Jackson / Meridian, MS - HDTV - Page 57

The biggest problem I've been complaining about is the lack of a Dolby 5.1 stream from WJTV, and that has nothing to do with being on cable or satellite. That's a problem at the source, WJTV.

As for picture quality, I wouldn't know if a really good antenna would make a difference for me or not. I have the unfortunate honor of watching TV through Comcast Cable. I admit I haven't been happy with the picture quality of local HD stations in Jackson, except for Fox 40 WDBD. WDBD has had EXCELLENT quality HD picture and sound for a long time now. WJTV and WLBT HD pictures tend to blur up or pixelate, and not necessarily during fast moving scenes, so I'm ruling out motion blur as the sole reason. I especially notice this while watching college or NFL football games on those respective channels. But again, it doesn't happen just during the fast moving parts. If anyone in this area watches the CBS SEC game of the week every Saturday at 2:30 p.m. on WJTV, let me know how the quality of your picture is please. Mine is always poor.

WLBT is currently building a new set in preparation for HD news. Not sure how far away they are.

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fb...96.86035385864

Will their broadcast be in Full HD, as in widescreen? It would be about time that someone else in Jackson caught up to WDBD's HD broadcast. WLBT, in my opinion, has been behind the other stations in Jackson for years in terms of the quality of their broadcast. I love the people on there, just not the picture and sound. If they go Full HD, they'll jump to the top in my mind.

I'm pretty sure it's supposed to be full HD.

They are building a new newsroom, not a set or so I hear. HD is still a ways off. WAPT on the other hand has lots of commercials and local syndciated shows in HD, more now than ever. Our promos and teases for the newscasts are wide screen too. We are getting there. On the other hand, WDBD has only the news in HD, nothing else local. Sorry, I had to brag.

WLBT HD pictures tend to blur up or pixelate, and not necessarily during fast moving scenes, so I'm ruling out motion blur as the sole reason. I especially notice this while watching college or NFL football games on those respective channels.


My set is an older 720p set and has an excelent picture but the motion blur is very noticible during football games and fast moving objects, especially when the camera is panning from let to right or vice versa. I believe some of the newer more expensive sets have have a higher refresh rate that is supposed to fix some of this problem. It also may be some problem with the fact that WJTV and WLBT are in 1080i interlaced scan which I believe was best suited for CRT type sets. Unfortunately you can't find many CRT based HDTV's anymore. WDBD uses 720p progressive scan which might actually be more compatable with flat screen sets, since most of these use progressive scan. The blur may be caused partly by some conversion process. I'm not an engineer but that was always my guess.

I'm curious, If a station has a good camera or video, wouldn't it be possible to simply back the camera up a little bit and crop a little off the top and bottom to make "fake" widescreen? (not stretch-o-vision) PBS crops old SD video and film to make it widescreen and it works OK as long as they don't cut anyones head off and if the original is in good shape. Film clips usually look fine, but older videotape looks a little fuzzy. Since most large studio camera have pretty good quality anyway, looks like it would work until you could afford to buy new cameras.

Keep up the good work, hope to see WAPT in HD really soon.

WDBD is like WFXT up here - all they have in HD is the newscast. Still, the newscast looks razor sharp in HD from what I've seen on antenna, but they've got almost no money right now.

yes om the wide screen note. our evening teases for 10pm are using our studio cameras put in 16:9 SD, not HD and they look pretty good even though the server we are using to "record" is only 25 MB. a 50 pr 100 MB recording would look fantastic.

Can you explain why I've been noticing some odd "blotching" during some programming on WAPT? I've especially noticed it during that new show "Detroit 1-8-7." Every couple of seconds or so you can see blotches appear all over the screen, especially in dark scenes, then they disappear, then they come back again. It repeats over and over. It's not always noticable, especially in bright scenes, but it's obvious during darker scenes. They look like faint purple blotches. This doesn't happen on any other HD channel or content that I watch, and I never noticed it on WAPT in the past until just recently.

I finally noticed last night(Monday, October 18) that WJTV seemed to have finally fixed their 5.1 issues. I haven't watched tonight, but hopefully it's still working.

Were you watching OTA, Comcast, satellite, etc?

I've noticed the exact same thing on some DVRed programs via Comcast. Unfortunately I never seem to catch it watching something live, so I never get a chance to flip over and see if I notice it OTA. I've seen it in several programs including college football, Modern Family, The Middle, and CougarTown.

That sounds like some digital artifacts that you commonly see in the dark areas on a standard DVD. I would bet that it's the cable companies fault. I haven't noticed anything like that with the antenna. The quality for WAPT is usually pristine over the air.

I watch on Comcast, which I like to call "Comcrap" normally. That refers to everything, including their lack of HD content/channels, poor and erratic service(freezing, etc.), and terrible equipment.

The shows I've noticed the "blotching" on were DVRed as well, so I'm going to have to check it out LIVE and see if I can still detect it. Whether I can or not, I wouldn't be surprised if it's all due to Comcast. Right now I'm searching my options for going to satellite, or maybe U-Verse if it ever becomes available at my house.

try using your antenna and see if the picture is better. I would bet that the problem is with comcast. Seems it alway is.

So who wants to talk about how much of a sin it is that WJTV is the SEC Network affiliate? Inevitably the SEC Network game always runs over into the CBS game. This week was a perfect storm of sorts. Ole Miss was in the SEC Network game. LSU/Auburn was on CBS (which would be a big enough game whether or not there were a few LSU fans around here). Multiple weather delays in Fayetteville caused the SEC Network game to run well over an hour into the CBS game.

It's nice that WJTV carries the second game on 12.3, but it's totally unnecessary. This is a big enough market, and there are other stations that could be the SEC Network affiliate. Fox 40 would probably be the most ideal, since Fox doesn't already host college football. They do have MLB on Saturdays, but it usually starts at 3pm and really...which is a bigger deal around here? (Don't get me wrong. I'm a huge baseball fan.)

Oh, and to add insult to injury, WJTV had to kick the HD broadcast on 12.1 down to 4:3 to run a scroll telling people where to look for the other game being played on 12.3. Not only did the scroll scrunch the widescreen broadcast in making everything look ridiculous, it also covered up the score at the bottom of the screen.

It was a massive fail all the way around.

Same thing happens here in the Tupelo market. The SEC network game should not be allowed on CBS affiliates. It should be on the Fox or CW affiliates. Better yet, move it to SportSouth.

Here in the New Orleans mkt, WWL dumped the sec game and went to LSU on CBS at 2:30. Thank goodness!

Don H

I think the obvious place for SEC football would be on WUFX 35 since WDBD also has sports on saturday which would conflict. WUFX usually has a rerun or an old movie on so that would be a good place for it. Besides, WUFX needs the ratings. My only complaint is that they don't broadcast in HD. And don't tell me they do because the onscreen display says 480i. WRBJ 34 would be another option, but a lot of people can't pick it up because its a Magee station and also does not broadcast in HD even though the transmitter is sending out an HD signal.

I've noticed that occasionally WJTV 12.3 will carry CBS programming in "squeeze o vision" which you can compensate for by pressing the stretch button on your widescreen tv, which gives you a widescreen SD picture. However if you are watching an old analog tv you're stuck with everyone being skinny. I think the best thing to do is to either crop it to 4:3 or to letterbox it.
Is this a mistake by WJTV or were they doing it on purpose? Last weeks CBS game on 12.3 was broadcast normal in 4:3

It would have to be in HD. Unless WUFX upgrades, WDBD would be the solution. As a mentioned before, the only sports they have on Saturday (usually) is MLB. Those games usually start at 3, and it would be less likely they would be interfered with. Otherwise, Fox 40 has on syndicated shows or a movie.

I've noticed WJTV squeezing the picture on 12.3 as well. Not sure if it was intentional or not, but it is nice being able to stretch it out to a widescreen picture.

guess I was wrong about WLBT

nope, they started carrying their news in HD today

I know

I guess we'll have to listen to them brag about it in between every commercial break. But anyway, its about time. WLBT had a crappy analog picture. Especially when they forgot to push the button during network shows. Which happens way too often. I guess WAPTand WJTV will be pressured into finally upgrading. with the exception of WRBJ and WUFX, which are either broke or could care less.

Is WAPT still having issues with their transmitter power? We never used to have issues getting a strong, clear signal for WAPT, but it seems like for a few weeks now we are getting frequent visual artifacts and momentary image freezes. For instance, I started watching Castle last night but turned it off after having the image freeze every couple of minutes...it would unfreeze after 4 or 5 seconds each time.

None of the other channels seem to have changed in relative strength during this time. Just WAPT.

You may have some trees blowing in the wind causing the signal to drop. Your antenna may be pointed wrong. A passing truck can cause drop offs if you are using a small antenna.

Tree interference is possible (lots of tallish trees in my neighborhood), but this has been happening over the last several weeks with no clear relation to weather (wind, rain, or otherwise).

The majority of channels I receive are all in the same. I'm confident that the my antenna is pointed in the right direction with a 10-15 degree margin of error.

Antenna (Eagle Aspen DB2) is mounted on a short pole on the corner of the roof.

Thanks for the suggestions, but I'm not sure any of those things would cause a particular change over the last few weeks, with months of satisfactory performance prior to that.

I ocassionally have reception problems but don't know why. I think it may have something to do with the weather. Back in the analog days WLBT would sometime get wiped out by other station's skip certain times of the year.

Hey Tom, how long til ya'll go HD? I'm a news junkie, and I record all 4 local news programs at 10 (well 9 for Fox40), but generally I only watch WAPT and WLBT in that order.

Kudos to WLBT....great picture.

Definite kudos to WLBT. I've always hated them from a technical standpoint. I like the people there, but at times it's been unbearable to watch that god-awful picture. Overnight they've gone from the worst to the best quality in Jackson.

My mother is now begging me to find out if WLBT will broadcast the Miss Mississippi pageant in HD next year. That broadcast is consistently one of the worst things to stomach every year. Just horrific.