Of course, I only had a few hours before LOST last night to investigate the LOTR blu-ray discs
, but I managed to satisfy my curiosity about what all the fuss is about.
I'll start off by doing what *everyone* (cough) should be doing when sharing their video impressions
and describe my viewing environment so folks will have a clue as how to understand where my impressions are coming from. I'm watching the image projected from my JVC RS2 (clone, I have the FPJ1 version) which is a full 1080p LCOS front projector with the image on a 106" hipower screen. I view from about 1.5 screen-widths away... basically about 12 feet back from the 8 foot wide screen. My projector has very good convergence for a 3-chip LCOS and resolves every detail in the 1080p signal (was definitely an eye-opener when I upgraded to this new machine from my older HD2K) and from the 1.5 screen width most mastering/disc-related video anamolies that are really there do reveal themselves.
So what's the verdict?
I'll make OVN a happy camper by saying right off the bat that Fellowship is not as bad as I had expected.
Having said that, I'll emphasize that given the superior detail in the HDTV encode screen captures, this image might have presented more real visible picture detail with more careful mastering.
Having said that... here are my detailed impressions...
Without out a doubt, *most* of the problems with Fellowship are from the source DI and stem from the production of the original film which was a composite of 2K scans and interwoven CGI. Most of us already knew that. But even watching a large-image wide-angle via front projection, my distinct impression during the 45 minutes I sampled (every scene) was that this blu-ray disc is light-years, let me repeat, LIGHT YEARS superior to the DVD and in every way is a bonifide "high definition experience". The scenes in the shire and at Rivendale that are overly soft and look processed *also* looked that way in the theater. And to that point, this blu-ray disc BLOWS AWAY the theatrical prints I saw projected at multiple movie houses.
The image does appear more "flat" with less depth in most scenes than the later 2 films, but this is not the fault of DNR, that's the production of the original feature (which perhaps could be improved with a new telecine and recomposition should WB ever want to spend the $$). As far as fine detail, in my opinion most detail is quite good given the source material and I'm releived that the perception of detail doesn't seem to be *too* hampered by DNR for the most part. I say this because from 1.5 screen widths I didn't notice too much of the typical "crawlie" wax I usually see from DNR... and in the shots that looked heavily processed (Rivendale), I remember that same strange foggy/waxy look in the theater (One thing we should consider is that it's possible that some of these soft scenes were *meant* to be soft... to create a more lush, fairy-tale effect for the Shire and Rivendale, and so even new scanning and recomposition for DI might still leave some scenes being obviously softer than others). Given the absence of grain in some scenes, and given the increased picture detail seen in the HDTV encode captures, I do believe that some detail we might have otherwise seen is lost, but I think that this loss is slight. That doesn't mean it's good that it's gone, just that the negative effects are minimal.
Bottom line is that given how far superior these discs are not only to the DVD, but also to the theatrical projections, I'm glad to have them in my collection. At the same time, since the HDTV encode does show more real picture detail, it's a shame that WB didn't manage to tweak their mastering efforts just a touch to preserve that last level of detail. However, the vast majority of image softness and digital processing (I'd say 90%) is simply the fault of the original DI, which was the "studio master tape" if you will that Jackson and his crew assembled and gave their blessing... akin to a Beetles master tape that has hiss and a distortion from mutiple track overlays, but is "the master" that the artists created nevertheless. My hope is that with the EE version that Jackson and/or some contingent of the original team will revisit the original 35mm film elements and do new 4K scans and regenerate the CGI and do a new assembly for a new DI. That would obviously be a stunning improvement. But given the appearance, of the original DI, the Fellowship Blu-ray comes very close (though even a slight reduction in detail as demonstrated by the HDTV encode should warrant some criticism for WB studios).
This disc comes close enough to the original DI that I can enjoy it, but I hope for something better in the future with the EE.
By the way, I will add one thing about "screen captures" that I haven't seen discussed too much: DNR tends to be most destructive during motion when the eye is less sensitive to the effects partly because of the 24 fps motion judder blurring of our film medium. When things slow down, the detail loss from DNR subsides (though never totally goes away). This can be tricky because it means that if a screen-shot is taken from a pan or moving image, it's likely to suggest a more severe detail loss from DNR than what your brain will really perceive when the picture is in play, so while one can objectively prove that detail loss exists by screen-shot comparisons, it doesn't mean that what you see in the still shots will necessarily be reflected 1-for-1 in what you see when the image is in motion. Now, I haven't see the HDTV encode in play on my new projector so I can't attest one way or the other to how this blu-ray compares when actually viewing, but I throw that out as food for thought.
I also briefly sampled scenes from the other two films and noted immediately that the sense of 3-dimensionality and image depth/clarity was improved, or more consistent from scene to scene, as Fellowship varies from soft/processed scenes to those with the same level of depth and clarity as seen in the later 2 films.
Oh, and yes, the lossless audio is absolutely stellar. Anyone thinking that DVD's lossy audio was "good enough" needs to have their hearing checked if they can't immediately detect the *dramatic* improvement with the lossless audio quality on this set.
All countries
Argentina
Austria
Belgium
Brazil
Bulgaria
Chile
China
Colombia
Cyprus
Czech Republic
Estonia
Denmark
Finland
Greece
Hong Kong
Hungary
Iceland
Indonesia
Ireland
Israel
India
Latvia
Lithuania
Malaysia
New Zealand
Norway
Philippines
Poland
Portugal
Romania
Russia
Singapore
South Africa
South Korea
Sweden
Switzerland
Taiwan
Thailand
Turkey
Ukraine
United Arab Emirates
There is a reason these films were all nominated for their sound. 
Linear Mode
