We can make Blu-ray catch like a wildfire.

[Livelong420]

There have been many things bringing people into the blu fold. Disney's DVD/blu combo only option is an example I can think of. What else can we do?

1. Make single disc blus the same price as DVD. How long will they try to pretend blu-rays take more resources to produce?

2. Bring blus out earlier than any other format. I remember some DVDs coming out earlier than VHS.

3. Commercials STILL say coming to DVD. "And blu-ray" if we're lucky. Saying blu ray only at the end of trailers/commercials has got to help boost blu.

What can you think of that we could put into a letter to studios?

[Canvas of Flesh]

I agree with you on your first point. I would love to buy cheaper, single disc Blu-rays without the DVD or the Digital Copy. I hate paying extra for things I will absolutely never use.

[ZoetMB]

Originally Posted by Livelong420

There have been many things bringing people into the blu fold. Disney's DVD/blu combo only option is an example I can think of. What else can we do?

1. Make single disc blus the same price as DVD. How long will they try to pretend blu-rays take more resources to produce?

2. Bring blus out earlier than any other format. I remember some DVDs coming out earlier than VHS.

3. Commercials STILL say coming to DVD. "And blu-ray" if we're lucky. Saying blu ray only at the end of trailers/commercials has got to help boost blu.

What can you think of that we could put into a letter to studios?

You're ignoring the realities of the business. For one thing, DVD still outsells BD by a wide margin. While some individual titles do quite well on BD, overall, in the U.S., DVD is 75% of the business (I don't have my exact numbers in front of me) in dollars, which means it has an even bigger margin in units. There is no reason from a business standpoint to try and reduce DVD sales, especially if you expect DVDs to be priced the same as BDs. And BDs do take more resources to produce: they're generally remastered and replication costs are higher. If there's a restoration involved, costs are far higher.

The whole point of bringing out physical media so close to the theatrical window (a strategy that I happen to be opposed to) is so there is, in effect, one marketing campaign. They're not going to release Blus first because then they need multiple marketing campaigns.

I agree with you slightly on #3, except that just about every TV spot I've seen does say, "coming to Blu-ray and DVD".

[connect42]

Are you worried Blu-ray is going away? I am pretty sure the format is here to stay for quite awhile. I just don't think the studios need our help selling their product.

[Anthony P]

Originally Posted by ZoetMB

You're ignoring the realities of the business. For one thing, DVD still outsells BD by a wide margin. While some individual titles do quite well on BD, overall, in the U.S., DVD is 75% of the business (I don't have my exact numbers in front of me) in dollars, which means it has an even bigger margin in units. There is no reason from a business standpoint to try and reduce DVD sales, especially if you expect DVDs to be priced the same as BDs. And BDs do take more resources to produce: they're generally remastered and replication costs are higher. If there's a restoration involved, costs are far higher.

Even though I agree that it would be too early to stop DVD (which no one said). You are missing 4 key things
1) if you were a studio/store, would you rather sell one copy at 30$ or 10 copies at 3$. Your argument that the difference in units is bigger then $ is true but it is not necessarily a good thing for DVD

2) A studio might not want to lose the guy that buys the cheap DVD in the garbage bin, but will they all be lost sales if the garbage bin is lost? probably not, the guy will still want to watch films, if the guy prefers buying over renting/pirating then maybe he will buy less but he will most likely still buy, so it is not realy a scenario where dropping DVD would mean that market disappears completely, some of it will turn into BD sales. The question is how much and at what point in time it makes sense (i.e. the extra profit from extra BD sales will more than make up for the losses by people not buying)

3) like you kind of pointed out when it comes to new releases the ratios are much more even and often more BDs are sold. Now studios might be interested in liquidating old DVD stocks, since they have already been paid for, but the real question is "what is happening with new films?" Think about it, if you are a studio and releasing the new stuff does not make sense, will you still make DVDs so that you can sell them on DVD when they would be in garbage bin?

4) yes BD replication is slightly higher than DVD and obviously if a DVD master exists and you are assuming it is used to press disks while you assume that the BD needs work and a new master that you are adding to the difference in cost of re-releasing the film on both. But let's be honest, there is a reason I have paid for some BDs under 5$ while others over 30$, some you can find some titles priced the same even though one has multiple disks while others might only have 1. Or that VHS was always priced lower even though it did cost more to release a film on VHS then DVD. And that is because you are paying for the content and what the studio believes they can charge and not the disks/work done on them. Now I don’t think that we will ever see (generally speaking) BDs priced at the same price as DVD just because the studio likes selling the BD at a premium to the guy that wants the better quality (or the 3D or extra extras or fancier packaging) while selling something lesser to the guy that cares less for those benefits at a lower cost and still making a sale.

The whole point of bringing out physical media so close to the theatrical window (a strategy that I happen to be opposed to) is so there is, in effect, one marketing campaign. They're not going to release Blus first because then they need multiple marketing campaigns.

don't know if they will or won’t, but
1) Warner did decide to release HD-DVDs after the BD/DVD releases
2) Fox decided to make digital copies of some films available a bit earlier
3) Disney has already sold some BD combo packs before the DVD only pack.

so it is not that far fetched of an idea.

I agree with you slightly on #3, except that just about every TV spot I've seen does say, "coming to Blu-ray and DVD".

agree on that, maybe I tend to skip most ads, but I don't remember the last time I saw the DVD placed prominently in the ad.

[Livelong420]

Yay some responses! The first clarification I have is that I don't want blus released earlier. Just DVDs later.

Oh, and as far as production cost goes, I meant for new releases. Ones that don't necessarily need remasters.

[ZoetMB]

Originally Posted by Livelong420

Yay some responses! The first clarification I have is that I don't want blus released earlier. Just DVDs later.

Oh, and as far as production cost goes, I meant for new releases. Ones that don't necessarily need remasters.

You're still off-base. There is no reason for a studio to release a DVD later. Even if it did encourage a small set of consumers to move to BD, the increase in sales price is offset by the increased marketing cost of marketing the DVD separately.

And production costs are still higher for BDs. In many cases, the rights for BD have to be re-negotiated because the original contracts specifically stated "DVD" and not "any optical media" or "any consumer technology both that known today and that which may be invented in the future", which is what most new contracts say today. There is tremendous amount of expensive labor involved in this. I know this first-hand because I develop rights management systems for the media industry.

Too many people look at this from a fan-boy perspective and not from a business perspective. Just because you're anal-compulsive and only want the format to exist that you prefer does not make a business case. DVD will disappear when it stops selling just as vinyl LPs pretty much disappeared when they stopped selling (although there's been a recent slight revival).

Through August 18th in the United States, sales of BD have been about $1.06 billion and sales of DVD have been $3.4 billion. Studios are not going to take the risk of those DVD sales converting to lower margin download/streaming sales (or disappearing completely) just because BD happens to be a "better" format to people like you and I.

The current strategy of the studios is to offer content in all media, whether that's broadcast, streaming, downloading, theatrical, DVD and BD and the industry is also heading (although I personally think this is a bad idea) to day-and-date release for everything. It wasn't that long ago that you didn't see a movie in a consumer format until a year after theatrical release.

While some people in this economy are doing very well and can afford to spend big $ buying BD titles, the masses aren't doing so well and they couldn't care less about PQ and AQ anyway, so DVD, especially at the incredibly low prices that catalog titles sell for today, are perfectly fine with them. Do you know how many people still watch SD channels on their HD TVs because they're used to tuning in the SD channel numbers and they don't really understand the difference?

I think we'll have more of a transition when the hardware manufacturers stop making DVD-only players. I think the prices of BD players have fallen enough that this is possible. However, even in that scenario, there will still be plenty of Chinese-made DVD players and the Wal-Marts, K-Marts and Targets of the world will continue to sell them. To the Wal-Mart shopper, $25 still looks better than $80.

[Steedeel]

it does not help that there seems to be more posts about digital copy and ultraviolet than actual bluray posts these days. it is the reason i only visit the forum a couple of times per month these days.

[octagon]

Originally Posted by ZoetMB

Too many people look at this from a fan-boy perspective and not from a business perspective. Just because you're anal-compulsive and only want the format to exist that you prefer does not make a business case. DVD will disappear when it stops selling just as vinyl LPs pretty much disappeared when they stopped selling (although there's been a recent slight revival).

Yup, this is exactly where these threads always lose me.

Why in the world would I care if somebody else wants to buy a DVD or if companies want to sell him one?

I'm fairly apathetic about most of the stuff that affects me. The stuff that doesn't affect me?

[Steedeel]

Originally Posted by octagon

Yup, this is exactly where these threads always lose me.

Why in the world would I care if somebody else wants to buy a DVD or if companies want to sell him one?

I'm fairly apathetic about most of the stuff that affects me. The stuff that doesn't affect me?

What the sheep do, normally affects the individual. Just look at the MP3 generation. Some people listening to music at 128 bit rates. Now people talk about 320 bit rates as if that is great quality.

If enough people don't buy into bluray, eventually it is going to die faster than dvd. That directly affects me as i love my blurays.

[krazeyeyez]

Originally Posted by Steedeel

What the sheep do, normally affects the individual. Just look at the MP3 generation. Some people listening to music at 128 bit rates. Now people talk about 320 bit rates as if that is great quality.

If enough people don't buy into bluray, eventually it is going to die faster than dvd. That directly affects me as i love my blurays.

Yet we still have cd and vinyl releases on mass and to lesser extent sacd, with blu-ray audio coming down the pipeline. Not to mention the growing number of FLAC and ALAC when it comes to MP3 players. Just because some don't make media formats and bit rates etc.. a focal point of their lives does not mean we who do will get the short end of the stick.

[Dusso Janladde]

It will take something drastic, such as a major, highly-anticipated release (I'm talking Avatar-caliber) coming out on BD only, no DVD.

[DealsR4theDevil]

Blu-ray and DVD will probably co-exist until the next format ... or longer. We all know 4K is coming, hard to think about Blu-ray as the future. I love it for the time being though.

[Livelong420]

Originally Posted by Dusso Janladde

It will take something drastic, such as a major, highly-anticipated release (I'm talking Avatar-caliber) coming out on BD only, no DVD.

And it wouldn't be hard to do that. Then, release the DVD a month later. It would sway some people.

[DealsR4theDevil]

Originally Posted by Livelong420

And it wouldn't be hard to do that. Then, release the DVD a month later. It would sway some people.

There is a similar strategy of delaying rentals, dont know if that has worked to dramatically increase sales. I personally find it annoying and it doesnt alter my buying habits.

I would also imagine there are a great many people who want blu-ray but cant afford it. I could see more of a push in a different economy.

[TripleHBK]

Originally Posted by DealsR4theDevil

Blu-ray and DVD will probably co-exist until the next format ... or longer. We all know 4K is coming, hard to think about Blu-ray as the future. I love it for the time being though.

4k is a pipe dream at best. While I do expect it at some point, I can all but confirm that it will run on a multi-layer Blu Ray disk. By the time it's ready for market it's also highly likely that we'll be a generation or 2 into players that either already have the feature available for up-scaling purposes, or will have the option of being upgraded via firmware to use it. On top of that we already are struggling to get older films remastered and placed onto Blu, why would a studio go back and do it all over again to remaster in 4k? I have little doubt that Disney will do it because of their artificial market they create by utilizing mark-ups and artificial shortages, and it wouldn't surprise me if new films were potentially released in 4k (for a HUGE markup) but outside of a few guaranteed big sellers (Star Wars for example) I just don't see the purpose/profitability in going 4k. It's already established that a screen size MINIMUM of 80 inches is required to even begin to see the difference between 2k and 4k, and while I know many of us have screens upwards of 120 inches, I'd wager that people with screen sizes that large represent less then 10% of the total market. (I'd be shocked if it's more then 5% myself).

My point in all of this is that Blu Ray isn't going anywhere. It's going to remain the most commercially viable format for a very very long time. 4k will likely trickle out in much the same fashion 3D is now, but it will not replace it, instead being more of a niche format then a truly universally accepted one.

[Livelong420]

I think a lot of people have a blu-ray player, but still buy new movies on DVD. And then, there's the digital downloads.

[Neild]

Originally Posted by ZoetMB

Through August 18th in the United States, sales of BD have been about $1.06 billion and sales of DVD have been $3.4 billion.

That is fascinating... are those numbers from home media magazine or something?

My own impression from walking around stores doesn't match. It seems like they have more blu-ray product and substantially more blu-ray going through the cash register. And that even if unit sales are similar, the higher unit price for blu-ray should show a much closer race than $3.40 billion versus $1.06 billion would suggest.

I decided to do a mini survey myself from Rentrak sales week of Sep 23, picking a bundle of 4 newer 'top 10' releases from both formats:

Blu-ray sales ($13.6 million)
---------------
Beverly Hills Chihuahua 3 $2,072,805
The Cabin in the Woods $4,534,824
The Hunger Games$1,321,677
Snow White and the Huntsman $5,664,830

DVD sales ($15 million)
----------------------
Beverly Hills Chihuahua 3 $4,956,459
The Cabin in the Woods $2,914,800
The Hunger Games $2,363,710
Snow White and the Huntsman $4,835,330

Looks like they are close right? But when you also include the many catalog re-releases where blu-ray sales are more compelling than DVD, there's no comparison.

In the sample week, that would adds another $19.5 million to blu-ray just for Indiana Jones/Titanic, compared to just $1.4 million for DVD (Titanic)

I know different numbers can say different things, but how could two tests show such radically different stories?

[Anthony P]

Originally Posted by krazeyeyez

Yet we still have cd and vinyl releases on mass and to lesser extent sacd, with blu-ray audio coming down the pipeline. Not to mention the growing number of FLAC and ALAC when it comes to MP3 players. Just because some don't make media formats and bit rates etc.. a focal point of their lives does not mean we who do will get the short end of the stick.

exactly I don't understand why it is so hard to understand, luxury sport cars and million dollar homes exist even though the sheep can't afford them, LD lasted until DVD even though the sheep were OK with VHS...... Why can't people grasp the simple notion that a market for quality can exist without the masses. The masses can support and help a bad technology but they can't kill a good one. BD will exist at least until the day when the people that want high quality decide there is something that offers higher quality.

[Anthony P]

Originally Posted by DealsR4theDevil

I would also imagine there are a great many people who want blu-ray but cant afford it. I could see more of a push in a different economy.

I don't know, there will always be some people that can't afford stuff but with being able to find players at under 50$ and the small difference in price between new titles on BD and DVD I don't see cost being an issue for most. I think ignorance is the biggest issue.