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

[Jeff Kleist]

That survey was definately worded badly, a large number of people think upscalers are "HD DVD"

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Brain Sturgeon

I would imagine that folks with non-scope systems wouldn't mind it, but I dunno, would a poll be in order?

No, I believe we already realize how most people feel about this issue and how significant it is to them plus, the postings would probably be overrun with the few but vocal fringe element expressing sentiments such as……*I want the subtitles to look exactly like they do in my public Cineplex; otherwise, I feel sooooo distracted I will not watch or buy the Blu-ray movie* - the rants of which could indeed prove counter-productive to your plea.

However, I’ll pass on the idea (of a poll) to others involved to see how much studio interest there would be for that sort of thing.

[Doctorossi]

*SPOILERS!*





I remember my disappointment the first time I found out what a Philly cheesesteak actually is. For so many years, I'd been letting my imagination run free, conceiving some fascinating mystery food substance.

Then I learned. Somebody just decided, perhaps only to mess with me, that they couldn't be bothered to fully write "steak & cheese sandwich". Somehow, that became "cheesesteak" and off I went, down the garden path of futile fantasy.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by bt12483

While at AVS, ask rdjam to fess up to the following:

That he either was given the confidential real name of a once then new member of AVS by the administration…….or he somehow hacked into the AVS system to get it.

You computer gurus out here can figure out which is the more plausible explanation. I don’t know but, I do know that the kid was very upset (I can find his online handle over at AVS if I put my mind to it), left the forum after a few posts and now attends USC School of Cinematic Arts where he told his friends of the *scientific* experience.

The skullduggery by the red ants (using the specific example above) knew no bounds!

[aramis109]

Originally Posted by Brain Sturgeon

Hey Penton--

Please extend kudos to the folks at SPHE for their fabulous work on the BD transfer of The International-- the video quality is just magnificent.

However, there is one issue that I wanted to point out, and that is the handling of the subtitles in this title. There were only a few, but they were partially in the bottom of the video and partially in the lower black bar. I know this issue has been beaten to death, but this is problematic for those of us that use CIH systems. Gran Torino (another great flick) also did this, although I will have to bug Warner Bros. on that one. I understand if the subtitles are entirely in the lower black bar or entirely in the lower portion of the video (much preferable for CIH systems), but I don't understand the half-in half-out technique. Movies in the theater place subtitles within the video frame, so I don't see why doing that on a home video presentation would be problematic. If you could pass that on to the powers that be, I'd greatly appreciate it. I would imagine that folks with non-scope systems wouldn't mind it, but I dunno, would a poll be in order?

Thanks mate!

Even without a CIH setup, they were a little hard to read. My wife and I watched the flick last night and I noticed they weren't exactly the best. The transfer looks great though- I'll agree. A lot of fine detail and a very light pass of grain. I really enjoyed the movie and might have to pick it up.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by bt12483

Or go to highdefforum and tell Lee Stewart to quit sh*tting on bluray for one goddamn second of the day.....

He continues to do that to this day?

[Jeff Kleist]

But your recommendation has me seriously intrigued. I take it that your friend is either from Philadelphia (i.e. "ex-pat") or lived there for a significant time to make a qualified assessment?

My other question is, aren't these places independent franchises and if so would their quality vary from location to location.....or not?

One of my best friends since kindergarten with over 20 years of experience He now is a Saturn award winning DVD author I couldn't say how quality varies, I don't know which ones are corporate and which are franchise, but he gave them the thumbs up.

Amoroso vacuum seals the rolls and puts them on a midnight plane out to about 2 dozen companies around the country, so it's about as good as you're going to get 3000mi away. I used to work at a hoagie shop, and was good friends with the delivery guy ( who also owned the hobby shop I frequented, he's part of the Amoroso family)

On Subtitles-

Penton, the CIH subtitles can be accomplished using the existing subtitle files, likely all that would have to be done is to write a plugin or a macro that shifts them the appropriate number of pixels up and the sub generation cycle run again (10min on my computer give or take, at least using DVD subs as a guide). The technical aspects/expense of doing so is pretty low cost.

On Lee Stewart:

he and Mike Morel still run around to this day pulling their crap. I'm convinced that Lee, being retired is bored and has more fun trolling than anything else, and that if one were to visit his house you'd see a blu player sitting on the shelf I still can't figure out why they don't just ban Mike into the middle of next week, his blatant trolling day after day has pretty much cheesed off the entire population over there from what i've seen

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Doctorossi

A noble effort......

lol, I think you and shark attended the same debate school.
I would call the “noble effort” more like an attempt to ambiguously rewrite format war history….without any evidence to support.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Slec

Penton man's been busy, so i'll bump this to try and separate it from the above discourse

Everyone is happy to see FFC back in the filmmaking saddle again and envious of the fact that he has the personal finances and backing to do what he likes/desires to do in regards to filmmaking choices.

I haven’t seen Tetro but, I do know that the production was plagued with some difficulty while down in Argentina and it’s quite amazing that he brought the product to the big screen given what he had to deal with.

I hope he has at least one more Godfather in him for us all.

[Tok]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

He continues to do that to this day?

best advice is to quit feeding the trolls. Let him live in his little corner of the internet deluding himself into thinking he is disuading thousands from buying Blu. In actuality it is just him and his same ol' FUDster buddies giving each other high fives.

His views are mostly irrelevant anymore.

[Penton-Man]

I'm all caught up with my PM's.
Please excuse all the one word to one sentence responses, as time is of the essence.

Later.

[sharkshark]

Originally Posted by Jeff Kleist

Amoroso vacuum seals the rolls and puts them on a midnight plane out to about 2 dozen companies around the country, so it's about as good as you're going to get 3000mi away. I used to work at a hoagie shop, and was good friends with the delivery guy ( who also owned the hobby shop I frequented, he's part of the Amoroso family)

...oh my god that sounds amazing... I've been jonesing to drive back to Philly for years and grab a real cheesesteak...

I had mentioned it before, anybody in LA actually try this yet? http://umamiburger.com/

I'm wondering if it warrants a flight to LA....

[Doctorossi]

Originally Posted by Jeff Kleist

Penton, the CIH subtitles can be accomplished using the existing subtitle files, likely all that would have to be done is to write a plugin or a macro that shifts them the appropriate number of pixels up and the sub generation cycle run again (10min on my computer give or take, at least using DVD subs as a guide). The technical aspects/expense of doing so is pretty low cost.

I really think user-adjustability, in the form of two separate (and identical except for placement) subtitle tracks, should be standard. Make one placement the default, switched on when you select "subtitles - on" in the "languages" menu, and provide a "shift subtitle vertical placement" option in the "set-up" menu, which simply switches you to the other subtitle track. This way, those without CIH systems (and the corresponding education) won't have to be confused by two subtitle options on the main selection screen.

[Doctorossi]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

I hope he has at least one more Godfather in him for us all.

I hope you mean that figuratively (ie. something of The Godfather's quality rather than The Godfather, Part IV ).

[Tok]

Originally Posted by Doctorossi

I hope you mean that figuratively (ie. something of The Godfather's quality rather than The Godfather, Part IV ).

Haven't you heard that the plot of GF IV was that Part III was just a dream?

[Doctorossi]

Originally Posted by sharkshark

I had mentioned it before, anybody in LA actually try this yet? http://umamiburger.com/

I'm wondering if it warrants a flight to LA....

Doesn't look that impressive to me, but maybe you've had some personal recommendations/reviews.

[Doctorossi]

Originally Posted by CraigW

Haven't you heard that the plot of GF IV was that Part III was just a dream?

I'll wait for Part V which reveals that Part III and Part IV were not actually a dream, but a nightmare.*









* not that we need to pay $10 to learn that

[Bobby Henderson]

I'm sure I've repeated this question a couple times already, but to repeat it yet again: why can't subtitles on Blu-ray movies be adjustable in both size and placement? Surely this can't be too difficult to accomplish with all the BD Java hoopla happening in the underpinnings of the BD format.

I'll also add the observation that player-generated subtitles have generally looked pretty crappy on DVD and have not improved very much in appearance on Blu-ray. Crude, pixel jaggy garbage seems to be the standard much of the time. It would be better if Blu-ray supported some kind of scalable vector-based font technology. That could also make it easier for viewers to specify on screen placement and size of subtitles.

Originally Posted by Jeff Kleist

That survey was definately worded badly, a large number of people think upscalers are "HD DVD"

I think most people have a poor understanding of video or any raster-based image as being limited/fixed in resolution. So it would not be any surprise at all if marketing research showed that most people think a mere DVD player with HDMI output is equal to anything showing native HD resolution video material, such as a Blu-ray player.

I've personally helped a number of friends in my town understand the difference only after seeing the same movie played in both DVD and Blu-ray. BTW, the DVD player I used in the comparison is HDMI equipped and set for 1080p upscaling. The unconverting nonsense simply is no match at all for Blu-ray.

Ultimately, this is a marketing screw-up on the part of the electronics industry they must work to undo if they intend to sell Blu-ray players and BD movies to a certain segment of the general public. They'll have to educate those people about the quality differences between native HD material and SD material merely blown up to HD.

In another year or two new DVD-only players won't be readily available. A broken DVD player will have to be replaced with a Blu-ray player that also happens to play DVDs. OTOH, SD DVDs will be available for at least a few more years after that. It will be more difficult to get price conscious "SD is good enough" customers to pay a few dollars more for the movie on Blu-ray unless they really understand the difference.

[Doctorossi]

Originally Posted by Bobby Henderson

It would be better if Blu-ray supported some kind of scalable vector-based font technology. That could also make it easier for viewers to specify on screen placement and size of subtitles.

This sounds like a job for... The Next Format TM.

Originally Posted by Bobby Henderson

Ultimately, this is a marketing screw-up on the part of the electronics industry they must work to undo if they intend to sell Blu-ray players and BD movies to a certain segment of the general public.

Yes, that needs to be the industry's agenda for the next couple years. And they need to get together to do it!

[cjamescook]

Originally Posted by CraigW

And if Warner overestimates demand, I am sure Amazon will be selling these for under $30 in a year. Still after getting Adv of Robin Hood for under $12 and The Searchers for $8. I am not going to budge until I can get the discs only for under $20.

Hey! Thanks for the prod! I just picked up three John Wayne's and How the West was Won, all on Blu-ray around 53% off. They weren't even listed on all the sale pages.

Thanks!