Early TNG especially was overlit and flat (lighting-wise) in my opinion. There wasn't a square inch of the bridge that didn't have light. Less heavily-lit sets look much better to my eyes and colors actually pop more. Give me contrast! Much more interesting. I loved the lighting in "Yesterday's Enterprise" for example. DS9 is going to look great in HD!
Yeah? It's not so "convenient" when something you want to see disappears from their list. I'll take cold, hard discs that are MINE over the nebulous streaming any day. I'm using the free year of Netflix to watch stuff that's not available on disc. After that year is up in a couple of months, I'm not sure I'll continue with it. Harry
EARLY TNG did have quite amount of contrast and I feel the look of seasons 1 and 2 especially were the most helped by HD conversion and are the series looking its most dramatic and best. It was later seasons that got a flatter look (which sped production time) but made the D look somewhat more bland. Judging by the scenes on DS9 in Birthright Pt I alone on blu-ray, the look of DS9 most definitely pops in HD. I feel the darker look exudes the "alien" nature of the show and the setting, and also helps the sets look even more believable. I enjoy the look of both shows. TNG did something esp in its later seasons to distance itself from the look of TOS. TOS reveled in contrast and color and swaths of light and a very moody look on board the Enterprise at times (much like the aforementioned Yesterday's Enterprise. The brightness of the D seemed very intentional to set the more distant and optimistic future apart. This was followed by a complete departure in DS9 where 'darker' corners of the galaxy and the various societies were being explored. I experienced this stark contrast in person at Star Trek: The Experience in Las Vegas. The restaurant, shops and museum were modeled after the promenade and had a great feel to them. Countless visitors and aliens (especially during time of the convention) would mingle in the darkened corners. When beginning the TNG 'ride', participants are whisked aboard the Ent D's transporter room, then proceed down a curved corridor, which compared to the rest of the attraction was very brightly lit, visually impressive and you literally felt like you were transported to a different time and place. I was ALMOST more impressed by the look and feel of the corridor, than the bridge itself.... almost I think the contrast and artistry of the two shows are brought into similar relief by contrasting their look in HD
Yeah, early TNG actually had shadows that made things seem more dramatic. That opening shot in the pilot with Picard looking out the window was something you would never see in the later seasons.
Agreed. But I'm not a fan of overly soft focusing which, artistic choice or not, is often taken that wee bit too far in much of DS9's photography IMHO.
As I sort of said, I tend to agree with you. It is, however, only a matter of time until the streaming services grow in power to the extent they can take on more of a Spotify model - where "everything" is available and content providers are paid per stream. The next great crisis for the industry will probably do it, as it is TV is streaking ahead of mainstream cinema in the creative stakes, it wont be long before Hollywood is ready to make some of the same compromises the music industry did.
The problem with streaming is the availability of high speed broadband. I don't know what it's like in the States or the rest of the world, but here in UK, there are still large patches of the country where it's simply not up to spec. I live in a fairly big city not far from London, and although I'm on the outskirts, we didn't get said high speed fibre optic cabling in our street until 2.5 years ago - at last enabling me to obtain the super-fast speeds I'd been pining for.
So, if they're not jumping right into remastering DS9, I can still hope it will be a possibility a few years from now. I imagine the plan is to see what returns they get from the finished TNG-R (does it wind up back in syndication? does the fee paid from streaming services change? how are blu-ray sales over a longer period?) and use those figures to help them justify DS9.
Consider yourself lucky, I'm still stuck on ADSL upto 8megs, and more often or not you can barely stream SD quality. Though hopefully that should change very soon as my exchange is schduled for fibre any time now and by the end of the year at the latest.
It is a big problem for the UK full stop, let alone for streaming. I'm an IT Manager for a medium sized business and we have to use 2 ADSL lines at a measly 2mbps each to keep us connected. It's mental. It will however be resolved over the next decade, as will the much feared upgrades to the infrastructure needed to supply universal HD streaming. Ultimately the Internet is probably the single most important bit of infrastructure in the country, it needs to be suitable invested in.
Perhaps, but any investment has to be across the entire network, we already have a digital divide in the UK (which is narrowing somewhat due to BDUK). It shouldn't matter if you live in a rural, sub-urban or urban enviroment.
Yes - well to an extent. The model has to be the road network, you can get anywhere habitable in the UK reasonably easily by car. You don't have motorways to everywhere, but you need at least a decent road you can get a Ford Fiesta (a metaphorical hi-def stream of House of Cards) up without it getting stuck in a bog!
Yes, however in you car analogy is that you can choose to go via the motorway or not. In the case of broadband, you are pretty much stuck with what your exchange supports i.e. ADSL, ADSL2, FTTC/H In the case of broadband someone who lives in a rural enviroment pays the same line rental as someone in an urban enviroment and it all goes into one pot. If you don't want to upgrade a particular segment of the network, then those parts of the network which aren't upgraded should pay less to their ISP. I live in a rural area and what is more frustrating than slow broadband speeds is paying through the nose for it. Sorry we can't give you our advertised £3.50 offer because your exchange is a non LLU we can however offer you a service for £20. How is that fair? My solution would be for example say an upto 40Mb connection is £20 then if your exchange can only support upto 8Mb then you pay £4, upto 16Mb £8. Sounds fair to me and it might cause providers to upgrade the exchange.
It's fair because it costs more to bring service to you over that longer distance. It's far better than the US solution, where the urban/suburban users end up subsidizing the rural users.
No it's not fair, we aren't talking hundreds of miles, you could be in a rural area and be less than a dozen miles from one or more cities. But aren't in essence rural users who often pay more for an inferior serivce with slower speeds subsidising urban users who often pay less and get a better speed?
That's still a dozen miles of cable, to reach 12-24 potential customers along it, whereas running that same cable in a suburban environment would let them reach 1200-2400 (or more) potential customers. Only if there's no difference in the cost-of-service for the ISP to supply you. But in this case there is.
You do know rural exchanges can service hundreds if not into the low end of 1000 premises? And in the UK a few years back (2010?), Ofcom ruled that Market 1 exchanges (where BT is the sole provider) would be placed under charge control which meant in essence that the BT wholesale could charge would reduce well below RPI. So in theory it would get cheaper for the ISP as they wouldn't pay as much for the line. So that would mean it would get cheaper for the ISP to use that BT wholesale line, so for example it cost the ISP £10 in 2011, in 2012 it might cost them £9, in 2013 it might cost them £8.30 Yet, prices to the end user remained the same or went up.
Not in any way. How many posts since anybody said something about Blu-ray? If they ever did get around to doing them--I wish they'd break the mold and do some CAST commentary. I love to hear Rene, Siddig, Nana, Armin and others talk about the show on episodes that featured their characters heavily. No offense to the Okuda's and the directors/writer but how about some cast comments.