The OFFICIAL STNG-R general discussion thread!

Season one of TNG has been out for 24 years now. Its been reviewed to death. With the blu ray release the news is not so much in what the episodes are like from a storytelling point of view but in how they have been remastered. By all means throw in your two cents on what you think about the episodes personnally, but I don't see the point of leaving out the main news item. Journalism is about informing about new information, right? So okay he wrote about the bonus features, but thats only the extras, what about the main product?

 

^ Gotta agree there, actually. Who is going to seek out reviews of this set thinking, well gee, I wonder if TNG season 1 is a good watch?

 

Beeing a little bit off-topic: I hope that the knowledge of the TNG transfer to HD will also be used later for the "X-Files", which also have been shot on film but post production was video only. The good thing for "X-Files": The early season are released for 4:3 frame, but the source material has an 16:9 frame preserved during filming for later use.

 

The early seasons of The X-Files were really protected for widescreen? I haven't read that before, but I hope it's true. The transition between seasons 1-4 and 5-9 is a bit jarring; shows that shift aspect ratios mid-run (The West Wing in season two, Farscape in season four) drive me a little crazy, honestly.

 

Even Friends was protected for widescreen. I tend to consider what they did on TNG a bit of a sloppy job.

 

X-Files started ran from 1993. Friends ran from 1994. TNG ran from 1987 and ended in 1994.

So, two shows that were basically shot after TNG had its run happened to project for widescreen but largely still aired in 4:3 for years anyway. And you're faulting TNG for not projecting in widescreen back then? What other shows did in 1987?

 

Exactly.

I don't know, but that doesn't change my opinion about it.

 

Just having an opinion isn't good enough, you need to have grounds for it. If you're saying it was sloppy not to do it, you need to prove that other productions at the same time did a "better" job.

 

DS9 and VOY were certainly shot in the same vein as TNG, and those were all produced well in the 90s. Hence my point about that particular point of the production being sloppy.

 

Aye, you have better case with DS9 and Voyager - but you're shifting goalposts there; we were talking TNG .

 

It IS a sloppy job to have a 35mm frame and put shit in it. Doesn't matter that they all did it in the 80s, which I doubt. I don't know about other conversions to HD, but I do think other shows might have handled it differently. Let's get back to this when they convert A-Team, Magnum or MacGyver.

 

OMG. Seriously. Friends wasn't shot in a way that would protect it for wide screen broadcast.

It was done because it was a multicamera production shot in front of a live studio audience.

If you have ever been to any filmed multi camera comedies you would know that the "stage" is kept clear of production. That way the studio audience is not distracted, and that they have all a free clear visual path.

Single camera (typically) hour longs, were never, never produced that way. They didn't have to power full sets, they could have exposed sets, they could have construction materials clearly visible, they could have productions personal standing around. Cast standing around. All of those things were absolutely normal, until late 90's for US productions.

All things that absolutely are not done on multi camera shows.

Now some shows, did film where they kept the full frame open (I believe X-Files was one such production), but if I recall correctly X-Files also played much stronger overseas, and that market when wide screen much faster then the US market. Trek on the other hand has traditionally not just done poor overseas, but as a major franchise I can't think of anything that historically does worse overseas.

Jeffries

This isn't a recent show or film getting released on a new format. THis is a season that was released in 1987. Many, many older releases get much larger sections devoted to actual content, as opposed to transfer.

Of course there are also sites specifically geared where the transfer is 95% of the full review of whatever material it is. Each individual site or paper is going to have their own standards on what is important to them and to their readers.

 

It's not sloppy, it's simply how TV was made back then. Having been born in 1975, I've seen a lot of tech come and go. Friends was made 7 years after TNG began.
The reality is that it was 1987 and they were busting their chops to make a weekly sci-fi show when nobody else was doing it. Friends is a sitcom, it's like filming a play, the stage is well lit and the camera work is much less dynamic than on a show like Trek. Can you not envision the extra work it would have taken back in 1987 to make sure that they framed the show to look good in both 4:3 and 16:9? No offense, but your opinion makes you sound very uninformed.

 

I'm at the opposite end of the spectrum. I think season one is one of Trek's finest. It felt fresh, with dynamic lighting and music and I can't wait to revisit it on Blu-ray in a little under two weeks.

 

TNG used a standard 4-perf, 1.33:1, Academy centered ground glass (the lower left one in the image below). As Sho mentions, Friends was made later (near the end of TNG's run) and probably used one of the 1.78:1 ground glasses (either upper left or right):



I believe DS9 and VOY switched to something similar to the common top option (top middle) in seasons 6 & 7 and 4-7 respectively according to this thread here:

http://www.cinematography.com/index.php?showtopic=2597&view=findpost&p=19075

 

You do mention to sides of the production that I did think were generally stronger then the rest of TNG, and that's the lighting, and the music. But thats window dressing. And just part of the window dressing. The FX (minus the pilot) was jarringly bad, from even a design point. I was also seriously disappointed with set design, set dressing, costumes, and makeup (With a few exceptions, like period pieces and sets, which I thought were top notch, but again thats the exception not the average for the shows). But even if I liked general production aspects of the show (ie not script, not acting, not direction, not editing) that still for myself is only about 5% of my grade of any given episode.

But again, you will find people who love to those who hate, and all stages in between. So I don't think its fair to harp on a reviewer since that is their opinion.

 

Would give anything for all nine seasons of The X-Files on Bluray. Not that the DVDs are unwatchable, but still. I wonder how they'd handle the video effects. A lot of that stuff would have to be redone from scratch I imagine. Plus, the title sequence was all done on video, wasn't it?

 

I believe so. My question, is the X-Files still doing anything on stripping. I know I haven't seen any results on it for us broadcast (be it national stripping or cable stripping).

And yes, I would be extremely grateful for a beautiful transfer of that show, as it especially after the first season gets some extremely well shot episodes.

 

I've seen X-Files reruns on BBC America.