|
|
This topic comprises 8 pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
|
|
Author
|
Topic: Let the HD DVD format wars begin...
|
Paul Mayer
Oh get out of it Melvin, before it pulls you under!
Posts: 3836
From: Albuquerque, NM
Registered: Feb 2000
|
posted 10-03-2004 11:59 AM
So Fox joins with MGM in committing to Sony's BD format (though that does not preclude them from also releasing on HD-DVD). Have there been any announcements for studios that have picked HD-DVD? I wish we could have gotten down to one format though--this reminds me too much of the Beta vs. VHS wars with their mutually incompatible technologies. I know I can't afford to buy two playback machines nor maintain a split-format library of HD discs, which means I'll sit this one out until one format wins. I predict that'll probably happen sometime in my 60's.
Fox Said to Back Blu-Ray DVD
quote:
U.S. studio reportedly signs onto Sony-backed standard for next-generation systems.
October 3, 2004: 8:40 AM EDT
TOKYO (Reuters) - U.S. film studio Twentieth Century Fox Film Corp. will support the Blu-ray standard for next-generation optical discs, a Japanese business daily reported Sunday, advancing the cause of Sony Corp. and its partners in a war over the next generation of DVDs.
Backers of two rival DVD formats, Blu-ray and HD DVD, are wooing studios to issue movies in their format, in an echo of the VHS-Beta videotape battle of 20 years ago.
The rival formats, both of which use blue lasers to read discs, offer much greater capacity than existing DVDs. This would enable discs to hold higher-definition and longer recordings.
Blu-ray backers say their discs will hold 25 gigabytes of data, five times the capacity of current DVDs.
The Nihon Keizai Shimbun said Twentieth Century Fox, the distributor of "Titanic," "Star Wars" and other blockbuster films, would join the Blu-ray Disc Association, which would be launched on Monday.
Obtaining the backing of Hollywood studios and their large film libraries will be key to winning the race to produce the next generation of DVDs.
No one at Sony (SNE: Research, Estimates), Twentieth Centry Fox or its parent, News Corp Ltd. (NWS: Research, Estimates), was available for comment.
The support of Twentieth Century Fox would be another step forward for the Blu-ray camp, whose case was buttressed last month when a group of companies led by Sony bought film studio Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Inc. (MGM: Research, Estimates) for $2.85 billion plus debt.
The rival HD DVD camp groups Toshiba Corp., Sanyo Electric Co. and NEC Corp.
Blu-ray's backers include Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. Ltd., the maker of Panasonic products, and Sharp Corp.
The blue laser light used for both technologies has a shorter wavelength than the red light used in current DVD recorders, so can read and store data at much higher densities.
Twentieth Century Fox was the sixth-largest player in the North American movie market in 2003 with a 8.8 percent market share, Nihon Keizai said, citing figures from the Hollywood Reporter.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Copyright 2004 Reuters All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
| IP: Logged
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."
Posts: 10973
From: Lawton, OK, USA
Registered: Apr 2001
|
posted 10-05-2004 10:53 PM
quote:
Bobby, do you mean 15Mb per second? Wouldn't 15 megabytes per second would be plenty for HD?
Dammit. Sorry, about the typo. Yeah, that's 15Mb not "15MB".
To answer your question, no I don't think 15Mb is enough for HD disc based content. The peak rate for regular DVD is 10Mb per second. I've seen lots of standard DVDs have pretty high average bitrates and peaks over the 9Mb and close to 10Mb range. Depending on the whether 720p or 1080i is used, HD-DVD would be working with 3 to 7 times the number of pixels. 15Mb just doesn't sound like enough for that.
Blu-Ray has much higher bitrate and a lot more forward looking potential. The Time-Warner/Toshiba camp seems to be going about the "we're only going to offer just what's barely good enough" strategy.
IMHO, the Sony camp has the right idea with pursuing a more demanding spec for disc-based HD video storage and playback. The D-VHS format already boasts a pretty impressive bandwidth of roughly 30 megabits per second. It seems really crazy for the HD-DVD people to pursue a standard of only half that rate, just a few megabits above the peak limit for standard DVD.
The only sensible argument I can see for choosing such a low bitrate for HD content would be perhaps for ease of disc manufacturing and durability issues with rental discs. It is true many renters out there are filthy pigs who treat discs like trash.
quote: Jesse Skeen
I'd like to see menus on discs just disappear, or at least only come up when you want to see a scene index or watch the 'extras'.
I agree with this for the most part. The intro menus for some big ticket film can be kind of cool. However, you should be able to instantly override them (as well as those damned FBI logos and crap) by hitting the play button. If I load a disc into the player and hit "play" before it finishes loading, it should just start playing the movie immediately -just like what happens when you play a CD.
There should be some kind of ability for home users to set their players to display menus or override them automatically. The menus are really irritating if you're watching a movie that spans across 2 DVDs (such as the LOTR extended edition series). I'd really like it if a player could automatically jump from playing disc 1 to disc 2 without any menu interruptions inbetween. What would be even better is if the player loaded up the first minute or two of video on the second disc into a memory buffer in RAM or on a hard disc, that way the disc switch would be seamless.
To add to this further, it would also be nice if you could set a next generation HD disc player to bypass menus and set default audio options for the formats or languages you want to use. This kind of thing would certainly be nice for DTS fans. The movie would just play in DTS automatically without you having to go to some menu to select it.
| IP: Logged
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
All times are Central (GMT -6:00)
|
This topic comprises 8 pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
|
Powered by Infopop Corporation
UBB.classicTM
6.3.1.2
The Film-Tech Forums are designed for various members related to the cinema industry to express their opinions, viewpoints and testimonials on various products, services and events based upon speculation, personal knowledge and factual information through use, therefore all views represented here allow no liability upon the publishers of this web site and the owners of said views assume no liability for any ill will resulting from these postings. The posts made here are for educational as well as entertainment purposes and as such anyone viewing this portion of the website must accept these views as statements of the author of that opinion
and agrees to release the authors from any and all liability.
|
Home
![[Cool]](cool.gif)
![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
![[thumbsup]](graemlins/thumbsup.gif)
Printer-friendly view of this topic