Possible maybe early release BLU-RAY movies might become a reality?

[HDTV1080P]

Perhaps one day BLU-RAY will get the same treatment as HD VOD early releases.
According to the following article the MPAA is pushing to have Early HD VOD releases over cable and satellite shortly after the theatrical release and many months before the movie is released on DVD or BLU-RAY.
Since digital cable encryption has been proven to be 100% secure with no security breaches and since satellite services like Direct TV have been secure for around 3 years now, the studios are considering offering 1080I movies either the same day it hits the theater or a few weeks or months later.
Before the studios allow early HD VOD releases they want to disable all analog outputs and also disable HD DVR recording features when a consumer is watching the early release. So everyone that is interested in watching early releases would be required to have a HD display that has either a HDMI or DVI connection with HDCP (high definition content protection). This will prevent anyone from making an unauthorized copy of the early release.
Note the same early releases could happen with BLU-RAY one day. BLU-RAY encryption with BD+ is renewable and 100% secure unlike the DVD format. I am against piracy but the fact remains there are many consumers that purchase blank DVD dual layer discs for 80 cents or less and then turn around and make perfect 480I digital copies for friends and relatives. It is in the studios best interest to one day stop releasing movies on DVD and release 100% of all movies on the secure BLU-RAY format which does not allow people to make copies of copy protected discs.

Possible early 1080P BLU-RAY releases might
becoming one day.

All the BLU-RAY format needs to do is disable all analog outputs on the BLU-RAY player when a consumer plays an early released BLU-RAY disc. This function could easily be added with a firmware update to older BLU-RAY players and all new BLU-RAY players should allow the analog outputs to be disabled as a option. Then the MPAA does not need to worry about people making 480I recordings from the S-Video output of the BLU-RAY player. Of course if early BLU-RAY releases were to become a reality then one might pay $60-$100 for the latest hit movie. Blockbuster could offer the early released BLU-RAY movies for rent for $10 or $12 for consumers that do not want to purchase the move. It would be awesome to be able to purchase a 1080P movie the same day it is released in the theater. Back in the days of the Laserdisc format $100 was common for some box sets. The studios could start offering a two tier BLU-RAY structure. Early released BLU-RAY movies would cost $100 then 4-6 months later the same movie could be released on BLU-RAY for $30 each. Blockbuster could rent the early released BLU-RAY movies for $10 or $12. Then rent the regular BLU-RAY releases for $4. The only difference would be the early released movies for $100 would disable all analog outputs on the BLU-RAY player and would also have no extra features or limited extra features on the disk. Hopefully an early released BLU-RAY with no extras would be a Super bit BLU-RAY disc maximizing the entire 50GB disc for picture and sound.

http://www.tvpredictions.com/mpaa062008.htm

[Windmill McGill]

Damn Straight! Didn't they do that with Be Kind Please Rewind?? or did it not happen? I forgot to check that out haha

[Anti-SD]

Wow, thats sounds friggin' amazing!

[Bobby Henderson]

Early releases on Blu-ray (weeks or months ahead of DVD) might not be such a bad thing as long as the release comes AFTER the theatrical release.

Still, I see a couple of problems with it.

The obvious problem is shortened windows between theatrical and home video release do more to encourage more people to save money and just wait for the movie to come out on video and not go to the theater at all. Movie theaters are already in enough financial trouble as it is without making matters even worse.

The problem I have with the concept is less obvious. And that's the very real threat of an early Blu-ray release being lower in quality than a movie on BD that arrives in a normal time frame.

A lot of what happens in movie post production is done in a rush. Final edits, much of the soundtrack and much of the movie score are assembled up to the last minute.

The window between theatrical release and release on DVD/BD has given a lot of productions a second chance to go back and fix little things they weren't able to address during the rush to make the theatrical version.

DVD and BD authoring requires a decent amount of time in order to deliver a good quality product. A high quality disc worthy of premium, sell-through status doesn't get thrown together in a matter of just a few days. But that's what might be required if a BD is expected to hit video store shelves and retail store shelves only 4 or so weeks after the movie opens in theaters.

[blu2]

Originally Posted by Bobby Henderson

Early releases on Blu-ray (weeks or months ahead of DVD) might not be such a bad thing as long as the release comes AFTER the theatrical release.

Still, I see a couple of problems with it.

The obvious problem is shortened windows between theatrical and home video release do more to encourage more people to save money and just wait for the movie to come out on video and not go to the theater at all. Movie theaters are already in enough financial trouble as it is without making matters even worse.

The problem I have with the concept is less obvious. And that's the very real threat of an early Blu-ray release being lower in quality than a movie on BD that arrives in a normal time frame.

The studios would also have no idea of how much to invest in the production of such a Blu Ray release (extras and so forth). For that matter, how many copies to produce. If the movie is a flop, they'll have overinvested, and if it a hit, they may not be able to satisfy demand.

We'll also have to wait and see if early HD VOD releases are detrimental to Blu Ray sales.

[WickyWoo]

It's not going to happen, and those are hardly secure.

You assume way to much, first and foremost that the HD compression will be ready at the same time it hits theaters. There will come a point when each iteration of BD+ is secure for weeks at a time. They will not hand out a physical disc that can be ripped a week after theatrical release.

Cable On-demand is nowhere close to Blu (and will remain so on purpose), and features almost immediately renewable copy protection, and wouldn't start until the same approximate time that movies hit hotels and airlines, at the very end of theatrical run.

Disabling analog outputs is designed to stop consumer piracy, not dedicated professional operations who would certainly be all over this like white on rice

[jd213]

Still, I hope they start releasing Blus one to several weeks ahead of the DVD to get more people to start upgrading

[MOONPHASE]

Originally Posted by Windmill McGill

Damn Straight! Didn't they do that with Be Kind Please Rewind?? or did it not happen? I forgot to check that out haha

nope ended up not doing it

[UKTruBlu]

hmmmm interesting...not sure if it would take off though.

[bluflu]

This is interesting.

[Bobby Henderson]

Originally Posted by WickyWoo

You assume way to much, first and foremost that the HD compression will be ready at the same time it hits theaters.

That's really not true.

Post production on the theatrical cut of most movies can take place right up until the last minute. What you see on opening day in movie theaters was often still a work in progress less than a week before that.

Sure, test screenings and press screenings can happen a couple of weeks ahead of opening day, but some parts of the movie may still be left unfinished or the filmmakers will go back and tweak a few things before completing the theatrical cut.

Anyway, with the nature of theatrical post production being what it is, there simply isn't any time to carefully author a VC-1 or AVC encode for Blu-ray.

The 2K (and sometimes 4K) digital intermediates created for most movies these days are uncompressed or lossless compressed. The data files given to digital cinema equipped movie theaters are encoded in high bit rate Motion JPEG2000 format. Not nearly as much work as to go into encoding a movie in JPEG2000 since the bit rate is still so high. The AVC and VC-1 video streams on Blu-ray require a lot more work to get comparable video quality while fitting into a much smaller space (a 50GB optical disc instead of a 300GB hard disc).

[BluOgre]

You know what's funny is VHS tapes used to cost all video rentailers about $60 or more per tape. they would still rent it at about $2-$3 back then.

Rentailers could make money because people were forced to rent if they wanted to see the movie. Remember, there was no sell thru on VHS.....there was about a 6 month window before they released it for sell thru pricing.

All I know is $10-$12 is way too much. Blockbuster Corporate is expensive enough at the moment. If Blu-ray got the movie close to the release date in the theater, the strong popularity of the title would drive revenue enough like back in the VHS days. NO NEED FOR PRICE INCREASES.

The only thing that most rentailers would have to change is the rental periods for this product. There is no way to make margins if you are renting out the product for the entire week (or in Blockbuster Corporates case, an infinite amoutn of time with no late fees). They would have to go back to the one day rental period....meaning return the movie by the next day before midnight. Online would be harder.....to rent these movies you would defintely have to pay a premium price which would probably not make it worth renting online.

[jw]

Originally Posted by Windmill McGill

Damn Straight! Didn't they do that with Be Kind Please Rewind?? or did it not happen? I forgot to check that out haha

our WM had the dvd out but no blu-ray...funny

[WickyWoo]

Anyway, with the nature of theatrical post production being what it is, there simply isn't any time to carefully author a VC-1 or AVC encode for Blu-ray.

That's what I said. I said they were assuming they could just crank the thing out

The only thing that most rentailers would have to change is the rental periods for this product. There is no way to make margins if you are renting out the product for the entire week (or in Blockbuster Corporates case, an infinite amoutn of time with no late fees). They would have to go back to the one day rental period....meaning return the movie by the next day before midnight. Online would be harder.....to rent these movies you would defintely have to pay a premium price which would probably not make it worth renting online.

You're assuming the physical rentailer has a future beyond the specialty/film buff market. They really don't.

All I know is $10-$12 is way too much. Blockbuster Corporate is expensive enough at the moment. If Blu-ray got the movie close to the release date in the theater, the strong popularity of the title would drive revenue enough like back in the VHS days. NO NEED FOR PRICE INCREASES.

Again I ask, why would they want a physical, rippable disc out there? Studios also have zero desire to return to rental windows, hell they're even removing the PPV/On Demand delay as we speak.

They could rent them at $3 back then because they knew they'd have 4 months or so where people could only rent it to make that money back and then some. A popular movie could go out the door every night for 2-3 months. Now the end of theatrical run to sellthrough Blu release time is often measured in 2-3 months.

It's simply impractical. People are not going to pay a premium for movie-only discs, and the studios do not want to sabotage their salesby letting a rippable medium out while the thing is still playing theaters. On Demand is fairly secure, and will not match the quality of BLu, as are the hotel systems that typically have the movie 6-8 weeks before video release.

The fastest Blu release was Wrestlemania 24, about 8 weeks from broadcast date to final product, and even that, as good as it looked had some things that screamed quick and dirty about it, and that was with a clean, well-lit shot 100% digital camera source.

Yes, you can turn a DVD around today in about 4 days, maybe in 10 years you'll be able to do that with Blu (probably not, because there's a lot less room to cheat, make it 7), but no one is going to sacrifice theatrical, particuarly international revenues so that it can be spread around the net and a miniscule number of people can see the movie a little faster, when those same people will pay to watch it On Demand instead, over a secure medium with little to no delivery costs

[J.Cornelius]

Blockbuster is a dinosaur, will lucky to be viable in 5 years.

[WickyWoo]

Blockbuster is a dinosaur, will lucky to be viable in 5 years.

That's why you see them trying to buy Circuit City, and trying to diversify to things other than rental

Game rental is still viable. Used games and movies are still viable. They could really hurt Game/MovieStop if they decided to use the existing locations and floorspaces to push that angle

[J.Cornelius]

When the Blockbuster offer was announced in April, here were some examples of why this was considered by many a horrendous idea.



"Tie two bricks together and they still don't float
Blockbuster can't afford Circuit City, which means it has to do a dreaded "rights offering" (equity) and raise even more debt.
We're headed into a recession, which means the operating performance for both companies will deteriorate, amplifying the weight of the debt load
In the years it will take to integrate these companies, more nimble and focused competitors like Best Buy and Netflix will race that much farther ahead.
Blockbuster will now be so distracted that the transition to electronic delivery, already challenging, will now be its last concern."

Very simply, in my view, as the ability of broadband expands you will be able to rent any movie, video game (from any platform) which Blockbuster carries at their stores via the internet or through VOD, the libraries will expand exponentially.