How Did DVD's Become So Disdained?

[StevenWest]

Recently caught the trailer to the movie Border, and it looks intriguing. Going on Amazon, there's only a BD version of it and of course streaming. I'm still of the ilk if something looks good, whether new or old, I'll pick up the DVD to check it out. If it's okay, I keep the DVD and add it to my collection. If it sucks, I take it to the 2nd store and get some money from it for something else. If it's awesome, and the BD or Premium offers a lot more in the way of quality and extras, I'll sell off the DVD and go BIG! But I really hate the fact that many companies now don't bother with DVD at all. And for what I can see, Blu-Rays are just a gouge to jack up prices over 100% with maybe a 10% improvement. I'm cheesed at Arrow for their release of Slaughterhouse Five, as the BD hardly looks any better than my DVD! I appreciate the extras added onto the BD, as my DVD was sadly lacking. But $41.44CDN...? All could've been put on a DVD still for less than half that price, and I'd be happy. And with IMDB and YouTube, I probably could get all the extras and more insight for FREE. Hearing so much praise for Arrow, I thought I'd take the plunge finally. But am seriously NOT impressed! Had they done a DVD version alongside, they might've won me over. High kudos to Criterion for keeping up both versions. I maybe a pain in the butt for them, but their DVD's suit me fine! Well packaged, affordable, and concise with my collection. What's even more hilarious is many of these BD only issuers like Shout! and such are actually issuing VINYL RECORD soundtracks to go alongside their BD releases! That to me is like ordering Beluga Caviar with white bread to put it on! Nothing against caviar or white bread - but whens the last time anyone ever had a caviar sandwich? How did it get like this? DVD's are STILL good! Be they on a 20 year old working player bought at a thrift store for $6, or on a new Sony PS5 PlayStation. One can still enjoy a movie with them. Maybe not the best picture quality. Maybe farty as to which side Full Screen and Wide Screen are on, and maybe packed with trailers and CD-ROM functions. But they are still more tangible in artwork, space for extras in case, spine recognition, and affordable cost to manufacture and purchase. "Freedom is a road seldom traveled by the masses..." - more of us should be demanding that DVD be kept as a staple. And if we wish to upgrade, sell it, use it as a coaster, or proudly display it on our top shelf and poo-poo the BD, 4k, and Premium 1 Click releases that have since followed. We should have that option still! Arrow and Shout! et al should care more about me and my money than the black market does. And lord knows, their DVD knock off business is STILL going strong!

 

Sorry for the rant, but feels good to get it out there.

[deckard99]

Hey Steven, I’m glad you have a system that works for you. I have a 75’ tv and DVDs look like crap, so I’ve upgraded most to Blu-ray’s or 4K discs. I can see a big difference between DVD and Blu-ray. Not much between Blu-ray and 4K however. I guess when 8k comes out there will be even less improvement. I’m really hoping for a return of 3D at some point!

[StevenWest]

Maybe that's it, as my TV's only 26" - which suits me fine still. And yes, some DVD's can be real crap too. Some publishers just rip a VHS onto DVD pretty with no tweaks or anything. But for say Criterion, there can't be that much difference between their DVD and BD's of the same title can there? Unless maybe if one's going with a big huge TV? The only Blu-Ray that's REALLY impressed me so far in transfer and upgrade is Vinegar Syndromes release of Lust In The Dust. The DVD I had was pretty crap, and so glad VS gave Paul Bartel the honor he deserves. And BAM! That movie just POPS now for me on BD. The other one that gets me is that many BD Only releases now with an extras disc - the extras are usually on DVD format still. And no consideration given to deleted footage, trailers, behind the scenes stuff. I'm not into Star Wars and all these CGI epics today. But for die hard fans I'm surprised they don't demand the same quality given to the extras as given to the movie? Maybe some of the footage could work if cleaned up a bit? Or be more evident why a scene or effect was chucked with the restoration added? Just seems "Six of one, half dozen of the other" to me. Charge as much as possible for 6, and let the half dozen go for cheap? And I agree that 3D is more intriguing to me than this 4k stuff. I'd be more willing to check out good ol' Star Wars in 3D if Lucas and ILM were behind it than this current Disney 4k cookie cutter crap. Studios and publishers I just don't get these days?

[pygospa]

Uh, this is a great post, and I have to confess - I have strong feelings here as well - but also some background knowledge on the technology. First off, there is also always a subjective component to it, and that has many levels:

 

1. Personal taste: Even though we now have 4k and 8k etc. some people prefer a certain blurredness, they might even feel that super sharp images look unrealistic and off; uncanny. I have this exact feeling with HFR movies. You might feel the same with HD vs SD.
2. Eye-sight: This is something I am confronted with on a regular basis. I am short sighted, so my eyes make things that are near to my eye appear much bigger, than the normal sighted person. My girlfriend on the other hand is farsighted, so for her, everything near is much smaller. This always gets interesting if we look at printed pictures, or smartphone resolutions. Where I can still see small dots on (in my view) bad printing quality, my girlfriend will think an image looks just fine, and where I am totally freaked out by the perfect picture quality on a retina-display smartphone my girlfriend doesn't get the fuzz I am making.
3. Viewing equipment and setup: Even though one could argue that this is already getting objective and technical, I'll argue for a certain subjectivity here, as not everyone has the means to have big screens or viewing distances (depending on your living situations, your house/flat and a bit also your personal preference on how you decorate your living space). There are certain constraints to meet, if you want HD and 4K to play out their strengths. Of course if you have an SD-resolution TV, there is no value in having an HD source, as it has to be down-sampled (however, there are people claiming that at least color-wise you can still get a minimal benefit - I haven't tried that yet). But even if you have a TV capable of 4K, you won't get much out of it, if you only have 20" screen, as all the dots get so packed that you wouldn't be able to distinguish them anyways. Then again if you just sit less then half a meter in front of it you will definitely see those individual pixels again. So here's a two-dimensioned rule of thumb: The larger the screen the larger the resolution should get; but also the nearer the screen, the larger the resolution should get. These are the two factors that have a certain subjective component: If you have a small flat, you'll want larger resolutions, no matter the size of the TV. But if you prefer larger TVs, again you'll want larger resolutions - unless you also have the space to sit far away - but at it also is getting technically, let's jump into the objective side of things:

 

First of all I feel that it is important to divide this post into three aspects that you @StevenWest seem to use interchangeably: You say BDs are over-hyped and DVDs still fine, because they don't look any worse. However, what you mean to say is SD is still fine, and HD is over-hyped,  because it's the picture format you'll then talk about, not the medium carrying this picture format. In fact BDs and DVDs aren't that different from a technical standpoint. It's rather the laser reading those discs, that - in the case of the BD - can read tinier information, therefore allowing for more information to be pressed on nearly identical material. Just judging from the material, the way these things are produced - you are totally right: We are ripped off. Producing these doesn't cost a penny more. However, there are two more aspects: The picture format - which - as you claim - looks (nearly?) identical. This might be true on a subjective standpoint, as I have already explained, but objectively speaking it is easy to show that this is not the case - given however, that we talk about grabbing this information from the same source, and that is the third aspect, that is often forgotten, but never the less really important.

 

The first thing that struck me in a "how could he"-sense of way is this sentence - as it totally shows what I mean by the first aspect, I talked about (comparing plain media formats, without considering the format of the content these media carry):

 

On 12/31/2019 at 7:19 PM, StevenWest said:

What's even more hilarious is many of these BD only issuers like Shout! and such are actually issuing VINYL RECORD soundtracks to go alongside their BD releases! That to me is like ordering Beluga Caviar with white bread to put it on! Nothing against caviar or white bread - but whens the last time anyone ever had a caviar sandwich?

 

And I feel like there's a lack of understanding here, which is why I'd like to go into such detail about the technicality here: You are comparing an digital format (saved on BD or DVD) with an analog one (saved on Vinyl), which is simply comparing apples with oranges. Our real world is continuous, i.e. with enough patients (and the right king of tools ) you could split everything you see in smaller and smaller parts - there is no limit how small you can get. You can always half a number, even if it is 0,0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000001. And getting to your example: In a truly analog taken photograph, every possible visible color you can see with your own eyes would have been captured by the photo. You can take a magnifying glass and go over the image and you wouldn't see "breaks" in a gradient - every possible and even so tiniest nuance of color is there. Video is a series of photos, so a analog film is just like an analog photo. And when it comes to music we get sound waves, that - if recorded analog and if copied to analog medium - will retrain its continuity. Vinyl records are an analog medium, i.e. the waveform saved on the disk is 1-to-1 exactly the same that was produced by the original instruments and singers, and is as such reproduced 1-to-1 without any information loss on your home stereo. It is like that, because the wave patterns are cut into the vinyl - there is of course a start and a ending point (as there would be for a picture with the colors pure white and pure black) but in-between these two states, the knife that cuts a vinyl can cut a theoretically infinite state of depths. In that regard, records are and have always been far superior to any other format (including tapes which is also a lossless analog format, but we all know the hassles that format has), it's durable (if well treated - you can find records from the 40s, i.e. 80 years old, that will still play), it is far less prune to wear and tear; but of course it is unhandy.

 

The counterpart of analog is often considered digital, which in 90% of the cases is true but the real difference is in the continuity - whereas most analog medium is capable of reproducing the continuous things we perceive in the real world, digital media, due to the way they are build, cannot.(*) They are discrete. A computer for instance only knows the values 0 and 1 (on a technical level that is current or no current, on a mathematical level we get the Binary-System). Of course we can start encoding things with these two states: 0 = white, 1 = black. But then we could only show two colors. Okey: 00 = white, 01 = light grey, 10 = dark grey, 11 = black. Only four colors. You can however go on; with 3 digits you get 8 colors, with 4 digits already get 16 colors, with 8 digits you are at 256 different colors. However, this gets limited by the space we have to save all of this information. 8 digits are 1Byte of information. We cannot do this indefinitely. Not so the analog photo camera that will get you the theoretically infinite nuances of color.

 

To get back to your Vinyl example - if I take an analog audio-wave and discretize it, I have to define my range, e.g. I could say I'll have a 4-bit-Range (in computer science the number of digits of binary numbers is referred to as bit, so this is a four digit binary number, i.e. all combinations of 0000 to 1111). That gives me 16 concrete different states I can represent (see the image at Wikipedia). The result is a a sound wave that jumps from one state to the next, so you don't get a curve anymore, but rather a stair case:

 

Information in-between is lost. And this is audible - at least to some: It sound's tinny and not as full. This will never happen with vinyl. To counter this effect on the digital side, what we do is we try to enlarge these numbers as much as feasible: No one uses 4-bit in audio: A CD has 16-bit, and the more states we have the smaller the distance between them can get (i.e. the more "samples" we can take per second). We usually take 44 to 48kHz (i.e. 44.000 - 48.000 samples per second) - so many that the ear gets "fooled" into believing to hear a continuous sound that he cannot distinguish from the original source.

 

For hearing, this is easy as the human physiology is not optimized on hearing. It's optimized on seeing and here things become more difficult.

 

Discretizing a picture means two things:

 

1. Discretizing the color (as mentioned above) - you need at least 8-bits to fool the eye, and it is mostly used on images on the internet; Blu-ray and DVD both use 24-bit of colors. UHD-BD uses 30-bit.

2. Discretizing the picture at hand into little dots. This is called rasterizing.

 

As the color is the same for BD and DVD you cannot expect any difference here, but the rasterizing will also have a color effect as we'll see. Because we are in the digital world, our raster is fixed, regardless the size that we'll do: We'll take a picture and cut it into a number of small squares. Each square is one pixel. And each pixel can only have one color. So we take the color that is most present in the pixel and use that as the color for our entire pixel. And thus we get a rasterized image:

 

 

The reality is of course a bit different - we usually don't use only the colors from the original image. Instead we'd mix the colors. If the pixel is just black, it's black, if it's just white, it'll stay white, but if it's half white and half black, we'll get a grey pixel, so we get a more "smooth" image.

 

But I think it's pretty obvious that it's the same here, as it already was with the audio: The finer we chose this raster to be, the better the end result will look. And our raster is the pixels that the image format accepts. For SD (standard definition, found on DVDs) this was set to 720x480 pixels. For HD this is 1920x1080 pixel. This is 6-times more pixels than with the SD format. And here are two rastering formats of the same fish from Wikipedia, and they are in scale to resemble the difference of SD and HD:

 

 

Now hopefully you will see how much more information there is on the second image than there is on the first. So from an objective perspective - you yourself have to confess, that there is much more detail, the image is much better and preferable to the first one. But now let's get back to the 3rd point I made about subjectivity:

Try to enlarge the image of the second fish, until the raster is of the same size as the first one - you will see that now the second fish doesn't look too good anymore. Same if you keep the image of the second fish as it is, but walk back from your monitor and thus enlarge your distance - you will get to the point where the second fish looks the same as the first one did up-close. And here's why we actually gotten to the point that HD was introduced in the first place. In the early television days, screens hand the size of a shoe box. Today however, people have TV screens that cover an entire wall. If you blow up the second fish you'll reach the point were it looks like the first. If you blow up the first one, it'll only grow more ugly. SD was good for small screens, but wasn't designed for growing TVs. HD is. And same goes with the viewing distance: The smaller the screen was, the nearer people sat in front of the TV making that screen bigger you'd either need to move back to retain picture quality, or if you cannot, then the resolution needs to get bigger. There are charts that will tell you exactly, what you'll need depending on both, your distance to the TV as well as your TV screen size:

 

So given that you've already told us that you have a 26" display, HD will only pay of if you sit somewhere between 0.6 and 1.2m away from your television. Most living room  wouldn't allow for that short range. I myself have a 40" with a sitting distance of ~2.5m, so HD makes sense - 4k would make sense at ~70", which I'd never get. I feel like 50" would be the maximum I'd feel comfortable with, but I wouldn't feel comfortable sitting just 1m in front of it.

 

So hopefully the first two aspects are clear now - totally objectively speaking, BDs are better due to their capacity (and I even got some SD-TV series on BD, which allows to reduce the number of discs drastically), and HD is always better than SD, due to a much larger number of details. However, if you are far away, or (due to your screen size) the pixels get really large, you wouldn't be able to yield the better details. Now there was a third aspect and I really like your comment that is connected to that, which is also connected to the price discussion you initiated:

 

On 1/1/2020 at 3:51 PM, StevenWest said:

And yes, some DVD's can be real crap too. Some publishers just rip a VHS onto DVD pretty with no tweaks or anything. But for say Criterion, there can't be that much difference between their DVD and BD's of the same title can there?

 

So if you get everything I tried to illustrate above, you can answer the question for your self: Yes (and no). Yes, because a DVD will simply not show you all the fine details. It can't because of the rasterizing. So the BD is of much better quality (which maybe you just cannot see due to your setup - that's why the no in brackets). However, if there was a prior DVD release, the DVD wouldn't have changed in quality anyways. At least not, if they did a new re-scan of the original material AND if that original material was eligible for a higher quality re-scan.

 

For this we need to get back to my statements from the beginning: If I have an analog movie, I have a theoretical continuous information material, which means I can blow it up however I want, and it shouldn't make a difference. And you might know this already: If you have a analog photo, you can make copies of it in standard photo size, or in poster size and it wouldn't look any worse. If you, however take a digitally printed picture, from a magazine or a flyer, and blow that up, you'll get something like this:

 

The reason is that again, we have discrete dots instead of a continuous spectrum. So the first takeaway is: If the movie was captured on film (i.e. analog), there is no problem. However if it's captured on digital camera, you're out of luck if the resolution they captured it on, is too small. Especially TV series and movies where captured on inexpensive digital cameras, and to keep costs even further down, this was done right in the format needed. So here, you will never get something on BD that will look better than on DVD. Just won't work. Best example is Star Trek. Ever wondered why TOS and TNG as well as all the movies where released in HD but DS9 and VOY were not? Now you know. An HD upscaling would require so much more work than would be feasible, so it just isn't done.

We're only in luck if we have it on film, or if the photographer had so much foresight as to produce it in a high quality. Digitally filmed movies where usually filmed in 4K, making 8K somewhat of a deal breaker. But even for film it means a lot of work: The material was usually scanned for the master copy, then all the effects (color grading, etc.) where done on that master copy and then the from this master copy all the other copies where created; for a HD release these masters have insufficient quality, i.e. the rasterization is larger than needed for HD. So all this work has to be redone. Rescanning them for a larger image also means, that more things will be visible that maybe shouldn't have. And last but not least - and here's where the "theoretically" plays out: practically film is a chemical process, and these chemical processes leave their marks, such as film grain; so in the end a lot of restoration is needed. It's needed because of the BD release. And this is what drives up the price for BDs. Now DVD collectors cheap out on this - and it is their right to do so, because in the end, the high resolution get's down-sampled for DVD again, and all the higher details are lost again. But it's not the BD you pay for - it's even not the picture quality. But the process to get there. At least for BDs (4K is of course another thing - but as it is always with new technology: In the beginning they are a bit more expensive).

And keeping this in mind, I think it's a bit unfair to criticize companies such as Shout!, Arrow or Criterion. These companies are not money-hungry, otherwise they wouldn't bother with cinematic classics that have a rather select group of collects, but focus on current blockbusters. These come in the right format, no work needed, press them on BD, ask your 15€-20€ or put them in a Steelbook and make it 35€ - and there you have your margin. But putting so much manual labor into correcting and restoring old films, re-scanning them for perfect picture quality from film rolls that are 30+ years old - that is costly also on their side. And that is (mostly) only done for the BD, because it's worth doing it for those - it isn't just for the DVD.

 

Now having said all of this  - and if you've read up to here: Kudos to you, for sticking to the DVD. I myself did that until Christmas of 2014. Because I was of the same opinion as you were. I never tried BDs at home as I didn't have a player for it; I just watched DVDs and I had such a large collection I didn't want to part with. Plus, I really detest these blue Amarays in their cheap plastic look that also destroys the mood of most of the artwork due to it's jarring blue. Then my brother gifted me a Blu-ray player because he was shocked that I still used DVD - I plugged it in and thought to myself: "Well, it can play DVDs so I have a new DVD-player if needed", then I tested out my Hobbit-Blu-ray I bought because the Collectors-Gift-Box only came with Bluray, and I was blown away by the picture quality. I then switched to my DVD, and experiencing that difference, my opinion was set: I'd never go back to DVD anymore

So in the end, I totally get you - if you don't see the difference, there is no reason to switch. Most companies only want to make money anways, and there is a lot of Blu-rays out there, which are just blown-up DVD versions. Shame on them. But there's also a lot of really great work done, and that probably for the last time (I don't see 4K getting anywhere near BD market share, so no one will re-scan and restore films another time, and 8K... I don't see that manifest itself any time soon. I try to cheap out as often as possible, but for these companies putting in the work I have a lot of respect and like to support them, for the work they put in.

 

 

(*) And to be quite honest, here again, this is a simplification which is why I used the (not scientifically correct) 90% and mostly. Take the analog film for example. Each image is captured in analog, i.e. we get continuous colors and continuous shapes and lines all the way. But, what about the shots themselves? We get 24fps, i.e. a discretization of time, as in reality each second has more than just 24 milliseconds. Which is why fast movement will look blurry on film. And anybody arguing objectively that HFR is better than our standard 24fps I cannot - objectively - disagree with. Subjectively, however... .

Edited March 12, 2020 by pygospa

[StevenWest]

Wow! Now that's HIGH TECH! But I get what you're saying - a bit anyways. I was recently dismayed at MVD Rewinds release of The Point: Ultimate Collectors Edition on BD. Lot's of new extras added about Harry Nilsson and the making of, which is great. But the movie itself - its like a rushed dupe from a 3rd strike print! Nice in one way to relive that 'old school' feel, and even in some of the newer interviews they do these sloppy 70's tape edits. But again, $30 for a Blu-Ray - and the previous DVD I had looked WAY better. So not to slight MVD Rewind, as they are definitely preserving and expanding the history of lesser known but important films. But is questionable if they didn't bother brushing up the copy they had acquired out of cost issues, OR they crammed it through a bunch of Final Cut plug in's to give it this aged and retro feel? I don't mind Tarantino mucking with his movies to give it that 'grindhouse feel'. But to take liberty with some of these old gem's in this modern age is really becoming dubious at best. Clarity, crispness, color restoration, artifact removal - okay. Director liberty to darken, brighten, extend or edit work on new formats - maybe? But to take something onto a new format and not be bothered with restoration and/or make it look it's age or older for poops and giggles? Fine for someone on YouTube, but in the supposed world of expectations of BD and/or 4k quality - are we really getting the 'full accurate picture' for our money's worth? And some might say "For a cheesy old movie like The Point, who cares?" But what in 10 years there's a gunked up retro release of Star Wars on 8k? Would there be outcry? Should there be outcry? Or would we be content going back to overpriced VHS copies on Ebay to better appreciate and/or compare the high tech advances 8k A.I. aging filters has come? Just seems like 1 step forward, and 2 steps back lately. And if no one says much, or demands better....?

[extantsrevenge]

@pygospa that was a great and interesting post, thanks for doing that.

 

But why do you have to crish my hopes for a DS9 & Voyager BD release 😭. Also looks like I have a great distance to my 65" TV 😍. Do you work in this field, or why all that knowledge?

 

Appreciate you posting this 👍

[pygospa]

13 hours ago, StevenWest said:

But again, $30 for a Blu-Ray - and the previous DVD I had looked WAY better. So not to slight MVD Rewind, as they are definitely preserving and expanding the history of lesser known but important films. But is questionable if they didn't bother brushing up the copy they had acquired out of cost issues, OR they crammed it through a bunch of Final Cut plug in's to give it this aged and retro feel? I don't mind Tarantino mucking with his movies to give it that 'grindhouse feel'. But to take liberty with some of these old gem's in this modern age is really becoming dubious at best. Clarity, crispness, color restoration, artifact removal - okay. Director liberty to darken, brighten, extend or edit work on new formats - maybe? But to take something onto a new format and not be bothered with restoration and/or make it look it's age or older for poops and giggles?

 

@StevenWest: I am totally with you on that! If they do release old movies, what I wish for is that the old vision of directors/cinematographers get respected; at least in the sense that they originally released it (there is one director - George Lucas - from whom I wished that he wouldn't meddle in his movies all the time. I mean, it's his movie, it's okey for him to do so, BUT he should at least also provide the original version in a restored manner). I know of some releases (at least in Germany with labels such as Turbine Media, or Wicked Vision) where they even contact the director/cinematographer and ask for their input on the restoration, to make it as true to the intend as possible. And where you cannot ask the ones responsible anymore, you could at least still guide your intentions with the original releases that where created by them when restoring it. But you are totally right, the emphasis on this whole operation should be on the restore, and not on adding/enhancing/etc.

 

However, that's a totally different point you are making now than you made in your initial post. I still believe that it should be done - for so many reasons. Blu-ray will future-prove such films: Blowing up DVD on HD will make the quality suffer, as you blow it up 6-times the size. Blowing it up to 4k will further increase the size by a factor of 4. Not as bad anymore, as it was with HD, but now imagine watching a DVD on 4k - that makes a factor of 24; definitely not fun to watch anymore. A blu-ray can however be watched on all three definitions: SD, HD and 4K(*), even though on 4K it will look a bit worse - but then again, that can all be handled with size and distance according to the chart from my previous post.

And I really believe that blu-ray will be the last big physical media format that we'll get. 4K isn't hitting off, and why should it? It's a niche to begin with, only benefiting those that have taste in extremely large TVs inside extremely large living rooms with a really large distance to the screen, as well as a number of 4K enthusiasts; but for the large majority of the population a lot still even stick to the DVD. 4K is supposed to replace HD which is a technology that is not that old yet, and not even adapted by everyone. BD on the other hand replaced DVD that still supported a screen resolution the first of us grew accustomed to since the 80s. Also, physical media is dying in general, and in the same time streaming services are on the rise. But - at least judging from today's point of view (and I strongly believe that this wouldn't change, due to economic assessments) streaming services will only feature movies that will be accepted by the majority of the population. It's just not feasible for streaming services to reserve resources for movies that only a couple of people will ever watch; and taking Netflix' policy as an example: They even now already remove movies from their database once the views sink to a certain threshold. So my believe is that we'll probably loose all these classics sooner or later - it has already begun with the DVD - every movie enthusiast knows a couple of movies that where only released on VHS  and still haven't had a DVD or BD release, and for a number of movies there wasn't even anything else other than the cinema or TV release. These things get lost. And so I can only applaud every attempt in bringing old classics back to blu-ray - probably for the last time on physical media, ever, before they are lost. And BD is just a bit more future prove than DVD will be. Given, of course, the proper care when transferring it, i.e. Restauration not changing the content!

 

17 minutes ago, extantsrevenge said:

 

@pygospa that was a great and interesting post, thanks for doing that.

 

But why do you have to crish my hopes for a DS9 & Voyager BD release 😭. Also looks like I have a great distance to my 65" TV 😍. Do you work in this field, or why all that knowledge?

 

Appreciate you posting this 👍

 

Thank you very much for the appreciation, @extantsrevenge. And no I am not working in that field directly - I studied computer science (actually I still am), after having worked a while as department assistance for an in-house IT(-Support) department. So I would say I have a general understanding as well as interest in technical things. And at least small parts (binary system and discretizing analog data) I had came across during my studies, even though my main studying focus is AI and robotics. But most of the technical stuff I explained here I worked out for myself, due to my interest in movies in general.

(*) By the way, there's even a nice experiment you can try for visualizing the effects that blowing up resolutions will have on material of different quality. Just visit the Wikipedia-article on color depth: You will find the same image of a leaf in different color depths, and the one with 8-bit color depth will look the same as the 24-bit one does. If however you now start increasing the zoom factor (on Firefox by pressing ctrl and +; you can get it back to normal afterwards by pressing ctrl and 0), you will soon see, how the 8-bit image will get worse and worse while the 24-bit image will retain it's quality much better. And (at least on firefox) that's only 3-times larger - SD->HD is 6 times larger, and SD->4K 24 times. What you see here with color-depth will behave similar on resolution, so again from HD->4K is the least worse blowup;

[StevenWest]

I think what's getting me now with DVD's vs. Blu-Rays is the cost discrepancies between the two. I believe it's Kino/Lorber that have some of their BD's priced LESS than the DVD versions. Which to me makes sense if BD is to be the dominate format for the next decade or two. Yet (and thankfully) Criterion is still keeping their DVD prices markedly lower than BD versions. Which to me is still ironic, in that some of their BD title's is LESS than what one gets with DVD. Less disc's, smaller case, booklet, etc. Really cheesed with Arrow releasing, as the first title I got from them was their version of Slaughter House Five. Nice extras over the DVD, but nothing really stunning. Movie transfer didn't wow me any, and packaging was kinda wan. Had there been a DVD version I opted for, I may have thought it better for the price - as long as it was cheaper ala Criterion and not Kino/Lorber.

 

I used to be the editor for monthly, semi and yearly CD-ROM's back in the 90's. Dealing with replicating plants like AmericDisc, CinRam, and Sony. At first, the costs between data vs. music were pretty wide. And totally understood that 5000 stuffy business CD-ROM's was not going to take precedent over 5 million Nirvana or Bruce Springsteen CD's. But these plants were good! 99% quality, on time, and quickly fixed mistakes. And again, I was giving them about 25 titles monthly to issue, from 500 to 5000 copies each. How they managed me, AOL, Bruce Springsteen, and Bob's Band Demo Disc's are beyond me?

Today obviously, disc demand for movies and music is at a all time low. So I'm surprised replicating plants aren't offering great discounts for DVD and Blu-Ray replication to keep business pumping. And/or publishers aren't taking advantage of or demanding more efficient price breaks for both formats combined. 50,000 BD's at say $10,000. Or 50,000 BD's and 5000 DVD's @ say $11,500. Even if the DVD's don't move as quickly, they still knock the BD price down significantly. Keeps people working, profits up, and customers happy. I'm sure there'd be a stink if music publishers today said the majority of there releases will only be 80g Vinyl and digital MP3 now, and forgo CD versions altogether. And maybe some have already? Again, not to sound like I'm 'pro CD' - but it still can offer some leverage in this day of age business wise I feel. And to me, Criterion is the only one still taking advantage of it in way of DVD + BD. Premium boutique lines wouldn't benefit any, which I totally understand. And possibly little indies like MVD Rewind wouldn't either? Then again, if MVD as a whole wanted to save money - dual issues for them and/or Rewind could bring costs down across the board and increase sales 15% or more?

Arrow, Shout, and others seem to missing the boat on this. And keeping the material stock low, prices high, and encouraging streaming to really CUT costs. Maybe I'm just too OLD SCHOOL and prehistoric in my business thinking. But I only see 'profitable business' now, as opposed to 'beneficial business'. And yes, beneficial isn't always profitable in the short term. But if price breaks are had, more selection offered, more sales and discounts could be had for BD fans, DVD fans, and possibly encourage 4k enthusiasm within the myriad? 

 

Or maybe replicating plants just can't handle that anymore, and the hired labor and equipment servicing defeats the varied material cost? Not to sound like Mandrake in Dr. Strangelove but "Hmmm, yes. Putting it that way sir, there definitely seems to be something wrong somewhere I would say...."

[Basil]

sorry to slightly side track this thread as is very interesting reading.

@pygospa my next telly want 4k , i am exactly 2.4m from eye line to base of existing 50 inch 1080. after reading your chart they could be an issue, as my telly is taking up all the available room atm between the window and the chimney breast.

basically i know i need a 65" but do not have physical room to fit that in existing hole and can't come forward either.

so whats you thoughts on this and the chimney breast cant come down neither. problems of english 1890s house.

 

cheers

basil 👍

Edited March 13, 2020 by Basil

[Veum]

26 minutes ago, Basil said:

sorry to slightly side track this thread as is very interesting reading.

@pygospa my next telly want 4k , i am exactly 2.4m from eye line to base of existing 50 inch 1080. after reading your chart they could be an issue, as my telly is taking up all the available room atm between the window and the chimney breast.

basically i know i need a 65" but do not have physical room to fit that in existing hole and can't come forward either.

so whats you thoughts on this and the chimney breast cant come down neither. problems of english 1890s house.

 

cheers

basil 👍

 

Go 55" bro... measure area, doh!😁😷

 

  

[Basil]

12 minutes ago, Veum said:

 

Go 55" bro... measure area, doh!😁😷

 

  

thats not good enough according to the graph above at 2.4m it has to be around 62 or 63 just to be in so i would say 65 minimum.

now im goona have to pick up that tape measure again you just my ocd itch, i have to solve this in my head or the engineer in me wont let this go.

even i dont need telly right at this moment

 

 

basil 

Edited March 13, 2020 by Basil

[Veum]

1 minute ago, Basil said:

thats not good enough according to the graph above at 2.4m it has to be around 62 or 63 just to be in so i would say 65 minimum.

now im goona have to pick up that tape measure again you just my ocd itch, i have to solve this in my head on the engineer in me wont let this go.

even i dont need telly right at this moment

 

basil 

 

If that's the case get the HULK in there to move your chimney breast!👽

 

[pygospa]

Well, I wouldn't take this chart as 100% strict rule. And as mentioned it is also always a subjective question. What I would do is, go to a TV shop, take a yardstick with you and then, in the shop, go to the size you want, and try out the distance. Do you like it? Do you feel it's somehow off (too near so you cannot see the entire screen easily, or too far away)? If you feel good, go for it, even if this chart does say different. If it doesn't feel good, just go up or down in size a little, and look if that makes it better.

These charts in the end are rules of thumb, and if you look for them, you'll find different ones, where the one is a few inches more or less for a certain resolution, or the distance is a little different, etc. And also it doesn't mean that you cannot do anything else: It's just the optimum.

[Basil]

2 minutes ago, Veum said:

 

If that's the case get the HULK in there to move your chimney breast!👽

 

 

no that cant be done either i have to chimney breasts that come up and pair up in the loft in an arch and support the whole wall.

if only was that simple plus i have a wife to deal with, who would not allow that level of building work for a tv

[Basil]

@pygospa thats normally my approach with these things, telly i have now is ok atm tbh. and i got beat up over buying that when i did (long story)

also with all tvs in oled the manufacturers im lead to believe is made by 2 world suppliers of the panels the rest is HOW that is controlled by panny or lg or who ever. selling there telly.

so currently i  thinking there be another breakthru at some point. im wondering if someone will end up doing a 4k and 3d tv without glasses i have heard is in works in R&D. that i think would possibly bring that market back abit but with cinemas waning on 3d in the uk at least i wonder if that research is still going?

8k is really pointless atm as you need live tv feed supporting that or at least films with discs so as you say its a dead duck for next 5 or so years imho.

so theres no point for the minute, dont have the money so will have to wait and just carry on tormenting myself as i always have