Star Trek: Enterprise - Seasons 1-4 (2001-2005)

[PeterTHX]

Originally Posted by jblank

What a horrible.....HORRIBLE looking Blu-Ray. Frankly, with as soft, blurry, and washed out as the picture frequently looks, I think the reviewer was quite generous with his score. Amazingly, and I'm not really sure how this could be, I think Season 1, as bad as it was, might even look better (on average) than Season 3, which is such a shame, because I think Season 3 of Enterprise is one of the best Trek seasons ever. It might be a decent upgrade from the DVD set (sold mine a long time ago so my memory isn't 100% clear on it) but I'm not sure it looks any better than the HD streaming feed on Netflix.

I have it and it isn't that bad. It's just a bit soft & noisy...but plenty of detail. It's a definite upgrade over the DVD & Netflix.

[jblank]

Well sir, you're entitled to that opinion, but I also am entitled to mine, and the reviews seem to corroborate a lot of what I said. You yourself seem to admit it is soft, after all, so while you may feel I'm adding "hyperbole" to my comments about the release, I don't feel that I am at all. In fact, another poster, in the other thread that I mistakenly started about this release, agreed. These were his comments:

I agree. This is my favorite season of television ever and I'm on disc 5 and aside from a handful of ship shots it's pretty awful. Just barely better than dvd. Very, Very disappointed. Wondering how Ds9 and Voyager will fare at this point.

This post was from Cap.T on page four of this thread, again, seemingly corroborating a lot of my own thoughts.

According to High-Def Digest season 3 offers the worst picture quality yet:

'Enterprise' was still shot on 35mm film in Season 3 (and then transferred to digital for broadcast), so a good deal of grain is still evident in the print. However, this season set also features a lot of digital noise, which I didn't really notice much of on the first two season sets. It's seen more easily in many of the well-lit shots (such as scenes in sickbay), but there's definitely a lot of 'mosquito noise' buzzing around in many scenes that clearly has nothing to do with the grain.

In addition to the digital noise, I also noticed occurrences of dirt on the print that popped up every now and again – usually in the form of white (although sometimes black) 'flecks' on the screen. While these are far less frequent than the noise issues mentioned above, the previous sets were pretty clean when it came to film dirt…that's not the case here. I have no idea if the production had to use a cheaper 35mm film stock in Season 3, but considering the show was always worried about budget, I suppose it's a possibility.

Added to the above problems, the video still has all the issues of prior releases. Even though all new special effects at this point in the series were being rendered in 780p, many effects still suffer from noticeable aliasing issues. Black levels are, once again, not very strong, and the murkiness is even more noticeable in Season 3, since there are only a handful of instances where episodes feature 'real' locations instead of being shot on a set.

Seems less like hyperbole and more like consensus, when you factor in the reviews, but all we're giving are opinions, and the video quality in no way diminishes from the quality of the episodes and the season as a whole. It was and still is, a fantastic season of Trek.

[PeterTHX]

What a horrible.....HORRIBLE looking Blu-Ray.

That is the hyperbole.

It is not "horrible". Predator UHE is a horrible Blu-ray. Something that is not in any way what it looked like originally.

Worst I can say about ENTERPRISE S3 is that it looks "meh" or "ok". Merely acceptable rather than great. Still worth the money.

[jblank]

Well sir, that is your opinion, but as you can read from other comments, my opinion of the quality of the video is shared by others. I do feel it is horrible, but as I am speaking from my experiences and opinions of it, it isn't an exaggeration as far as I'm concerned. I respect your opinion but I do feel very let down by the quality we've gotten from the Enterprise releases and I do feel this is the worst of the three, from a video standpoint.

[Maxwell Everett]

Originally Posted by jblank

According to High-Def Digest season 3 offers the worst picture quality yet:

In addition to the digital noise, I also noticed occurrences of dirt on the print that popped up every now and again – usually in the form of white (although sometimes black) 'flecks' on the screen. While these are far less frequent than the noise issues mentioned above, the previous sets were pretty clean when it came to film dirt…that's not the case here. I have no idea if the production had to use a cheaper 35mm film stock in Season 3, but considering the show was always worried about budget, I suppose it's a possibility.

This reviewer from High-Def Digest seems to be (willfully?) misinformed about a couple things. First of all, no prints were ever made of the Star Trek: Enterprise camera negative -- there would be no reason... it's a TV show. The o-neg would have been directly telecined to 1080/24p HD D5. Black 'flecks' would be occasional dust or dirt on the film in the camera during exposure and white 'flecks' would be dust or dirt (or maybe left over sediment from processing) on the negative captured during telecine. It's the film loader and camera assistant's job to keep the film and gate clean during production. Level 3 Post in Burbank is where the processed film was telecined, color-corrected and edited.

And let's clear another thing up: Kodak doesn't make and has never made 'cheap' 35mm film. Just the minimal amount of checking online would have told the reviewer that Season 3 of Enterprise was shot on Kodak VISION 500T 5279, just like the previous two seasons.

[Blades1370]

Originally Posted by PeterTHX

That is the hyperbole.

It is not "horrible". Predator UHE is a horrible Blu-ray. Something that is not in any way what it looked like originally.

Worst I can say about ENTERPRISE S3 is that it looks "meh" or "ok". Merely acceptable rather than great. Still worth the money.

Still worth the money, if they were priced well UNDER what a season of Next Generation was asking, then yes I would agree on that point. My own personal opinion is anything more then $30-35 for a season with the current PQ is overpaying. I plan to wait and grab these used for no more then $25, even if it takes a while, as much as I enjoyed the show, I can't see paying that kind of money for mediocrity.

I payed $60 for the first season of next gen, and $45 each for season 2 and 3 (got a couple lucky deals) and had no quams about paying that much considering how much effort went into the presentation we received.

[Deathbymonkeys]

Has anyone else got a refund from amazon on this yet? For some reason I still havn't yet?

[Geoff D]

Originally Posted by Maxwell Everett

This reviewer from High-Def Digest seems to be (willfully?) misinformed about a couple things. First of all, no prints were ever made of the Star Trek: Enterprise camera negative -- there would be no reason... it's a TV show. The o-neg would have been directly telecined to 1080/24p HD D5. Black 'flecks' would be occasional dust or dirt on the film in the camera during exposure and white 'flecks' would be dust or dirt (or maybe left over sediment from processing) on the negative captured during telecine. It's the film loader and camera assistant's job to keep the film and gate clean during production. Level 3 Post in Burbank is where the processed film was telecined, color-corrected and edited.

And let's clear another thing up: Kodak doesn't make and has never made 'cheap' 35mm film. Just the minimal amount of checking online would have told the reviewer that Season 3 of Enterprise was shot on Kodak VISION 500T 5279, just like the previous two seasons.

Agreed on the film stock quip, but a lot of people just say 'print' when it comes to talking about an underlying transfer, and aren't too bothered about the specific nomenclature.

[KenHurd]

Originally Posted by Deathbymonkeys

Has anyone else got a refund from amazon on this yet? For some reason I still havn't yet?

I haven't either. Amazon must be glitching or something because they haven't updated the price on my pre-orders for Carrie, You're Next, or Short Term 12. I also applied reward points to that order for those three and my account says I still have the points. Not sure what's going on with them.

[Gone2HiDef]

I'm really bummed about the feedback on the PQ on S3. S4 was the only season I could stomach of Enterprise and showed that with my dollars by adding the DVD to my collection. If the Blu-ray PQ for S4 gets similar feedback, I won't be as enthusiastic about upgrading. But I am a bonus features fan, so it has that in its favor. Still...fingers crossed for better feedback.

[Maxwell Everett]

TrekCore has S4 trailer screencaps here for those that missed them.

[KenHurd]

Originally Posted by Deathbymonkeys

Has anyone else got a refund from amazon on this yet? For some reason I still havn't yet?

Did Amazon give you a refund yet? They still haven't refunded me the difference. Normally I get a credit by Thursday at the latest.

[JaseT]

I haven't received my $18.50 refund either. Time to send them an email.

[JaseT]

Originally Posted by JaseT

I haven't received my $18.50 refund either. Time to send them an email.

And they just emailed me back and have gone ahead and apologized and processed the refund.

[KenHurd]

The price went back up. I contacted them, but since it's now back to 76.49, they said I would have to provide a screenshot of the 57.99 price. Maybe the pre-order guarantee will kick in eventually. I think now I'll wait until season 4 drops before I order it.

[JaseT]

Originally Posted by KenHurd

The price went back up. I contacted them, but since it's now back to 76.49, they said I would have to provide a screenshot of the 57.99 price. Maybe the pre-order guarantee will kick in eventually. I think now I'll wait until season 4 drops before I order it.

If you preordered at a price higher than $57.99 and they aren't honoring their guarantee, I would escalate until they do. I didn't have to provide any proof. They know what the price was, so don't settle for anything less than a refund of the difference and an apology.

[Deathbymonkeys]

Originally Posted by KenHurd

Did Amazon give you a refund yet? They still haven't refunded me the difference. Normally I get a credit by Thursday at the latest.

Sorry didn't see this. I actually had to contact them myself and then they finally did it. I did it before it went back up in price though to make sure. But it did NOT do it automatically for the first time ever with them. I use them for so many blurays now I'm worried about future ones. Don't want to pay for another year of prime if I have to make sure to call them every time a price changes.

[KenHurd]

Originally Posted by JaseT

If you preordered at a price higher than $57.99 and they aren't honoring their guarantee, I would escalate until they do. I didn't have to provide any proof. They know what the price was, so don't settle for anything less than a refund of the difference and an apology.

I ended up contacting them again yesterday and got a different person. This time the guy saw that it did drop in price and that I wasn't automatically refunded, so he took care of it. I guess it just depends on who you talk to.

Originally Posted by Deathbymonkeys

Sorry didn't see this. I actually had to contact them myself and then they finally did it. I did it before it went back up in price though to make sure. But it did NOT do it automatically for the first time ever with them. I use them for so many blurays now I'm worried about future ones. Don't want to pay for another year of prime if I have to make sure to call them every time a price changes.

Just out of curiosity, did you use a gift card for any part of your order? I applied a gift card for some of it, and I think that may be why the pre-order guarantee didn't go through, even though I used my credit card for most of it. I saw in another thread that in the fine print of the pre-order guarantee, it says that if you paid for it with anything other than a credit card to contact them. I didn't notice that until yesterday, which is why I decided to contact them again.

[BrandonJF]

Originally Posted by KenHurd

Just out of curiosity, did you use a gift card for any part of your order? I applied a gift card for some of it, and I think that may be why the pre-order guarantee didn't go through, even though I used my credit card for most of it. I saw in another thread that in the fine print of the pre-order guarantee, it says that if you paid for it with anything other than a credit card to contact them. I didn't notice that until yesterday, which is why I decided to contact them again.

I did use a gift card for part of the order and didn't get the automatic credit.

[JaseT]

Originally Posted by KenHurd

I ended up contacting them again yesterday and got a different person. This time the guy saw that it did drop in price and that I wasn't automatically refunded, so he took care of it. I guess it just depends on who you talk to.

Just out of curiosity, did you use a gift card for any part of your order? I applied a gift card for some of it, and I think that may be why the pre-order guarantee didn't go through, even though I used my credit card for most of it. I saw in another thread that in the fine print of the pre-order guarantee, it says that if you paid for it with anything other than a credit card to contact them. I didn't notice that until yesterday, which is why I decided to contact them again.

Just FYI, I paid 100% of the order with my credit card so it wasn't just the gift card use that caused them to not give the automatic price guarantee refund.