Sony "Mastered in 4K" Blu-ray Titles May 14 and July 16

[brian9229]

Sony cant seem to get their own blurays right, cant imagine the problems these will come with.

[spawningblue]

Sony will just throw out some crappy newer titles and then forget about the format like they did with Bluray. They rush into everything and then get bored and move onto something else.

[MifuneFan]

Proposed artwork:

[Megalith]

Can I get Bad Boys II in 4K.

[blu-ray_girl_fan]

Originally Posted by MifuneFan

Proposed artwork:

[Show spoiler]

LOL!!! I really like the graffiti X over the DVD logo.

[Monkey]

DTA Master Audio now goes to 11!

[Dubstar]

Originally Posted by Monkey

DTA Master Audio now goes to 11!

hell, I'm sure Sony would screw the market over by porting over five front channel 'SDDS' spread of sound for 11 track sound instead of the two extra front channels designated as height speakers.

[YodasFootPowder]

Reminds me of when Sony introduced the term "Full HD". Way to cause confusion. There is no such thing as Full HD. It's either an HD resolution or it's not. Go, Sony!

[Jompa]

They are actually right. 720p is also HD, but not full HD as in 1080p.

[EricJ]

Originally Posted by Robonaut

I dunno, I actually seem to recall that the Superbit DVDs I had were noticeably better than many normal DVDs.

But those came out in the early days of DVD's, and bragged about the fact that they didn't use room for bonus extras, since true home theater buffs "didn't want them".

....Guess why they didn't sell.

Originally Posted by blu-ray_girl_fan

LOL!!! I really like the graffiti X over the DVD logo.

And Fifth Element, of course.
(Okay, betting pool's in for when we get the inevitable 4K versions of Labyrinth, Resident Evil, and Johnny Mnemonic.)

Anyone else find it revealing that we're getting the '12 Amazing Spiderman as the first 4K title, seeing as how the '02 Raimi first movie was their first-out-of-the-gate whipping-pony for every single new disk format, Superbit included? They just can't help themselves anymore.

[jordanwalkert]

Hey, if anything.. until legitimate 4k discs start being released- at least this is a way to own THE best possible looking version of a film. Tons of discs out there suffer from compression artifacts, banding, encoding issues and if they are coming from 4k sources- there is a chance you will see some increase in detail. Minimal, but with high bit rates.. I bet these discs look pretty darn good compared to the current versions.

[DoubleDownAgain]

The obvious marketing gimmick aside, I don't have a problem with it. A 4k source could mean a better transfer, which isn't a bad thing. I Will have to decide whether to double dip on a case by case basis.

I still have some SuperBit DVDs, but picked mine all up for cheap. I know on a few discs there was enough room on the disc for the bonus features they left off. Most of the SuperBit DVDs were the best they looked and sounded on DVD.

[blu-ray_girl_fan]

Yeah, problem is, 4K is not even that special when you have

[icy hot]

Originally Posted by Dubstar

hell, I'm sure Sony would screw the market over by porting over five front channel 'SDDS' spread of sound for 11 track sound instead of the two extra front channels designated as height speakers.

I thought it would be 11 because it would be 1 louder.

[metaridley]

Originally Posted by blu-ray-neil

I agree with you 110 percent! I was another one who fell for that Superbit hype until the industry finally admitted that the DVD format could not hold all the data needed for both improved PQ and DTS 5.1 sound on one disc. Furthermore, they also admitted that all the channels were not being totally utilized. Disbelievers need to go back and read the forums of that time period. In fact, what sold me on Blu-ray's years ago was when I compared my SUPERBIT version of BLACKHAWK DOWN to the Blu-ray version.

What pissed me off is that I had to double dip on Black Hawk Down because after the 3-disc DVD edition (which had an enormous amount of impressive special features, none of which are present on the Blu-ray for some ominous reason) came out, I replaced my stupid Superbit copy with what was truly the definitive release of that movie.

Originally Posted by Robonaut

I dunno, I actually seem to recall that the Superbit DVDs I had were noticeably better than many normal DVDs.

tbh I never held a proper comparison with a Superbit vs. some other edition of the same movie but I can't imagine it would have looked all that different on my standard-def TV.

Originally Posted by MifuneFan

Proposed artwork:

[Show spoiler]

I love this. So. Much.

Originally Posted by EricJ

But those came out in the early days of DVD's, and bragged about the fact that they didn't use room for bonus extras, since true home theater buffs "didn't want them".

My friends laughed out loud at the Superbit menu. Do you guys remember that ugly thing?

[blu-ray_girl_fan]

Originally Posted by metaridley

What pissed me off is that I had to double dip on Black Hawk Down because after the 3-disc DVD edition (which had an enormous amount of impressive special features, none of which are present on the Blu-ray for some ominous reason) came out, I replaced my stupid Superbit copy with what was truly the definitive release of that movie.



tbh I never held a proper comparison with a Superbit vs. some other edition of the same movie but I can't imagine it would have looked all that different on my standard-def TV.

[/spoiler]

I love this. So. Much.



My friends laughed out loud at the Superbit menu. Do you guys remember that ugly thing?

Superbit was basically a scam. Sony said that it removed Bonus Features to maximize bit space for video/audio. When people checked the discs in their DVD-ROM drives, they saw that sometimes the movie took up only 5 GB out of roughly 8.5 GB.

Meanwhile, Disney, Fox, and Warner frequently had movies taking up almost the entire space on a DVD and didn't make a big deal out of it.

[HeavyHitter]

Some of the Superbits gave a very, very slight improvement (noticeable on a larger screen) but it was kind of a scam for reasons mentioned already.

In this case, the more Blu-ray movies sourced from 4K scans the better. Most Blu-ray catalogs come from old 1080p masters and it would be nice to see them re-released with new scans. This will make a huge difference - nothing like the Superbit thing.

[Geoff D]

Originally Posted by HeavyHitter

Some of the Superbits gave a very, very slight improvement (noticeable on a larger screen) but it was kind of a scam for reasons mentioned already.

In this case, the more Blu-ray movies sourced from 4K scans the better. Most Blu-ray catalogs come from old 1080p masters and it would be nice to see them re-released with new scans. This will make a huge difference - nothing like the Superbit thing.

That's fine and dandy, but this, er, 'initiative' is coming from Sony who are pretty much the premier studio when it comes to 4K origination and mastering, i.e. a good amount of their recent output has already been derived from 4K masters.

Launching this 'mastered in 4K' drive with movies that were recently released on Blu is a huge mistake IMO because the differences - should they actually be new encodes and not just repacks - will be tiny, whereas if they redid some older HD/2K catalogue titles then there could be noticeable improvements by virtue of the new transfer alone.

[vertigo12314]

Just wait a few years for a PS4 and then for prices to come down. Then I'll be interested.

Also I want 48fps and 60fps options on a new TV before I bother.

[blu-ray_girl_fan]

Originally Posted by Geoff D

That's fine and dandy, but this, er, 'initiative' is coming from Sony who are pretty much the premier studio when it comes to 4K origination and mastering, i.e. a good amount of their recent output has already been derived from 4K masters.

4K and up is pretty standard for all of the major distributors these days.