"Club Penton" - Ask questions to Hollywood insider "Penton-Man"

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Doctorossi

That's a bit of a deep-end introduction! So, were those 4cm road-course extensions or 40cm straight-line extensions?

If memory serves, I believe that the DT-1 was one of the first (if not the first?, Kris Deering or someone else here also owned one back in the day) ‘dual purpose’ (as it came road licensable with lights and exhaust) 250cc. 2-stroke that Yamaha manufactured and could truly be considered to be ‘dirt’ worthy and actually quite competitive back in the day….especially, after some modifications.

I’m pretty sure that Robert Redford raced one in Little Fauss Big Halsy when he wasn’t impressing the SoCal blondes with his 'package' ……………
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MrNyFAujb3M

It’s too funny because the end of the above ^ clip reminds me so much of SquidPuppet’s recent post concerning his feelings about desert enduros and the consequences of a crash.

Anyway, the extension was an S-shaped job, probably measuring no more than 4-5 cm. in length, afterwards, I never could get the paint job to match the rest of the swingarm though. Good thing is, not only did it give the rear end better tracking but, it also provided me with an excuse to change out the swingarm bearings, which I probably never would have otherwise done until they seized or what not.

[SquidPuppet]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

If memory serves, I believe that the DT-1 was one of the first (if not the first?, Kris Deering or someone else here also owned one back in the day) ‘dual purpose’ (as it came road licensable with lights and exhaust) 250cc. 2-stroke that Yamaha manufactured and could truly be considered to be ‘dirt’ worthy and actually quite competitive back in the day….especially, after some modifications.

I’m pretty sure that Robert Redford raced one in Little Fauss Big Halsy when he wasn’t impressing the SoCal blondes with his 'package' ……………
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MrNyFAujb3M

It’s too funny because the end of the above ^ clip reminds me so much of SquidPuppet’s recent post concerning his feelings about desert enduros and the consequences of a crash.

Anyway, the extension was an S-shaped job, probably measuring no more than 4-5 cm. in length, afterwards, I never could get the paint job to match the rest of the swingarm though. Good thing is, not only did it give the rear end better tracking but, it also provided me with an excuse to change out the swingarm bearings, which I probably never would have otherwise done until they seized or what not.

It WAS. The whole line. 125, 175, 250 and 360. Prior to that, the Japanese bikes were not competetive. The dedicated MX Honda Elsinore changed ALL that in 1973. First six speed in the world.

The DTs were simple...yank the lights and battery and bolt on an expansion chamber (J&R). Boom. Go chase the Maicos, Huskys and CZs with a fair chance. Of course, if you wanted to do it right, you needed to scab on a couple of Preston Petty plastic fenders and a fork brace. ....oh...and dont forget the crital upgrade for corner entry...a soft Metzler front tire.

Remember "unpacking" the mud from Akront rims. Jeeeez.

[mpsan]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

Hi mpsan!
Long time no hear from!

How's divedude doing?
I would go over to there to say "Hi" to you guys but, I just can't endorse (with my presence) your "landlord"........meaning the adminstrators of that forum.

For a while DD was doing as well as can be expected. We used to swap comments on regular email, but I have not heard from him on email or on the Q forum. I think I will send him an email. Admins have not bothered me so I still go there but not very often. Most Q talk is still about the OB.

So, have you seen the BR of 24 yet?

[Anthony P]

By the way, the conjecture about Warner distinguishing between the two formats is an interesting one

it is not conjecture.
1) many other studios used loss less on BDs at the time
2) BD has much higher BW so that can't be an issue for not having it
3) look at the titles like Happyfeet and super man returns and compare the data on the HD DVD/BD and you will see that there would be room.

The only possible reason is political.

2) Lots of people on forums such as this one often claim DTS HD MA is superior to TrueHD. Some even say that LPCM sounds better than both of them (less losslessy, I guess... *cough*)

Both of these could be true at the same time, naturally

yup. Technically they are the same. But there are two issue which gives some credence to why some don’t feel that way i.e. not 100% the same.
LPCM is not compressed, that means that the player does not need to decode it. For the most part, that should not matter, but decoding takes memory and processing power and in theory (and I think we have seen it in practice) where glitches happened during decoding.

As for DTS vs Dolby, I think part of the issue is that DTHD has Dialogue normalization and Dynamic range control. with those two it makes it hard to make a proper test and there is/can be digital manipulation of the data (i.e. the LPCM coming out as decoded is not the one that went in while encoded and which goes to the receiver). I think that is why some don't trust it.

PS http://www.dolby.com/consumer/technology/trueHD.html

[Jeff Kleist]

As for DTS vs Dolby, I think part of the issue is that DTHD has Dialogue normalization and Dynamic range control. with those two it makes it hard to make a proper test and there is/can be digital manipulation of the data (i.e. the LPCM coming out as decoded is not the one that went in while encoded and which goes to the receiver). I think that is why some don't trust it.

Dialnorm gets a bad rap, all it does is set a consistant volume evel for playback, the value of which is included in metadata so that your "start point" is the same for every title Too many people don't know how to set up their gear, and more importantly don't read manuals. I agree that at this point in the game, AVR and player manurfacturers should be shipping DRC defaulted to "off", but proper testing is easy with an SPL meter

[Anthony P]

Dialnorm gets a bad rap, all it does is set a consistant volume evel for playback, the value of which is included in metadata so that your "start point" is the same for every title Too many people don't know how to set up their gear, and more importantly don't read manuals. I agree that at this point in the game, AVR and player manurfacturers should be shipping DRC defaulted to "off", but proper testing is easy with an SPL meter

agree, that is why in PM's thread on what should Sony use I voted that I did not care. My point was that in the end even if we have the same master, the playback from LPCM/DTS-HD MA/DTHD can end up being different. hey should all give back the exact same playback on the same audio device, but they could end up being slightly different as well. DN works during the decoding, right? past that it is LPCM which then becomes analogue, what happens if DN boosts it by three clicks and there is audio ranging in the top three clicks? what if it lowers it by 3 clicks then audio at the bottom three clicks will get crushed. Now usually if it is a "loud" movie you won't have much in the bottom and if it is a soft movie there might not be real loud noises, but it can happen that a movie goes through the whole dynamic loudness of sound.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by aramis109

I've only watched the first 20 minutes (got interrrupted) but I thought Valkyrie looked amazing. I appreciated the depth and feel of the image. I'm eager to watch the rest this weekend.

Well, I would like to hear your impressions after you’ve seen the whole thing, which is always a good idea for people to keep in mind at least in general for some feature films, for example, in this case, since the second half of the motion picture (for the most part) was captured a little differently than the first although, I think you may not even notice that subtlety because it appears to flow rather seamlessly.

It’s funny, because I viewed this with a compressionist (yes, one of the people that really does encodes for a living - which probably ranks up there in excitement with anesthesiologists who only monitor healthy young males during routine knee operations all day long...my hat is off to both of them for their ‘endurance’).
Anyway, we watched the Blu-ray edition in my home theater this past week and despite the most popular terms on some internet forums, i.e. by that I mean, dnr and ee, these never even came up once during our discussion following the screening………not even as a pertinent negative by him. Of course, his job is, and always has been, to make the Blu-ray encodes as transparent as possible to the HD master so, some hobbyist’s obsessions don’t often jive with topics of interest to professionals. Anyway, his primary interest was regarding how Sony Picture Imageworks technically did the visual effects for the upper extremity deformity of Tom Cruise’s character in the film.

And before anyone starts whining about the *look* of the film not being “right” and implying that there was some kind of color grading/contrast faux-pas with the transfer, I would strongly suggest that they never saw the theatrical presentation, as the Blu-ray *look* is compatible with the theatrical *look*.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

There is (or at least was) a cool ‘atmospheric’ roadside desert bar just down aways from the main riding in El Mirage which many times reminded me of this place………..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pjjAs...eature=related

Instead of being frequented by experienced fighter pilots, most everyone in there often times were crusty desert racers and they even had a ‘character’ like the guy in the YouTube clip asking…..”Hey, y’all wanna drink wiskey?”.

And in case anyone missed it, that “character” in the YouTube link (as the author noted) was a cameo by the REAL Chuck Yeager.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by SquidPuppet

It WAS. The whole line. 125, 175, 250 and 360. Prior to that, the Japanese bikes were not competetive. The dedicated MX Honda Elsinore changed ALL that in 1973. First six speed in the world.

The DTs were simple...yank the lights and battery and bolt on an expansion chamber (J&R). Boom. Go chase the Maicos, Huskys and CZs with a fair chance. Of course, if you wanted to do it right, you needed to scab on a couple of Preston Petty plastic fenders and a fork brace.

It's tough to see in real-time but to me, it looks like "Little Fauss" has a fork brace on that 125cc he's riding.

[Esox50]

Penton,

Some feedback for SPHE, and I am not going to mince words. The Angels & Demons "movie cash" process sucks. I don't go into BD-LIVE and/or have a printer. So I had to send it off to that address in NY. Was supposed to be a 5-7 business day turnaround. Roughly 15 business days later...still don't have it. Now, it's $10 which isn't the end of the world (so I could just go buy a ticket and pay cash), but it's become a matter of principle to me now.

Look at how Fox did it. Give us a code where we can just go on our regular computer to an internet site, and print it out. I think the studios put too much stock in all of this BD-Live and connectivity stuff.

-Esox

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by mpsan

For a while DD was doing as well as can be expected. We used to swap comments on regular email, but I have not heard from him on email or on the Q forum. I think I will send him an email. Admins have not bothered me so I still go there but not very often. Most Q talk is still about the OB.

So, have you seen the BR of 24 yet?

Well, divedude was a fanatic for the Q thread, so I hope that does not indicate things are going poorly for him……health wise.

As to your question, regarding 24, that is one of the few dramatic television shows that I am able to keep up with on a weekly basis once they air every season, so no, I haven’t seen the Blu-ray of 24 yet.....no need, as my wife claims I still have a memory like an elephant.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Anthony P

it is not conjecture.
1) many other studios used loss less on BDs at the time
2) BD has much higher BW so that can't be an issue for not having it
3) look at the titles like Happyfeet and super man returns and compare the data on the HD DVD/BD and you will see that there would be room.

The only possible reason is political.

Any rebuttal from sharkshark?

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Esox50

.....I think the studios put too much stock in all of this BD-Live and connectivity stuff.

-Esox

As I mentioned before (in Jan. ?), what seems to be taking up a lot of peoples’ time and efforts is discovering a truly killer app for BD-Live.

I guess you'll have some subjective hits and misses based on peoples' individual preferences.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Esox50

Penton,

Some feedback for SPHE, and I am not going to mince words. The Angels & Demons "movie cash" process sucks. I don't go into BD-LIVE and/or have a printer. So I had to send it off to that address in NY. Was supposed to be a 5-7 business day turnaround. Roughly 15 business days later...still don't have it. Now, it's $10 which isn't the end of the world (so I could just go buy a ticket and pay cash), but it's become a matter of principle to me now.
-Esox

Just so some people don't get the impression that we sweep things under the rug, I'm quoting your post and bolded the pertinent phrase.

Thanks for the constructive criticism and feedback.
I'm just personally glad that I'm not involved in that aspect.

[Jeff Kleist]

I have never heard a single actual hollywood sound engineer, compressionist, or anyone otherwise professionally involved see this as a problem. In fact most of them are confused about it to begin with why it's even brought up.

Originally Posted by Anthony P

agree, that is why in PM's thread on what should Sony use I voted that I did not care. My point was that in the end even if we have the same master, the playback from LPCM/DTS-HD MA/DTHD can end up being different. hey should all give back the exact same playback on the same audio device, but they could end up being slightly different as well. DN works during the decoding, right? past that it is LPCM which then becomes analogue, what happens if DN boosts it by three clicks and there is audio ranging in the top three clicks? what if it lowers it by 3 clicks then audio at the bottom three clicks will get crushed. Now usually if it is a "loud" movie you won't have much in the bottom and if it is a soft movie there might not be real loud noises, but it can happen that a movie goes through the whole dynamic loudness of sound.

[Jeff Kleist]

Any rebuttal from sharkshark?

I doubt you'll get one

It was absolutely political, using the BS excuse that (at the time) most players did not support TrueHD decoding and bitstreaming wasn't possible so it was a "needless expense"

That was on Superman and a few other titles where HD DVD got lossless and we didn't

Later the excuse was used because HD DVD kept tapping out on space and bandwidth and "we have to keep the 2 formats equal"

[Esox50]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

As I mentioned before (in Jan. ?), what seems to be taking up a lot of peoples’ time and efforts is discovering a truly killer app for BD-Live.

I guess you'll have some subjective hits and misses based on peoples' individual preferences.

Agreed.

BTW, I've been retraining myself re: the menus on the new T2 disc. I know this is not a SPHE issue, but what a joke. I don't want to minimize the effort some creative people in Hollywood make, in this case Van Ling, cause I do appreciate it. But man-o-man. That menu/disc is frustrating. Seriously, I didn't have any idea what was going on. Was I suppose to be pushing a button, or was it loading, etc. And the chapter stop menu was an effort in futility.

I get it, the studios are trying to add all the bells and whistles (elaborate manus, BD-LIVE, etc) and have a certain "coolness" factor to Blu-Ray to get people to jump in from DVD. But at times it can be frustrating when you just want to sit down and watch a movie, and/or demo a few scenes for guests.

It's been a frustrating week for me as far as Blu-Ray is concerned. Maybe we'll get lucky and Braveheart or Mask of Zorro will be announced in the next week or so.

[sharkshark]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

Any rebuttal from sharkshark?

It's up to me to rebut baseless conjecture based on technical considerations of discs? I though we weren't supposed to ascribe malicious or political intent to these things, such as giving due respect for those that let the usual PQ whipping boys get through PQ in mollested form.

I was simply pointing out that while the claims may very well be true, they certainly sound more like rumour, gossip and conjecture, and that the only source for such judgement of studio politics was being done by forum members, not "insiders".

But, hey, I guess if conjecture or extrapolation fits in with one's point of view it stops being bias and starts being "rational analysis of the facts at hand".

[sharkshark]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

Anyway, we watched the Blu-ray edition in my home theater this past week....

I recall asking before, do you have your equip list up online?

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Esox50

BTW, I've been retraining myself re: the menus on the new T2 disc.

And what's with that ^ ?
Not the menus per se but, the picture quality.
I haven't followed the discussion but, Jeff made an allusion that the screenshot *scientists* are going wild again, then Torsten chimes in with info from someone whom I imagine Jeff would love to have on his rolodex.
Bill Hunt pops in and out to give updates, etc.