Video/Film quality of Emissary

[Gagarin]

Re-watched the DS9 pilot for the first time. I was shocked by...how bad it looked. It looked worse than TNG. And not just the effects, it was the whole cinematagraphy. Did they shoot it on video tape instead of film stock or what?

Was it an ultra low budget pilot?
Even the Picard-Sisko scene looks like it was ripped from a mid-90's interactive movie PC game.

 

[Picard Alpha]

Yeah, I've been re-watching the entire series and was amazed at how bad the transfer was as well. I don't think it was necessarily the cinematographer's fault, it was probably the film stock they used or more likely the transfer. It's amazing to see the quality difference between season one and season four. I've noted the same quality difference in TNG as well, they seemed to punch it up by s3.

 

[Diddle]

I agree, I was watching some DS9 episode yesterday on TV that was from late second season, probably, and it looked so poor, I don't know. I don't know if they were out of money or not, but it's odd because I remember watching Voygaer's first seasons and it looked good enough...

 

[DS9forever]

The original cinematographer left at the end of season two, which is why season three onwards looks better.