Get your first peak of 2D DISNEY CLASSICS IN HIGH-DEFINITION

[Jules]

Standard resolution doesn't make the movie blurry or show off the imperfections like places where colour wasn't fully added or the lines aren't smooth and connected.

Bigger isn't always better. Espically when it comes to 2-D animation.

That is absolute hogwash. You cannot diss a medium for not appropriating certain movie genres. Blu-Ray is not responsible for the faults you mentioned. In that case, it would be the film-makres who are to blame.

Secondly, Disney films are ... quite polished, to put it mildly. Any lack of smoothness in the lines will not be made worse by HDMI.

Can you imagine how bad the movies made using the xerox process are going to look with a better resolution? No wonder Disney didn't put The Jungle Book or 101 Dalmatians on Blu-Ray. HD would kill them.

No! No! No! Stop it! You're killing me!

Better resolution will never - in any way - mar the presentation of the Xerox features. Why should it? Give me a good reason. If you say that it's because you might spot flaws in the animation, then what should people have spotted back in 1961 when 101 Dalmatians premiered in theatres on the big screen?

[purin]

So far, HD feels a tad superfluous. I'm sure it's lovely, but I still don't feel I really need it. It's great if I have a HUGE screen or if I like to zoom in on things, but I'm normally not going to be in a position to see the pencil nature of the line on the magic lamp.

The argument about how a film was intended to be, I think, refers to the fact that certain things were expected to blur or disappear for the overall picture. Think about certain restorations of films where you can see the texture of the drybrush on the cel. Is that really important?

It'd be great for future releases of Beauty and the Beast, if they're going to do the 3-movies-on-one-disc thing again.

[thatartguy]

The only way a DVD can look as good than a blu-ray or hd-dvd is if it was played on a standard definition TV, a badly setup HDTV, or just a bad HDTV. Otherwise, it might be time to get a better prescription for the glasses you possibly might need.

Seriously, on high definition formats, you don't see the jpeg compression artifacts, colors don't bleed, and blacks actually look black due to the higher color range. The sound is also pristine, identical to the movie track due to lossless audio streams. As stated on a recent article, "Unlike DVD, high definition offers a near flawless archive of the original master print. Most of today’s movies are made with a 2K digital intermediate, which means that a high quality AVC encoded HD DVD/Blu-ray offers over 90% of the quality available to the Director himself, and therefore a leap in quality over what the typical moviegoer sees in a standard movie theater."

Here's some comparisons for you:

http://www.cornbread.org/FOTRCompare/index.html

http://csel.cs.colorado.edu/~pmjohnso/swhighdef/

You also have to realize that these are resized and compressed as well.

[thatartguy]

As for theater presentation, well nothing beats the expereince...

On a side note, I love the theater experience. People talking on cell phones, people leaning over to their buddy making obnoxious and/or obvious comments, people coming in halfway through the film to sit beside you and constantly pull their shoes up off the sticky floor drowning the film, theater managers that don't care about your experience...

I hate the theater experience now. People aren't considerate anymore. I think out of the last six times I've been to the movies there's only been one time I didn't have to deal with inconsiderate people.

Now that I can watch things at home in reference quality, I don't have to worry about them.

[Disney's Divinity]

The only question, to my mind, is whether you have to buy a different player just for HD/Blu-ray? If so, I'll pass. I don't think a higher resolution is going to drastically affect the way I view a film--especially since, I'm guessing, the creators never even considered the idea of the film being this way in the future.

[KubrickFan]

As for theater presentation, well nothing beats the expereince, but the actual movie looks much better on DVD when the grain and big black spots from the filmstrip aren't there.

You must be kidding, film has a much bigger resolution than dvd. Even the new formats don't even reach the high resolution of film. And grain is actually part of an image, to remove that is to lose details of the picture.

[TM2-Megatron]

It's not the price of the discs themselves that turn me off (in most cases, a Blu-Ray or HD-DVD only means an extra dollar or two, and that gap will dissapear pretty quickly), but the prices of the associated players and, mostly, the TVs (good ones, that is). I've seen a few flat-panel HDTVs that I've liked recently in the 42"-46" range (any larger is pointless, really, unless you want people to think you're a weirdo when you have them over for dinner) but the $2500-$4000 price tags make me want to vomit. Sure, as many people are always quick to point out I could get an HDTV for $1000 or $1200 but the quality if those (IMO) isn't particularly impressive. They're better than SD and EDTVs on one front, but all the flat-panels in that price bracket have irritating artifact and a granular quality that bugs the hell out of me, which is noticeable even when the TV is receiving a signal in its native resolution.

I may be willing to pay $2000 for an HDTV, probably around 42" and maybe $4500-$5000 on a home theatre system in total. I already recently picked up a new Denon receiver that supports Dolby TrueHD, DTS HD, etc. for nearly $2000, so I'm ready for the time that the presently expensive TVs are a little more affordable. When I finally do get a new TV, I'll probably spend the remainder of that budget on some new speakers for a 6.1 or 7.1 setup. At the moment, I just hooked in the old speakers to the new receiver as they're fine for regular Dolby Surround and DTS 5.1.

Also, I'd much rather have a combo player than go with one or the other... both have advantages and drawbacks, and I don't see either one winning out for quite some time. In all probality, it'll end up like DVD-A and SACD, both being available for more selective consumers (and ego strokers who couldn't tell a good picture from a bad one, of course, and just like to boast they have an expensive, bigass TV).

Until then, I may pick up a combo HD-DVD/Blu-Ray drive for my computer so I can at least buy the discs and watch them. I'd think my monitor, running at 2048x1536 can manage the paltry HD resolutions. I could probably also output from my computer to my existing CRT HDTV, which lacks those irritating display flaws despite only costing me around $500. It's only 32", which I guess might be a drawback for some. But it wasn't too long ago that a 32" screen was considered fairly large, so I'm happy with it for now.

[Widdi]

That is absolute hogwash. You cannot diss a medium for not appropriating certain movie genres. Blu-Ray is not responsible for the faults you mentioned. In that case, it would be the film-makres who are to blame.

Secondly, Disney films are ... quite polished, to put it mildly. Any lack of smoothness in the lines will not be made worse by HDMI.

I'm not saying that Blu Ray will make them worse. I'm saying it will make it more noticeable which, to me anyways, makes the movie less enjoyable.

No! No! No! Stop it! You're killing me!

Better resolution will never - in any way - mar the presentation of the Xerox features. Why should it? Give me a good reason. If you say that it's because you might spot flaws in the animation, then what should people have spotted back in 1961 when 101 Dalmatians premiered in theaters on the big screen?

The reason being that little lines and imperfections of the process (like only half of a puppy's face showing up in the background) will be more obvious. They probably were more obvious on the theater screen in 1961 but they aren't overly obvious on DVD and I like that.

[Widdi]

As for theater presentation, well nothing beats the expereince, but the actual movie looks much better on DVD when the grain and big black spots from the filmstrip aren't there.

You must be kidding, film has a much bigger resolution than dvd. Even the new formats don't even reach the high resolution of film. And grain is actually part of an image, to remove that is to lose details of the picture.

I know film has a bigger resolution than even Blu Ray. And am an avid theater goer so don't think I'd rather watch it on DVD. I'd trade my DVD of any movie just to have the experience of seeing it in theater . I'm just saying that, to me, DVD looks better than theater or Blu Ray.

[deathie mouse]

Correction > HD DVD won't have anything to offer in this regard as Disney is Blu-ray exclusive.

Yes - for now! Many compagnies have switched formats and the war is not over yet...

Can you give me the list?

The only movie studio that has released exclusively in the US on hddvd is Universal. Paramount made a contract for an unspecified time to release on hddvd only certain titles, so hd dvd would have Transformers as a exclusive (For example Spielberg movies are not part of that contract and can't be released on hddvd only) and even when Transfrmers was released, more BDs were sold that week. I have about 30 Paramount released Blu-rays.

Disney is fully commited to Blu-ray. Disney is not going to switch to hddvd. If you want Disney movies in High Def you'll have to buy them on Blu-ray.

Can you imagine how bad the movies made using the xerox process are going to look with a better resolution? No wonder Disney didn't put The Jungle Book or 101 Dalmatians on Blu-Ray. HD would kill them.

Well you can actually see how great Jungle Book looks in HD in the Ratatouille Blu-ray, there's a brief segment of it when you insert the disc. HD won't kill anything, as:

As for theater presentation, well nothing beats the expereince, but the actual movie looks much better on DVD when the grain and big black spots from the filmstrip aren't there.

That's a little contradictory, me thinks. Well if theater is the best experience, and theater prints are most commonly done from 2K scan masters nowadays (<- that's 1080p high for widescreen movies), and BDs are 1080p, and on the 480i discs "the actual movie looks much better on DVD when the grain and big black spots from the filmstrip aren't there", won't the logical conclusion be that the 1080p BD will be the "best experience" + "the actual movie will look much better when the grain and big black spots from the filmstrip aren't there"?

The best of both worlds

I'm not saying HD isn't good for other movies, but it isn't the best thing to happen to 2-D animation. And it certainly isn't this ground breaking innovation alot of people make it out to be for film as a whole.

I have the total opposite opinion.

Just watch the amazing 2-D animation already on BDs. You can start with the Rattatouille's 1080p BD supplement "Your Friend The Rat" done in early classic Disneyland feature educational short. Looks awesome!





I want, I want, I want my blu-cheese

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[Jack Skellington]

Deathie mouse, why is there a Jungle Book segment in the Ratatouille Blu-ray ?, I already ordered it but I'm really anxious to find out why before I get it next week.

And BTW I heard there's a trailer for Sleeping Beauty, how did that look like in HD ? And does anyone know if it's going to look like it does in the trailer when the BD gets released next October ?

[purin]

Well, of course anything made nowadays would be gorgeous in HD, there's no question about it! The Lord of the Rings, Ratatouille and its short. When I saw Ratatouille in the theater with the digital projection, it was the crispness of the 2D portion that wowed me.

The issue is with older films, particularly ones that were made assuming certain colors or details would change or blur with the day's film technology. You'd have to get the best transfer possible, and then there's the issue of how far the restoration goes and how the image looks overall. With certain old animated films, unless you've got an enormous screen or you sit two inches away from your set, I don't see how the extra hi def would make a difference unless you practically repainted the whole movie to make it hi def (and then, is it the same movie?). How much more hi def could you go from the best film transfer, really?

Now, as for cramming extras onto the disc, that's a good use of the extra storage capacity!

Sleeping Beauty is an exception, I think, because it was made with a bigger film size to pack in lots of detail, so high definition would suit it well.

[thatartguy]

[thatartguy]

Sorry. Double Post.

[deathie mouse]

The only question, to my mind, is whether you have to buy a different player just for HD/Blu-ray? If so, I'll pass. I don't think a higher resolution is going to drastically affect the way I view a film--especially since, I'm guessing, the creators never even considered the idea of the film being this way in the future.

We finaly have a video format that does justice to high resolution 35mm film, and you don't want to watch film.. like film?


It's the opposite:

No, creators didn't consider the idea of the films being watched mostly in low resolution interlaced video tiny screens in the future, they made their films to have their impact on a big sharp screen.

[Disney's Divinity]

We finaly have a video format that does justice to high resolution 35mm film, and you don't want to watch film.. like film?

Apparently I haven’t been watching “film like film” for the past 20 years; why start now?

[deathie mouse]

It's never too late?

Deathie mouse, why is there a Jungle Book segment in the Ratatouille Blu-ray ?, I already ordered it but I'm really why to find out why before I get it next week.

And BTW I heard there's a trailer for Sleeping Beauty, how did that look like in HD ? And does anyone know if it's going to look like it does in the trailer when the BD gets released next october ?

The Jungle Book mini shot is part of a potpourri of Disney Movie shots shown on the opening Disney/Blu-ray promo when you insert the disc. For example there's also a Peter Pan one but that doesn't look "restored", I just noticed that the shot of the (recently released) Jungle Book looked nice

The SB tailer looks good in some shots and in others it looks less good, but the trailer is not from the actual high definition digital restoration.


Thanks, theartguy . I like this comparison pic too:

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(click to make bigger)

[Kyle]

We finaly have a video format that does justice to high resolution 35mm film, and you don't want to watch film.. like film?

Apparently I haven’t been watching “film like film” for the past 20 years; why start now?

yeah. my grandpa's been watching tv in black and white for over 40 years, why stop now?

[Disney's Divinity]

Apparently I haven’t been watching “film like film” for the past 20 years; why start now?

yeah. my grandpa's been watching tv in black and white for over 40 years, why stop now?

You're right--those two situations are exactly the same! You've opened my eyes so I can see!