Sony Black Crush on late-2014 / early-2015 BDs - Blu-ray Forum

James Luckard · 12-28-2014, 06:52 AM

A number of Sony Blu-Rays, almost all released in the United States from January to March 2015, suffered from "crushed blacks". The new releases have been CORRECTED for most European markets. The catalog titles have not been corrected.

New releases:
FURY (Jan 2015)
Brazilian and German BDs from Sony - CORRECTED
This title was released by companies other than Sony in a few markets (Poland, Taiwan, etc), those releases never had the crush.
Comparison: http://caps-a-holic.com/c_list.php?c=2290

THE INTERVIEW (Feb 2015)
British, Brazilian, German, French, Dutch, Australian BDs from Sony - CORRECTED
Croatia, Czech Republic, Estonia, Poland, Slovenia, Ukraine, Bulgaria, Portugal, Iceland, Greece - not corrected
Comparison: http://caps-a-holic.com/c_list.php?c=2291

ANNIE (2014) (Mar 2015)
All overseas Sony versions are apparently CORRECTED
Comparison: http://caps-a-holic.com/c.php?go=&d1...=&x=&y=&l=&i=0

Catalog titles:
MY BEST FRIEND'S WEDDING (Feb 2015)
European and Asian markets got this title in 2008-2009, using the HD master created for the SE DVD. A new "Mastered in 4K" version was released on BD in the US only in 2015, where it was ruined by the black crush.

MY GIRL (Mar 2015)
Released in most major markets in March/April/June, crushed.

TROOP BEVERLY HILLS (Mar 2015)
US release only, crushed blacks

In addition, one overseas title apparently suffered crushed blacks:

HANCOCK
Japanese "Mastered in 4K" BD has black crush
Comparison: https://forum.blu-ray.com/showpost.p...postcount=2055

It has also been suggested that SEX TAPE (Oct 2014), may have suffered from crushed blacks.

When these titles were released in the US, only the BDs suffered crushed blacks. The DVDs, UltraViolet and Netflix versions were all normal, as the caps below demonstrate.

In addition, the clips from the films in the special features on the BDs were also normal, making it extremely easy to toggle back and forth between shots and see the flawed BD versions.

--------------------------------------------------

06/08/2015 Update:

Sony admitted that some of their BDs have black crush.

Image courtesy of Extremis:

[Show spoiler]

--------------------------------------------------

You can contact Sony Pictures Home Entertainment Customer Service at consumer@SPHECustomerSupport.sony.com or 1-800-860-2878 to voice your concerns about this issue.

--------------------------------------------------

Fury

BD vs DVD comparison: http://caps-a-holic.com/c.php?go=&d1...=&x=&y=&l=&i=0

BD

[Show spoiler]

iTunes Digital Copy

[Show spoiler]

DVD

[Show spoiler]

The Interview
(All screencaps from James Luckard except the ones with the tiger.)

VUDU UV:

[Show spoiler]

BD:

[Show spoiler]

UV:

[Show spoiler]

BD:

[Show spoiler]

UV:

[Show spoiler]

BD:

[Show spoiler]

UV:

[Show spoiler]

BD:

[Show spoiler]

UV:

[Show spoiler]

BD:

[Show spoiler]

UV:

[Show spoiler]

BD:

[Show spoiler]

UV:

[Show spoiler]

BD:

[Show spoiler]

UV:

[Show spoiler]

BD:

[Show spoiler]

This thread was originally started by jscoggins, who seems to have left the forum. I have been given control of the thread by the mods.

cuzzin · 02-19-2015, 09:11 PM

It's funny how the digital copies are never affected by these glitches in the transfers. The third season of Shameless also suffered from issues with black levels, but the problem only existed on the BD; the UV copy looked great.

philip74 · 02-19-2015, 10:34 PM

When I first saw the screencaps of the Fury review on this site I was already surprised how dark they looked

How does this black crush happen? What goes wrong during the production/transfer process?

It`s like Sony is trying to discourage the last remaining physical media
buyers from Blurays

jscoggins · 02-19-2015, 10:49 PM

No idea, other than a conspiracy to get us to move completely to streaming.

bruceames · 02-19-2015, 10:53 PM

I have Fury on both BD and the Sony 4K download and have noticed that the BD doesn't have good black levels, as you can see the brightness in the black bars (whereas on the download they look totally black).

revgen · 02-19-2015, 10:54 PM

Somebody mixed up PC levels with TV levels during the blu-ray rendering process.

Here's the brighter Itunes version with 16-235 TV levels used for input.

When the change is applied, it looks similar to the blu-ray image jscoggins posted. Apparently, QC at Sony is not up to snuff.

philip74 · 02-19-2015, 11:07 PM

Wow! I hope people like Bill Hunt from DigitalBits and other sites write about this!
Doubt Sony will ever offer an exchange though! (Total Recall

)

jscoggins · 02-20-2015, 02:28 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by philip74

Wow! I hope people like Bill Hunt from DigitalBits and other sites write about this!
Doubt Sony will ever offer an exchange though! (Total Recall

)

That was just dumb. They sent out the same exact disc as "replacements".

James Luckard · 02-20-2015, 03:56 AM

Their new disc of MY BEST FRIEND'S WEDDING also suffers from this.

We need to get organized and complain and STOP this from continuing, these discs look like garbage. THE INTERVIEW is almost unwatchable during the dark scenes.

And you can't even fix it by raising the brightness, I tried, the detail simply isn't there in the black areas, no matter how bright you make the image.

RAZGRIZ-1 · 02-20-2015, 04:21 AM

I just watched Fury tonight and noticed this myself. Glad I'm not the only one. Honestly it wasn't too bad to me.

jscoggins · 02-20-2015, 04:22 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by James Luckard

Their new disc of MY BEST FRIEND'S WEDDING also suffers from this.

We need to get organized and complain and STOP this from continuing, these discs look like garbage. THE INTERVIEW is almost unwatchable during the dark scenes.

And you can't even fix it by raising the brightness, I tried, the detail simply isn't there in the black areas, no matter how bright you make the image.

James, My Best Friend's Wedding comes with a UV code. If you create a VUDU account, you can see what the movie should look like. You could even post a screen capture like I did for The Interview.

asmodeux21 · 02-20-2015, 04:45 AM

Wasn't "Hostel 2" one of the worst offenders some years back? Eli Roth even stated that something technically went wrong when Sony transferred the movie to blu ray. "Hostel 2" was supposed to have a much warmer look than the darkened/crushed presentation of the blu ray.

Clark Kent · 02-20-2015, 04:48 AM

Quality control has gone down the drain. No one is checking these BDs before they are sent for replication.

James Luckard · 02-20-2015, 05:22 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jscoggins

James, My Best Friend's Wedding comes with a UV code. If you create a VUDU account, you can see what the movie should look like. You could even post a screen capture like I did for The Interview.

Cool, will do! It will be my first ever use of one of those codes

Shame to have to start this way though. They need to fix these BDs.

James Luckard · 02-20-2015, 06:01 AM

MY BEST FRIEND'S WEDDING caps:

[Show spoiler]

jscoggins · 02-20-2015, 06:10 AM

Wow, the captures with the two actors sitting in the car are really different!

James Luckard · 02-20-2015, 06:16 AM

On the MBFW caps, notice in particular how the bushes outside the tent at the wedding vanish completely in the darker BD transfer. And how his tuxedo turns into a huge black blob. I saw the film multiple times in theaters, and it NEVER looked this dark. And no previous version - VHS, DVD or even BD was this dark.

The same thing happens throughout THE INTERVIEW. Kim Jong Un wears a black costume, and it looks like a black puppeteer's suit, lol. These are cruddy BDs that need to be REPLACED ASAP.

cuzzin · 02-20-2015, 06:23 AM

We need an HD-to-HD comparison though.

James Luckard · 02-20-2015, 06:24 AM

Wow!!! I have THE INTERVIEW BD running right now on my TV and the UV version running on Vudu simultaneously. They are NIGHT AND DAY. The BD looks like it had a blind cinematographer, it is impossibly dark. The UV version looks exactly as it did in theaters.

This is outrageous!!!! I paid $20 for a BD with a pristine copy of the film, not this GARBAGE. I'll be calling Sony Home Video tomorrow to complain. This is unacceptable!!

jscoggins · 02-20-2015, 06:25 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by James Luckard

Wow!!! I have THE INTERVIEW BD running right now on my TV and the UV version running on Vudu simultaneously. They are NIGHT AND DAY. The BD looks like it had a blind cinematographer, it is impossibly dark. The UV version looks exactly as it did in theaters.

This is outrageous!!!! I paid $20 for a BD with a pristine copy of the film, not this GARBAGE. I'll be calling Sony Home Video tomorrow to complain. This is unacceptable!!

$20? It's $9.96 at Walmart.

12-28-2014, 06:52 AM	#1
James Luckard Blu-ray Count Top contributor Member since:Jan 2011 Location:Los Angeles, CA 4K collection:397 Blu-ray collection:1806 Blu-ray reviews: 34	Sony Black Crush on late-2014 / early-2015 BDs A number of Sony Blu-Rays, almost all released in the United States from January to March 2015, suffered from "crushed blacks". The new releases have been CORRECTED for most European markets. The catalog titles have not been corrected. New releases: FURY (Jan 2015) Brazilian and German BDs from Sony - CORRECTED This title was released by companies other than Sony in a few markets (Poland, Taiwan, etc), those releases never had the crush. Comparison: http://caps-a-holic.com/c_list.php?c=2290 THE INTERVIEW (Feb 2015) British, Brazilian, German, French, Dutch, Australian BDs from Sony - CORRECTED Croatia, Czech Republic, Estonia, Poland, Slovenia, Ukraine, Bulgaria, Portugal, Iceland, Greece - not corrected Comparison: http://caps-a-holic.com/c_list.php?c=2291 ANNIE (2014) (Mar 2015) All overseas Sony versions are apparently CORRECTED Comparison: http://caps-a-holic.com/c.php?go=&d1...=&x=&y=&l=&i=0 Catalog titles: MY BEST FRIEND'S WEDDING (Feb 2015) European and Asian markets got this title in 2008-2009, using the HD master created for the SE DVD. A new "Mastered in 4K" version was released on BD in the US only in 2015, where it was ruined by the black crush. MY GIRL (Mar 2015) Released in most major markets in March/April/June, crushed. TROOP BEVERLY HILLS (Mar 2015) US release only, crushed blacks In addition, one overseas title apparently suffered crushed blacks: HANCOCK Japanese "Mastered in 4K" BD has black crush Comparison: https://forum.blu-ray.com/showpost.p...postcount=2055 It has also been suggested that SEX TAPE (Oct 2014), may have suffered from crushed blacks. When these titles were released in the US, only the BDs suffered crushed blacks. The DVDs, UltraViolet and Netflix versions were all normal, as the caps below demonstrate. In addition, the clips from the films in the special features on the BDs were also normal, making it extremely easy to toggle back and forth between shots and see the flawed BD versions. -------------------------------------------------- 06/08/2015 Update: Sony admitted that some of their BDs have black crush. Image courtesy of Extremis: [Show spoiler] -------------------------------------------------- You can contact Sony Pictures Home Entertainment Customer Service at consumer@SPHECustomerSupport.sony.com or 1-800-860-2878 to voice your concerns about this issue. -------------------------------------------------- Fury BD vs DVD comparison: http://caps-a-holic.com/c.php?go=&d1...=&x=&y=&l=&i=0 BD [Show spoiler] iTunes Digital Copy [Show spoiler] DVD [Show spoiler] The Interview (All screencaps from James Luckard except the ones with the tiger.) VUDU UV: [Show spoiler] BD: [Show spoiler] UV: [Show spoiler] BD: [Show spoiler] UV: [Show spoiler] BD: [Show spoiler] UV: [Show spoiler] BD: [Show spoiler] UV: [Show spoiler] BD: [Show spoiler] UV: [Show spoiler] BD: [Show spoiler] UV: [Show spoiler] BD: [Show spoiler] UV: [Show spoiler] BD: [Show spoiler] This thread was originally started by jscoggins, who seems to have left the forum. I have been given control of the thread by the mods. Last edited by James Luckard; 05-04-2016 at 06:01 PM.

02-19-2015, 10:49 PM	#4
jscoggins Banned Top contributor Member since:Apr 2014 Trading Score:115	No idea, other than a conspiracy to get us to move completely to streaming. Last edited by jscoggins; 02-20-2015 at 04:23 AM.

02-19-2015, 11:07 PM	#7
philip74 Blu-ray Samurai Member since:Jan 2010 Blu-ray collection:11 Trading Score:140	Wow! I hope people like Bill Hunt from DigitalBits and other sites write about this! Doubt Sony will ever offer an exchange though! (Total Recall)

02-20-2015, 06:01 AM	#15
James Luckard Blu-ray Count Top contributor Member since:Jan 2011 Location:Los Angeles, CA 4K collection:397 Blu-ray collection:1806 Blu-ray reviews: 34	MY BEST FRIEND'S WEDDING caps: [Show spoiler] Last edited by James Luckard; 02-20-2015 at 06:30 AM.

02-19-2015, 09:11 PM	#2
cuzzin Blu-ray Guru Member since:Dec 2011 Location:Houston, Texas Trading Score:10	It's funny how the digital copies are never affected by these glitches in the transfers. The third season of Shameless also suffered from issues with black levels, but the problem only existed on the BD; the UV copy looked great.

02-19-2015, 10:34 PM	#3
philip74 Blu-ray Samurai Member since:Jan 2010 Blu-ray collection:11 Trading Score:140	When I first saw the screencaps of the Fury review on this site I was already surprised how dark they looked How does this black crush happen? What goes wrong during the production/transfer process? It`s like Sony is trying to discourage the last remaining physical media buyers from Blurays

02-19-2015, 10:53 PM	#5
bruceames Blu-ray Knight Top contributor Member since:Nov 2012 Location:Novato, CA 4K collection:15 Blu-ray collection:1337 DVD collection:2 Trading Score:1	I have Fury on both BD and the Sony 4K download and have noticed that the BD doesn't have good black levels, as you can see the brightness in the black bars (whereas on the download they look totally black).

02-19-2015, 10:54 PM	#6
revgen Power Member Member since:Oct 2013 Location:Southern California, USA Trading Score:17	Somebody mixed up PC levels with TV levels during the blu-ray rendering process. Here's the brighter Itunes version with 16-235 TV levels used for input. When the change is applied, it looks similar to the blu-ray image jscoggins posted. Apparently, QC at Sony is not up to snuff.

02-20-2015, 03:56 AM	#9
James Luckard Blu-ray Count Top contributor Member since:Jan 2011 Location:Los Angeles, CA 4K collection:397 Blu-ray collection:1806 Blu-ray reviews: 34	Their new disc of MY BEST FRIEND'S WEDDING also suffers from this. We need to get organized and complain and STOP this from continuing, these discs look like garbage. THE INTERVIEW is almost unwatchable during the dark scenes. And you can't even fix it by raising the brightness, I tried, the detail simply isn't there in the black areas, no matter how bright you make the image.

02-20-2015, 04:21 AM	#10
RAZGRIZ-1 Blu-ray Guru Top contributor Member since:May 2008 Location:Illinois 4K collection:9 Blu-ray collection:334 Blu-ray reviews: 5	I just watched Fury tonight and noticed this myself. Glad I'm not the only one. Honestly it wasn't too bad to me.

02-20-2015, 04:45 AM	#12
asmodeux21 Special Member Member since:Oct 2010 Trading Score:3	Wasn't "Hostel 2" one of the worst offenders some years back? Eli Roth even stated that something technically went wrong when Sony transferred the movie to blu ray. "Hostel 2" was supposed to have a much warmer look than the darkened/crushed presentation of the blu ray.

02-20-2015, 04:48 AM	#13
Clark Kent Blu-ray Prince Top contributor Member since:Oct 2007 Location:Metropolis Blu-ray reviews:2 Trading Score:184	Quality control has gone down the drain. No one is checking these BDs before they are sent for replication.

02-20-2015, 06:10 AM	#16
jscoggins Banned Top contributor Member since:Apr 2014 Trading Score:115	Wow, the captures with the two actors sitting in the car are really different!

02-20-2015, 06:16 AM	#17
James Luckard Blu-ray Count Top contributor Member since:Jan 2011 Location:Los Angeles, CA 4K collection:397 Blu-ray collection:1806 Blu-ray reviews: 34	On the MBFW caps, notice in particular how the bushes outside the tent at the wedding vanish completely in the darker BD transfer. And how his tuxedo turns into a huge black blob. I saw the film multiple times in theaters, and it NEVER looked this dark. And no previous version - VHS, DVD or even BD was this dark. The same thing happens throughout THE INTERVIEW. Kim Jong Un wears a black costume, and it looks like a black puppeteer's suit, lol. These are cruddy BDs that need to be REPLACED ASAP.

02-20-2015, 06:23 AM	#18
cuzzin Blu-ray Guru Member since:Dec 2011 Location:Houston, Texas Trading Score:10	We need an HD-to-HD comparison though.

02-20-2015, 06:24 AM	#19
James Luckard Blu-ray Count Top contributor Member since:Jan 2011 Location:Los Angeles, CA 4K collection:397 Blu-ray collection:1806 Blu-ray reviews: 34	Wow!!! I have THE INTERVIEW BD running right now on my TV and the UV version running on Vudu simultaneously. They are NIGHT AND DAY. The BD looks like it had a blind cinematographer, it is impossibly dark. The UV version looks exactly as it did in theaters. This is outrageous!!!! I paid $20 for a BD with a pristine copy of the film, not this GARBAGE. I'll be calling Sony Home Video tomorrow to complain. This is unacceptable!!

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