The Hobbit Trilogy 4K UHD Extended & Theatrical (2012-2014)

[MattJ1991]

Agreed, let's keep ogling about the stars out of the review please. I like these films more than most but all 3 as 5/5 is pretty generous.

[Frank@Chicago]

Watched the 1st movie, PQ was generally strong and pretty bright at times.

Outdoor scenes looked the best, but some effects shots still seemed a bit soft.

EE version feels a bit long here, so I might watch the TC for this one next time.

Atmos is pretty aggressive, with dialogue being moved around the room frequently.

Stand out moments included anytime Sting was drawn and glowed in HDR.

[mebusa]

which version have turkish subtitle ? anybody know ?

[poke smot]

Does the atmos provide much bass on these since you already know the bluray release has real weak low end.

[dannycj]

I only just watched an unexpected journey on 4K and it not a 5/5. No way were the landscapes at the shire consistently razor sharp. Plenty of soft looking effect shots throughout the presentation.
It is still a great looking disc though.

[Resettito]

One question I have is: what about the film grain they added to DOS?! Did they somehow add it back here to AUJ, is it visible on DOS? I think it was there on BOFA and it is logical it would be for consistency. It seems those presentations are much more vibrant than the Blu Rays and Peter intrigues me when he speaks of making the whole six films feel of one piece and coherent.

[nusilver]

I was mostly overjoyed with the UHD presentation of AUJ, which my wife and I watched tonight. But I have to say, midnight blue and orange is something I strongly associate with this film, having watched it so many times on Blu-ray, so the new grade, especially during the "Out of the Frying Pan" scene, is going to take some getting used to. It looks more natural (with the exception of the fiery pinecones, which are almost unnaturally intense in Dolby Vision on my OLED), but the skies are a much more subdued shade of blue. I initially thought there was something wrong with the calibration on my projector, which handles HDR poorly enough that I do an HDR-SDR conversion in the OPPO every time I project a 4K disc and load my REC.709 profile, but, yeah, I brought the player into the living room, set HDR back to auto so it would engage Dolby Vision, and the presentation was fairly similar to what I saw via the projector.

Long winded way of saying: yeah, it's quite lovely. But it's different, and for a movie like this that gets spun annually in my household, it's probably not something I'm going to get used to for a long time.

[Pieter V]

Blu-ray.com reviews are up. Reviewer left all audio/subs info untouched. Just empty.



Not professionally either.

[Resettito]

"Sitting there watching The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, I was kinda dumbfounded at how fantastic this thing looked and how – most importantly – it looked like a movie. The gorgeous 4K remaster (overseen by Jackson) maintains the painterly details of the CG background work while seamlessly combining them with the practical sets and actors, a juggling act that was bungled in the previous releases of these movies. Something always felt “off,” but now they finally feel like they somewhat fit into the world Jackson first created with the Lord of the Rings trilogy."

This is from a review on Collider where just before this paragraph, he mentions HFR and how it made the films feel. I'm baffled considering the films on Blu Ray were in 24fps and look great, and here he keeps going on about how the 4K discs make the films look like "real movies".

Anyone owning the discs can tell me if there's some secret magic sauce to the 4K Hobbit discs or this is just silly hyperbole? Or did they refine the VFX?

[Vashetti]

Note: The screenshots in the review are from the 1080p MPEG-4 AVC encoded Blu-ray edition of the feature-film.

Why?

[Cook]

Originally Posted by Vashetti

Why?

Most of the UHD reviews here use the 1080p screenshots. I cant remember the exact reason why, but it needs to stop.

[dannycj]

Halfway through The Desolation of Smaug and this is an absolutely beautiful transfer, it is quite a sight to behold. The detail and colours oh my.

[imsounoriginal]

Ugh. Was planning to wait on upgrading The Hobbit trilogy, but these reviews/reactions are testing my patience.

[Ernest Rister]

$10.03 price drop on The Hobbit set this a.m. In stock.

[pottyaboutpotter1]

Originally Posted by MattJ1991

Agreed, let's keep ogling about the stars out of the review please. I like these films more than most but all 3 as 5/5 is pretty generous.

Reviews are meant to reflect the reviewer's opinion, so if that's the reviewer's opinion then that's their opinion.

[Resettito]

But how different does it look to the Blu Rays? I've seen two people noticing a refinement in the VFX work? Is it night and day?

[Geoff D]

Originally Posted by Resettito

"Sitting there watching The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, I was kinda dumbfounded at how fantastic this thing looked and how – most importantly – it looked like a movie. The gorgeous 4K remaster (overseen by Jackson) maintains the painterly details of the CG background work while seamlessly combining them with the practical sets and actors, a juggling act that was bungled in the previous releases of these movies. Something always felt “off,” but now they finally feel like they somewhat fit into the world Jackson first created with the Lord of the Rings trilogy."

This is from a review on Collider where just before this paragraph, he mentions HFR and how it made the films feel. I'm baffled considering the films on Blu Ray were in 24fps and look great, and here he keeps going on about how the 4K discs make the films look like "real movies".

Anyone owning the discs can tell me if there's some secret magic sauce to the 4K Hobbit discs or this is just silly hyperbole? Or did they refine the VFX?

I dare say that the secret sauce is simply HDR, it's been the single greatest asset for "enhancing" modern CG VFX that I've yet come across, as it provides depth, shading and volume that SDR tends to flatten out. (It comes with pitfalls too as they have to make sure that the extra range doesn't 'break' the VFX, but most of the time the work is of such high standard to begin with that it holds up.) And Jackson's literally said that they didn't change the VFX, they just "painted out" stuff. For example:

Originally Posted by James Freeman

Nothing to worry about, there is not one among us that didn't experience LOTR fatigue.
I still rewatch the extended trilogy 2-4 times a year.

This 4k release definitely worth a rewatch, fatigued and unattentive, but still worth the rewatch if only for the correct colors and fixed CG.

I mean look, they fixed Moria's door for us, even if it's a super dark scene and almost invisible.

[CHONK!]

Still don’t understand the scoring system on this site, as they give 0 stars for the Extras not being included, yet All versions of these films are getting 4.5 Ratings... which is not inline with every other 4K review on this site!

[Spearmint701]

Originally Posted by MattJ1991

Agreed, let's keep ogling about the stars out of the review please. I like these films more than most but all 3 as 5/5 is pretty generous.

Should be noted that the 5/5 ratings are for the extended editions only.

[gto35830]

Originally Posted by Ernest Rister

$10.03 price drop on The Hobbit set this a.m. In stock.

yes saw that. Ordered both movies on 11/24 at $89-99, which have not been shipped yet but I should receive tomorrow,12/3. Hope they will refund me the $10.00 difference on the Hobbit.