old skool film on blue ray

admin_exported

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i cant understand the advantage of watching these 80s films on blu-ray. does it look any better than dvd. surely its no better than dvd thats upscaled by the tv anyhow. is that not all that has been done anyway. has anyone watched a classic on hd???
 

Andrew Everard

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If done properly - ie taken from a new print from a clean negative -, then even very old films transferred to Blu-ray should look stunning. So much more info on a 35mm or even 70mm frame that you could ever get on DVD - much more than you could get on Blu-ray, actually!

Yes, watched some classics on Sky's HD services - and they can look amazing. Saw an old movie in which John Wayne played the ambassador to Japan in the 1800s on Sky the other week, and we couldn't believe how good it looked.

Ah yes, John Huston's The Barbarian and the Geisha (1958) - thank you, IMDB...
 

Clare Newsome

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We watched Orson Welles' Touch of Evil the other night on Sky Movies HD, and it looked great (as well, of course, as having one of the best movie-scores ever composed...)

I agree with Andrew - you can't get much more high-def than a 35mm or 70mm movie lovingly transferred to disc. Take Blade Runner - holds up very well on Blu-ray/HD DVD.

Ironically, it's the modern films that are more reliant on SFX/CGI that can (and do) suffer in high-def - it makes it all too easy to see the effects (this is rumoured to be one reason we haven't seen the Lord of the Rings films on HD disc yet).
 
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Anonymous

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You are both correct. Whatever system you watch a movie on, whether it is DVD or HD, the image is made up of a screen full of dots, (pixels), with the HD image having more dots and therefore a clearer image. The original movie would have been shot on a celluloid film with no dots making up the image but a pure, clean, smooth image. Only VERY old movies where the film grain itself could be seen would produce an image as "dotty" as video. It is analogous to viewing an image from a modern, professional 10MB still digital camera and the same 35mm camera with an effective film resolution of 100TB!

When these older movies, such as the 60's Bullitt and The Getaway starring Steve McQueen are transferred from Film (celluloid) to video (DVD or HD), the infinitely smooth image is compressed into a number of dots to produce the digital image. This naturally degrades the resolution of the image but does offer the opportunity to "enhance" the new digital image to compensate for any degradation of the original film stock over time, such as colour fade or hue shift.

I have both the above mentioned movies on HD and can confirm that the image from both blows away the image from my Star Wars Ep 3 on DVD. As Clare states, as Special Effects and CGI both manipulate the image digitally rather than on the actual "film stock", it is these effects that can be seen if examined closely whereas the good ole stuntman did it for real!

Hope that explains it.

Gerry.
 
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Anonymous

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This is absolutely right. The 1st Harry Potter movies looks decidedly dodgy in places (especially in the FX sequences - which is after all most of the movie). It reminds me of the Ray Harryhausen movies, where the grading changes when an FX shot comes in and you can see join. Odd. Indeed, the UK HD disc of Kong doesn't hold up well in FX secenes either (I know the US one's better), so I assume that a combination of the technical and the greedy is what's holding up New Line with LOTR.
Older films use better stock, too. Film stock began to look very grainy in the 70's and it's getting worse now. Video to film to disc transfers are often deeply iffy. Classic 3 strip technicolor still looks absolutely stunning, and I'm surprised that more of these classics don't make an appearance on HD discs. The Adventures of Robin Hood, Singin in the Rain. Movies like that. I know they're 4:3 and they did get out briefly in the US, but there has to be a market for them in the HD universe.
I have The Searchers on BD and it looks stunning, even though the restoration is a little flawed. That's a VistaVision movie, in which there was even MORE detail in the frame, is often true 16:9 and therefore should be a given for an HD makeover. So come on Warners and Paramount - give us North By Northwest, The Court Jester, Vertigo, High Society and Funny Face.
I'd rather see them than an HD version of The Simpsons anyday.
 
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Anonymous

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I recently watched Lawrence of Arabia on Sky HD and it looked amazing. By all acounts Sony are really taking their time over LoA which maybe released this year on Blu Ray. Sony have just announced another Lean movie Passage to India.
 
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Anonymous

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The good news is that Warners have announced (on Feb 6th) that they're bringout out some more key library titles on BD. These include:

Q2 2008: 'Dirty Harry: Ultimate Collection' (includes 'Dirty Harry,' 'Magnum Force,' 'The Enforcer,' 'Sudden Impact,' 'The Dead Pool' and bonus disc "Clint Eastwood: Out of the Shadows')

Q3 2008: 'Batman Anthology' (includes 'Batman,' 'Batman Returns,' 'Batman Forever,' 'Batman & Robin,' 'Batman Begins'), 'Batman Begins'

2009: 'Gone with the Wind,' 'North By Northwest,' 'The Wizard of Oz,' 'Woodstock'

That means a wait, but........
 
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Anonymous

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Don't expect all those titles to come out in the UK. Certainly not at the same time as the US anyway. Up until now, Warner Brothers has been region free, so hopefully they'll keep that policy now they are going Blu-ray exclusive!?

MGM/Fox have announced Battle Of Britain and Bridge Too Far (amongst others) for US release in the summer. Sadly, MGM, now Fox is distributing their titles, is regionally coding all their BDs!

I think it maybe a slight exaggeration to suggest old film looks exclusively better than modern productions and transfers to BD.

A lot of recent films have excellent picture quality. Are they not digitally recorded from start to finish?

Die Hard 4.0 and Casino Royale as examples!?
 
A

Anonymous

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You're right NN, a lot of new titles look stunning. The two you mentioned are great. Out of the Blue is fairly crappy movie, but really shows off the format in terms of picture. It's stunning.
On the other side, some new titles (The Fountain for example) look truly terrible, when there's absolutey no reason for them to do so.
Many older titles - 2001, Blazing Saddles, The Wild Bunch, Bullitt for example - all look good. It's give and take and is often a result of the original film stock and the clean grading. Too many recent movies has odd/peculiar/wilful grading that degrades the picture when shown on flat screens.
And call me old fashioned - Technicolor is simply stunning!!
 

professorhat

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[quote user="niftynigel"]
Are they not digitally recorded from start to finish? ... Die Hard 4.0 and Casino Royale as examples!?
[/quote]

I think Casino Royale works as all the stunts in the film were really done, not made up using CGI, therefore everything was actually filmed in HD, rather than drawn on a computer.
Can't say the same about Die Hard 4.0 though obviously! I guess they had good CGI artists!
 

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