreme hardcore purists who believe that unless a film looks EXACTLY like a 35m print being projected, with the soft look of a print and all, then it looks wrong, horrible, it was digitally sharpened, and so on.

Home Theater Forum also has some of these types of users (I've even seen hate against the perfect blacks of OLEDs there, not that lack of perfect blacks is a deal-breaker by any means, don't get me wrong). And they dare to think they are actually better than this forum. Just like any forum in the internet, there are lots of people talking total bullshit.

HTF largely seems like a bunch of out of touch old men. lol They were kind of leading edge and with it during the DVD days, but deteriorated during the HD format war and downhill since.

[50strat54]

Originally Posted by Mking78

Buy it in a plain paper wrapper if you must. It is simply the best home presentation I have ever seen of any movie or show. ….or wait 9 years for a “better scan.”

streaming only by then

[PonyoBellanote]

Originally Posted by Pans

I have to think that it was the film's runtime + the fine details in the larger format film and a decision to prioritize a single disc release (rather than splitting it across two discs).

Lawrence of Arabia's 4K UHD *was* split in two discs.

I don't see the iTunes SDR vs UHD BD comparison as the UHD being worse. I think it's a case of the colour grading.

[PonyoBellanote]

By the way, I'm all for reissues of steelbooks. Some people just don't get to catch them all at first. I'd love a reissue of the first Jaws steelbook, but I don't see it happening for now.

[Pans]

Originally Posted by 50strat54

streaming only by then

This is a large factor in why imo there's a kind of lingering feeling that releases should be as ideal as they can be for UHD, since there may not be another opportunity with physical media at such resolutions.

Mainstream streaming may possibly never support disc-level quality/filesizes given the average internet connections users have and the enormous bandwidth requirements for providers. Kaleidescape has been literally the only other alternative but it's the niche of the niche when it's like $20k just to get in the door—but it does show that online bought, high quality releases can be a thing.

I used to cross-reference streaming exclusive 4K titles that hadn't had a disc release and it would sometimes be years before the disc was released (albeit sometimes SDR initially). If we can get as many things on UHD BD it'd be nice for preservation and collectors.

Originally Posted by PonyoBellanote

Lawrence of Arabia's 4K UHD *was* split in two discs.

I don't see the iTunes SDR vs UHD BD comparison as the UHD being worse. I think it's a case of the colour grading.

Was it? God, my memory is blurred if that's the case. Then I really don't see how the encoding needed to be filtered.

One can see the finer details in elements like Lawrence's gold areas of that hat, the facial hairs on the second shot, camels/horses and the mountain in the wide shot.

[matbezlima]

Originally Posted by PonyoBellanote

Lawrence of Arabia's 4K UHD *was* split in two discs.

I don't see the iTunes SDR vs UHD BD comparison as the UHD being worse. I think it's a case of the colour grading.

I don't think you really opened fully the pictures and zoomed in properly. The UHD looks a bit blurrier in the super fine detail overall. And if Geoff D is right, the filtering happened to alleviate film grain and restoration artefacts exposed like they weren't before by HDR.

Originally Posted by 50strat54

streaming only by then

Physical media releases will always exist, even though as a niche, and being rarer than now, specially wide releases. Like the LP market. At the worst case scenario, limited editions, in Disney Vault style, will be the standard, and often the only way films will get physical media releases in the future. I also believe there will be more services like Kaleidescape for films in the future, such services are already pretty popular in music. It's the gigantic size of film files that make it very difficult to implement any time soon. It's already a pain in the ass to download huge files to start playing a game, for example, and that's a big and fair complaint among gamers. Internet still need to improve a lot for such services to be more appealing outside of music. But the internet evolves fast. We have gone a long way from those modem connections that struggled to load even a second of a YouTube video in 144p resolution. I know that suffering.

[matbezlima]

Originally Posted by PonyoBellanote

Lawrence of Arabia's 4K UHD *was* split in two discs.

But Sony didn't come even remotely close to actually filling either disc.

[ilenewoodsfan99]

I missed out last time, I really regret doing so. Glad there seems to be another chance!

[TravisTylerBlack]

Originally Posted by Pans

Kaleidescape has been literally the only other alternative but it's the niche of the niche when it's like $20k just to get in the door— it does show that online bought, high quality releases can be a thing.

Imagine investing that much money into a service/device that almost certainly will no longer exist within the next decade. Admittedly I like the concept, though I’d sooner spend a few grand on external drives to 1:1 backup my existing physical collection than plunk down the cost of a new Honda on what is, ultimately, a streaming box that holds “hard” downloads.

One day in the not too distant future there will be mainstream (aka affordable) devices that essentially offer the same function. Data storage tech is evolving at an almost incomprehensible pace. When the market will reflect that though? Anyone’s guess.

[d3nt0n]

Originally Posted by TravisTylerBlack

One day in the not too distant future there will be mainstream (aka affordable) devices that essentially offer the same function. Data storage tech is evolving at an almost incomprehensible pace. When the market will reflect that though? Anyone’s guess.

You can pick up a good Android TV capable of playing UHD files and 10TB HDD for <$300. The only thing missing is a service where you could buy and download high quality DRM free mkvs.

[aviosis]

Originally Posted by matbezlima

If it is a Top 10 movie for you, then I strongly advise you to buy it anyway. What matters the most is by far the actual video, the transfer itself, instead of the cover art. Unless you want to buy it just to have in your collection, and not actually watch it. But since you said it is one of your Top 10 movies, I don’t believe that would be the case, you want to watch it.

Lol if you love the film but hate the art so much just pay someone on Etsy a couple bucks and I'm sure they'll make a nice custom cover for you.