DS9 on blu ray?

[jimbotron]

Maybe CBS Home Entertainment got it for free as repentance from this heretic sinner who twittered on September 18 and 19, 2011?

You're taking a three-year-old tweet as gospel? He said that very very early into the TNG-HD production before episodes were fully constructed. Has he said anything subsequent to that in support for cropped versions?

The fanbase did not support a 16x9 version "by a landslide", by the way.

 

[Maxwell Everett]

[sep 19] TNG was photographed in such a boring fashion 16:9 can only help.

This is such a ridiculous blanket statement it discredits anything this so called eyewitness has to say. If he finds TNG so boring why does he even bother watching it in the first place?

The person being quoted is Robert Meyer Burnett. This was BEFORE he was hired and did any work on the project. When he was brought aboard and saw all the problems 16:9 would bring he, *gasp*, changed his mind based on new evidence, which is entirely rational, btw.

 

[Jefferies]

[sep 19] TNG was photographed in such a boring fashion 16:9 can only help.

This is such a ridiculous blanket statement it discredits anything this so called eyewitness has to say. If he finds TNG so boring why does he even bother watching it in the first place?

The person being quoted is Robert Meyer Burnett. This was BEFORE he was hired and did any work on the project. When he was brought aboard and saw all the problems 16:9 would bring he, *gasp*, changed his mind based on new evidence, which is entirely rational, btw.

Shame there some who appear oblivious to this feat of the mind.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

With all this talk of widescreen, I gotta go back to TOS-R - specifically, why exactly the hell they made its new effects in widescreen if they were never shown that way (except in Japan). Does anyone know why they did this?

 

[Jefferies]

With all this talk of widescreen, I gotta go back to TOS-R - specifically, why exactly the hell they made its new effects in widescreen if they were never shown that way (except in Japan). Does anyone know why they did this?

Because it didn't cost any time or money and it was new footage where they could simply choose to make it so rather than chop up and compromise existing material?

 

[jimbotron]

They had to recreate all the effects from scratch on the computer. Rendering the TOS effects in 1920x1080 instead of 1440x1080 is just a matter of a few extra clicks. It was still composed for a 4x3 screen like the original with extra information on the sides for 16x9.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

With all this talk of widescreen, I gotta go back to TOS-R - specifically, why exactly the hell they made its new effects in widescreen if they were never shown that way (except in Japan). Does anyone know why they did this?

Because it didn't cost any time or money and it was new footage where they could simply choose to make it so rather than chop up and compromise existing material?

But since there is no TOS live-action footage in widescreen, why make the effects that way?

 

[Jefferies]

But since there is no TOS live-action footage in widescreen, why make the effects that way?

I suppose that in the case where a broadcaster would want to crop at least the new FX footage would look ok that way at no extra cost.

 

[Oso Blanco]

But since there is no TOS live-action footage in widescreen, why make the effects that way?

I suppose that in the case where a broadcaster would want to crop at least the new FX footage would look ok that way at no extra cost.

Still doesn't make sense to me, since this fx footage would be where the black bars would normally be. Or did I get this completely wrong?

 

[Rarewolf]

But since there is no TOS live-action footage in widescreen, why make the effects that way?

I suppose that in the case where a broadcaster would want to crop at least the new FX footage would look ok that way at no extra cost.

I think its beyond anything a broadcaster would do - they'd have to reframe between the 16:9 and zoomed in 4:3, they just want some thing ready to play.

Paramount (or whoever they are this week) probably just created widescreen versions for international sales as well as the HD 4:3. We must have them in the UK too. Those you can tell have been cropped.

 

[Mage]

The combo of zooming and stretching is just horrible, and if there are actually people out there that think that altering an original 4:3 source into 16:9, I'd love to see some examples of that done properly, because I haven't encountered it yet.

I mentioned it earlier, but "Broken Bow" looks pretty decent. You'd never guess it was shot and completely finished in 4:3. But that's because the director was given the time to reframe it carefully shot by shot before it aired. That kind of director involvement would likely never happen with the last few seasons of a DS9-R, I'm afraid.

Really? That explains why I though the image looked somewhat off during Broken Bow. Was the rest of the series shot in 16:9 then?

 

[LOKAI of CHERON]

The combo of zooming and stretching is just horrible, and if there are actually people out there that think that altering an original 4:3 source into 16:9, I'd love to see some examples of that done properly, because I haven't encountered it yet.

I mentioned it earlier, but "Broken Bow" looks pretty decent. You'd never guess it was shot and completely finished in 4:3. But that's because the director was given the time to reframe it carefully shot by shot before it aired. That kind of director involvement would likely never happen with the last few seasons of a DS9-R, I'm afraid.

Really? That explains why I though the image looked somewhat off during Broken Bow. Was the rest of the series shot in 16:9 then?

Yes, some of "Broken Bow" does appear to be fairly cramped and claustrophobic to me also. However, it would be uncharitable to suggest it's all like that, indeed, I'd say the majority of the episode (maybe 80%) looks perfectly well framed.

I've watched quite a few episodes of TOS-R on CBS Action here in the UK purposely to check out the 16:9 framing, and for me, that "artistic endeavor" is truly an abomination. I'd suggest, compositionally speaking, DS9 would probably turn out more like TOS if cropped to 16:9.

 

[Maxwell Everett]

Was the rest of the series shot in 16:9 then?

Yeah. I believe they made the switch to native 16:9 framing with the 9th episode "Civilization" which probably went into production safely after "Broken Bow" aired in widescreen. That's (likely not coincidentally) when the image clarity goes up on the Blu-rays. Before that episode, the image looks unnaturally soft and the grain looks stretched vertically. This is because the norm at the time at Paramount Television was to stretch the 4:3 image horizontally during telecine to fill the entire frame of the 1080/24p D5 tape dailies (instead of having the correct geometry and large black pillar bars on the sides) so that any later reframing to 16:9 would start out with the most pixels possible.

If you scrutinize the 1080p screencaps in TrekCore's Enterprise Season One review, you'll hopefully see what I'm talking about:

http://trekcore.com/blog/2013/03/review-star-trek-enterprise-season-1-blu-ray/

 

[LOKAI of CHERON]

Yeah. I believe they made the switch to native 16:9 framing with the 9th episode "Civilization" which probably went into production safely after "Broken Bow" aired in widescreen. That's (likely not coincidentally) when the image clarity goes up on the Blu-rays.

Many thanks for the information, Maxwell Everett - I did not know that as they say. It does make sense, as I definitely observed a small yet noticeable increase in PQ in later S1 episodes. I believe I commented on it in the ENT on BD sticky thread ages ago.

 

[Mage]

Well, I have the series on DVD, just got it this weekend actually, and was only able to watch a little of Broken Bow because of an MCU marathon. So the quality difference shouldn't be as noticable on dvd. Still, good to know. Thanks for the info.

 

[d514]

In Germany I only remember letterboxed movies on VHS. Probably because PAL has a higher vertical resolution with 576i (compared to 480i NTSC). So having movies letterboxed in NTSC just means the picture gets too blurry, while PAL can handle it better.

Yes, PAL has higher resolution than NTSC but most PAL masters were converted from NTSC masters so the additional resolutions was not used. The same is true for older DVDs. I think (and hope) that todays PAL DVDs are mostly sourced from HD masters.

 

[Robert Comsol]

Yes, PAL has higher resolution than NTSC but most PAL masters were converted from NTSC masters so the additional resolutions was not used.

Unfortunately, that's true. The only true and superior PAL master I remember was the outstanding extended version of "Dances With Wolves" on UK LaserDisc. This one definitely had a higher resolution and better quality than the anamorphic (!) DVDs that were still around at the same time. It took the arrival of Blu-ray (the Japanese Hi-Vision LD notwithstanding) to send this LD into the collectors archive.

The same is true for older DVDs. I think (and hope) that todays PAL DVDs are mostly sourced from HD masters.

But they still feature the "PAL speed-up" and therefore higher pitched voices. One more reason on behalf of Blu-ray.

Bob

 

[MacLeod]

But how many people actually noticed the slightly higher pitch?

 

[Start Wreck]

But how many people actually noticed the slightly higher pitch?

I never noticed it until I watched the TNG Blu-rays for the first time and wondered why everybody's voice was so low and why the theme tune sounded so much bolder.

Now I know, it's hard to unknow, y'know?

 

[TheSeeker]

But how many people actually noticed the slightly higher pitch?

I tried to watch TNG and Enterprise from a PAL source once and it was terrible. It was like everyone was talking with a bit of helium in their lungs. I honestly don't know how people couldn't notice it.