DS9 on blu ray?

[80ninjas]

Considering last year the two recovered Doctor Who stories that were B&W and barely SD briefly topped the iTunes charts, don't write off older formats just yet. Digital downloads offer a bigger library than possible before.

Doctor Who is a whole different beast though. Those were episodes that people had thought were lost forever, so to see them in any quality is a rare thing. I'd bet a good number of classic Who fans didn't even see those stories when they aired on television, so them being released was a major thing. I'd say that Doctor Who is the exception rather than the rule.

Of course not that it'll factor in to it, is that ST has already earned hundreds of millions if not billons already.

That's exactly why CBS wants to keep being able to make money from this franchise. They've probably pulled in hundreds of millions from this brand and I'm sure TOS and TNG restorations will pull in huge numbers over their lifetime as well.

CBS isn't getting any new Trek any time soon (unless they surprise announce a new series), and considering that the well for DS9 and Voyager is probably getting dry, I don't see them just leaving it that way. Unless getting them to some form of HD is going to cost an obscene amount of money (and if they don't do a full on TOS/TNG-like restoration that likely wouldn't be the case), CBS will want to do something with them.

 

[MacLeod]

Of course not that it'll factor in to it, is that ST has already earned hundreds of millions if not billons already.

I'm sure that someone will look at how much Deep Space Nine and Voyager have earned and how much more they are likely to earn over the next several years with and without an HD facelift.

The questions iare of course how much extra can they charge for SD vs HD. How many HD channels are looking to fill their schedules. How many TV stations around the world can they sell to, what would the potential global sales be, how much can they charge OnDemand services for the rights to show it. There are plenty of revenue streams available.

 

[80ninjas]

Of course not that it'll factor in to it, is that ST has already earned hundreds of millions if not billons already.

I'm sure that someone will look at how much Deep Space Nine and Voyager have earned and how much more they are likely to earn over the next several years with and without an HD facelift.

The questions iare of course how much extra can they charge for SD vs HD. How many HD channels are looking to fill their schedules. How many TV stations around the world can they sell to, what would the potential global sales be, how much can they charge OnDemand services for the rights to show it. There are plenty of revenue streams available.

It shocks me how expensive both shows still are on DVD. The DS9 complete collection is around $240 (buying the individual seasons actually costs more total) and Voyager being around $280.

 

[MacLeod]

Shop around, I just did a quick search and in the UK I could get the comple DSN for £66.99 which is around US$112.

 

[80ninjas]

Here in the states the lowest I found it for was $220, though I didn't check Ebay where I'm sure I can get it for cheaper (I just prefer shopping regular retailers).

I haven't bought a DVD years though. It's all been replaced by either streaming or BD in my house (BD when I can help it. Nothing beats lossless audio). Which is why I want DS9 on Blu-ray!

 

[Maxwell Everett]

Sometime in the near future, all SD broadcasts, streaming and digital downloads will end and content distributors will only accept 720p HD as a minimum standard, maybe even 1080p -- we can only hope.

Considering last year the two recovered Doctor Who stories that were B&W and barely SD briefly topped the iTunes charts, don't write off older formats just yet. Digital downloads offer a bigger library than possible before.

As 80ninjas mentioned, I think that's just a special case, similar to the six episodes in Season Two of The Twilight Zone that were shot on videotape. On blu-ray, they upconverted those to 1080p because they had the space. I can see why that would make less sense as a digital download. Nevertheless, I think what can be presented in HD will be. Maybe that doesn't mean all content will be in HD, but certainly the vast majority will.

Look at what BBC America does to TNG in SD! They crop it to 14:9. I guarantee you that will look better starting with an HD image.

I'm not sure they can. HD doesn't support 4:3, so the pillarboxes are part of the image. If you zoom in on that - yes it would look better -but it wouldn't technically be HD

Sure it would! A 14:9 crop of TNG would be 1440 x 929. That is still higher than 720p HD (1280 x 720)!

 

[Start Wreck]

It's the amount of little offenders in the live action footage, ranging from removing the seams in Odo's makeup in Season One to panel reflections and eliminating overhead microphones and all that kind of stuff.

All these corrections were done in SD and would have to be redone in HD.

I didn't know this level of correction was done. Was it just done for DS9? Do you have a source I can read into?

 

[Grant]

It's the amount of little offenders in the live action footage, ranging from removing the seams in Odo's makeup in Season One to panel reflections and eliminating overhead microphones and all that kind of stuff.

All these corrections were done in SD and would have to be redone in HD.

I didn't know this level of correction was done. Was it just done for DS9? Do you have a source I can read into?

I've never heard that before either and was wondering about what he meant.

Was he suggesting they did CGI fixes at SD resolution?

 

[trekker670]

I've never heard that before either and was wondering about what he meant.

Was he suggesting they did CGI fixes at SD resolution?

I've heard that they did do such corrections in DS9, where there was something practical that detracted from the scene. I've heard they'd fix issues with Odo's makeup and remove equipment that was in the shot mentioned in the past, but it's only been on these forums, I haven't seen any interviews that confirmed this though.

Whether or not they made such fixes with CG (rather than just getting the makeup right), you can be sure they did it after the film was converted to video for editing. That's the reason they mastered everything on video instead of film; it was faster and easier to work with in post-production.

 

[Maxwell Everett]

It's the amount of little offenders in the live action footage, ranging from removing the seams in Odo's makeup in Season One to panel reflections and eliminating overhead microphones and all that kind of stuff.

All these corrections were done in SD and would have to be redone in HD.

I didn't know this level of correction was done. Was it just done for DS9? Do you have a source I can read into?

I've never heard that before either and was wondering about what he meant.

Was he suggesting they did CGI fixes at SD resolution?

It's certainly possible. In the first season it likely would have been used very sparingly, particularly correcting things like Odo's makeup as motion tracking software was in its infancy in the early 90s. If tracking software wasn't used on DS9 it would have had to be painstakingly painted by hand, frame-by-frame by an artist. It's obvious that Odo's makeup changed quite a lot between the pilot and the last episode of S1 where it went from many smaller appliances to one large mask. The producers would have wanted to get the makeup looking right rather than resort to fixes in post. They didn't have much time to deliver episodes as it was. Stuff like that would have caused unacceptable delays.

I know that camera tracking was used in the 1992 S6 TNG episode "Man of the People" where it was needed to match two morph plates of Troi as she de-aged. Soon after that the Flame system (made by Discreet) became available, which made tracking more ubiquitous. Other systems followed like the Quantel Henry in 1994.

 

[trekker670]

^ Thanks for all the details! Very insightful!

 

[Robert Comsol]

It's the amount of little offenders in the live action footage, ranging from removing the seams in Odo's makeup in Season One to panel reflections and eliminating overhead microphones and all that kind of stuff.

All these corrections were done in SD and would have to be redone in HD.

I didn't know this level of correction was done. Was it just done for DS9? Do you have a source I can read into?

Yes, it's in the section featuring post-production techniques in The Making of Star Trek - Deep Space Nine. What I wrote is basically what is stated in the corresponding chapter.

And there is also another uncomfortable issue, let's hope it is limited to very rare exceptions:
They shot one scene (on the Promenade, IIRC) and later realized it was out of focus. Rick Berman suggested to increase "sharpness" a little (for home theatre applications I strongly recommend the lowest settings, "sharpness" is a relict from the b&w stone age of television and a euphemism) and relying on the SD resolution of TV sets, then, they somehow "got away with it".

Bob

 

[80ninjas]

It's the amount of little offenders in the live action footage, ranging from removing the seams in Odo's makeup in Season One to panel reflections and eliminating overhead microphones and all that kind of stuff.

All these corrections were done in SD and would have to be redone in HD.

I didn't know this level of correction was done. Was it just done for DS9? Do you have a source I can read into?

Yes, it's in the section featuring post-production techniques in The Making of Star Trek - Deep Space Nine. What I wrote is basically what is stated in the corresponding chapter.

And there is also another uncomfortable issue, let's hope it is limited to very rare exceptions:
They shot one scene (on the Promenade, IIRC) and later realized it was out of focus. Rick Berman suggested to increase "sharpness" a little (for home theatre applications I strongly recommend the lowest settings, "sharpness" is a relict from the b&w stone age of television and a euphemism) and relying on the SD resolution of TV sets, then, they somehow "got away with it".

Bob

Eh, even if there are a few instances of that I doubt it'd be much of a hurdle. The season 1 and 5 sets of TNG-R both have instances of episode footage that went unconverted to HD for one reason or another.

 

[thumbtack]

I remain hopeful despite the numbers.

As far as a "best of" set, it would depend who decided what the best of is. I've already seen a list that did not have Duet or In the Pale Moonlight on it.

.

 

[DonIago]

^How does that even happen?

 

[Dream]

So how likely is a DS9 Bluray 4 episode sampler like what was done with TNG?

 

[MakeshiftPython]

Maybe not a sampler, but perhaps giving "Emissary" an individual release with exclusive bonus features would be a nice preview into what we should expect from DS9.

 

[Dream]

Sometimes you got to take the first step like releasing a sampler, before you can cross the finish line (complete DS9 bluray release)!

 

[Bad Thoughts]

A "best of" would likely be a teaser in reality: three or four visually or emotionally appealing episiodes to whet one's appetite for the series. Think The Visitor, Trials and Tribble-ations, Call to Arms, and Defiant.

 

[Maxwell Everett]

Well, my speculation that BBC America could possibly crop TNG-R to 14:9 once they started airing it was unfounded. They're airing the episodes right now in HD and it's 1.33:1 pillarboxed!

Go here for this week's schedule.