Please Bring South Park.........

[gamer4eva]

I just found out that paramount are the distributors of South Park so i just wanna say please bring south park as the first animated series to Blu-Ray i can't watch it anymore at 576p PLEASEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

[Frode]

Of all the things to ask for...

I seriously doubt SP was animated with HD in mind. Backgrounds aren't exactly detailed enough for it, and it's not cel animated. At best you'd get some sharper line work, but that's it. You might even have issues with aliasing along diagonal lines. Just get the DVDs and upconvert instead IMO.

[dakota81]

Not going to like the news:
http://www.comedycentral.com/press/p..._highdef.jhtml

[Leapold BUTTERS]

I had this episode on my 360 in HD. It looked way better lol, for a paper cut out show. I agree though, i would love to see it on HD DVD or Blu-Ray.

[Stef Nighthawk]

I would be happy if they would release seasons 5 - 10 on DVD. My SP collection only goes to 4. Never saw any DVDs for the other seasons. Mind you that I like a dutch subtitled collection.

PS. I'm speaking of EU releases.

[groovyone]

I have seasons 1-9 on DVD. I love them, but I think it would be far down my list of DVDs to upgrade to Blu.

[AlaskaDon]

Originally Posted by dakota81

Not going to like the news:
http://www.comedycentral.com/press/p..._highdef.jhtml

I've seen those free HD-DVD's in Best Buy so figured that Comedy Central was in the HD-DVD camp. Not really a big deal to me as I have seasons 1-9 already and wouldn't consider replacing them with BD's anyway. The same goes for Family Guy. I love both shows but couldn't see the improvement in PQ/SQ being worth what it would cost to replace them.

[Frode]

Originally Posted by dakota81

Not going to like the news:
http://www.comedycentral.com/press/p..._highdef.jhtml

Right, but southpark is hitting its 11th season now. You have to remember at what stage animation production for TV was 10-11 years ago - I don't think most of the show was made with HD in mind. The movie should "work" fine as well as newer eps, but the earlier ones probably won't. Here's some detail on what they actually do:

http://www.apple.com/pro/profiles/southpark/

[u_nick]

I think the majority of SouthPark has been animated on a computer, so I bet the source material would look a ton better in HD than what we get in a TV broadcast.

I saw the HD 360 episode too, and I loved how solid and crisp everything looked.

[atdm71]

What about Team America? -- it'd be pretty nice to have that on Blu-Ray...

[WriteSimply]

I think the only South Park episode that was actually done with paper cuts was the Christmas present video Parker and Stone was commissioned to do.

After that, it was all done on Alias Wavefront for lighting, Alias PowerAnimator for animation, with character building in Corel Draw and partial set decor in Photoshop. Of course, this was back when they started. They could have changed their MO now.

Link to the South Park article.


fuad

[buckshot]

Originally Posted by WriteSimply

I think the only South Park episode that was actually done with paper cuts was the Christmas present video Parker and Stone was commissioned to do.

After that, it was all done on Alias Wavefront for lighting, Alias PowerAnimator for animation, with character building in Corel Draw and partial set decor in Photoshop. Of course, this was back when they started. They could have changed their MO now.

Link to the South Park article.


fuad

really I thought the first episode ''cartman gets and anal probe'' was done with cutouts as well? because it has such a different look to it than any of the other episodes.

[PeterTHX]

Originally Posted by buckshot

really I thought the first episode ''cartman gets and anal probe'' was done with cutouts as well? because it has such a different look to it than any of the other episodes.

Yes, the pilot was done with construction paper as well. They switched to computer once they realized even with a crew they could never do a TV show that way (plus the fact that the computer could do the job just as well in the first place).

They riffed on this when they had the whole Special Edition parody thing (Star Wars, ET).

In any case, this is one thing where DVD is definitely good enough. The colors aren't going to get any better. It isn't widescreen. There is no additional textures or dimensionality to be gained. The only advantage to having it on BD would be having all the episodes of a season or even two seasons on a single disc.

[WriteSimply]

Originally Posted by PeterTHX

Yes, the pilot was done with construction paper as well.

I didn't know that.

In any case, this is one thing where DVD is definitely good enough. The colors aren't going to get any better. It isn't widescreen. There is no additional textures or dimensionality to be gained. The only advantage to having it on BD would be having all the episodes of a season or even two seasons on a single disc.

IF they had kept the animation files, they could re-render the episodes in widescreen. They could also enhance the fidelity of the textures.


fuad

[gamer4eva]

i know aye the HD episode of good times with weapons looked so good on my 360 only on 720p they should take out like a best of south park with 5 disks or something which has the funniest episodes on HD that'll be a good idea if not all the seasons

[Frode]

Originally Posted by WriteSimply

I didn't know that.

IF they had kept the animation files, they could re-render the episodes in widescreen. They could also enhance the fidelity of the textures.


fuad

Yeah they could and would have to for a HD release. The working resolution of the resulting files right now would not give good HD results. This is from a different show, but should give you an idea of the issues with computer drawn animation if shown in HD and not designed for it in the first place:

http://img120.imageshack.us/img120/7947/rah03hdjx0.png

[WriteSimply]

Originally Posted by Frode

This is from a different show, but should give you an idea of the issues with computer drawn animation if shown in HD and not designed for it in the first place:

That is really sloppy work.


fuad

[Resseh]

I'd love to see south park on BR. It would be great if they could fit all the episodes per season on 1 disk with new commentarys too. Their commentaries on films such as Orgazmo or canibal the musical are sometimes funnier than their film

[Frode]

It's not so much sloppy work as it's from doing straight digital 2D animation. The shot above is from the HD-DVD version of Raxhephon the movie, and thus represents pretty much the original working resolution they made it in. When it gets converted to SD resolution it'll look like this:

http://img120.imageshack.us/img120/9677/rah03dvdpr0.png

Note that this has been scaled up so you can compare the two directly, but the blurring should give you an idea. I think that in addition to the resize it's been run through a filter to reduce the aliasing, but some of it is still there if you look closely.

It just illustrates how one shouldn't assume that digital 2d animation will handle the transition to HD painlessly, especially if originally targeted at SD. Cel animation is different as it's painted on acetate sheets which are then shot on film, and thus gain all the benefits that hi-def can provide.

[PeterTHX]

Not to mention at times "South Park" is barely finished on time. They'll wrap it up early Wednesday morning and it'll be on the air that night. Thank goodness for the internet, eh Trey?