Why so few "King Kong"-quality transfers?

3914 Views 58 Replies 41 Participants Last post by nickelplayer6, May 29, 2007

vladi123456

Discussion Starter · May 21, 2007

Last night my gf and I were watching Scorpion King on HD DVD, which happens to be a tier 1 title, and I accidentally pushed the Channel button on my TV remote and switched to channel 5 NBC which I get with an over the air HD antenna. And it was showing National Treasure with Nicolas Cage. That over the air movie in high definition looked a lot better than my Scorpion King HD DVD - it made me wonder what's up. Can anyone explain in simple English why HD movies (both HD DVD and especially Blu-Ray) for the most part don't look all that better than standard DVDs? And how can over the air HD broadcast look so much better? I think the difference was more noticeable than between standard DVD and HD DVD? Do they use different codecs for broadcast or is there any other reason? I'm just being curious....

EDIT: Changed the original text a bit - I'm not trying to say HD DVD looks bad - I just like the over the air HD Broadcast better. I've read somewhere that over the air HD broadcast is better than cable/satellite HD because the latter use more compression. Which I don't think would the case here

1 - 20 of 59 Posts

wnorris

· #2 · May 21, 2007

Whatever...

your eyes must be broke.

Ettepet

· #3 · May 21, 2007

vladi123456, what screen (or pj) do you use to watch HD?

maverick0716

· #4 · May 21, 2007

Man, you must have some really bad calibration on your HD DVD input. There's no way you could think broadcast HD looked a lot better than top HD DVD movies unless there was something wrong with your setup.

chad473

· #5 · May 21, 2007

and NBC HD at that...

Vipper IV

· #6 · May 21, 2007

Quote:
Originally Posted by chad473 /forum/post/0

and NBC HD at that...

You mean macroblocking is a *bad* thing?

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chris r in pa

· #7 · May 21, 2007

Best thing you could do is probably get an eye exam (just kidding)...but seriously, broadcast HD is hideous, plain and simple.

aC39

· #8 · May 21, 2007

For the record I turned on National Treasure last night for the hell of it (I'd already seen the movie). It is a pretty dark movie at times, and HOLY CRAP was there a lot of noise. I mean christ, did they compress it on youtube before airing it?

Topweasel

· #9 · May 21, 2007

Depends on the movie or what you are watching. King Kong and Hulk look great because they are relatively new movie that are mostly or all digital using the most recent equipment and very few "optical" effects and instead use very detailed CGI. Movies like Road Warrior are never going to look that good due to age, particular film stock and other things. Most non Block Buster movies are going to be using normal film stock and tend to use stylistic optical affects and some add defects (fake grain) induce noise and all sorts of things to get a certain feel.

You are comparing apples to oranges. Unless you are comparing the Break-Up on HBO HD and HD-DVD you never know what all is going into making the movie or particular scene. Even then You run into an issue where there is artificial cleanup and such on over air or digital HD in order to keep the needed bitrate down since they are severely crippled in terms of bandwidth. Then finally due to the severely confined bandwidth limitations often times the compression induces noise which is apparent watching static backgrounds like a blue wall or such.

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fretman

· #10 · May 21, 2007

I have compared a couple HD DVD's movies to broadcast HD movies of the same title and

HD DVD has been better every time. Now, I am doing 1080p with my HD DVD's, so maybe it's not a fair comparison. Like others have said, not all HD DVD's are created equal.

Herman

· #11 · May 21, 2007

3

Quote:
Originally Posted by wnorris /forum/post/0

Whatever...

your eyes must be broke.

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maingon

· #12 · May 21, 2007

Theres a huge difference between DVD and HD-DVD, on almost every title i have watched, Especially on a 92" screen. watching it on a projector theres never any confusion wether its HD or dvd. Even OTA HD while they look good arent as sharp and crisp as HD-DVD. On a smaller screen the differences might not stand out as much as they do on a 92" screen.

vladi123456

Discussion Starter · #13 · May 21, 2007

Quote:
Originally Posted by Ettepet /forum/post/0

vladi123456, what screen (or pj) do you use to watch HD?

In my bedroom it's a 40 inch 1080i JVC that I bought about 5 months ago. Connected to a Panasonic receiver via HDMI. HD-A1 is connected to that same receiver via HDMI as well. I usually watch a little Jay Leno or SNL before I go to bed, and PQ is pretty amazing. I understand that TV broadcast is shot with different equipment, so I don't compare that to the movies' PQ. But last night it was the first time that I actually saw a movie via HD air, and I honestly thought it looked better than most of HD DVD movies I had seen on that same TV. And yes - my player is set to output 1080i...

Dead.Horse

· #14 · May 21, 2007

Alright, I agree that HD-DVD is going to look better than broadcast, hands down. However, calling broadcast HD "hideous" is the most idiotic thing I've ever heard. I've seen some stunning HD programs, especially a lot of the movies they play on Showtime HD. I watched "Bad News Bears" on there yesterday and the picture was remarkable for broadcast HD and had very few motion artifacts. Same thing with Capote.

AustinSTI

· #15 · May 21, 2007

Is it possible the resolution on your plan is set to 480p instead of 720p/1080i/p? If its not that then something is wrong - take your HD-DVD player back

What does your TV say the resolution is at when you hit 'display'?

Are you using component, RCA, S-Video, a Reciever that's supposed to upconvert, HDMI? Maybe if you have a reciever in the mix its downconverting...

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vladi123456

Discussion Starter · #16 · May 21, 2007

Quote:
Originally Posted by AustinSTI /forum/post/0

Is it possible the resolution on your plan is set to 480p instead of 720p/1080i/p? If its not that then something is wrong - take your HD-DVD player back

What does your TV say the resolution is at when you hit 'display'?

Are you using component, RCA, S-Video, a Reciever that's supposed to upconvert, HDMI? Maybe if you have a reciever in the mix its downconverting...

I'm using HDMI cables, and when I hit "display" - it shows 1080i. I'm almost prepared to accept the "my eyes are broke" explanation that some gentleman offered here in an earlier post - as I'm clueless why I can't see what other people see.

In the living room I have both HD-A2 and PS3 connected via HDMI to Onkyo 604 and from Onkyo via HDMI to a 52 1080p LCD Sharp. When I hit display button - it shows 1080i and 1080p for HD-A2 and PS3 respectively. But I still don't really see anything high definition in most of the movies I watch. For example, I watched "Click" on Blu-Ray - and it looked even worse than SD DVD in my opinion. Ironic, but the only hi-def stuff that look hi-def to me are those that I get via my over the air hi-def antenna - news, some sports shows and such. So maybe it's not the issue of my tv not beeing properly calibrated, but my HD players/PS3.....

MidnightWatcher

· #17 · May 21, 2007

Quote:
Originally Posted by vladi123456 /forum/post/0

Last night my gf and I were watching Scorpion King on HD DVD, which happens to be a tier 1 title, and I accidentally pushed the Channel button on my TV remote and switched to channel 5 NBC which I get with an over the air HD antenna. And it was showing National Treasure with Nicolas Cage. That over the air movie in high definition looked a lot better than my Scorpion King HD DVD - it made me wonder what's up. Can anyone explain in simple English why HD movies (both HD DVD and especially Blu-Ray) for the most part don't look all that better than standard DVDs? And how can over the air HD broadcast look so much better? I think the difference was more noticeable than between standard DVD and HD DVD? Do they use different codecs for broadcast or is there any other reason? I'm just being curious....

EDIT: Changed the original text a bit - I'm not trying to say HD DVD looks bad - I just like the over the air HD Broadcast better. I've read somewhere that over the air HD broadcast is better than cable/satellite HD because the latter use more compression. Which I don't think would the case here

Sounds to me like you need to calibrate your display for the input being used. There is generally no way that OTA is better than HD DVD, and Scorpion King is awesome quality. Do you have the DVE HD DVD or even the standard DVD disc?

venk

· #18 · May 21, 2007

I saw a couple seconds of National Treasure on NBC-HD last night and it looked pretty good. Granted I only saw a daylight/bright scene so I didn't notice any noise or macroblocking. NBC-HD OTA has been doing a lot better recently in terms of their PQ. Heroes is usually pretty grain free even in dark scenes.

karlw2000

· #19 · May 21, 2007

Quote:
Originally Posted by vladi123456 /forum/post/0

I'm using HDMI cables, and when I hit "display" - it shows 1080i. I'm almost prepared to accept the "my eyes are broke" explanation that some gentleman offered here in an earlier post - as I'm clueless why I can't see what other people see.

In the living room I have both HD-A2 and PS3 connected via HDMI to Onkyo 604 and from Onkyo via HDMI to a 52 1080p LCD Sharp. When I hit display button - it shows 1080i and 1080p for HD-A2 and PS3 respectively. But I still don't really see anything high definition in most of the movies I watch. For example, I watched "Click" on Blu-Ray - and it looked even worse than SD DVD in my opinion. Ironic, but the only hi-def stuff that look hi-def to me are those that I get via my over the air hi-def antenna - news, some sports shows and such. So maybe it's not the issue of my tv not beeing properly calibrated, but my HD players/PS3.....

Why don't you try an experiment and go direct HDMI from your HD players to the TV.

Even on my 32" LCD I can see a huge difference between DVD (Oppo upconverting) and HD-DVD (Xbox360 HD add-on). On my 47" LCD, it is even more obvious.

lgans316

· #20 · May 22, 2007

I agree that some of the HD broadcast outperforms the HD disc counterparts.

1 - 20 of 59 Posts

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