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Topic: DVD Problem

Betsie Beadling
Expert Film Handler

Posts: 178
From: Fairfax, Virginia, USA
Registered: Sep 2000

posted 02-24-2001 05:00 PM

I have 5 DVDs, and 2 of them dont seem to
want to work.one Tenchi Muyo Movie
and Princess Mononoke.

Ive Exchanegd Princess Mononoke 3Times
and it Still wont work.
What to do Cause i Really want to Wach that Movie???

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Paul G. Thompson
The Weenie Man

Posts: 4718
From: Mount Vernon WA USA
Registered: Nov 2000

posted 02-24-2001 05:16 PM

Betsie, did they work before? And, does the DVD player work ok with other DVD's?

Joe Redifer
You need a beating today

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

posted 02-24-2001 05:17 PM

Try exchanging the DVD player itself instead of the discs. Those discs work fine on my machine, and since you have tried several different copies of the same movie, my bet is that it is your player.

James R. Hammonds, Jr
Jedi Master Film Handler

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

posted 02-25-2001 12:04 AM

was your player made by GE?
it wouldnt suprise me if it was.
the one i bought for my family last christmas is a GE and it sucks.
it even skips on some new movies.
i bought a dvd lens cleaner and it wouldnt even read that properly.

but when i moved up to school, i got myself a good one.

also, having some no-name brand like apex or something like that is a bad idea.

Darryl Spicer
Film God

Posts: 3250
From: Lexington, KY, USA
Registered: Dec 2000

posted 02-25-2001 12:32 AM

What is the brand and model of your player and how old is it. Some early tashiba models have been having problems reading discs do to the internal processor. This has since been corrected. Make sure you do not get any fingerprints on the disc. if finger prints get on the center area of the disc it can cause problems with the disc loading up. Also make sure that the player is well ventilated and nothing is placed on top of the unit. This can actualy cause the unit to stop working.

Scott Norwood
Film God

Posts: 8146
From: Boston, MA. USA (1774.21 miles northeast of Dallas)
Registered: Jun 99

posted 02-25-2001 09:43 AM

Yes, do post the make/model of the player. Some players have trouble with some disks. It's also possible that the alignment is off in your particular player.

Note that some DVD players also have trouble playing CD-Rs. I've only seen a couple of DVD-Rs, and those played fine in a Toshiba player, but I don't know if other players have trouble with them.

(Admittedly, I don't own a DVD player yet, so I probably can't help that much with the specifics of what make/model to buy or avoid.)

Betsie Beadling
Expert Film Handler

Posts: 178
From: Fairfax, Virginia, USA
Registered: Sep 2000

posted 02-25-2001 10:00 AM

My Fathers Computer

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Darryl Spicer
Film God

Posts: 3250
From: Lexington, KY, USA
Registered: Dec 2000

posted 02-25-2001 11:38 AM

Dvd roms can be tricky with some types of DVD's. It could be a number of problems. How old is the dvd Rom. I would say it is no more than two years old. DVD roms run a little differently than regular dvd players. Do you have another cdrom drive on the computer. Sometimes the other drive can cause problems. If the DVD was an add on to a computer that has a cdrom. The dvd player must be set up as the master drive not the slave drive. Otherwise it will not run correctly. Some of the dvd's could have pretty large files on them that thr drive is having trouble loading. Make sure you have as minimum amount of programs running in the background otherwise the dvd will have trouble loading. Fingerprints play an even more important roll when it coms to cumputer drives. They can prevent the drive from loading. CD lens cleaners are not recomended in dvdroms and dvd rom lens cleaners will sometimes have trouble running.

Heyward Garner
Expert Film Handler

Posts: 101
From: Winston-Salem, NC, USA
Registered: Jan 2001

posted 02-26-2001 12:22 AM

Hmmmm....
Betsie, did you check the regional code? (aka United States is "1", etc.) The regional code of the disks and the regional code of your DVD-ROM must correspond. I have Tenchi, and it runs great on the PS2. Also, do you know if you use software or hardware decoding? One drawback to a DVD-ROM instead of a stand-alone DVD player is software decoding... NO GOOD. Always use a hardware decoder. Check those two items, and see if that doesn't help some... Good luck!

Betsie Beadling
Expert Film Handler

Posts: 178
From: Fairfax, Virginia, USA
Registered: Sep 2000

posted 02-26-2001 01:43 AM

Yes its region one

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Josh Jones
Redhat

Posts: 1207
From: Plano, TX
Registered: Apr 2000

posted 03-01-2001 12:18 AM

Speaking of DVD's, how many people out there watch letterboxed or widescreen formatted films at home. If I'm given the option, I always watch them in WS. Too bad Blue Submarine No. 6 is in Acadamy

Gundam Too

Josh

John Pytlak
Film God

Posts: 9987
From: Rochester, NY 14650-1922
Registered: Jan 2000

posted 03-01-2001 08:10 AM

IMHO,with DVDs and a good monitor, "letterbox" or "Widescreen" is ALWAYS the way to go. That's the format the cinematographer and director composed each shot for. "Pan and Scan" fills the screen of a 4:3 television set, but usually RUINS the composition and pacing of a movie. Unfortunately, many uninformed people still prefer "pan and scan", if only because their VHS tapes and old TVs are so unsharp that they need to fill the screen to see what is going on.

Two movies that clearly show the entire widescreen frame being used for creative composition are "The Graduate" and "The Sound of Music". They just are NOT the same movies with pan-and-scan.

Marty Hart's "American Widescreen Museum" website describes a wonderful new technique called "FlikFX" that tries to fit wide movies onto a small TV screen without pan-and-scan or letterbox. I think something will be released this April 1:
http://www.widescreenmuseum.com/flikfx/default.htm

On a more serious note, check out his feature on "Letterbox Lunacy":
http://www.widescreenmuseum.com/widescreen/lbx.htm

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John P. Pytlak, Senior Technical Specialist
Worldwide Technical Services, Entertainment Imaging
Eastman Kodak Company
Research Labs, Building 69, Room 7419
Rochester, New York, 14650-1922 USA
Tel: 716-477-5325 Cell: 716-781-4036 Fax: 716-722-7243
E-Mail: john.pytlak@kodak.com
Web site: http://www.kodak.com/go/motion

Brad Miller
Administrator

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

posted 03-01-2001 10:03 AM

For those who haven't checked out Marty's link that John posted above, be sure and check out "exhibit #3" on Letterbox Lunacy. This is a nice visual explanation on yet another reason against curved screens. Curved screens kill the apparent width of the image, do in fact lose more image area (as anyone who has ever cut an aperture for a curved screen can attest) and distort the image. Anyone notice that the THX Broadway "blue box" never has straight lines on a curved screen? Sheeesch!

Too bad customers have been trained to look for "stadium seating" and "curved screens".

John Pytlak
Film God

Posts: 9987
From: Rochester, NY 14650-1922
Registered: Jan 2000

posted 03-01-2001 10:20 AM

Brad:

I agree that a deep curved screen combined with a steep projection angle results in very unacceptable geometric distortion and lost image area, clearly seen in Marty's example from "Patton".

But gain screens should be installed with a slight curve (per SMPTE RP95) to improve illumination uniformity. Usually, a curve with a radius of more than 80% of the projection throw distance won't have objectionable distortion, especially if the projection angle is within a few degrees of perpendicular to the center of the screen.

Again, trying various combinations using Schneider's Theatre Design Pro software is very useful to understanding the tradeoffs:
http://www.schneideroptics.com/theatre/desprodn.html

If you have enough light to use a matte white (gain = 1) screen, you should always install it flat so as not to have contrast killing cross-reflections.

Scott Norwood
Film God

Posts: 8146
From: Boston, MA. USA (1774.21 miles northeast of Dallas)
Registered: Jun 99

posted 03-01-2001 04:50 PM

I have mixed feelings about curved screens. I've seen some great theatres that use deep-curve (Uptown in DC), shallow-curve (lots of early '50s CinemaScope conversions were set up this way), and flat screens, as well as bad examples of each.

I think it depends a lot on the design and installation, as well as the movie itself. IMHO, Academy stuff does not look good on a deep-curve screen, since the picture appears to be square. I'd say that 1.66 can go either flat or curved. Shallow-curve is probably best for 1.85, although some films ("Starship Troopers" comes to mind, but there are others) are great on deep-curve screens. Deep-curve is great for scope action films, but probably not so great for "artsy" scope films, particularly if subtitles are involved ("Brother of Sleep," for example, was a great German film from a few years ago that used scope for good reasons, but which probably wouldn't look right on a curved screen, particularly with the resultant distortion to the subtitles).

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