Hi guys,

here's a big screenshot comparison for you:

http://home.arcor.de/madshi/serenity.html

Doing this has consumed many many many hours. I've compared 26 frames of the movie "Serenity" between:

- NTSC DVD
- PAL DVD
- USA broadcast
- SkyHD broadcast
- PremiereHD broadcast
- HD-DVD

The comparison can be controlled by keyboard. Press the keys "a" to "z" to choose a specific frame. Press the keys "1" to "6" to choose a specific format. Of course you can also use the mouse, if you prefer that. The comparison is realized by JavaScript, so your browser must have JavaScript enabled, otherwise the comparison website won't work.

Software configuration:
(1) DVDs were decoded by ffdShow, deinterlaced by the "Decomb" AviSynth Plugin and scaled to 1080p by ffdShow's Lanczos scaling (default settings). I've not applied any noise reduction or sharpening because I haven't found any "optimal" settings for that. After reading a lot of threads about sharpening (e.g. on Doom9) I found that everybody seems to prefer different settings. So I simply didn't do any sharpening.
(2) USA broadcasting was decoded and deinterlaced by DScaler with IVTC mod.
(3) The h264 broadcasts were decoded by CoreAVC and not deinterlaced at all (not necessary due to correct flags).
(4) The HD-DVD was decoded by Microsoft's own VC-1 decoder. Deinterlacing isn't necessary here, of course, cause HD-DVDs are encoded progressively, anyway. Btw, I've compared the European and US Serenity HD-DVDs and they are bit identical, as far as I can say.

Two of the broadcasts (USA + PremiereHD) were not OAR but for the biggest part 80% cropped/OpenMatte. I've resized these with Gimp Bicubic, so we can fully compare them to the other sources.

I'm looking forward to your opinions! Here's mine:

(1) The DVDs are (unsurprisingly) very soft und low resolution in comparison to any HD source. Generally the PAL DVD has (again unsurprisingly) a bit of a resolution advantage over the NTSC DVD (most frames, e.g. "A", "I", "J", "Z"), but it also sometimes has some more compression artifacts (frame "H"), probably due to the lower bitrate.
(2) The USA broadcasting has ugly artifacts in many scenes with heavy motion (frame "C") or lots of detail (frame "J") and it's generally somewhat softer and has less detail than the other HD sources (frame "R"). Also grain seems to be artificially reduced in many frames (frame "V").
(3) The SkyHD broadcasting has a much too strong contrast. This adds a bit of pop in some scenes (frame "E"). But in many other scenes dark image areas and any shadow details are totally lost (frames "B", "M", "O"). Grain is much too visible (frame "G") and looks very unnatural. In scenes with strong motion (frame "Y") and especially in scenes with lots of grain (frames "T", "U") there are extremely ugly artifacts. Overall I have to say that this is by far the worst SkyHD broadcast I've ever seen. Usually SkyHD does a lot better than this.
(4) The PremiereHD broadcasting generally has a quite good quality. In some frames it's hard to say whether PremiereHD or HD-DVD is better (frames "L", "O"). But overall HD-DVD has a little bit more detail and pop. E.g. HD-DVD shows more stars in space scenes and the stars are brighter and sharper (frame "D"). The biggest disadvantage of the PremiereHD broadcast is that it's 80% cropped/OpenMatte most of the time. That means: quite a bit of image content was cut left and right to get rid of the black bars (almost all frames, e.g. "D"). There are some artifacts in some scenes (frames "C", "J", "X", "Y"), but much less so than the other broadcasts. Even HD-DVD shows some artifacts now and then (frames "A", "Y"), but it's hard to say whether these artifacts were caused by VC-1 or whether they already existed in the original master.

I should add that I've intentionally chosen frames which artifacted in one or more of the sources. Often I've chosen the first frame of a new scene (that makes life a bit harder for the compression, cause there's a lot of change in such frames compared to the previous frames) or frames with lots of motion in them. So don't fret, most of the time all sources show less artifacts than demonstrated in these chosen frames.

Wow, that is a really interesting comparison . . . don't know what else to say other than it really highlights the differences. The German broadcast version is pretty good, I think, relative to HD DVD.

Wow, thanks. This is the mother of all screenshot comparisons. Is this something you wrote or is it available somewhere for us to fill in the pictures for any other types of comparison?

now thats how you do comparison shots

For some reason I have noticed that Sky b/c HD always has pumped contrast levels, it is just like that, I don't know why they do it, they just do.

If the contrast was set properly, I would say the SkyHD was the best of the lot, but b/c HD in the UK will always give HD DVD and Blu-ray a run for their money as the bandwidth allocation is much higher and the compression is AVC rather than MPEG-2.

IMO the b/c version of Planet Earth was immensely better than the BD version I have seen, the 1080i50 b/c was very good, and I don't understand why they didn't use that for the Blu-ray.

Thanks for the positive feedback, guys! :)

Is this something you wrote or is it available somewhere for us to fill in the pictures for any other types of comparison?
I've written the html/JavaScript page by hand with notepad. Everybody please feel free to reuse the html/script for other comparisons, if you want. You will probably need a bit of html and JavaScript experience, though.

Wow, this is a fantastic comparison. Easy to navigate and very well done!

Very good job. It was great to see the comparision. Definately great at showing how HD DVD is better than DVD and US broadcast.

Adam

GREAT job Madshi! Well done!

Great job! I wish the checkboxes were radio buttons (it would be easier to navigate with the mouse), but that's my only complaint/suggestion.

Hope to see more comparisons like this.

The most incredible piece of work I've ever seen on the forum. Thanks for choosing Serenity I've seen it so many times !

I was not surprised at the difference between US DVD and HDDVD. The slightly more resolved PAL also had been discussed with similar results some years ago. I'm also not surprised at how bad the artfacting was on broadcast US HD since this is the biggest complaint many of us have had of it.

The surprising part was how great the German HD looked. In many instances it was all but indistinguishable from the HDDVD examples. There were a few instances where very fine pixel structure could be seen in the German version and not in the HDDVD but as you say who knows where that was originally perhaps in the master ?

A point that I did notice was that grain was more apparent ,almost across the board , on the German version to a greater degree than the HDDVD. This is the first concrete example I've see where HDDVD may indeed have some filtering or grain reduction. I could not however , make out any examples where it appeared to reduce high frequency information.

Obviously, the most striking differences were in some of the jaw dropping CGI work !

Once again ,thanks for the incredibly well done presentation... it is folks like you who make this forum the powerful place it is.


Art

The most incredible piece of work I've ever seen on the forum ! Thanks for choosing Serenity, I've seen it so many times. :)

I was not surprised at the difference between US DVD and HDDVD. The slightly more resolved PAL also had been discussed with similar results some years ago. I'm also not surprised at how bad the artfacting was on broadcast US HD since this is the biggest complaint many of us have had of it.

The surprising part was how great the German HD looked. In many instances it was all but indistinguishable from the HDDVD examples. There were a few instances where very fine pixel structure could be seen in the German version and not in the HDDVD but as you say who knows where that was originally perhaps in the master ?

A point that I did notice was that grain was more apparent ,almost across the board , on the German version to a greater degree than the HDDVD. This is the first concrete example I've see where HDDVD may indeed have some filtering or grain reduction. I could not however , make out any examples where it appeared to reduce high frequency information.

Obviously, the most striking differences were in some of the jaw dropping CGI work !

Once again ,thanks for the incredibly well done presentation... it is folks like you who make this forum the powerful place it is.


Art

Wow! The Sky HD is definately the sharpest one. Look at the preservation of blacks around the top left side of the globe - despite the higher contrast when comparing to HD DVD. I think the German one is probably the most accurate.

It shouldn't be surprising that broadcast versions look as good as HD DVD on these shots. I would put up resolution of some Discovery HD broadcast on my FIOS setup to anything released thus far on high-def discs. Broadcast HD's shortcoming isn't in resolution, but lack of bandwidth that cause blocking during fast motion sequences. I think to truly compare broadcast HD to high-def disc formats, we need to pick out those motion sequences and even then, difference might not be as easy to pick out as during real motion.

Thanks again for the nice feedback everyone - it's a great reward for the work I've invested... :)

I wish the checkboxes were radio buttons (it would be easier to navigate with the mouse)
In what way would radio buttons make navigation easier? In what way is it not so easy now? If you can see a way to improve the navigation, I'll change it. I'm just not sure right now why radio buttons would be better. I think they'd be worse. Thanks.

The surprising part was how great the German HD looked. In many instances it was all but indistinguishable from the HDDVD examples. There were a few instances where very fine pixel structure could be seen in the German version and not in the HDDVD but as you say who knows where that was originally perhaps in the master ?

A point that I did notice was that grain was more apparent ,almost across the board , on the German version to a greater degree than the HDDVD. This is the first concrete example I've see where HDDVD may indeed have some filtering or grain reduction.
I've wondered about that, too. Especially frame "O" looks better to my eyes in the German HD version compared to the HD-DVD - thanks to the added grain. However, e.g. in frame "U" Mal's face looks more "real" to me in the HD-DVD screenshot. So I'm a bit unsure how much of the "grain" is really grain and how much is compression noise or something else.

One thing that should be noted: The German HD was cropped/OpenMatte and as such it *could* be a totally different master (not sure how studios handle cropped/OpenMatte masters). So it's still possible that noise/grain noise reduction was done before the HD-DVD compressionist received the master. But since Serenity was one of the very first encodes, maybe the Universal compressionist wanted to make his life a bit easier, by applying a little bit of grain/noise reduction? I've no idea. Would love to hear a MS voice about the grain question!

Wow, this is really amazing ... thanks alot!

I watched "Serenity" several times on Premiere HD (German HD broadcast) (and also own it on HD DVD *g*) and the broadcast-quality is really amazing most of the time (this weekend e.g. all the Star Wars episodes were shown - you gotta love it) ;)

Broadcast HD's shortcoming isn't in resolution, but lack of bandwidth that cause blocking during fast motion sequences. I think to truly compare broadcast HD to high-def disc formats, we need to pick out those motion sequences
Have you checked out all 26 frames? I've intentionally chosen some frames with fast motion sequences. E.g. check out frames C, J, M and Y. The broadcasts all show artifacts in these frames.

Something else that should be mentioned about SkyHD, the signal quality from the dish can have a big effect on PQ. If it is raining or there is a thunderstorm, Sky broadcasts start to break up.

Atm in the UK, the most reliable HD service is Virgin Media, but they have the smallest range of programming available.

Have you checked out all 26 frames? I've intentionally chosen some frames with fast motion sequences. E.g. check out frames C, J, M and Y. The broadcasts all show artifacts in these frames.
Thanks I know. My response was to the post right above mine. People sometimes seem to think that resolution from broadcast 1920x1080 is different from 1920x1080 on disc, when on an image with very little motion, apparent resolution would be all but indistinguishable regardless of video codec given everything else remaining constant.

Excellent work. This is the best screen comparison thread I've seen.

Haven't seen Serenity but this is fantastic work! Best comparison of any movie ever and a breath of fresh air here, instead of the usual HD vs BD :)

Madshi, any plans on doing similar comparisons for other movies in the (near) future?

Madshi, any plans on doing similar comparisons for other movies in the (near) future?
I'd love to, since home cinema is currently my main hobby. But unfortunately doing this kind of comparison costs a lot of time. As a result I currently have no plans for other movie comparisons. However, I would be willing to provide screenshots of other German HD broadcasts and German DVDs, if someone else is willing to do the rest of the work.

In what way would radio buttons make navigation easier? In what way is it not so easy now? If you can see a way to improve the navigation, I'll change it. I'm just not sure right now why radio buttons would be better. I think they'd be worse. Thanks.


Well, checkboxes require you to uncheck the box, then check it for it take effect, where radios would just switch it.

For example, when I first click on your link, I am looking at the Universal logo. All 6 checkboxes are checked. If I want to view the HD DVD one, I click (uncheck) it, and nothing happens. I have to click (check) it a second time to make it appear.

Basically everytime I want to change it, it requires 2 button clicks (one to uncheck it, and a second to check it).

A radio button should allow you to do the same thing with one button press (with the added benefit of having only one option chosen at once, instead of all 6).

Of course, this is only with mouse clicks, as pressing 1-6 works fine. Again, good job, and I was just trying to point out an improvement that could be made.

This is the standard for comparison shots.

Amazing. It clearly shows the advantages of HD DVD.

w00t :cool:

@mproper, I see what you mean. You're unchecking and rechecking the "HD DVD" checkbox now and you need two clicks that way to switch images, right? But that was not how I intended things. Please don't click on the little checkbox, but click on the big "HD DVD" text next to it. This way the image will switch at once and the check box will stay checked. The only reason why there is a checkbox to begin with is that the checkboxes allow you to customize between which images the website will cycle if you click on the screenshot itself.

@mproper, I see what you mean. You're unchecking and rechecking the "HD DVD" checkbox now and you need two clicks that way to switch images, right? But that was not how I intended things. Please don't click on the little checkbox, but click on the big "HD DVD" text next to it. This way the image will switch at once and the check box will stay checked. The only reason why there is a checkbox to begin with is that the checkboxes allow you to customize between which images the website will cycle if you click on the screenshot itself.

Oh...didn't notice that I could click on the names, and was using the checkboxes to switch them. Don't mind me then :)

I hope you plan on more comparison shots like this for other movies.

Very cool...GREAT job. Overall, the HD DVD has the more pleasing look. The Sky HD looks punchy at times and appealing but in other shots looks too contrasty.

Excellent work. :)

Awesome work! and esp. on one of my favorite movies :) Thanks!

germany definitely knows how to present films..I think all their stuff is shown OAR, 1080p h.264..

Fantastic work indeed!

I almost skipped frame D. It had little motion or detail so I thought all the HD sources would net nearly the same results. Wow was I wrong!

germany definitely knows how to present films..I think all their stuff is shown OAR, 1080p h.264..
Most of the time that's correct. But unfortunately not always. Recently some movies were shown cropped/OpenMatte. Serenity was one of those... :(

--------------

Guys, I'm sorry to say, but it seems that I f*cked up the SkyHD screenshots. I've been told in a different forum that the SkyHD stream isn't as dark/contrasty as in my screenshots. So please ignore the SkyHD screens for now. Sorry about that.

Wow! The Sky HD is definately the sharpest one.
It looks sharper because the contrast is overcranked. I'd rather have an image that's close to the master.

germany definitely knows how to present films..I think all their stuff is shown OAR, 1080p h.264..
Have you looked at those comparisons? While some scenes are open matte, a lot of scenes are cropped on the sides.

I'd rather have the original Cinemascope presentation than open matte or cropped. So that alone makes the HD DVD version a clear winner to me.

Picture quality of the Premiere HD broadcast of course is astonishingly good.

Guys, I'm sorry to say, but it seems that I f*cked up the SkyHD screenshots. I've been told in a different forum that the SkyHD stream isn't as dark/contrasty as in my screenshots. So please ignore the SkyHD screens for now. Sorry about that.

Are you sure, my SkyHD comes in similar to what you posted, not that pumped, but pumped nevertheless. It definitely is not the same as the German b/c or the HD DVD.

Are you sure, my SkyHD comes in similar to what you posted, not that pumped, but pumped nevertheless. It definitely is not the same as the German b/c or the HD DVD.
I've just got a 70MB chunk of the SkyHD broadcasting again for double checking and it has the same contrast as the other sources. So it's my screenshots that are at fault, unfortunately. I'll redo the SkyHD screenshots, but it will take a few days, cause I first need to get access to the full stream again.

I can confirm that the Sky broadcast is the same contrast/colours wise as the other sources with Haali's Renderer.

Still though, a great effort and very informative :)

I can confirm that the Sky broadcast is the same contrast/colours wise as the other sources with Haali's Renderer.

Still though, a great effort and very informative :)

My box must be fooked, I will have to call an engineer in, great!

I love how all the screenshots are centered. While this does cut down the resolution of the open/matte cropped versions, so what? They're unwatchable anyway. Good job.

I recall seeing a mpeg-2 OAR version somewhere. Maybe you can add that among the others sometime.

You da man Madshi! Thanks.

Very well done.

I recall seeing a mpeg-2 OAR version somewhere. Maybe you can add that among the others sometime.
I've been told there's a Canadian mpeg-2 OAR version, but I don't have it.

Hi guys,
here's a big screenshot comparison for you:
http://home.arcor.de/madshi/serenity.html
Doing this has consumed many many many hours. I've compared 26 frames of the movie "Serenity" between:
- NTSC DVD
- PAL DVD
- USA broadcast
- SkyHD broadcast
- PremiereHD broadcast
- HD-DVD

The European HD-DVD is a newer encode and supposed to be better. You should add it too. :D

The European HD-DVD is a newer encode and supposed to be better. You should add it too. :D
I have the European HD-DVD disc lying right next to me. The screenshots were 100% identical. Don't ask me why. I thought it was a newer encode, too.

Well so much for that rumor. :D

why can't i open the website? :( error...

Very nice. :) I still want to see a VHS vs Beta vs CED vs LaserDisc vs DVD vs D-VHS vs HD DVD comparison if a movie exists in all these formats :D

why can't i open the website? :( error...
Which kind of error do you get? Which browser are you using?

Very nice. :) I still want to see a VHS vs Beta vs CED vs LaserDisc vs DVD vs D-VHS vs HD DVD comparison if a movie exists in all these formats :D
:p

Great job!

Very nice. :) I still want to see a VHS vs Beta vs CED vs LaserDisc vs DVD vs D-VHS vs HD DVD comparison if a movie exists in all these formats :D

Maybe Terminator 2, but it's only on BRD unless there's a foreign HD-DVD release somewhere yet.

You could also include WMV-HD, Muse Laserdisc, and the various dvd editions. Massive.

Good work.

I may borrow your code at some stage (I had planned something similar, but with fash, however this does the job very well).

Simply incredible, thank you for doing this.

The artifacting in the US broadcast is absurd. Sometimes I wonder why I even pay for HDTV, so much of it is a complete wash. Thank god for hd dvd.

I have the European HD-DVD disc lying right next to me. The screenshots were 100% identical. Don't ask me why. I thought it was a newer encode, too.

I bought the European version as soon a sit was available ,having heard it was a superior presentation and loving the movie. I couldn't find any differences in a casual look.

Art

*applause*

Phenomenal work!

WOW! How long did it take to put everything together?

Which kind of error do you get? Which browser are you using?

here's the error i get - (i tried on Explorer and Firefox)

Not Found

The requested URL /madshi/serenity.html was not found on this server.
Apache/2.0.59 (Unix) FrontPage/5.0.2.2635 Sun-ONE-ASP/4.0.0 Server at home.arcor.de Port 80

Perhaps expected, but has anyone else noticed that HD DVD is resolving more detail than the other HD formats? Even with h.264 pumping out a few extra MB/s. Is it variations in the respective loop filters, sources, other?

Nice work... just say the German People.. cherist that moment as long as you can, because one day, you'll have 100 HD channel and the bitrate will drop to lower 10-8mbits CRB.. trust me , it's coming....

I'd love to, since home cinema is currently my main hobby. But unfortunately doing this kind of comparison costs a lot of time. As a result I currently have no plans for other movie comparisons. However, I would be willing to provide screenshots of other German HD broadcasts and German DVDs, if someone else is willing to do the rest of the work.
Like everyone else, thanks for terrific work ! One suggestion, UK broadcast tends to be brighter, which suits human eyes better. I wonder if there is an easy way to normalize brightness.

Wow, German HD broadcast is simply amazing :)

Exellent work. One thing that stands out above everything - that sd is butt ugly compared to high def.

This is an amazing compaison system. It helps that the screen caps are true and not photographs off of someones TV screen.

Perhaps expected, but has anyone else noticed that HD DVD is resolving more detail than the other HD formats? Even with h.264 pumping out a few extra MB/s. Is it variations in the respective loop filters, sources, other?


I noticed that right away in shot 'B' (I have not even looked past that one yet.)

The rear section of the uppermost spacecraft clearly has more resolved detail in the HD DVD version compared to anything else.

It probably helps to be looking on a monitor with fixed pixel structure of 1080x1920 or above... I doubt you would see the difference otherwise, but it is definately there.

Looks great!

EDIT: Shot 'C' also demonstrates clearly that there is far less compression artifacts on the HD DVD encode than any other.

probably the best post I seen on this forum. Great work.

Excellent work. One thing that stands out above everything - that SD is butt ugly compared to high def.

Hasn't that always been the case?

Bravo! Fantastic work!

First, thanks madshi for doing this. I hope somebody will do something similar if "Babel" comes out in Europe and uses VC-1, although I'm just interested in the HD versions. I think Studio Canal is using VC-1 pretty exclusively, so if they are releasing that one then I would expect it to be VC-1. Not sure about a schedule, but a comparison like this with the AVC version in the US could be very interesting given comments Amir and Ben made about AVC when it came out that Paramount (and their post house) had decided to use AVC for that title. Ben said something about VC-1 being able to do film grain while AVC couldn't, so it would be really interesting to see if a comparison like this back that up (at least for this one case) or give some evidence another way. And "Babel" came out in MPEG-2 on Blu-ray, so could make an interesting 3 way comparison.

--Darin

WOW! How long did it take to put everything together?
I haven't really counted the hours. If I had to guess, I'd say maybe 30 hours? I've no idea. However, if I had to do it again, I'd get along with less time. I wasted many hours because I deleted sources too early. I thought I was done with a source, but wasn't. Next time I'd make sure I'd keep all sources until everything is really 100% perfect.

here's the error i get - (i tried on Explorer and Firefox)

Not Found

The requested URL /madshi/serenity.html was not found on this server.
Apache/2.0.59 (Unix) FrontPage/5.0.2.2635 Sun-ONE-ASP/4.0.0 Server at home.arcor.de Port 80
Can you please just try again? It seems to work for everybody else. I can only guess that you had bad luck and contacted the server at a bad time? Don't know why else it should work for everybody except you.

Nice work... just say the German People.. cherist that moment as long as you can, because one day, you'll have 100 HD channel and the bitrate will drop to lower 10-8mbits CRB.. trust me , it's coming....
Well, it's a pay TV channel. They once tried to add logos to their broadcasts. They undid that very quickly because of the many complaints they got. If they should decide to lower bitrates, I hope enough people will complain about this, too.

I may borrow your code at some stage (I had planned something similar, but with fash, however this does the job very well).
PM me if you have any problems with or questions about the script.

Thanks for these comparisons. Lucky Germans! One benefit possibly related to this thread is that Serenity has moved back to #6 on Amazon's HD DVD chart as of the time of this post. Always a good sign to see a launch title that high.

madshi;
Thanks for your hard work - excellent job!
____
Axel

Can you please just try again? It seems to work for everybody else. I can only guess that you had bad luck and contacted the server at a bad time? Don't know why else it should work for everybody except you.

still doesn't work. :( it goes immediately to the 404 screen....it doesn't even try to connect to the site it seems like.

i have no clue what to do

I noticed that right away in shot 'B' (I have not even looked past that one yet.)

The rear section of the uppermost spacecraft clearly has more resolved detail in the HD DVD version compared to anything else.

It probably helps to be looking on a monitor with fixed pixel structure of 1080x1920 or above... I doubt you would see the difference otherwise, but it is definately there.

Looks great!

EDIT: Shot 'C' also demonstrates clearly that there is far less compression artifacts on the HD DVD encode than any other.
Also check out the lower right quadrant of frame D. Each format resolves a different amount of stars. The German broadcast comes close, but even there the smaller stars are blurred and the smallest stars are missing.

germany definitely knows how to present films..I think all their stuff is shown OAR, 1080p h.264..


That is because they have like 3 HD channels. They can run high bandwith. It was like that in US in the bginning. Once they will have more channels quality will drop drastically. However, THERE IS NO 1080P BRODCASTS ANYWEHRE. Premiere is 1080i/50hz h.264.

This comparison is the best I have ever seen. However I personally do not care about any 50Hz broadcasts, no matter how good they look, as I can't stand sound speed up. That is why I am happy that HD DVD and Blu-ray use 24fps for film only.

I personally do not care about any 50Hz broadcasts, no matter how good they look, as I can't stand sound speed up.
You can easily convert the 50Hz video stream to 48Hz without reencoding it.

Perhaps expected, but has anyone else noticed that HD DVD is resolving more detail than the other HD formats? Even with h.264 pumping out a few extra MB/s. Is it variations in the respective loop filters, sources, other?
Yes, it's really astonishing how much more detail.

I would say that the second-best images are from the German AVC version, but when you look at image "B"and switch between that and the HD DVD version, you can see a lot more fine detail in the smallest two space ships.

Even though the German image is much grainier, there is still more fine detail on the ships.

I have a theory on this, as I think VC1 is doing some temporal analysis, which would carry details found in other frames and add it to the picture in adjoining frames. This would also account for there being less "grain noise", since temporal analysis would ignore some of the random noise caused by grain. I think that this is what some people are confusing for "filtering", but if VC1 was really doing "filtering" then we wouldn't be seeing so much extra detail in these small structures on the ships.

I think that there is a lot more going on in VC1 that some people are giving it credit for.

That is because they have like 3 HD channels. They can run high bandwith. It was like that in US in the bginning. Once they will have more channels quality will drop drastically. However, THERE IS NO 1080P BRODCASTS ANYWEHRE. Premiere is 1080i/50hz h.264. [...]
Actually we have 5 HD-Channels ;) ... and every station decides on their own, how good they want their broadcasts to look, only limited to the bandwith left on their satellite's transponder (e.g. Sat.1 HD, ProSieben HD, Anixe HD and an Astra HD promo-channel share one transponder - resulting in an often really "blocky" and not very good looking HD-image on the Sat.1 & ProSieben HD-Channels).

Premiere had 3 HD-Channels some time ago but merged the "HD Film" and "HD Sport"-Channels to "Premiere HD", due to lack of HD-sports-material after World Cup 2006, significantly increasing the bitrates & quality of the 2 remaining channels.


Free-TV
Sat.1 HD & ProSieben HD (H.264 / bitrates between ~4-14Mbps)
HD-Versions of 2 popular german commercial channels, most of the time with upconverted SD-image and (more and more) highlights as HD-Simulcasts (mainly movies and some TV-shows like NCIS, Ugly Betty, Desperate Housewives (since Season 3), Grey's Anatomy)

Anixe HD (H.264 / bitrates between ~8-20Mbps)
Movies, older TV-Shows (e.g. Vegas, Matt Houston, Roswell), Soccer (live-on-tape Bundesliga-matches of Schalke 04 and Werder Bremen), Trailer/Shopping (all in HD)


Pay-TV
Premiere HD (H.264 / bitrates between ~17-20Mbps)
most of the time movies, some TV-Shows (e.g. Lost, E-Ring, Supernatural, The 4400, Over There ...), sometimes sports (UEFA Champions League, Golf, Ice Hockey ...)

Discovery HD (H.264 / bitrates between ~17-20Mbps)
documentaries :)

You can easily convert the 50Hz video stream to 48Hz without reencoding it.

You mean slow it down. What about audio. You have resample it, and right now there is no easy way to do it at DD 5.1 level. Too much trouble.

BTW, do you know from which provider in US came your MPEG-2 capture.

Actually we have 5 HD-Channels ;) ... and every station decides on their own, how good they want their broadcasts to look, only limited to the bandwith left on their satellite's transponder (e.g. Sat.1 HD, ProSieben HD, Anixe HD and an Astra HD promo-channel share one transponder - resulting in an often really "blocky" and not very good looking HD-image on the Sat.1 & ProSieben HD-Channels).

Premiere had 3 HD-Channels some time ago but merged the "HD Film" and "HD Sport"-Channels to "Premiere HD", due to lack of HD-sports-material after World Cup 2006, significantly increasing the bitrates & quality of the 2 remaining channels.


Free-TV
Sat.1 HD & ProSieben HD (H.264 / bitrates between ~4-14Mbps)
HD-Versions of 2 popular german commercial channels, most of the time with upconverted SD-image and (more and more) highlights as HD-Simulcasts (mainly movies and some TV-shows like NCIS, Ugly Betty, Desperate Housewives (since Season 3), Grey's Anatomy)

Anixe HD (H.264 / bitrates between ~8-20Mbps)
Movies, older TV-Shows (e.g. Vegas, Matt Houston, Roswell), Soccer (live-on-tape Bundesliga-matches of Schalke 04 and Werder Bremen), Trailer/Shopping (all in HD)


Pay-TV
Premiere HD (H.264 / bitrates between ~17-20Mbps)
most of the time movies, some TV-Shows (e.g. Lost, E-Ring, Supernatural, The 4400, Over There ...), sometimes sports (UEFA Champions League, Golf, Ice Hockey ...)

Discovery HD (H.264 / bitrates between ~17-20Mbps)
documentaries :)


Thanks for the summary. I was just responding to uninformed post.

Pictures in US were great in late 90's and early 2000's, when we also had few channels. Everything was full bandwith, and even using MPEG-2 there was virtually no macroblocking.
Now because there are so many channels and limited bandwith, many providers reencode signal. However Dish Network with the latest h.264 encoders gives some hope. Most channels look very good now.

You mean slow it down. What about audio. You have resample it, and right now there is no easy way to do it at DD 5.1 level. Too much trouble.
You can easily resample the audio by using BeHappy. Alternatively you can mux a NTSC DVD audio track to the video. I've done both already and it works just fine.

BTW, do you know from which provider in US came your MPEG-2 capture.
No, I'm sorry.

A great comparison (with material I'm familiar with to boot)! Outstanding work.

Still shots and A to B are the best way to show the vast increase in sharpness and detail. I'm always amazed that I know people that can't tell the difference between DVD (upscaled) and HDVD. It's particularly telling in the CGI shots (where there is tons of detail that just gets smeared to virtually nothing in the DVD shots).

The UK version has serious contrast issues, no doubt. I can see why some folks like that pop, but it comes at a cost...

Beautiful job!

I just sat there for 90 seconds clicking A4 vs A6...
press "a4646464646..."
beautiful Universal opening title, but the deep black turns to crush (see M4 vs M6) and the deep colors look over-saturated in some of the real scenes.

o4 vs o6 would make a good gamma demo.

J5 vs J6 is a fun one for open matte.
But why does L5 vs L6 have P&S crop?

Great SD vs HD in R1 vs R6 and W1 vs W6
But if you showed V1 vs V6 to J6P they'd probably say BFD.

Check out the EE in the center clock face in X1 vs X6.

I wonder why browser caching doesn't work? IE6 has to reload all 6 pics when I revisit a previous scene.

Very nice work. This is probably my favorite disc PQ-wise

darn, it looks that much shadow detail were clipped to black on the HD DVD

edit: Oops, I was referring to the SkyHD broadcast. Using the right keyboard number configuration confused me

When looking the K-image the German h264 broadcast seems to be sharper and more detailed than VC-1 version. For example see the wall on the left or the wooden box on the table.

yes great work on the comparisons also i have to say that the UK and German broadcasts look about on par with the HD DVD and better than HD DVD on some images but not all

(2) USA broadcasting was decoded and deinterlaced by DScaler with IVTC mod.Can you provide more info about the USA source?
BUD?
HD cable? which provider?
E*?
D*?

I have "Serenity" from Comcast... I'll try to find the same frames.
Do you happen to have h:mm:ss references?
Does anyone else have it from D* or E*?

Can you add the numbers 1-6 as labels after the check boxes so we'll have a quick reference to which key to press and which source people are referring to?

When looking the K-image the German h264 broadcast seems to be sharper and more detailed than VC-1 version. For example see the wall on the left or the wooden box on the table.http://home.arcor.de/madshi/serenity.html
K5 vs K6
Fairly close. I see the extra wood grain detail in the box on K5, but not so much on the wall... a little sharper on the white scrapes. Hair is usually an easy comparison for detail, but I don't see much difference there.

the UK and German broadcasts look about on par with the HD DVD and better than HD DVD on some imagesWhich images do you think look better than HDDVD?

Excellent job. From what I can see Premiere and HD-DVD are kind of tied for the top, but both have encoding issues of various degrees. Sometimes one is better than the other - sometimes they're both bad. Take frame Y for instance, where both have blocking. Frame O looks excellent on Premiere, but HD-DVD has less detail and posterization issues. I've skipped back and forth between the different ones, but I still haven't seen what I'd call a single "perfect" image as far as compression goes.

For the K frame look at the digital clock on the table.

I agree, I think that the German version is better than the HDDVD in detail in that frame and perhaps several others.The HDDVD is slight less grainy as well.

Art

Kind of hard to tell since the German screenshots have been resized to line up with the version that aren't cropped. I think you're seing some scaling artifacts.

Kind of hard to tell since the German screenshots have been resized to line up with the version that aren't cropped. I think you're seing some scaling artifacts.

It is rather subtle but the HDDVD looks to have less grain and slightly less fine detail.
Art

Also check out the lower right quadrant of frame D. Each format resolves a different amount of stars. The German broadcast comes close, but even there the smaller stars are blurred and the smallest stars are missing.


I noticed the stars also. The shot I found was the overall most impressive in showing the difference in detail between SD DVD and HD DVD was shot 'J'

The trees, the crop rows in the distance, the details in the landscape and the dwellings... the speeder cruising down the street... all an unresolved mess in SD, and perfectly clear in HD.

Beautiful stuff! Thanks again Madshi.

Can you provide more info about the USA source?
Unfortunately I don't have this information about the source. Since I'm living in Europe I had a hard time getting a 1080i60 Mpeg2 source in the first place. I'm not even fully sure it's USA, it was just my best guess.

Do you happen to have h:mm:ss references?
Just check out the png image names. Their name is the timecode.

Great work.

Unfortunately I don't have this information about the source. Since I'm living in Europe I had a hard time getting a 1080i60 Mpeg2 source in the first place. I'm not even fully sure it's USA, it was just my best guess.

Just check out the png image names. Their name is the timecode.Perfect. The timecode filenames will make the frames easy to find.

I can provide Comcast cable frames in PNG.

Can anyone else provide DirecTV (D*) or DishNetwork (E*)?

Perfect. The timecode filenames will make the frames easy to find.

I can provide Comcast cable frames in PNG.
That'd be nice! One problem is that I've found out in the meanwhile that my graphics card has done some playing with the colors. So it might be difficult for you to create screenshots which match the colors of the already existing screenshots. Anyway, you can email those pngs to me, I can then add them to the comparison.

incredible work.
Now we have something to show people that can't see the difference between sd and HD

Hi all - I am making some comparisons of detail in the various encodes against VC1, over here: http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=10462454&&#post10462454

I'll be using some blow-ups from various shots by Xylon and Madshi.

Hey guys,

I've now corrected the SkyHD (UK broadcast) screenshots. As I said earlier, the shots I had originally taken were incorrect. Now SkyHD looks noticably better (compared to how it looked before).

http://home.arcor.de/madshi/serenity.html

Here is another comparison added to the above thread.

These direct-mode 200% blowups show the difference caused by Mepg2 macro-blocking quite starkly.

Bluray on the left, HD DVD on the right:

http://www.CampaignHD.com/images/Trainingday_bd_1a_2x.png http://www.CampaignHD.com/images/Trainingday_hdvd_1a_2x.png

http://www.CampaignHD.com/images/Trainingday_bd_1b_2x.png http://www.CampaignHD.com/images/Trainingday_hdvd_1b_2x.png

Your resizing method is smoothing out a lot of the mpeg-2's blocks. It actually looks much worse than that.

These direct-mode 200% blowups ...
Your resizing method is smoothing out a lot of the mpeg-2's blocks. It actually looks much worse than that.These shots are not using any scaling technology. They are simply 200% blowups using regular "box pixel" mode, so you see all the same pixels, just bigger.

I have used the Lanczos scaling in blowups in other threads to demonstrate differences in fine detail.

But yes, Lanczos does tend to mask Mpeg blocking artifacts, which is why I have not used them here.

So your new example is even further off-topic from those that spawned this topic. They aren't even "doctored" in the same manner, let alone not of the movie Serenity. Should we also post the banding pix from PE here, as well?

Sigh....

...and in true irony, the vc-1 encode manages the feat demonstrated in the above samples at a whopping "0.8x efficiency", instead of the oft cited 2x efficiency claim. MISSION ACCOMPLISHED vc-1!!! :D

...and in true irony, the vc-1 encode manages the feat demonstrated in the above samples at a whopping "0.8x efficiency", instead of the oft cited 2x efficiency claim. MISSION ACCOMPLISHED vc-1!!! :D
Again with this "efficiency" argument in this thread too?

If the two releases showed identical Picture Quality, then you could divide the file sizes they each took to get there and claim to have an "efficiency ratio".

But the quality on the BD Mpeg releases have so far been shown to be MUCH poorer than the VC1 versions.

So there is NO basis on which to divide filesizes, no more than you could compare the VC1 encode to a 6 Gig satellite "HD lite" encode - since by your thinking here, the satellite encode would "prove" that Mpeg2 is three times as efficient than VC1, even though the PQ was crap.

Everyone knows that VC1 is far more efficient than Mpeg2, so I don't know why you would suggest that I'm trying to "prove" this fact. The only thing that is being proven in the many threads comparing PQ is that VC1 is much better and is providing better PQ on real-life, real-world releases.

In fact, you are mainly trying to disprove that VC1 is better, but all of the screen shots available for people to view for themselves is somewhat blowing away your position.

In fact, I have not seen a single Bluray mpeg movie yet which does not display very visible and ugly blocking artifacts when the action gets busy in difficult scenes....

Pretty scary whan one realizes that about 70% of bluray titles are in Mpeg2 and about 70% of bluray titles are on single layer discs. In contrast almost all HD DVD releases are in VC1, and double layer discs, which is why I give my nod to HD DVD...

It appears everywhere you have posted your misleading picture sample. The context is maintained for all other observers.

Again, "far more efficient" seems to translate to 1.1-1.3x and liberal incidence of blended macroblock artifacts. In the sample you posted, it goes as far down to 0.81x, given similar macroblock artifact incidence. The vc-1 appears to look "better" only because the block edges are blended. The macroblock artifacts still exist, nonetheless. Hence, there is no mathematical advantage demonstrated, other than the image degrading more "gracefully".

It's "there" because you tell me it's "there"? Red Herring.

The VC1 version look far better than the Mpeg versions. You cannot therefore compare filesizes for "efficiency", as the mpeg version has not yet matched the VC1 version, and will take A LOT more bandwidth before it gets there.

End of story...

...or maybe 1:1 is all it takes. Even at 0.8x the macroblock artifact state is very similar. Crank it to 1:1 or even 2:1, and vc-1 is surely in for some jellyfish action.

I'm telling you the artifacts are there, but your failure to see them is just simple denial.

Sure dude. The Mpeg shots are really better looking than the VC1 shots, but my mind won't accept this. I knew you were right all along. I'm so glad that I have seen the light ;)

No one said this. Again, you have resorted to a strawman argument.

By all accounts, the vc-1 shot has degraded more gracefully than the mpeg-2 shot. Who would have predicted anything different, especially given the 0.8x efficiency condition of this comparison. On an incidence of macroblock artifact basis alone (blended edge or not), the are really not worlds apart. It would only get worse for vc-1, if we were able to observe a 1:1 or 2x efficiency state- jellyfish city, I'd imagine.

So Mr Hanky, would you prefer VC-1 had never been invented?

I don't see where you could interpret any of my comments to suspect that is my position. Vc-1 certainly has a place and a purpose, just like any of the codecs that reside in that family/generation. When you have to shoehorn something into a limited bandwidth, you need a codec capable of high compression while degrading "politely". There are numerous applications for just that.

The premium hd formats, otoh, are more than that, imo. It's about using all the bitrate and all the space you need to achieve the ultimate pq. Quite frankly, it could be vc-1, avc, mpeg-2, afaic- as long as the bitrates flow like beer at the pub, and it isn't a race for the bottom of bitrate hill.

IMO, these are comparisons between 114 degrees F and 115 degrees F. When you are at this level of performance differences become picayune and partisan.

Again, you have resorted to a strawman argument. Nein, mein herr, you are mistaken. I have simply finished with debating you, since my points have been amply illustratd already. My last post was simply to lighten the mood, starts with "s", ends with "m", and rhymes with "car spasm"...

...It would only get worse for vc-1, if we were able to observe a 1:1 or 2x efficiency state- jellyfish city, I'd imagine.
...or maybe 1:1 is all it takes. Even at 0.8x the macroblock artifact state is very similar. Crank it to 1:1 or even 2:1, and vc-1 is surely in for some jellyfish action.
Are you by any chance Don Eklund's speechwriter?
"oh, yeah, what are those funny amoeba-like artifacts that VC-1 can produce,
where it looks like there is a jellyfish on the wall that's moving around (http://bluray.highdefdigest.com/feature_visitwithsony.html)?"

:)

Diogen.

I am paying homage to that moment, but the real reason I bring the term up again is a recent personal revelation of figuring out what the "jellyfish" could possibly mean (and it makes perfect sense, given the context of clumps of macroblock artifacts with blended edges). ;)