The Green Planet 4K UHD

[McCrutchy]

Originally Posted by GeordieW

Has anyone bought the UK version of this? I got the Australian version a few weeks ago, and though it is narrated by David it doesn't actually have him IN the show, it's just his voice. All of the promotional material like the trailer and short clips on YouTube show him actually presenting not just narrating (like the moment with him and the bat etc.).
Just wondering whether I need to order the UK version instead so I can view his beautiful blue shirts in crisp 4K.

Originally Posted by Hedrox

That's really odd. I don't have the UK discs but I did watch the series as it was being broadcast and he appears throughout quite a bit.
Did you check the runtime of each episode and compare it to it's imdb runtime? I'd imagine they're shorter if they cut out those segments.

Edit: I did a lite bit of digging and you're right. The 1080p discs (technically 1080i since they're 25fps) have the full episodes running between 57-59 min, while the 4K discs (at 23.976) have edited down versions with runtimes of about 54-55 min, when they should be longer due to the framerate.

The "on location" footage was not shot in 4K apparently and is available separately on disc 2 in HD.

Originally Posted by FilmFreakosaurus

They never leave those segments on the 4k disc, only the Blu-ray. Why those shorts aren't shot in 4k too remains a mystery only the BBC can answer.

The segments that are only on the Blu-rays are the little 10-minute location shoots from the camera crews that appear at the end of each episode during the UK broadcast and on Blu-ray. Because these are filmed by the crew themselves over the duration of the shoot, they are probably in a variety of frame rates and likely not even in 4K resolution to start with, which is why they're not included as part of the 4K version of the program and why the running times of the episodes are different across Blu-ray and 4K UHD. My understanding is that these segments, which I believe are titled "The Green Planet: On Location", are combined into an extra in 1080 resolution on one of the UHD discs.

This is different from the footage in the episodes, including footage of Attenborough on location. All of the episode footage--including footage of Atteborough--should be included in the version of the program on the 4K UHD disc. If someone has a version that doesn't include the footage of Attenborough, then it must be an edited version, or defective.