TNG DVD Transfers

[Gepard]

Here's an example of the resolution on my television:

I did not modify this in any way other than to reduce image size:

This is from 3 feet away.
It's what you'd expect from a VHS tape if you had recorded it off of the TV on EP mode.

J.

Holy. SHIT.


We should put together some kind of TrekUnited-type project to raise funds for Paramount to pay for an all-new edit of the show. Seriously. This sucks.

 

[Amaris]

Yeah, it's pretty bad. We probably won't see a remastering for a very long time.


J.

 

[B.C.]

I avoid having to deal with the actual DVDs too much, by ripping each episode onto my server and watching them via my AppleTV.

While I enjoy owning the actual DVDs, and of course paying the people who give me this enjoyment, in my opinion tangible media will become an endangered species. It's just much nicer to be able to take my collection of music, TV shows and movies with me. Whether that be on my desktop computer, on my 50" plasma (via AppleTV), on my laptop, or on my iPod.

The packaging, while sort of cool at first, just seems clunky over time.

What I have read (check out the reviews at Amazon) is that the packaging is very cheap and literally falls apart over time. And stunningly, there is no insert indicating which episodes are on which discs, and that’s a basic necessity in a 49-disc package, so you have to create one yourself, or else deal with a major pain in the ass whenever you want to watch a particular episode and have to find the disc that it’s on. I realize that remastering the video may be impractical, but there are certain minimum standards for packaging of a set like this, and Paramount has failed to meet even those minimal standards. Selling it in this kind of a package is completely disrespectful to the material.

 

[Malcolm Orr]

Just watched 'Lower Decks' and the image on it is, for the most part, excellent - the newer Ent-D is markedly better than the older one used in some shots. The clarity on the PS3 is great.

Then I put in series 2, 'Q Who' and it was still watchable, less detailed and higher contrast. Doesn't put me off. Some of the intermediate seasons have some grain, but otherwise it's OK.

I wonder if the DVDs are 'as good' as the master versions or whether they are poorer copies, or recorded more compressed. Many scenes should be amenable to upscaling with pretty good results.

 

[JoeD80]

Wow. That's a shame. I can watch TOS episodes in crystal clear high definition, the colors are sharp and bold, the lines crisp and detailed, yet TNG which was some 21 years later, looks old and outdated in quality. I guess they didn't think too far ahead on that one.

It's because TOS exists on film. You can just pick any resolution from there. TNG exists on videotape at the low resolution used by 80's/90's televisions, and flaws are accented with higher resolution devices.

 

[jefferiestubes8]

surround sound

As for the audio, I find I'm tweaking it a lot, trying to get the 5.1 track to sound decent though I'm using (4) 3-way speakers, so no center and no subwoofer hooked up.

Dolby Digital 5.1 relies on the center speaker for all dialogue and sound FX for every production. Occasionally you get non-essential dialogue source panned to L or R or even to a surround channel but you need to purchase a center speaker, really.
Budgets aside this sole thing will anchor your viewing experience to the dialogue coming from your screen.
Try a pawn shop to get a used one and/or a subwoofer speaker...

 

[Amaris]

Some good points above by several posters.

So my friend comes over and watches an episode of TNG with me and I remark on the quality. He says it just reminds him of when the show was originally on cable and says I've become spoiled to DVD and HD. He's right.

However, his idea that it looks like how the show appeared on our local cable stations back in 1987/88 gives me an idea to simply pretend that's what I'm watching once more. Not a bad way to convince me, I might add.

J.

 

[Hober Mallow]

Some good points above by several posters.

So my friend comes over and watches an episode of TNG with me and I remark on the quality. He says it just reminds him of when the show was originally on cable and says I've become spoiled to DVD and HD. He's right.

However, his idea that it looks like how the show appeared on our local cable stations back in 1987/88 gives me an idea to simply pretend that's what I'm watching once more. Not a bad way to convince me, I might add.

J.

That would be fine, except that it doesn't look the way it did when I was a kid watching it on an analog TV. The more video technology improves, the more the flaws in the image quality become more and more obvious.

 

[Amaris]

Some good points above by several posters.

So my friend comes over and watches an episode of TNG with me and I remark on the quality. He says it just reminds him of when the show was originally on cable and says I've become spoiled to DVD and HD. He's right.

However, his idea that it looks like how the show appeared on our local cable stations back in 1987/88 gives me an idea to simply pretend that's what I'm watching once more. Not a bad way to convince me, I might add.

J.

That would be fine, except that it doesn't look the way it did when I was a kid watching it on an analog TV. The more video technology improves, the more the flaws in the image quality become more and more obvious.

Well, our local cable station and FOX affiliate sucked anyway.

J.

 

[GalaxyX]

Who cares about Region 2 packaging? Real people live in Region 1.

LMAO!!!! Too awesome!!!

Anyway, I never bothered to buy the DVD's because TNG was overplayed for like a decade on a ton of Networks. I got to see every single episode just watching TV

The crazy prices they were asking for the DVD sets (over $100 when they came out) was just ridiculous.

Now they are trying to sell them again with another repackaging. Paramount, why don't you just REMASTER the series like you did with TOS???

You dumped some good cash into Star Trek IX but it payed off for you, TNG would be the same.

 

[Similitude]

Luckily due to some error in Blockbusters pricing I was able to get all 7 Seasons for 27 bucks a pop. This was like 5 years ago or so when the Seasons were going for well over 100 in most places.

 

[ManaByte]

My first post here, and I can't think of a better one. Forgive any typos as I am on my iPhone.

As part of my old job, I reviewed all seven DVD seasons fir IGN DVD and even visited the DVD production house when they were working on the final DS9 seasons. As a previous poster stated; TNG was shot on video and as such it doesn't translate too well to DVD. The existing DVDs are the absolute best the existing TNG elements can look on standard DVD.

Even SciFi HDs TNG broadcasts do not look much better due to the source elements.

The reason TOS looks great in HD is because CBS Paramount did a very costly HD remastering mission for the shows 40th anniversary. All of the effects were re-done with CG at HD resolution, and the source elements were cleaned up using the original negatives.

Now, TNG was the best selling Trek series on DVD by a very large margin. There is a RUMOR going around that CBS will remastering the series like TOS. If so, the BluRay will look great. However until then, the DVDs are the best you can get.

 

[Captrek]

Luckily due to some error in Blockbusters pricing I was able to get all 7 Seasons for 27 bucks a pop.

Wow. And five years later that’s still a price I can’t touch. I would love to get all 7 seasons for $27*7.

Right now I’m watching bootlegs I downloaded off the internet. I don’t feel good about it, and if I could buy the series for a reasonable price I would, but I can’t find the complete series legit for much less than $300.

 

[ManaByte]

Luckily due to some error in Blockbusters pricing I was able to get all 7 Seasons for 27 bucks a pop.

Wow. And five years later that’s still a price I can’t touch. I would love to get all 7 seasons for $27*7.

Right now I’m watching bootlegs I downloaded off the internet. I don’t feel good about it, and if I could buy the series for a reasonable price I would, but I can’t find the complete series legit for much less than $300.

Well, it's $320 new on Amazon. If you really dig you can find it for $250 or so.

 

[Malcolm Orr]

My first post here, and I can't think of a better one. Forgive any typos as I am on my iPhone.

As part of my old job, I reviewed all seven DVD seasons fir IGN DVD and even visited the DVD production house when they were working on the final DS9 seasons. As a previous poster stated; TNG was shot on video and as such it doesn't translate too well to DVD. The existing DVDs are the absolute best the existing TNG elements can look on standard DVD.

Even SciFi HDs TNG broadcasts do not look much better due to the source elements.

The reason TOS looks great in HD is because CBS Paramount did a very costly HD remastering mission for the shows 40th anniversary. All of the effects were re-done with CG at HD resolution, and the source elements were cleaned up using the original negatives.

Now, TNG was the best selling Trek series on DVD by a very large margin. There is a RUMOR going around that CBS will remastering the series like TOS. If so, the BluRay will look great. However until then, the DVDs are the best you can get.

Thanks for posting. Your opinion appears to be far more informed than mine as I have no experience in this field.

There's 2 points where I'd like to share my thoughts and wondered what you or others felt.

1) Video - on my PS3 with the right settings I can get many episodes looking very good - close to satellite broadcasts of Enterprise in SD for example, but some episodes are excellent, some are not (for similar scenes and similar lightings such as the bridge). Now the question I have is this - when you say the DVDs are as good as the existing masters, is that to say that the master versions of these episodes are recorded to the same quality or are the DVD versions slightly more compressed. I appreciate the masters will still look like they were shot on video, but there are certain epsides where a lot of compression seems to have occured.

2) The Remastering Project - I think it's probably a case of how and when than if. I think that the amazon/target place markers and the rumours of the test 2-3 years ago makes me think that it is at least being looked into. If I was to guess I would imagine that any tests to professionally upscale the images are less than satisfactory, however the series is still marketable, esp in Europe where TNG is on 2 different channels every day. Also the movies* include 4 TNG ones and I assume that as a block having TOS and TNG as HD for future syndication etc might be helpful.

Many TNG episodes have very little added effects. Darmok doesn't have a huge amount at all, neither does Chain of Command. Checking season 7 I can see a whole lot more, but many TNG episodes have very little added effects, assuming the ship and other model shots exist still.

* as an aside, Generations was on Sky HD last night. I'm not an expert but I swear it was an upscaled version. It had a LOT of artefacts present.

Anyway, here's hoping. TNG might have two things going for it overall - firstly it's popularity/familiarity with a general audience and the fact that it looks so bad that the choice will probably remain between remastering it in some form (and in it's entirity) or letting it become an atrefact of the past. I can see them leaving DS9 and VOY, but not TNG

 

[ManaByte]

I think we're almost guaranteed to see TNG remastered in time for its 25th Anniversary. I wouldn't be surprised if the project is going on right now.

 

[Falcor5]

My first post here, and I can't think of a better one. Forgive any typos as I am on my iPhone.

As part of my old job, I reviewed all seven DVD seasons fir IGN DVD and even visited the DVD production house when they were working on the final DS9 seasons. As a previous poster stated; TNG was shot on video and as such it doesn't translate too well to DVD. The existing DVDs are the absolute best the existing TNG elements can look on standard DVD.

Even SciFi HDs TNG broadcasts do not look much better due to the source elements.

The reason TOS looks great in HD is because CBS Paramount did a very costly HD remastering mission for the shows 40th anniversary. All of the effects were re-done with CG at HD resolution, and the source elements were cleaned up using the original negatives.

Now, TNG was the best selling Trek series on DVD by a very large margin. There is a RUMOR going around that CBS will remastering the series like TOS. If so, the BluRay will look great. However until then, the DVDs are the best you can get.

Welcome to the board! I hope the rumor is true about CBS re-mastering TNG!

 

[ManaByte]

Well here's the thing with TNG; the amount of raw material that is available for the show is so much the company that did the TNG DVDs wanted to do a full seven disc set of nothing but extras but Paramount wouldn't go for it. There's THAT MUCH material in near pristine shape; and that doesn't even include the original elements which are preserved even better than the original series.

The only thing holding it back is if it is worth it financially for CBS to do it, and since TNG sold so well on DVD it's almost a no-brainer. The 25th Anniversary of the show is coming up in just a couple years so it would be the perfect time to do the BluRay re-release of TNG with remasted video and effects.

You'll never see DS9 or VOY remastered the way TOS was, but the chances of TNG happening are very good.

Also the new release should be awesome. CBS does an amazing job on their TV DVDs, better even than what Paramount did in the past. The TOS Remastered DVDs/BluRays along with the Twilight Zone Definitive Collection (done by Image under supervision of CBS) are fantastic and are even better than the initial Trek DVD releases.

 

[Hober Mallow]

Also the new release should be awesome. CBS does an amazing job on their TV DVDs, better even than what Paramount did in the past. The TOS Remastered DVDs/BluRays along with the Twilight Zone Definitive Collection (done by Image under supervision of CBS) are fantastic and are even better than the initial Trek DVD releases.

I've got the first couple seasons of TZ, and you're right, it does look great, but since they've already done the work and remastered the series in HD, I hope it won't be too long a wait for the definitive definitive edition on blu-ray. I really want the last three seasons, but I'm holding out for a future blu-ray release.

And if TNG and TZ both go to blu-ray, and I can only afford one series, I'm gonna have to go TZ. Sorry, TNG.

 

[ManaByte]

I wasn't just talking about the quality, but the extras too.

The TZ set is about as complete as you can get.

The TOS Remastered sets are great too. On Season 2 disc five has Trouble with Tribbles in addition to the animated series Tribble episode and the DS9 Tribble episode. THOSE are great extras.