8K discussion thread

[Lee A Stewart]

Year End 2003 Top-selling titles (combined VHS and DVD)



https://variety.com/2003/biz/news/ye...nd-dvd-626828/

[Geoff D]

That really is the point: when things are still making millions of dollars then companies will still keep them going, but at the same time I don't see where the impetus to make an 8K physical format will come from as the market continues to contract. If they could magic up an 8K disc tomorrow then they'd do it (and I'd buy it too!), but with all the development costs and cross-party support that it'd need from the industry - and at a time when almost every major studio has its own streaming platform - then it'd be like herding cats.

[Christian Muth]

Interesting that Blu-rays are outselling DVDs in those 2021 lists.

Chris

[Anthony P]

Originally Posted by Lee A Stewart

Top-Selling DVDs in the United States 2021

https://www.the-numbers.com/home-market/dvd-sales/2021

Top-Selling Blu-rays in the United States 2021

https://www.the-numbers.com/home-mar...ray-sales/2021

Originally Posted by Lee A Stewart

Year End 2003 Top-selling titles (combined VHS and DVD)



https://variety.com/2003/biz/news/ye...nd-dvd-626828/

thanks.

[Anthony P]

Originally Posted by Staying Salty

Those numbers are so depressing.

I am glad that I have been collecting 4K blu-rays since the beginning, even though I don’t have 4K equipment yet. I have close to 400 titles now and I am sure that I could not acquire them all if I had waited.

don't forget 2020/2021 have been particularly odd years because of covid-19 in a lot places theaters where mostly closed so movies were not being released like normal. In a couple of years or so we will have a better idea of what is happening

[Anthony P]

Originally Posted by Geoff D

That really is the point: when things are still making millions of dollars then companies will still keep them going, but at the same time I don't see where the impetus to make an 8K physical format will come from as the market continues to contract. If they could magic up an 8K disc tomorrow then they'd do it (and I'd buy it too!), but with all the development costs and cross-party support that it'd need from the industry - and at a time when almost every major studio has its own streaming platform - then it'd be like herding cats.

I agree with you. Like I said before IMHO the studios will always want the merry-go round to keep going, the tougher question to answer is consumers and the rest of the industry.

And it is not just physical, what will it take HW wise for an 8k Netflix/Apple* player ? Will Netflix/Apple* be willing to invest on their side on offering it and pay the studio more for it?

The only glimmer of hope, if someone wants 8k content, is that 8k displays exist and that puts some pressure on the industry to bring us 8k content for it.

[Lee A Stewart]

Originally Posted by Anthony P

don't forget 2020/2021 have been particularly odd years because of covid-19 in a lot places theaters where mostly closed so movies were not being released like normal. In a couple of years or so we will have a better idea of what is happening

Take another look at that chart: 2017, 2018 & 2019. Business as usual. So what do you see?

[ikms]

Not even a million sales for the top disc in 2021... when was the last time THAT happened? I bet even in the mid-90s Disney VHS would handle that easily. Probably talking pre-sellthrough days, maybe ~1986, then again Jane Fonda, so, 1983ish?

[Geoff D]

Originally Posted by Anthony P

I agree with you. Like I said before IMHO the studios will always want the merry-go round to keep going, the tougher question to answer is consumers and the rest of the industry.

And it is not just physical, what will it take HW wise for an 8k Netflix/Apple* player ? Will Netflix/Apple* be willing to invest on their side on offering it and pay the studio more for it?

The only glimmer of hope, if someone wants 8k content, is that 8k displays exist and that puts some pressure on the industry to bring us 8k content for it.

For your netflixes and apples it’s relatively easy, it’s their own content and their own delivery systems which they can update any time they choose to do so (for new 8K hardware I mean, not jury-rigging it to existing tech). 8K on digital will absolutely be a thing as more new streaming productions start to finish out to that rez, it’s not the notion of the existence of 8K content itself that I’ve been railing against. It’s there being some kind of unified industry-wide physical format to deliver it that seems far-fetched at this point in time.

[mkozlows]

Originally Posted by Geoff D

it’s not the notion of the existence of 8K content itself that I’ve been railing against.

I'll rail against it. The only reason to make 8K content for streaming is pure vanity marketing, like from the "megapixel race" era of cameras, where the number kept going up and up, even when it actually hurt the image quality of the camera.

There are real limitations on streaming quality, but streamers could improve the quality without even thinking of 8K. Devote more bandwidth to lossless audio, devote more bandwidth to the video stream to reduce compression artifacts.

Those things would matter. Those things would be visible and audible. Streamers aren't doing them now, because they're too expensive.

Going forward, of course, we expect bandwidth to get cheaper over time. Streamers could use that lower cost of bandwidth to improve quality or to reduce costs. Looking at the financial situation of streamers and the degree to which their audience totally dgaf, my expectation is that cheaper bandwidth is going to mostly go to cost reduction for a good long while. (Heck, even in the audio market where bandwidth usage is much lower, most streaming is still lossy and lower-bitrate, with FLAC being a weird niche for Tidal/Qobuz and a sort of halo feature for Apple, and most people don't care at all.)

So given that we're in a world in which real, easily-apparent visible/audible changes are possible but not happening due to cost... what conceivable non-marketing reason is there to add in 8K resolution, which adds no actual normally-apparent quality improvement?

[Waboman]

Originally Posted by geoff d

that really is the point: When things are still making millions of dollars then companies will still keep them going, but at the same time i don't see where the impetus to make an 8k physical format will come from as the market continues to contract. If they could magic up an 8k disc tomorrow then they'd do it (and i'd buy it too!), but with all the development costs and cross-party support that it'd need from the industry - and at a time when almost every major studio has its own streaming platform - then it'd be like herding cats.

85z9k?

[Geoff D]

Originally Posted by mkozlows

I'll rail against it. The only reason to make 8K content for streaming is pure vanity marketing, like from the "megapixel race" era of cameras, where the number kept going up and up, even when it actually hurt the image quality of the camera.

There are real limitations on streaming quality, but streamers could improve the quality without even thinking of 8K. Devote more bandwidth to lossless audio, devote more bandwidth to the video stream to reduce compression artifacts.

Those things would matter. Those things would be visible and audible. Streamers aren't doing them now, because they're too expensive.

Going forward, of course, we expect bandwidth to get cheaper over time. Streamers could use that lower cost of bandwidth to improve quality or to reduce costs. Looking at the financial situation of streamers and the degree to which their audience totally dgaf, my expectation is that cheaper bandwidth is going to mostly go to cost reduction for a good long while. (Heck, even in the audio market where bandwidth usage is much lower, most streaming is still lossy and lower-bitrate, with FLAC being a weird niche for Tidal/Qobuz and a sort of halo feature for Apple, and most people don't care at all.)

So given that we're in a world in which real, easily-apparent visible/audible changes are possible but not happening due to cost... what conceivable non-marketing reason is there to add in 8K resolution, which adds no actual normally-apparent quality improvement?

I've literally made the case that it's offering very little. But it will happen nonetheless. It just won't happen on disc.

[mkozlows]

Originally Posted by Geoff D

I've literally made the case that it's offering very little. But it will happen nonetheless.

Yeah, I understand how much I'm not disagreeing with you. But the place where I am is that I don't think it will happen at all. Just as the megapixel camera race faded away, and now nobody has any idea how many megapixels a given camera has, I think the TV pixel race goes away rather than 8K becoming popular.

In fact, I think this is already happening. It's notable that 8K TVs aren't even that expensive anymore. You can buy an 8K TV at Best Buy for under $2K. But nobody cares, because everyone understands that other aspects of the TV are more important. All the energy and interest from reviewers and high-end buyers is in color volumes and black levels and peak brightness. 8K is an irrelevancy.

Right now, there's a small group of marketers and enthusiasts who don't realize that the megapixel race is over, and who are still trying to flog 8K in the way they flogged 4K. But this time around, it's not working, with 8K sales low and falling even lower; eventually, they're going to stop trying, and everyone will settle in to competing on some other easily marketable set of numbers (probably "peak nits" for the next few years).

To be very concrete about this, my prediction is that at any point in the next ten years, <5% of TVs will be 8K TVs, and <5% of content will be delivered to the viewer as 8K. I actually think those are super-conservative numbers, and that I could sub in 1% in those predictions and be safe, but hey, ten years is a long time, I'll give myself a cushion.

[Fendergopher]

Under $2K is not that expensive? lmao

[moreorless]

Originally Posted by mkozlows

I'll rail against it. The only reason to make 8K content for streaming is pure vanity marketing, like from the "megapixel race" era of cameras, where the number kept going up and up, even when it actually hurt the image quality of the camera.

There are real limitations on streaming quality, but streamers could improve the quality without even thinking of 8K. Devote more bandwidth to lossless audio, devote more bandwidth to the video stream to reduce compression artifacts.

Those things would matter. Those things would be visible and audible. Streamers aren't doing them now, because they're too expensive.

Going forward, of course, we expect bandwidth to get cheaper over time. Streamers could use that lower cost of bandwidth to improve quality or to reduce costs. Looking at the financial situation of streamers and the degree to which their audience totally dgaf, my expectation is that cheaper bandwidth is going to mostly go to cost reduction for a good long while. (Heck, even in the audio market where bandwidth usage is much lower, most streaming is still lossy and lower-bitrate, with FLAC being a weird niche for Tidal/Qobuz and a sort of halo feature for Apple, and most people don't care at all.)

So given that we're in a world in which real, easily-apparent visible/audible changes are possible but not happening due to cost... what conceivable non-marketing reason is there to add in 8K resolution, which adds no actual normally-apparent quality improvement?

To be fair as a professional photographer I would say its questionable whether the megapixel race has ever made image quality worse, on smaller sensors like those inphones its questionable whether its made it better but noise performance overall doesnt generally get worse as you up the resolution, noise at a pixel level may but thats balanced by their being more of them.

That said though I would argue that actually the "megapixel race" really cooled off a few years ago, it seems for more serious cameras that 24 megapixels become something of a standard and even higher resoluotion cameras havent been advancing that quickly anymore, my Nikon D850 from almost 5 years ago is still as high as the company has gone.

I think that is a good example that pushing certain headline specs will not automatically advance forever, you do potentially reach a point were the market decides it doesnt see the benefit in them.

[LordoftheRings]

I'd take an 8K display to show the highest resolution possible, even if the original is 1080p.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by mkozlows

I don't think it will happen at all.

If 8K TVs become as successful and commonplace as 4K tvs, unless there is a substantial boost in accompanying temporal resolution with motion pictures (unless you’re talking some nature documentary involving something like a frog or lizard not moving) it won’t be a watershed event for improving picture quality as that of increasing color fidelity -

DisplayWeek 2022 - 6P Color Highlights 4P Display and Ecosystem Solution - YouTube

The ^ Baylor University research team members kind of remind me and perhaps Kris Deering too - https://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread...ge#post8641670 of the UBC Brightside team back in the day with the development of the first HDR display.

8K tvs do do one thing with excellence though –
they provide great fodder for debate/speculation/opinion

[gkolb]

Originally Posted by Fendergopher

Under $2K is not that expensive? lmao

Our household (me) spent $3000+ in 2005 on a Sony 1080i tv, and $5000+ on a 2016 Sony 65 Z9D 4K backlight master drive tv (still going strong). For the right tv, $2K would only take a ten second decision. There are OLEDS by LG that can be had for under $2K. But that tv isn’t quite right for family viewing (burn-in being the concern with family members).

[Penton-Man]

To alleviate any legacy misgivings concerning the above mentioned 6P display endeavor, be aware that these proposed full color displays are not intended to require all new content be captured in order to show anything on them. In other words, a 6P display could show traditional material mastered for Rec. 2020 or Rec. 709 using conventional color management too.

Anyway, in the case for 6P displays showing newly captured (multi-primary color capability) content, I think it would indeed be display revolutionary and of interest to informed consumers just bringing on more of the cyan range - https://www.provideocoalition.com/yo...text=turquoise and who knows, maybe fully displaying the colors of old three-strip Technicolor movies for the more cinephile crowd?

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by gkolb

Our household (me) spent $3000+ in 2005 on a Sony 1080i tv....

We have a 2006 Sony KDS-R70XBR2 (70 incher) SXRD at the place we keep up in Big Bear. If memory serves, it cost at least 3K, maybe closer to 4K. The monster is still going strong to this day .

As I enjoy taking pics, e.g. – https://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread...d#post20215578, next time we get up the mountain, I’ll snap a picture of it. Firing her up is almost akin to the nostalgic feeling of kickstarting a Richman Metisse in the video you recently watched - https://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread...d#post20210758