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Topic: Dvd

Joe Redifer
You need a beating today

Posts: 12859
From: Denver, Colorado
Registered: May 99

posted 08-30-2002 11:52 PM

Things I like about DVD:

-I can watch it more than once without the picture getting all scratched and dirty.

-It's video. If video is good enough for Steven Sodaburger it's probably too good for me.

-The cases. Extra entertainment value is included in most DVD packaging in the form of spending countless hours peeling the stickers off of the top and bottoms.

-The animated menus. Why would anyone want to put the disc in and just press play? That's stupid. Unskippable animated menus are definitely the best thing ever to grace my television screen. It's a known fact that they add a great deal of value to any DVD.

-The copyright warnings. I was going to copy my DVDs for my friends, but since that copyright warning is unskippable I definitely won't now.

-The compression. Wow, everything I love is compressed! DVD's, MP3's, DLP. Compression is obviously the most important advancement in history. Nobody notices the details anyway. How can they when there are none to notice?

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Aaron Haney
Master Film Handler

Posts: 265
From: Cupertino, CA, USA
Registered: Jan 2001

posted 08-31-2002 12:28 AM

Two more:

- Remixed soundtracks. Why yes, let's have a bunch of flunkies in the home video department replace half the foley sound effects, change the balance, and do fake 5.1 from an original mono mix. Who cares if the people who did the original sound mix won Academy Awards for Best Sound. It was done in the past, so it's primitive and needs to be replaced. It's almost as good as colorization!

- Cropped transfers. I just love it when I can't see all the way to the edges of the picture. There was nothing important there anyway! The Ben Hur DVD is a great example.

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Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."

Posts: 10973
From: Lawton, OK, USA
Registered: Apr 2001

posted 08-31-2002 12:23 PM

Here's another thing: DVD accomodates an ego-driven penchant to customize a DVD to make it more inconvenient --like eliminating all chapter stops! I just love popping in a David Lynch movie like "Mulholland Drive" and having to hold down the fast foward button for several minutes to get to that lucious girl-on-girl couch scene! The DVD would have been better with two chapter stops: opening title and girl-on-girl thang.

Seamless branching would have been even better on that disc. We could have had the option to skip that really creepy scene where the young blond girl has to kiss that old dude that played on "Medical Center" in the 1970's.

Another Lynch DVD, "The Straight Story" goes straight to play when inserting the disc. I wasn't expecting that. I'll usually go pee while the DVD is cycling through the opening menus. So I missed the first couple minutes.

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Dave Williams
Wet nipple scene

Posts: 1836
From: Salt Lake City, UT, USA
Registered: Jan 2000

posted 08-31-2002 12:49 PM

Shame on the ben hur transfer. SHAME SHAME.

Not all remixes are bad. Some are quite good, using all of the original tracks and sounds, just remixed using the new 5.1 technology.

I will agree that I have heard some of the fake 5.1 remixes from mono sound. What the hell is that?

Dave

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Paul Linfesty
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1383
From: Bakersfield, CA, USA
Registered: Nov 1999

posted 08-31-2002 05:09 PM

quote:
DVD accomodates an ego-driven penchant to customize a DVD to make it more inconvenient --like eliminating all chapter stops!

Isn't the act of adding chapter stops to a DVD customizing a movie for the DVD experience?

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Evans A Criswell
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1579
From: Huntsville, AL, USA
Registered: Mar 2000

posted 09-02-2002 10:37 AM

I know DVD isn't perfect, but it's the best medium there has ever been for watching movies at home. If you have a properly calibrated widescreen set that can take full advantage of anamorphic DVDs and do the inverse 3:2 telecine, your home viewing experience will be far greater than anything anyone ever dreamed of for video 10 years ago. Most DVD movies have an anamorphic transfer in the movies original aspect ratio, and in some cases, the DVD was my first opportunity to see a movie in its original aspect ratio (after seeing scope cropped to 1.85 in a couple of local theatres or seeing older movies on VHS or TV only). I know the presentation quality achievable with such a setup falls far short of a properly setup 35mm environment in a theatre, but my DVD setup will beat the Carmike Century Cinema 8 in Decatur most of the time (frequent focus, brightness, and alignment problems). A good DVD environment can beat a lousy theatre, and there are plenty of lousy theatres out there. I admit that I don't see as many movies in theatres as I used to.

------------------
Evans A Criswell
Huntsville-Decatur Movie Theatre Information Site

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Thomas Procyk
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1842
From: Royal Palm Beach, FL, USA
Registered: Feb 2002

posted 09-02-2002 11:53 AM

As I've said in other threads, I don't own a DVD player. I've often been tempted to buy one, but the prices keep going down, (saw one with SRD & DTS out, and Component video for $79) and the features are getting better on the more expensive ones. So i've decided to wait until those come down, too. There aren't any DVD titles out that would make me run out and get one, either.

Speaking of the titles available, and this may not be true anymore, but releases were often reissued several times in better packaging, (remember DVDs in jewel cases?) a better disc, (no dual-layered discs early on) or a new director's cut or additional scenes, etc. Why didn't they do this on the original disc?!? Sometimes it's planned in advance, as is the case with Lord Of The Rings. In some cases, a new disc SHOULD be issued because the previous version is inferior. (There is still no widescreen version of Happy Gillmore available, or the Titanic DVD where the only real "extra" was the trailer.)

True that the quality of the image on a DVD surpasses VHS, and this would be especially noticable in my screening room on a large screen, and the fact that my projector has Component inputs makes me really want to get one. But I feel I have more control over VHS. I can fast-forward past the FBI Warning and all that nonsense. I don't have to deal with a menu. I can have my screen masked to the correct aspect ratio for the film and not have to worry that the menu is fullscreen and would be partially on my cieling while I search for the "Play Movie" option.

So I guess i'll wait until the format settles down and gets on a straight track. Oh, and when Warner Bros./New Line switch from that stupid cardboard packaging, and start listing the aspect ratio on the box. (instead of just "...the black bars at the top and bottom of your screen are normal" )

=TMP=

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Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."

Posts: 10973
From: Lawton, OK, USA
Registered: Apr 2001

posted 09-02-2002 12:10 PM

Chapter stops are a holdover from the Laserdisc format, and a matter of convenience for most viewers. If you want to check out a certain scene again, it is kind of nice to have a chapter stop to get you much closer to that point.

But if some filmmakers want to be totally puritanical about it, they'll also disable your pause button so you can't go take a pee break while the DVD is playing. They'll disable the fast forward and rewind buttons so you can't track back to figure out what some mumbling character just said.

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Thomas Procyk
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1842
From: Royal Palm Beach, FL, USA
Registered: Feb 2002

posted 09-02-2002 12:14 PM

A quick side note...

I noticed (according to Amazon.com) that the Neverending Story DVD will be released tomorrow, Sept. 3, and that it's 1.85:1

However, IMDB lists under "technical details" as 2.35:1, and a laserdisc release in 2.20:1. (I know, I know, IMDB is about as accurate as the National Enquierer.)

So what's the real aspect ratio on this film?
=TMP=

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Paul Linfesty
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1383
From: Bakersfield, CA, USA
Registered: Nov 1999

posted 09-02-2002 12:47 PM

It was shown in 35mm "scope" in theatres.

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Brad Miller
Administrator

Posts: 17775
From: Plano, TX (36.2 miles NW of Rockwall)
Registered: May 99

posted 09-02-2002 12:49 PM

quote:
"But I feel I have more control over VHS. I can fast-forward past the FBI Warning and all that nonsense. I don't have to deal with a menu. I can have my screen masked to the correct aspect ratio for the film and not have to worry that the menu is fullscreen and would be partially on my cieling while I search for the "Play Movie" option."

This is actually one of the main reasons why I dislike DVDs. Enough of the cutesy crap. When I press PLAY, just play the movie! Seeing that non-bypassable FBI logo just makes me want to copy the thing to spite them for making me sit through it. And what's with Universal? I watched a Universal DVD the other day and had to sit through a 60 second promo showing off their "fabulous" movies as well as the FBI logo before my player would give me control. Back when LaserDiscs were popular, I used to dupe them onto S-VHS just so I wouldn't have to deal with the intermission(s). I'm tempted to start doing that with DVDs. No FBI menu, no studio promos and no silly menus. Duping to D-VHS wouldn't lose a bit of quality either.

Also if the movie is 1.85 letterboxed, at least have the courtesy when designing the silly Flash-like menu screens to keep all options within that frame. Same for 2.39 letterbox.

Oh well, DVDs are overrated.

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Mark Gulbrandsen
Resident Trollmaster

Posts: 16657
From: Music City
Registered: Jun 99

posted 09-02-2002 01:28 PM

So far the best aspect of DVD's is the DVD Audio format! Nothing else about DVD is very important or fascinating.
Mark

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Chad Souder
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 962
From: Waterloo, IA, USA
Registered: Feb 2000

posted 09-02-2002 01:34 PM

I guess I feel that having to wait for an FBI warning doesn't even come remotely close to tipping the scales againt DVD. Like Evan said, it's the best medium ever for home. Random access, not having to rewind the damn thing every time, better picture, clear pauses, clear frame-by-frame, and better sound are just a few reasons why DVD is the best.

Part of me wonders if some of you are against DVD's just because they're digital?

Finally, if it wasn't for DVD, I would've never gotten that good CD recording of the film version of Pink Floyd, The Wall.

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Robert E. Allen
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1078
From: Checotah, Oklahoma
Registered: Jul 2002

posted 09-02-2002 01:58 PM

My biggest complain about DVDs is that they don't offer enough "Standard" or P&S discs. I have a regular 25 inch TV and the "wide" formats of DVDs put out just too small a picture. So when I see a film I want and it isn't offered in "standard" on disc I'll buy it in VHS. Both my players are new and I see no noticable difference in pic quality. I buy DVDs to save storage space. And all that added garbage is just annoying for me and doesn't impress me at all. I think this is just another case of "Techno-nerds" gone crazy. I even get annoyed at having to fast forward through trailers on tapes I've purchased (they're OK on rented tapes or in theatres).

Bob
The Old Showman

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James R. Hammonds, Jr
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 931
From: Houston, TX, USA
Registered: Nov 2000

posted 09-02-2002 02:30 PM

You know on those VHS tapes, you only have to fast forward through those trailers once if you just want to see the movie.
Just reset the counter to zero when you get to the feature, and at the end of the movie, put on the memory button and it will only rewing to the beginning of the movie.

I know its a matter of tast, but I think everything should be released to video whether it is VHS or DVD in its original apect ratio.
P&S means POS in my book

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