Master & Commander Blu-Ray is here!!

[Nooff]

I was able to pick up Master & Commander on Blu-Ray today

Yes, your eyes are good

Release date in The Netherlands is Dec. 5th, but I found it on sale early

Here are some pictures and specifications, I'll pop in the disc tomorrow for some initial impressions..

Specifications:

BD50

AR: 2.35:1

Audio: English 5.1 DTS HD-MA / French 5.1 DTS / German 5.1 DTS

Runtime: 138 mins.

Features: Trivia Track / 6 Deleted Scenes / Trailers (Master & Commander/Eragon/Kingdom of Heaven/Live Free or Die Hard

Now watch and drool







Impressions

Well, I popped in Master & Commander today and skipped through various chapters.

Picture:

Fox went with a High Bitrate AVC encode, probably around 30 average. While I skipped through the chapters I saw the bitrate meter jump up to 48MBps various times. Most scenes I saw were between 30 and 38MBps and overall did held up pretty well.
Master & Commander, thanks to the high AVC encode, can look incredibly sharp, but, unfortunately, it suffers from the same flaws as the DVD did. The Fog scenes were around 35MBps but it still suffers from macroblocking and an incredible amount of Grain. Now, we all know the Grain is part of the movie to make it look typical 17th century, but around 14.40 mins (DVD too) it's unbearable!

I remember the DVD had some speckles and dirt throughout the movie which were not cleaned up for this release, so I guess it's how Weir wants us to experience the movie. Colors look good throughout but you'll notice the filter is kind of washing them out here and there. Blacks are often rock solid but it does sometimes suffer from black crush.

Overall the movie looks good, but some scenes have no improvement over the DVD version eventhough it got a High bitrate encode.

I will probably give the PQ 3,5-4,0 out of 5

Audio:

WOW, I mean, WOW!!! Allthough I have a PS3 that does Core only, Dynamics are stupendous! We all know how the DVD sounded, well this BD version sounds even more incredible than it already did! There's plenty of LFE throughout the movie to make your subwoofer shake the house and upset the WHOLE neighborhood! This Disc will make your soundsystem sound like it costs twice as much as it did! If there is any Reference Title on AQ, Master and Commander is by FAR the very very BEST!

AQ a BIG 5 out of 5!

I have not watched any of the Extras so far, but there aren't many anyway!