Transmitted Picture Quality

[admin_exported]

Are other people concerned about the poor picture quality on television when programmes recorded in video are given a film look? I understand that there are two settings on a television camera - progressive and interlaced. The former gives a recording a film effect; the latter doesn't - or have I got it the wrong way round? It seems to me that the film effect gives an inferior picture: movement is blurred and the colours darker. You have only to watch a programme without the film look (for example Rick Stein's Mediterranean Escapes) to see the great picture. What do other people think? Can we say that one system records more information? Recently Casualty went for the film look - most people have greeted it warmly, according to the BBC's head of drama. I wonder why this is so when the quality, in my opinion, is worse. I suspect that some people associate the film look with the cinema: that's why they prefer it. Personally, I don't really mind how programmes like Casualty, which I don't watch, are recorded, but I think that lifestyle programmes and some soaps have a more immediate and intimate effect when they do not have a film look. I suppose it is because they then feel like a live transmission. Songs of Praise, The Antiques Roadshow , Gardeners' World or a promenade concert would, in my opinion, be ruined if they were given a film look. Anyway, once recorded, does anyone know if a programme can be changed from one setting to another? I seem to remember that a series of My Family was transmitted initially with the film look, but not when it was repeated. Furthermore, since its move to Channel 5, Neighbours has been given a film look. Channel 5 assure me that the tapes are no different from those sent to the BBC for transmission the week before the move. Nevertheless, I can see from my hard disk recording of the BBC's final episode of Neighbours that it did not have a film look. This implies that a change can be made on transmission. If changes can be made, can they be done at home? Could I change Neighbours back from the film look if I had the right equipment? I note that phrases like progressive scan often appear in reviews of televisions, but I do not really know how they relate to the home user.

 

[professorhat]

Not really too sure what you mean by a "film look", but a progressive signal is one whereby each line of information sent to the screen is updated each frame. An interlaced signal is where every other line of information sent to the screen is updated each frame. A standard PAL signal is 60Hz i.e. 60 frames per second, so with a progressive signal, every line of information is being updated 60 times a second, whereas with an interlaced signal, each line of information is actually only being updated 30 times a second. As a result, a progressive signal should look smoother and generally be better.

Any standard TV broadcasts you are getting are all interlaced, so whether it be Casualty or Songs of Praise, there's no difference in terms of progressive or interlaced here. You may be thinking in terms of the quality of the broadcast, most easily described by the bitrate in Megabits per second (Mbs). In this sense, on Freeview, the BBC is broadcast at a higher bitrate than Five, hence Neighbours would have looked better on the BBC than it does on Five, no matter if the tapes sent to them are the same.

 

[tvmog]

I think by "film look" the OP is referring to the technique where material shot on video is artificially processed to appear more like 35mm film stock. "Casualty" did this a few years back and many people complained that it detracted from the "real life" feel of the programme. Don't know if they still do it as I don't watch it."Neighbours" certainly looks very different on Five than it did on the BBC, both via Freeview and Sky. Not neccesarily technically better or worse, just very different.