8K is available yet 4K hangs on like a disease that killed someone dear to you. Why?

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

Which behooves making the point that despite all the hoopla in the blogger press about modern digital cameras having 14 or more f-stops of dynamic range and capable of capturing a wider color gamut than P3, I can not overemphasize the relatively unknown (by Tech writers) significance as to the value of shooting in RAW and from there….

going thru a high quality workflow (i.e. openEXR with 16bit float) and ending in a 16bit master….rather than the imagery being truncated down to a lesser quality file format which is commonly done in many productions, i.e. they don’t harvest all the possible range of the camera recording because it is then squished down by the post house (often to a 10-bit DPX type file) in order to become more bandwidth friendly.

And the same best practices *16bit* concept applies not only to digital acquisition, DI workflow and finishing (masters) but also to the scanning of modern motion pictures which are still shot on film (Kodak Vision3 stock).

In other words, as I mentioned to fellow Blu-ray.com member singhr almost a year ago now (in a post reassuring him that the BT.2020 color primaries would be included in the Ultra HD Blu-ray spec), 4K 16bit scans are necessary to capture all the color fidelity and dynamic range of modern motion pictures that are shot on film. Is this being done by every producer? No. For example, even for some blockbusters (e.g. Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation), the Vision3 was scanned to 10bit DPX.

[Spike M.]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

And the same best practices *16bit* concept applies not only to digital acquisition, DI workflow and finishing (masters) but also to the scanning of modern motion pictures which are still shot on film (Kodak Vision3 stock).

In other words, as I mentioned to fellow Blu-ray.com member singhr almost a year ago now (in a post reassuring him that the BT.2020 color primaries would be included in the Ultra HD Blu-ray spec), 4K 16bit scans are necessary to capture all the color fidelity and dynamic range of modern motion pictures that are shot on film. Is this being done by every producer? No. For example, even for some blockbusters (e.g. Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation), the Vision3 was scanned to 10bit DPX.

The IMAX DCP seemed particularly horrible. Certain shots literally looked like a pixelated Youtube clip. I attributed it to IMAX overcompensating with the sharpness, but if they're just using the same pre-set DNR settings as they do with everything (which they said as much in one of their videos), is it possible that the particularly "overcooked" movies are just a by-product of IMAX getting a 10 bit DPX?

What site can I use to check and see if a particular movie is 10 or 16 bit?

[blonde_devil]

Why is every format suddenly some disease when a new format is available? Want to know why 4K is still around? Because it is cheaper than 8K. That's it. Same reason why dvd stays around - when a dvd is $15 and a blu is $20-25, lots of people would rather save money and buy the dvd. But not everyone will so they give an option and maximize profits. Same here. It is cheaper to do 4K than 8K so they use it but they will release odds and ends of 8K at crazy prices to get those people who need to be the first to have anything. It is all about maximum profit. If they wanted the best available to be the standard, they could just quit making the "inferior" format but they don't. Question shouldn't be why it hangs on, question should be why are studios so slow to adapt a new standard that they know is coming.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Spike M.

The IMAX DCP seemed particularly horrible. Certain shots literally looked like a pixelated Youtube clip. I attributed it to IMAX overcompensating with the sharpness, but if they're just using the same pre-set DNR settings as they do with everything (which they said as much in one of their videos), is it possible that the particularly "overcooked" movies are just a by-product of IMAX getting a 10 bit DPX?

No, I’d rack up your poor IMAX experience to something else because 10bit DPX workflows and masters are rather still the industry norm, just like 2K masters are (as opposed to 4K masters for modern day feature films). Where you’ll see 16bit DPX put 10bit DPX source/workflow/master to visual shame is more with viewing HDR versions of the movie….if indeed the filmmaker desired to take advantage of the full potential of his camera acquisition to begin with.

Originally Posted by Spike M.

What site can I use to check and see if a particular movie is 10 or 16 bit?

You mean like imdb’s Tech Specs category? - As far as I know there is none….sorta like no facility will inform a list-like site if they can do the color grade for their motion picture in real time at that level of precision (16bit OpenEXR) in their DI theater without the colorist and filmmaker initiating bandwidth hitches during the sessions. Most shops are still designed for 10bit DPX daily project work .

[Spike M.]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

No, I’d rack up your poor IMAX experience to something else because 10bit DPX workflows and masters are rather still the industry norm, just like 2K masters are (as opposed to 4K masters for modern day feature films). Where you’ll see 16bit DPX put 10bit DPX source/workflow/master to visual shame is more with viewing HDR versions of the movie….if indeed the filmmaker desired to take advantage of the full potential of his camera acquisition to begin with.

You mean like imdb’s Tech Specs category? - As far as I know there is none….sorta like no facility will inform a list-like site if they can do the color grade for their motion picture in real time at that level of precision (16bit OpenEXR) in their DI theater without the colorist and filmmaker initiating bandwidth hitches during the sessions. Most shops are still designed for 10bit DPX daily project work .

How much would a filmmaker be able to push the file in post before a 10 bit DPX would start to become a hinderance? Isn't it possible that IMAX's DNR, which as I understand it automatically tackles grain and tries to get rid of it on a image to image basis, could panic at the particularly grainy photography of M:I5 and just push certain shots past the point of acceptability as far as sharpening and de-graining are concerned? Or it could be that the colorist sharpened these shots since they were out of focus, and then IMAX ran their special sauce program over it. I'm interested because as a budding filmmaker, the freedom I have with a Sony A6000 feels amazing over what I had with a T2i, so I'm curious if once you hit the big boy camera's whether or not 10 bit gives the filmmakers a comfortable amount of room to play with.

I'm lost on why a digital shoot like Ant-Man or Guardian's would look atrocious, though. Could just be because the only IMAX around me has the seats awkwardly close to the 40x60 screen. The pixelation is worse than any other D-IMAX I've been to, including the Metreon in San Fran or an equally large screen in Portland.

[Kris Deering]

Originally Posted by Spike M.

How much would a filmmaker be able to push the file in post before a 10 bit DPX would start to become a hinderance? Isn't it possible that IMAX's DNR, which as I understand it automatically tackles grain and tries to get rid of it on a image to image basis, could panic at the particularly grainy photography of M:I5 and just push certain shots past the point of acceptability as far as sharpening and de-graining are concerned? Or it could be that the colorist sharpened these shots since they were out of focus, and then IMAX ran their special sauce program over it. I'm interested because as a budding filmmaker, the freedom I have with a Sony A6000 feels amazing over what I had with a T2i, so I'm curious if once you hit the big boy camera's whether or not 10 bit gives the filmmakers a comfortable amount of room to play with.

I'm lost on why a digital shoot like Ant-Man or Guardian's would look atrocious, though. Could just be because the only IMAX around me has the seats awkwardly close to the 40x60 screen. The pixelation is worse than any other D-IMAX I've been to, including the Metreon in San Fran or an equally large screen in Portland.

Interesting you say this. Saw Ant Man at the IMAX in Seattle to try their new projector. Looked awful. Like a TV with all the enhancements on max. Saw the 2D trailer for the new MI movie before it and it looked awful as well prompting me to skip it there and see it with friends at the Cinerama instead. Picture looked great there (as did the trailers of it that I saw before). I can't remember the last time I was impressed with an IMAX showing honestly. Maybe THe Dark Knight in true 70mm??

[Spike M.]

Originally Posted by Kris Deering

Interesting you say this. Saw Ant Man at the IMAX in Seattle to try their new projector. Looked awful. Like a TV with all the enhancements on max. Saw the 2D trailer for the new MI movie before it and it looked awful as well prompting me to skip it there and see it with friends at the Cinerama instead. Picture looked great there (as did the trailers of it that I saw before). I can't remember the last time I was impressed with an IMAX showing honestly. Maybe THe Dark Knight in true 70mm??

To be fair, your alternative is tied for second as the widest screen in the country... everyone else's is a random screen that may or may be a decent size and may or may not have a decent projection system.

I'm sort of torn on Spectre. The significantly bigger 2K IMAX is closer than the 4K, decent sized, XD, but part of me feels like putting an extra 40 minutes of travel into a smaller screen and less "dominate" sound system is silly.

[DRC72]

Originally Posted by BluBonnet

So what's going to come after 8k - 12k or 16k?

More than likely i'll still be enjoying my 2k 1080p plasma tv when 100k comes out.

[steve1971]

Originally Posted by DRC72

More than likely i'll still be enjoying my 2k 1080p plasma tv when 100k comes out.

I agree with you DRC72. I will also be still enjoying my 1080p Sony 55W900A when 100K comes out. Hell I'm still enjoying it while you have 4K out there. 4K, 8K, 100K I dont care because I aint buying into it.

[Goremeister100]

Originally Posted by steve1971

I agree with you DRC72. I will also be still enjoying my 1080p Sony 55W900A when 100K comes out. Hell I'm still enjoying it while you have 4K out there. 4K, 8K, 100K I dont care because I aint buying into it.

That's what everyone says in the beginning

[DRC72]

Originally Posted by Goremeister100

That's what everyone says in the beginning

I'm more than happy with my 1080p plasma. The only time I'll upgrade to 4K is when my plasma TV dies. Until then I have no desire for 4K, 8k, 20k, as long as I feel oK.

[steve1971]

Originally Posted by Goremeister100

That's what everyone says in the beginning

Well that's what "everyone" say's in the begining yes but I'm not just one of those "other's" who are so impressed with 4K that I find it better then 1080p and I dont. So while everyone is jumping on the hype ship that is 4K I'll be more then happy to stay with my Sony 1080p Sony 55W900A until it dies. After that happen's then its onto another tv and I'm sure it will be 4K BUT more then likely for me it will be a full blown projection system in 4K. But who knows if 4K will even be around when that day comes? But for now and for the forseeable future I aint budging one bit.

[dvdmike]

All those under 100 70mm films will look great on repeat......

[Shadowself]

Originally Posted by Blu-ray Neo

There will come a time when it will be pointless to upgrade. I'm not sure about the exact resolution, but the human eye can only see so much.

18X? 32K? What is the limit?

While I whole heartedly agree that this is a ridiculous thread as the 4320p variant of UHDTV will not be commonly, publicly available for five years or more, most people would be surprised at the numbers for the theoretical maximum of what can really be perceived by human eyesight.

For the average person with good vision (or properly and fully corrected vision) the horizontal field of view that can be comfortably watched is 90 to 120 degrees [openly debated within that range as to what can *comfortably* be watched]. This is NOT what can be seen as for some people that's well over 170 degrees. So let's stick with 90 degrees as a comfortable baseline.

Each individual sensor in the average eye subtends about an average of one arc second of angular field of view in the densest area of the eye. In the *most simplistic sense* you can think of absolute, static resolution of one arc minute. So that's a resolving capability of about 60 per degree. Combine the two and you get a total, horizontal resolving rate of about 5,400 individual points that the human vision can see IF EVERYTHING WERE STATIC.

Fortunately for humans, things are NOT static. The human eyes constantly move. You can think of it as the eyes dithering and the human brain doing a continuous set of "super resolution" processes on that constantly changing imagery to interpolate between that static image resolving power. And, to complicate things further, some people's brains do a better job than others. So, the amount of enhancement varies from person to person. But there have been many studies over the past 40+ years that show people can PERCIEVE imagery changes as small as 1/10 of that one arc minute static sensor-object figure of merit (and in some specific situations some people can perceive changes as small as 1/20 rather than 1/10). So what people can perceive is that 5,400 times another factor of 10 or 54,000. (Note, this is perceived changes in the imagery. It is not actually being able to SEE 54,000 individual pixels in a horizontal line.)

So what's the limit? Somewhere around 54,000 by about 30,000 pixels. Beyond that, no matter what you do the average person with good vision will not be able to perceive any difference.

Alternatively, if you go to the real extremes of 120 degrees of comfortable viewing angle and 1/20 enhancement you get in the neighborhood of 144,000 by 80,000 pixels. At such a pixels count, except for the fact that a painting is really three dimensional (the paint does not dry 100% flat) you'd never be able to tell that such an image was not a real painting by just looking at it.

Note, this whole discussion has not mentioned pixel size, pixels per inch, viewing distance, or anything similar. All of those things will just scale. The smaller (larger) the image the closer (farther) you need to be to get the same angular resolution effect.

[Shadowself]

Originally Posted by steve1971

Well that's what "everyone" say's in the begining yes but I'm not just one of those "other's" who are so impressed with 4K that I find it better then 1080p and I dont. So while everyone is jumping on the hype ship that is 4K I'll be more then happy to stay with my Sony 1080p Sony 55W900A until it dies. After that happen's then its onto another tv and I'm sure it will be 4K BUT more then likely for me it will be a full blown projection system in 4K. But who knows if 4K will even be around when that day comes? But for now and for the forseeable future I aint budging one bit.

Part of the problem is that the UHDTV spec is slowly rolling out in the industry. (The spec if finalized, but industry initially only implemented part of the spec, e.g., the pixel count, and will over the next couple of years finally implement the full spec for the entire home video chain.) The full, best variant of 2160p will have a vastly increased dynamic range in brightness and color space and a higher frame rate. Once imagery is recorded (sourced) at those specs and delivered to your TV at those specs then you'll easily be able to see a difference between 1080p HDTV and 2160p UHDTV. If you can't, you'll likely need to get your vision checked.

[Goremeister100]

Originally Posted by Shadowself

Once imagery is recorded (sourced) at those specs and delivered to your TV at those specs then you'll easily be able to see a difference between 1080p HDTV and 2160p UHDTV. If you can't, you'll likely need to get your vision checked.

Maybe many of us will see the difference but we just won't care. We aren't talking a leap in quality like VHS to blu-ray after all. Remember that many people are still happy with dvds

[Auditor55]

Originally Posted by Shadowself

Part of the problem is that the UHDTV spec is slowly rolling out in the industry. (The spec if finalized, but industry initially only implemented part of the spec, e.g., the pixel count, and will over the next couple of years finally implement the full spec for the entire home video chain.) The full, best variant of 2160p will have a vastly increased dynamic range in brightness and color space and a higher frame rate. Once imagery is recorded (sourced) at those specs and delivered to your TV at those specs then you'll easily be able to see a difference between 1080p HDTV and 2160p UHDTV. If you can't, you'll likely need to get your vision checked.

It all depends on the size of your screen and your seating distance. You're not going to see the difference between 1080p and 4K if you're sitting 9 feet from a 65 inch set, human eyesight is limited.

Please watch this video, Joe Kane is a highly respected expert on this topic, he owns an 85 inch 4K set and testifies that he can't make out the difference in resolution. At around the 4:00 market of this video is shown a picture of his room and his 85 inch 4K set and his seating position.

Home Theater Geeks 180: Ultimate Ultra High Definition - YouTube

[Auditor55]

As far as 8K is concerned, its coming. 4K is pretty much useless, however 4K TV is a marketing tour de force. They will market 8K as a must have item and we will be convinced, not matter what science shows, we will claim we're not subjected to it.

[spectre08]

Originally Posted by Auditor55

As far as 8K is concerned, its coming. 4K is pretty much useless, however 4K TV is a marketing tour de force. They will market 8K as a must have item and we will be convinced, not matter what science shows, we will claim we're not subjected to it.

who pays you to post?

[bruceames]

Originally Posted by Auditor55

As far as 8K is concerned, its coming. 4K is pretty much useless, however 4K TV is a marketing tour de force. They will market 8K as a must have item and we will be convinced, not matter what science shows, we will claim we're not subjected to it.

Useless to who? Do you draw that conclusion just because Joe Kane can't see the difference? I certainly can, so it's not useless to me (and my tv is "only" 65", not 85"). Maybe Joe needs to get his eyes checked.