Fair enough. I was always displeased with the quality (and 4:3 ratio) of the DVDs, its the kind of quality you'd expect from a Chinese bootleg (actually, my friend had some bootleg Voyager DVD's which I found the later seasons to actually look better than the official DVDs).
Fingers crossed for a 16:9 ratio 1080p remaster sometime in the near future!
Fingers crossed for a 16:9 ratio 1080p remaster sometime in the near future!
TNG & TNG-R?
SoM posted about how TNG was shot on film.
FYI For Japan only TOS-R was cropped for 16:9 and the new visual effects were completed in 16:9. All other foreign markets and USA thus far has gotten the 4:3 release except when the XBOX Live Marketplace had TOS-R episodes only the visual effects were shown in 16:9 and The live-action shots were 4:3. In Japan the regular live action shots were cropped to match the rendered Visual FX for a 16:9 presentation.
see
TOS-R Goes Widescreen In Japan July 31, 2007
You should check out the massive 14-page thread:
Star Trek TNG Remastered?
for the detailed discussion on the picture quality, visual effects recreation/conforming, packaging, and just about anything else that would be involved with a remastering effort of the TNG series to HD.
Starfleet I don't think it's going to happen in any market other than Japan.
SoM posted about how TNG was shot on film.
FYI For Japan only TOS-R was cropped for 16:9 and the new visual effects were completed in 16:9. All other foreign markets and USA thus far has gotten the 4:3 release except when the XBOX Live Marketplace had TOS-R episodes only the visual effects were shown in 16:9 and The live-action shots were 4:3. In Japan the regular live action shots were cropped to match the rendered Visual FX for a 16:9 presentation.
see
TOS-R Goes Widescreen In Japan July 31, 2007
You should check out the massive 14-page thread:
Star Trek TNG Remastered?
for the detailed discussion on the picture quality, visual effects recreation/conforming, packaging, and just about anything else that would be involved with a remastering effort of the TNG series to HD.
TOS-R seasons 1-3 Blu-ray Japanese version
BluRay Region Coding Announced - Japan & US Same Region Code
I checked the Japanese Paramount sites & used Google Translate:
http://dvd.paramount.jp/search/detail.php?id=5934
It does not say if it is 4:3 Original Aspect Ratio or 16:9
Star Trek: The Original Series Remastered Season 2
http://dvd.paramount.jp/search/detail.php?id=6313
Wednesday, December 28, 2005
BluRay Region Coding Announced - Japan & US Same Region Code
I checked the Japanese Paramount sites & used Google Translate:
Star Trek:The Original Series Remastered Season 1
http://dvd.paramount.jp/search/detail.php?id=5934
It does not say if it is 4:3 Original Aspect Ratio or 16:9
Star Trek: The Original Series Remastered Season 2
http://dvd.paramount.jp/search/detail.php?id=6313
A
Amaris
Guest
Yeah, the first one looked much worse, and it was because of a faulty set of discs. This image is better, but you can still tell the source material is poor.
Yep.
J.
After reading this thread a bit I've become even more aware of the problems with these DVDs.
For example, the luma levels vary. Encounter at Farpoint is pretty good, with black usually being black. But I was watching Unification last night and black was consistently grey.
And there are really some very poorly transferred effects shots with what looks like black combing that's built into the frames and bounces around. DS9 and Voyager don't have this issue.
I've also noticed that some of the effects shots seem to be a strange/screwed up combination of telecined 24fps material and 30fps interlaced video.
For example, the luma levels vary. Encounter at Farpoint is pretty good, with black usually being black. But I was watching Unification last night and black was consistently grey.
And there are really some very poorly transferred effects shots with what looks like black combing that's built into the frames and bounces around. DS9 and Voyager don't have this issue.
I've also noticed that some of the effects shots seem to be a strange/screwed up combination of telecined 24fps material and 30fps interlaced video.
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The blacks are all over the place, especially in the later seasons. The frequent cave scenes usually suffer, and the MPEG compression is noticeable at points too. I think DS9 thankfully tended to look better on DVD, as it was generally lit darker than TNG. I can't comment on the Voyager discs, but I imagine they look better than TNG too.
The DVDs generally look fine on CRT, but LCD displays are very unforgiving to any sort of VT-sourced programme.
Yes, that's part of the problem with the way it was edited rather than the DVD transfer. Another big advantage of a full remaster will be to iron out these dodgy VFX overlays. I think it could look amazing given enough time, money and expertise.
TNG vs VOY transfer
TNG is soft and looks like old video while VOY which was mastered to D-2 videotape format looks the same as the day it was mastered thanks to digital video being...digital. There is minimal loss of quality on the MPEG-2 encoding itself from the master tape.
That said Bill Hunt the main reviewer over at The Digital Bits website felt that VOY season 1 picture quality was:
It's odd that when you watch an episode from TNG in 1993 to an episode of ENT in 2003 (Regeneration #049) which was mastered to HD and then downconverted to D2 standard-definition videotape how much the quality of post production of 35mm telecine to video tape, editing, & mastering had changed.
Since TNG seasons were put out on DVD in 2002 I don't think MPEG-2 encoders changed THAT much between 2002 and 2004 when VOY was encoded for DVD.
The Borg Fan Collection has episodes from 3 series and is a good place to compare MPEG-2 encodes from the videotape masters.
TNG is soft and looks like old video while VOY which was mastered to D-2 videotape format looks the same as the day it was mastered thanks to digital video being...digital. There is minimal loss of quality on the MPEG-2 encoding itself from the master tape.
That said Bill Hunt the main reviewer over at The Digital Bits website felt that VOY season 1 picture quality was:
I can assure you when watching episodes from the Borg Fan Col. that there is a noticable difference between the two generations of series.
It's odd that when you watch an episode from TNG in 1993 to an episode of ENT in 2003 (Regeneration #049) which was mastered to HD and then downconverted to D2 standard-definition videotape how much the quality of post production of 35mm telecine to video tape, editing, & mastering had changed.
Since TNG seasons were put out on DVD in 2002 I don't think MPEG-2 encoders changed THAT much between 2002 and 2004 when VOY was encoded for DVD.
Re: TNG vs VOY transfer
Yes, I assumed they'd moved over to digital video by then. Do you know when the transition was? The first couple of seasons of DS9 look much softer than the later ones, so I assume it was around the third season, concurrent with the start of Voyager.
Yes, I assumed they'd moved over to digital video by then. Do you know when the transition was? The first couple of seasons of DS9 look much softer than the later ones, so I assume it was around the third season, concurrent with the start of Voyager.
The quality gets better after season 2. They use new lighting techniques, which is especially noticeable on the bridge.
An additional issue with TNG vs. MPEG2 is that seasons 1 and 2 frequently have a considerable amount of noise/grain. Heavy film grain and noise really eat up video bitrate and MPEG2 is anything but amazing in this case unless you give it a ton of bitrate to work with.
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