Sliders.tv → Sliders Bboard → Sliders DVD Releases (Universal, Mill Creek, SD blu-ray, Restoration)
One would think that the episodes would be edited on a videotape suite and then the videotape suite would be able to output the final cut to multiple U-matic or Betacam or DV cassettes with a set number for distribution, storage, archival maintenance, some of which would be returned, some of which would be lost, and some of which would stay within the hands of the studio for legal and financial precautions.
One would think that the episodes would be edited on a videotape suite and then the videotape suite would be able to output the final cut to multiple U-matic or Betacam or DV cassettes with a set number for distribution, storage, archival maintenance, some of which would be returned, some of which would be lost, and some of which would stay within the hands of the studio for legal and financial precautions.
Makes sense.
I tried running some Handbrake sharpening over some of the S1 upscales and... for the closeups, the sharpening did eliminate a lot of fuzziness. However, for the more distant shots, it wasn't effective. Distant shots in AI upscaling tend to have a muddy, watercolour effect. The sharpening made it even worse and it went from tolerable to distracting. It occurred to me that individual scenes could be sharpened separately from the wider angles. It also occurred to me that I should go to bed and be ready for work in the morning and not spend any more time upscaling SLIDERS outside of plug and play solutions that can run while I do my day job.
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Thinking some more about this -- NBCUniversal must have multiple copies of the master tapes and a way to duplicate them losslessly and maintain their originals. I understand that NBCUniversal does not care about SLIDERS, but I'm sure that as a corporation, they care very much about owning their properties and citing the combined value of their properties as part of their total corporate worth.
As an amateur accountant, I would severely reduce the estimated value of the SLIDERS property if NBCUniversal didn't own videotape masters of the completed episodes in their archives. If they don't have the masters, then they don't have the ability to convert the show into future formats for future sales.
I don't know what these future formats or future sales would be -- they're in the future.
But if NBCUniversal doesn't have masters, they have nothing they can mine for future sales; they can only engage in their current sales: bargain basement DVD packagers like Mill Creek, NBCU's in-house streaming service.
I would (as an amateur accountant) reduce SLIDERS' value by 80 per cent if that were the case because NBCUniversal would no longer have the ability to monetize the episodes beyond what they are doing now. Having the masters means SLIDERS has significantly more value than it does if NBCUniversal only has a box of their godawful DVDs.
I think NBCUniversal would keep the video masters. They might not use them, they might not bother to rescan them, they might hold them in utter contempt or bland indifference -- but they're not going to use them for target practice or to prop up uneven tables. Whatever we might think of multinational corporations, they're not going to allow their potential sale value to be diminished by a refusal to store some cassettes.
Anyway. Turbine Media has clearly done a maximum resolution scan of the master tapes for the standard definition blu-ray release. NBCUniversal has the masters.
I tried running some Handbrake sharpening over some of the S1 upscales and... for the closeups, the sharpening did eliminate a lot of fuzziness. However, for the more distant shots, it wasn't effective. Distant shots in AI upscaling tend to have a muddy, watercolour effect. The sharpening made it even worse and it went from tolerable to distracting. It occurred to me that individual scenes could be sharpened separately from the wider angles. It also occurred to me that I should go to bed and be ready for work in the morning and not spend any more time upscaling SLIDERS outside of plug and play solutions that can run while I do my day job.
**
Thinking some more about this -- NBCUniversal must have multiple copies of the master tapes and a way to duplicate them losslessly and maintain their originals. I understand that NBCUniversal does not care about SLIDERS, but I'm sure that as a corporation, they care very much about owning their properties and citing the combined value of their properties as part of their total corporate worth.
As an amateur accountant, I would severely reduce the estimated value of the SLIDERS property if NBCUniversal didn't own videotape masters of the completed episodes in their archives. If they don't have the masters, then they don't have the ability to convert the show into future formats for future sales.
I don't know what these future formats or future sales would be -- they're in the future.
But if NBCUniversal doesn't have masters, they have nothing they can mine for future sales; they can only engage in their current sales: bargain basement DVD packagers like Mill Creek, NBCU's in-house streaming service.
I would (as an amateur accountant) reduce SLIDERS' value by 80 per cent if that were the case because NBCUniversal would no longer have the ability to monetize the episodes beyond what they are doing now. Having the masters means SLIDERS has significantly more value than it does if NBCUniversal only has a box of their godawful DVDs.
I think NBCUniversal would keep the video masters. They might not use them, they might not bother to rescan them, they might hold them in utter contempt or bland indifference -- but they're not going to use them for target practice or to prop up uneven tables. Whatever we might think of multinational corporations, they're not going to allow their potential sale value to be diminished by a refusal to store some cassettes.
Anyway. Turbine Media has clearly done a maximum resolution scan of the master tapes for the standard definition blu-ray release. NBCUniversal has the masters.
i would think re-scanning tape masters would be relatively in expensive. maybe turbine was willing to roll the dice since at least people were buying a physical good (that would be reviewed) whereas w peacock it's a free, commercial supported play w/o a less picky consumer. but i also think people at peacock, svod services, mill creek, and even hulu and netflix just assume that whatever digital files universal provides, that's the best that you really gonna get. they arent really familiar w. the terrible look of dvd releases etc. If Peacock knew better was possible, maybe they'd insist a rescan of master tapes in order to license it.
I think Turbine has clearly tapped into a market in Germany with audiences who want German audio tracks and want a premium product. If you look at their website, they're like a boutique version of Criterion. They're like Apple Computers: a small selection of high priced, high quality products with a devoted audience prepared to spend $80 USD on a box set of SLIDERS.
In contrast, Mill Creek is the equivalent of Walmart's laptop division, caring more about hitting a low price point with low to near non-existent levels of effort. Mill Creek will take what they're given; they don't care if their SLIDERS product is good, they just care about making it available, priced at $40 and discounted to $20.
Apple's executives once remarked during the netbook craze, "We don't know how to release a $200 computer that isn't a piece of junk and it's not in our DNA to do that." Turbine's website and their high quality, small selection lineup speaks to a company that wouldn't have tolerated 500 MB files for a SLIDERS DVD; they don't know how to release a $20 box set of SLIDERS that isn't a piece of junk and it's not in their DNA to do that. If that were their only option for SLIDERS, Turbine would have simply declined to license it and found some other project.
I think Turbine has clearly tapped into a market in Germany with audiences who want German audio tracks and want a premium product. If you look at their website, they're like a boutique version of Criterion. They're like Apple Computers: a small selection of high priced, high quality products with a devoted audience prepared to spend $80 USD on a box set of SLIDERS.
In contrast, Mill Creek is the equivalent of Walmart's laptop division, caring more about hitting a low price point with low to near non-existent levels of effort. Mill Creek will take what they're given; they don't care if their SLIDERS product is good, they just care about making it available, priced at $40 and discounted to $20.
Apple's executives once remarked during the netbook craze, "We don't know how to release a $200 computer that isn't a piece of junk and it's not in our DNA to do that." Turbine's website and their high quality, small selection lineup speaks to a company that wouldn't have tolerated 500 MB files for a SLIDERS DVD; they don't know how to release a $20 box set of SLIDERS that isn't a piece of junk and it's not in their DNA to do that. If that were their only option for SLIDERS, Turbine would have simply declined to license it and found some other project.
Might you be able to email Turbine and see if they could tell you if they rescanned master tapes for this release? It would be great to get confirmation on your suspicions here. Id send them a note myself but I think you'd be in better position to discuss the technical with them, especially if there is a back and forth.
I'm also really curious if the fact that the release is limited to four discs caused any compression that resulted in picture loss. E.g. you wonder if they could have gone even better. Guessing not but 22 episodes per disc does seem like a lot when normally one 2 hour movie goes on one of those things (even if its more lines of resolution).
I've asked if they did a new scan, no response yet, but they may not have an English speaker reading customer messages. However, compression isn't an issue on their discs. They only have four discs because the files are not HD, just 20 percent bigger than SD. And their video scan can't be improved because their files for S2-5 have all the film grain. Once the film grain is present, the smallest aspect of the film image has been captured. There is no further level of detail to be scanned from the tapes.
Sooo, I'm finishing up my upscales on the S1 blu-ray files... but honestly, I'm not sure it was really worth it.
Stretched version on the left, AI upscaled version on the right:
The difference is so small that once the video is in motion, I honestly don't think it would make any difference. It started as decent DVD quality and so it remains.
They look quite similar. Obviously the right is a little better. Seems like it isn't much worth the effort. Perhaps Tracy can at least get them to do a rescan of the 35mm. I mentioned it to him in the chat of the youtube live stream. Maybe that could help the negotiation in some way for the series.
Sooo, I'm finishing up my upscales on the S1 blu-ray files... but honestly, I'm not sure it was really worth it.
Stretched version on the left, AI upscaled version on the right:
The difference is so small that once the video is in motion, I honestly don't think it would make any difference. It started as decent DVD quality and so it remains.
maybe i'm a nut but i see a huge difference on my desktop monitor at full screen (tho on my laptop, it's not quite as noticeable).
I've asked if they did a new scan, no response yet, but they may not have an English speaker reading customer messages. However, compression isn't an issue on their discs. They only have four discs because the files are not HD, just 20 percent bigger than SD. And their video scan can't be improved because their files for S2-5 have all the film grain. Once the film grain is present, the smallest aspect of the film image has been captured. There is no further level of detail to be scanned from the tapes.
good to know regarding compression level.
my guess is they'll be able to handle the english language in your inquiry. I am more so worried that the folks with the institutional knowledge of making that disc (five years ago) maybe not be looped in or handle the inquiry. It will be awesome if you get a definitive response either way to help unlock this mystery..
So, I finished "Luck of the Draw." I'm reviewing all the upscaled blu-ray S1 episodes now and... honestly, I don't like the results at all.
Individual shots when frozen look really nice as still images for screencaps. Clear and smooth. But when in motion, the AI upscale has an odd plastic, plasticine, wax dummy look to everything despite more defined detail. The problem is that AI upscaling depends on grain to rebuild detail. The grain in the S1 episodes, as I said, has been severely filtered out. There's a small amount left that makes AI upscaled close-up shots look good. However, AI upscaled medium and wide shots just look terrible, like paintings where the ink has gone outside the outlines of the figure being drawn.
This was present in my Season 2 - 5 upscales for the wide shots, but for S1 SD blu-ray, it affects everything except close-ups of faces.
I think the videotape scan was best left alone and I've decided to delete my upscales and just go with the blu-ray versions as-is. The SD blu-ray of Season 1 is better than the DVDs and AI is only improving close-up shots of people's faces, the rest isn't working.
Also, I'm not going to upscale any more episodes from the blu-ray. It's clear that for these files, AI upscaling and bicubic scaling will produce the same results. The only reason upscaling was so dramatic with Universal and Mill Creek DVDs is because those DVDs were so badly riddled with compression artifacts and the AI could lift away those artifacts. With these blu-ray discs, there's nothing to lift.
The blu-ray is good. Everyone should buy it!
The blu-ray is good. Everyone should buy it!
Already did! I do regret not using the german amazon to get it new, however. Only a dollar more than a used one (very good condition) I ordered at u.s. amazon.
Did yours come with an insert pamphlet book? About 20 pages or so of photos? I am not sure if that only comes with the "limited edition."
There is a pamphlet is bound to the disc case. It's just episode descriptions.
Before going to the office, I put my 720p AI upscales into Handbrake and set them to re-encode the files back to 720x576, but with a sharpening filter applied. Maybe that can add some of the gains while mitigating the losses. But what it comes down to: Topaz AI upselling upscaling is, currently, only effective at removing compression artifacts, and only if the image under that compression retains film grain. The Universal and Mill Creek DVDs had grain for S2 - 5, and after Topaz, those episodes looked broadly like the Turbine Blu-ray but without the fine grain and smaller details in that grain. Wide shots have a watercolour effect, medium and close up shots look good.
However, if the image isn't compressed and lacks grain, Topaz AI will make the image worse. Everything except closeups will have watercolour effect. In terms of the Blu-ray S2 - S5, there is a lot of grain, and AI upscaling the image will simply smooth out that grain in rebuilding that detail at a higher resolution. But the results wouldn't be worth the 24 hours in AI. S2 - S5 would technically be an HD or 4K resolution image that would look clean, but the fine detail would have a sheen over it and you'd get the same results with on the fly bicubic scaling and a noise reduction filter.
There is a pamphlet is bound to the disc case. It's just episode descriptions.
Before going to the office, I put my 720p AI upscales into Handbrake and set them to re-encode the files back to 720x576, but with a sharpening filter applied. Maybe that can add some of the gains while mitigating the losses. But what it comes down to: Topaz AI upselling upscaling is, currently, only effective at removing compression artifacts, and only if the image under that compression retains film grain. The Universal and Mill Creek DVDs had grain for S2 - 5, and after Topaz, those episodes looked broadly like the Turbine Blu-ray but without the fine grain and smaller details in that grain. Wide shots have a watercolour effect, medium and close up shots look good.
However, if the image isn't compressed and lacks grain, Topaz AI will make the image worse. Everything except closeups will have watercolour effect. In terms of the Blu-ray S2 - S5, there is a lot of grain, and AI upscaling the image will simply smooth out that grain in rebuilding that detail at a higher resolution. But the results wouldn't be worth the 24 hours in AI. S2 - S5 would technically be an HD or 4K resolution image that would look clean, but the fine detail would have a sheen over it and you'd get the same results with on the fly bicubic scaling and a noise reduction filter.
Perhaps adding upres on S2-S5 german release could have grain effect added in after the smoothing. But as you said, it really comes down to ROI.
I asked Bill Hunt, founder of Digital Bits if he thought Uni would send master *tapes* to Turbine. Here's his response (maybe he fails to distinguish between tapes and negatives):
It really depends. The film masters would never be given to Turbine, but Turbine may have paid for new film scans, which would have been done here in the States by a company Universal worked with. But I haven't seen the SD on BD release. So my guess is that it's not a new release.
A new scan, I should say.
Given the fact that they're SD and not HD (any new scan would certainly be in HD) it's probably NOT a new scan.
If Universal actually rescanned everything it's plausible they are so disorganized that they didn't then provide that stuff for Peacock etc. Another theory would be german release is in PAL. Maybe that helps? idk.
I reached out to someone at universal who deals with a bunch of management of their digital stuff and licensing it out. He has given me a couple responses in the past but for the most part isn't very responsive. I've very much tried to push them to do up-res's etc. Everything I've gotten the sense of is unless the licensee asks for HD (and the deal i guess big enuf) it's not gonna happen otherwise.
If we keep chirping to peacock maybe they will press universal's internal team on these matters.
I think there's been a miscommunication with Mr. Hunt. He says NBCUniversal would never have given Turbine the film for SLIDERS episodes. But SLIDERS' completed episodes do not exist on film. They exist on videotape. Possibly Betacam, U-Matic, DV or some other form of videotape, but tape nonetheless. No scan of videotape is going to be HD. There is no new film scans for SLIDERS because there is no film outside of the raw, unassembled material with no colour processing or effects. NBCUniversal may have given video cassettes to Turbine for a rescan (or yes, Turbine may have paid another company to do it, but Turbine has videotape and film scanning infrastructure and NBCUniversal isn't just going to have a single cassette of their archived shows).
Mr. Hunt seems to be responding with the impression that the completed SLIDERS episodes are stored on film negatives with the need to create release prints and with the master copy remaining under strict storage and preservation. But SLIDERS was made by transferring film to videotape, specifically because videotape was easier and cheaper to edit, duplicate and distribute and store.
It's the only format in which the completed episodes can exist and it would be insane for NBCUniversal to not have multiple copies and lossless duplication for all of their tape-stored shows. The ability for future resale in future formats is a high value proposition, admittedly not for SLIDERS alone, but for the totality of their standard definition catalog of properties.
I think there's been a miscommunication with Mr. Hunt. He says NBCUniversal would never have given Turbine the film for SLIDERS episodes. But SLIDERS' completed episodes do not exist on film. They exist on videotape. Possibly Betacam, U-Matic, DV or some other form of videotape, but tape nonetheless. No scan of videotape is going to be HD. There is no new film scans for SLIDERS because there is no film outside of the raw, unassembled material with no colour processing or effects. NBCUniversal may have given video cassettes to Turbine for a rescan (or yes, Turbine may have paid another company to do it, but Turbine has videotape and film scanning infrastructure and NBCUniversal isn't just going to have a single cassette of their archived shows).
Mr. Hunt seems to be responding with the impression that the completed SLIDERS episodes are stored on film negatives with the need to create release prints and with the master copy remaining under strict storage and preservation. But SLIDERS was made by transferring film to videotape, specifically because videotape was easier and cheaper to edit, duplicate and distribute and store.
It's the only format in which the completed episodes can exist and it would be insane for NBCUniversal to not have multiple copies and lossless duplication for all of their tape-stored shows. The ability for future resale in future formats is a high value proposition, admittedly not for SLIDERS alone, but for the totality of their standard definition catalog of properties.
Yes, I already noted that in my response to him. Will see what he says...
A gentleman who does making of documentaries/special features for dvd companies on the notion that the master tapes were re-scanned for the Turbine release:
It is possible. Their transfers of AMAZING STORIES looks better than some of the streaming versions.
Interestingly enough... the resolution here says it was upconverted:
resolution: 1080p (upconverted)
https://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Amazing- … ay/174005/
Turbine actually commented several times in this thread here:
https://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread.php?t=289083
this is interesting...
also says resolution: 1080p (upconverted)
https://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Sliders- … ay/161702/
Altho, it actually may be 720x576, right?
I'm still curious about how they did the Quantum Leap blu-ray.
I'm still curious about how they did the Quantum Leap blu-ray.
Universal rescanned the film for a blu-ray release. The Mill Creek release is apparently somewhat overcompressed (shocker), but they're HD files, so there's margin for loss.
this is interesting...
also says resolution: 1080p (upconverted)
https://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Sliders- … ay/161702/
Altho, it actually may be 720x576, right?
Yes, it's 720x576. The claim about being upconverted is likely miscopied from an entry on a different TV show. The box art even says SD on blu-ray on the site.
No response (yet?), but the Turbine representative posting on the forum seems to speak very colloquial English, so I sent a message asking if Turbine did a new scan of the tapes. I also specified that it is a terrific blu-ray release.
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Downscaling my AI upscales from 720p back to 546 pixels high didn't improve the image at all for Season 1 episodes.
Adding grain on top of the image isn't helpful for AI upscaling. AI upscaling works by seizing onto the grains that form the picture, not grains laid on top of the picture afterwards. That is simply a layer of dots that the AI dismisses. Season 1 of SLIDERS is way too denoised to upscale properly.
It's definitely not Turbine's fault and I don't even think it's Universal's fault. The 35mm film was transferred to tape in a very peculiar fashion that might have made sense in 1994 (creating a clean image for cathode ray tube TV) but is unfortunate in 2021 for an HDTV that renders that grain as detail.
Future upscaling technology may offer some gains.
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However, regardless of all that, the Turbine release is an excellent home video release for SLIDERS. Turbine has shown the show some true respect and diligence. The packaging is effective and resilient; the episodes are presented in the correct order and in the highest possible quality from the video masters; the disc count is precisely what is needed to show the files at maximum fidelity while still being small enough to be priced reasonably ($80 for the whole show is great). And Season 1 looks okay. It just doesn't look great.
Considering how bad Season 1 on the Universal DVDs and how Season 1 is contemptibly awful on the Mill Creek discs, the fact that Turbine's files look okay is a massive achievement.
Do you know if they upscaled the CGI on Quantum Leap or was the CGI originally done on film?
Apparently, QUANTUM LEAP was a rarity for the first three seasons: it was edited on film and the effects were created optically on film. However, for Seasons 4 - 5, there was a switch to videotape effects and all the effects for the blu-ray version of 4 - 5 are upscaled SD shots.
I'll be trying the up-res samples from earlier this year on a 135 inch projected image today. The peacock content of course looked awful. Let's see what happens here.
Here's the up-res'd content projected onto a white wall in a dark room from a 600 dollar projector from about 15 feet away. Making for a 135 inch screen. You can see the couch next to the image for scale.
These are of s3's The Guardian. The pilot looks equally as good. Beautiful image like newer content.
In the photos above, I actually used the projector's zoom feature to zoom in on the image so it would crop 16:9 from within the 4:3 native image, and then scale that cropped image up to fill the screen.
Other s1 (non-pilot) episodes and s2 can't use this zoom feature without not looking great. But s2 still looks very solid at 4:3, and s1 non pilot to a lesser degree. All are LIGHT YEARS better than the Peacock at 135 inches. In that case, s4 episodes look worse than up-res'd s1's.
I got a message from Turbine media.
Hi there,
this is SD on Blu-ray, so I am puzzled you find the quality differs from the DVDs. It's the sam data and stream. But we used the PAL masters for Europe of course...
Cheers!
I think it's safe to say that NBCUniversal has plenty of copies of the video masters.
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Do you use your projector a lot? I imagine the Zoom function, while 'cinematic,' cuts off a lot of vital information from the frame of a 4:3 image.
I am pleased to report that while my upscales are superficially as good as the blu-ray, the blu-ray is better because of all the fine grain. It's interesting: Cez of LEGO SLIDERS has the blu-ray. But he told me that he prefers the look of my upscales (I sent him the clip of Sabrina singing in "Stoker") because they are "cleaner." However, that "cleaner" look is actually a lack of detail due to a lack of film grain; the graininess may seem unappealing in a screenshot, but on an HDTV screen, it gives the image far more physical reality.
The Season 1 blu-ray episodes look a bit muddy for wide shots and distant elements, but I honestly stop noticing it once I get into the episode and the lack of compression artifacts means that the image isn't constantly obscured with distractions.
I got a message from Turbine media.
Hi there,
this is SD on Blu-ray, so I am puzzled you find the quality differs from the DVDs. It's the sam data and stream. But we used the PAL masters for Europe of course...
Cheers!
.
Does this mean they used the digital copies for euope/pal or that they rescanned the tapes (which were in pal format for the European market)?
I got a message from Turbine media.
Hi there,
this is SD on Blu-ray, so I am puzzled you find the quality differs from the DVDs. It's the sam data and stream. But we used the PAL masters for Europe of course...
Cheers!
I think it's safe to say that NBCUniversal has plenty of copies of the video masters.
**
Do you use your projector a lot? I imagine the Zoom function, while 'cinematic,' cuts off a lot of vital information from the frame of a 4:3 image.
I am pleased to report that while my upscales are superficially as good as the blu-ray, the blu-ray is better because of all the fine grain. It's interesting: Cez of LEGO SLIDERS has the blu-ray. But he told me that he prefers the look of my upscales (I sent him the clip of Sabrina singing in "Stoker") because they are "cleaner." However, that "cleaner" look is actually a lack of detail due to a lack of film grain; the graininess may seem unappealing in a screenshot, but on an HDTV screen, it gives the image far more physical reality.
The Season 1 blu-ray episodes look a bit muddy for wide shots and distant elements, but I honestly stop noticing it once I get into the episode and the lack of compression artifacts means that the image isn't constantly obscured with distractions.
The zoom function can cut off info but in this case it's worth the trade off for a more overwhelming and encompassing image size. Mostly the framing just seems closer than really losing elements needed for the story. At least on the two episodes I tried.
I'll definitely compare the sd on bluray once it arrives, especially with the image on a 135 in projection ... because that's where issues reveal themselves most. I was honestly shocked how well the up res looked on pilot and s3 that big.
I've sent Turbine another message asking if they received digital files or tapes. No response (yet?).
I wonder why Season 1 looks so different from Season 2 - 5 onward. One theory of mine was that the film to tape process involved some sort of denoise process (which is common for effects shots, but it seems to have been applied to all scenes all post-Pilot Season 1 episodes).
I'm also wondering if it's a videotape medium situation. SLIDERS' first season was filmed in 1994 - 1995; I wonder if maybe the Pilot was edited on something like Digital Betacam (540 lines of resolution) or Hi8 (420 lines of resolution). And maybe the subsequent episodes were edited on some lower quality videotape format like 8mm tape, U-Matic or Betamax (250 lines of resolution). It would certainly explain the loss of sharpness going from the Pilot to "Summer of Love." The Pilot episode would have been filmed and edited some time before the subsequent episodes and at a higher budget than the rest, possibly on a pricier videotape format.
In 1995, Panasonic introduced the DV format (540 lines of resolution) and I can see that leading to non-Panasonic 540 line video formats to become cheaper to compete. Season 2 began filming in October 1995 and the massive leap in sharpness after "Luck of the Draw" is obvious; "Into the Mystic" is razor sharp. It's possible that a switch to a new videotape format for editing and effects is why the video quality of Season 1 is so below that of Season 2 onward.
There is also another massive leap forward in video quality for Seasons 4 - 5 which are far more detailed than any Season 2 - 3 episodes. That one's easier to explain: the grain is obviously that of 16mm film. It's less than half the size (and resolution) of 35mm film; the image is composed of much larger grains, and those grains survive a film to tape transfer more resiliently than 35mm film.
Can't say on any of that, but the Director of Photography from Season 2 through most of 4 was Robert Hudacek. Glen MacPherson did "The Pilot" while Peter Woeste worked the remainder of the first season. Might have been a change in film stock, or simply in the way the show was lit and shot that is what you're seeing.
Got a message from Turbine on whether or not they received videotapes or digital files. "It was so long ago I honestly don't remember." Anyway. If RussianCabbie has further questions, he can message Turbine himself! I can't spend the rest of my life in the middle of this line of inquiry! :-)
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Going from the Pilot into "Summer of Love," the level of resolution in the episodes clearly takes a drop with the sharpness falling from 40 to 50 per cent. This cannot be the result of a different 35mm film stock or a different cinematographer; that might result in differing depths of light and alternate grain patterns and new colour tones, but that's not what's on the videotape scans.
It looks to me less like a different style and more like the Season 1 episodes having fewer lines of resolution than the Pilot and Seasons 2 - 5. 35mm film doesn't suffer from this; the situation resulted during or after the film being transferred to videotape. Then Season 2 'suddenly' has at least double the sharpness of Season 1 episodes except it's not so sudden given the break between seasons.
The timing is incredibly striking with Season 1 being filmed in late 1994 and early 1995, just before the rise of digital video tape in 1995 through Sony and Panasonic releasing the new DV format, and the shift from analog videotape editing to digital videotape editing with 540 lines of resolution instead of the mid-range of 200 - 250 with U-Matic and Betamax and 8mm. Then we have Season 2 starting production in the fall of 1995, with film being transferred to videotape just after DV tape has become the new industry standard and Season 2 now looks at least twice as sharp as the Season 1 episodes before it.
Got a message from Turbine on whether or not they received videotapes or digital files. "It was so long ago I honestly don't remember." Anyway. If RussianCabbie has further questions, he can message Turbine himself! I can't spend the rest of my life in the middle of this line of inquiry! :-)
I actually had made attempts on the blu-ray forum at the same time as you... They probably found it weird they got the same sort of questions.
Here's the latest of what i got re: quality difference and if they re-scanned tapes:
I must assume that the reason is that we used the PAL masters and not the NTSC masters. ...
which was similar to a possibility i previously threw out:
Maybe there is some seperate set of assets (that maybe even have different specs for conversion to pal, or requirements internationally), that are just better. Perhaps provided by an enttity in Europe or Universal has some seperate folders for international assets.
I've looked for other PAL formatted DVDs because that's one way we can compare to see if it looks same as German release.
The australian one is all i saw at this point and seems cost-prohibitive. Also they warn about won't play on U.S. dvd players... so i assume that has a specified region and germany's is region-free....
Could make it hard to test then.
All this stuff I am super curious about, including the process, because as I mentioned earlier, on occasion i have been able to "get to" someone who manages distribution for universal. So having specifics can help lock down what may be repeatable. Right now the stuff can look aborish on Peacock. If there's a way to push for a fix for that -- so a wider consumer audience can enjoy the show -- great. It certainly wouldn't hurt Tracy's case (and obviously they examine streaming numbers).
There is also another massive leap forward in video quality for Seasons 4 - 5 which are far more detailed than any Season 2 - 3 episodes. That one's easier to explain: the grain is obviously that of 16mm film. It's less than half the size (and resolution) of 35mm film; the image is composed of much larger grains, and those grains survive a film to tape transfer more resiliently than 35mm film.
shouldn't 35mm look better than 16mm? I am assuming you are saying s4 & 5 were shot on 16mm then. Wouldn't 35mm look better?
Or are you saying 16mm will up-res better in topez because the gain will give it something to "latch" onto?
The timing is incredibly striking with Season 1 being filmed in late 1994 and early 1995, just before the rise of digital video tape in 1995 through Sony and Panasonic releasing the new DV format, and the shift from analog videotape editing to digital videotape editing with 540 lines of resolution instead of the mid-range of 200 - 250 with U-Matic and Betamax and 8mm. Then we have Season 2 starting production in the fall of 1995, with film being transferred to videotape just after DV tape has become the new industry ctandard and Season 2 now looks at least twice as sharp as the Season 1 episodes before it.
If Universal says "NO" to Tracy, the one thing I hope he would try to do is ask Universal to scan and re-edit the eight episodes of s1. He can supervise the process.. they can make a documentary about it (and sliders) and maybe do a "what would a reboot entail" with animation's like the Deep Space 9 documentary (and writer's room). Google it if you haven't seen it, free on tubi, amazon etc.
JW_Slider, maybe you can pass this along. If it goes well, they can consider making the pilot (as a movie) and if that goes well, a new spin off series.
shouldn't 35mm look better than 16mm? I am assuming you are saying s4 & 5 were shot on 16mm then. Wouldn't 35mm look better?
Or are you saying 16mm will up-res better in topez because the gain will give it something to "latch" onto?
The issue is that when film is transferred to videotape, there is a corresponding loss of resolution as a high resolution format is reduced to a small percentage of its full detail.
If projected to a screen or scanned for digital presentation to HDTV, then yes, 35mm produces a crisply detailed image while 16mm is less than half the resolution. In addition, the grain on 35mm film that forms the image is small enough to offer subtle texture while in contrast, the grain on 16mm film produces an image that is seemingly covered in noise (although that noise is actually forming the image).
However, what we are seeing when we watch SLIDERS is a videotape version of the film image. The film has been transferred to tape. When 35mm is transferred to tape, the image forming grain looks very fine and minute; the standard definition image can't render it fully because it's too small to show up entirely, and that means a loss of detail in going from film to tape.
The same thing happens with 16mm film. However, the image forming grains on a 16mm are more than twice the size 35mm film. That grain remains visible when reduced to a videotape resolution, which means that the details within those grains remain visible as well. The result is that while Seasons 4 - 5 are grainier and don't look as 'clean,' as Seasons 2 - 3, faces and clothing and surfaces in Seasons 4 - 5 have more detail and texture than than in Seasons 2 - 3.
RussianCabbie_Lotteryfan wrote:shouldn't 35mm look better than 16mm? I am assuming you are saying s4 & 5 were shot on 16mm then. Wouldn't 35mm look better?
Or are you saying 16mm will up-res better in topez because the gain will give it something to "latch" onto?
The issue is that when film is transferred to videotape, there is a corresponding loss of resolution as a high resolution format is reduced to a small percentage of its full detail.
If projected to a screen or scanned for digital presentation to HDTV, then yes, 35mm produces a crisply detailed image while 16mm is less than half the resolution. In addition, the grain on 35mm film that forms the image is small enough to offer subtle texture while in contrast, the grain on 16mm film produces an image that is seemingly covered in noise (although that noise is actually forming the image).
However, what we are seeing when we watch SLIDERS is a videotape version of the film image. The film has been transferred to tape. When 35mm is transferred to tape, the image forming grain looks very fine and minute; the standard definition image can't render it fully because it's too small to show up entirely, and that means a loss of detail in going from film to tape.
The same thing happens with 16mm film. However, the image forming grains on a 16mm are more than twice the size 35mm film. That grain remains visible when reduced to a videotape resolution, which means that the details within those grains remain visible as well. The result is that while Seasons 4 - 5 are grainier and don't look as 'clean,' as Seasons 2 - 3, faces and clothing and surfaces in Seasons 4 - 5 have more detail and texture than than in Seasons 2 - 3.
Gotcha. VLC player has a nice film grain effect where it's easy to at least see how it helps S2&3 though I get it wouldn't be the same as natural grain.
Also, s4&5 really lacked locations vs. 2&3 so I wonder if lighting plays any role on the superior look of 4&5. The colors seem to pop pretty nicely.
Well, if you look at the screencaps from earlier, you can compare the faces. You can see all the lines and grooves on Kari Wuhrer's face because the smaller 16mm film is, when reduced to standard definition videotape, only reducing the 16mm film grains to about 53 per cent of their original size (operating on the presumption that 16mm film is only worth scanning at 2K/1080p because any higher resolution yields no further fidelity).
In contrast, Wade's face in the Season 2 screencaps is slightly fuzzier with less pixel contrast. That strikes me as the result of reducing 35mm film grains to about 27 per cent of their original size (assuming 35mm film has a maximum scan resolution of 4K/2100 pixels high). Grain-composed images aren't like pixel-based images because not all grains are the same size. The smaller you make the grains, the less you can see the details in the grains.
In terms of upscaling: Topaz has a tendency to smooth out grain in extrapolating pixels to add into a larger-sized image. I found that increasing the image by 50 per cent (480 pixels high to 720 pixels high) made the image presentable on an HDTV, lifted compression artifacts and made effective use of the grain while leaving a little at the end. However, upscaling the image beyond that (480 pixels to 1080 pixels) removed all the grain completely and without grain, the image looked more like it had been painted than photographed.
I've seen this odd phenomenon with the STARGATE blurays which were 576i master tapes upscaled to 1080p; everything's just too smooth and flattened out (although after watching for a bit, I get used to it).
In working on some other upscaling experiments, I've come to realize that Topaz is doing some more complicated things than I realized and Season 1 of SLIDERS might benefit from another effort at upscaling.
I was trying to upscale a Canadian show, SLINGS & ARROWS (2003 - 2006, 18 episodes). While released to 720p, the first six episodes were unfortunately not available in true HD; they had been filmed on a standard definition format that looks to me like 8mm film. (The next 12 were filmed in HD and what looks to me like DVCPro HD, a digital videotape format that can be set to record at 720p and 24 frames per second.) The first six episodes were, for blu-ray, stretched from SD to 720p and while they look okay, the entire picture is covered in these huge dot patterns obscuring every part of the image. These are (probably) the 8mm film grains inflated to 720p.
I ran one of these stretched episodes through Topaz with the preset for low quality video but with no change in resolution. Topaz smoothed out all the noise and rebuilt all the detail underneath, but there was a slightly painted look to the video. So I changed it to the preset for medium quality video. Now, a small portion of the noise remained, but much of it had been replaced with crisply rendered detail and it looked like the episodes that were actually shot in 720p. I ran this episode through the preset for high quality video and in this case, Topaz didn't seem to change the video at all, leaving all the video grain untouched.
I also ran the pilot for the TV show CHUCK through Topaz. CHUCK was shot on 16mm film and there's always this pattern of static that seems baked into every frame of every episode. Topaz on the low quality video pre-set totally denoised CHUCK but made it a little too blurry. The medium quality setting was a massive improvement: no grain and a very faint loss of texture sharpness. The high quality video setting, however, left the grain intact but faintly diminished to the point of being totally undistracting and the underlying details were left the same.
I don't think Topaz *has* to remove the grain; I think that the algorithms actually address two aspects of video in need of upscaling: compression artifacts (such as from DVD compression, which need to be lifted off) and grain (which the AI uses to work out what additional pixels should be added and where and how). The low quality preset will aggressively smooth out the image (and severely reduce the grain texture in the process) and this was the right preset for every episode of SLIDERS on DVD -- except for the Season 1 episodes where it smoothed out video that was already (too) smooth. The medium quality preset will reduce the degree to which it targets compression noise.
The high quality preset, however, doesn't seem to be trying to reduce flaws in the image, but is instead designed to scale good quality video to a larger size and not create any new flaws in the process. It's not meant to correct video (although it can), it's meant to be a highly forgiving way of stretching a video that is presumed to already be in good quality.
I'm trying this preset now on "Luck of the Draw," scaling the 576 image to 1080 this time -- the same resolution as my HDTV. It isn't going to make the video look dramatically better, but rather than having my Android TV box scale the video from 576 to 1080 on the fly, Topaz will produce the 1080 resolution in advance so it should at least look about the same as playing the file at the 576 resolution.
I'll see if it's better. I won't know for 22 hours, this upscaling preset is a lot slower than the low quality preset and I'm increasing the video to a higher resolution this time.
Well, this is certainly an interesting development...
Well, if you look at the screencaps from earlier, you can compare the faces. You can see all the lines and grooves on Kari Wuhrer's face because the smaller 16mm film is, when reduced to standard definition videotape, only reducing the 16mm film grains to about 53 per cent of their original size (operating on the presumption that 16mm film is only worth scanning at 2K/1080p because any higher resolution yields no further fidelity).
In contrast, Wade's face in the Season 2 screencaps is slightly fuzzier with less pixel contrast. That strikes me as the result of reducing 35mm film grains to about 27 per cent of their original size (assuming 35mm film has a maximum scan resolution of 4K/2100 pixels high). Grain-composed images aren't like pixel-based images because not all grains are the same size. The smaller you make the grains, the less you can see the details in the grains.
i assume you mean
this
vs this?
Maybe this was already said but apparently PAL sd tapes had 576 lines of resolution vs. NTSC 480.
But, if they created the PAL tapes off of a 480 source, it wouldn't explain a PAL tape automatically being better.
I think that the SD blu-ray has the best possible scan of the master tapes. I just noticed: they aren't actually 640 x 480 pixels, but 20 per cent larger at 768 x 576 pixels.
.
Oops this was discussed already. In any case I wonder if sliders was edited in at least 576... if so that may mean universal could theoretically create something better for North American market.
I'm also wondering if it's a videotape medium situation. SLIDERS' first season was filmed in 1994 - 1995; I wonder if maybe the Pilot was edited on something like Digital Betacam (540 lines of resolution) or Hi8 (420 lines of resolution). And maybe the subsequent episodes were edited on some lower quality videotape format like 8mm tape, U-Matic or Betamax (250 lines of resolution). It would certainly explain the loss of sharpness going from the Pilot to "Summer of Love." The Pilot episode would have been filmed and edited some time before the subsequent episodes and at a higher budget than the rest, possibly on a pricier videotape format.
In 1995, Panasonic introduced the DV format (540 lines of resolution) and I can see that leading to non-Panasonic 540 line video formats to become cheaper to compete. Season 2 began filming in October 1995 and the massive leap in sharpness after "Luck of the Draw" is obvious; "Into the Mystic" is razor sharp. It's possible that a switch to a new videotape format for editing and effects is why the video quality of Season 1 is so below that of Season 2 onward.
Ok this was covered... you could say I'm catching up.
I finished upscaling "Luck of the Draw" to a 960x1080 file and it looks okay. The Topaz HQ video preset ensures that it went from 576 to 1080 without losing what clarity it had. The SD blu-ray file, when scaled to HDTV, was fuzzier due to the TV and Android TV box stretch.
The thing about stretching the Season 2 - 5 SD blu-ray files to an HDTV scale: the quality of those video files is so good that any added fuzziness is quite low because the files are in such good quality and clarity that losing a little doesn't make much difference. Season 1, however, doesn't have much quality to lose.
With the HQ preset scaling Season 1 episodes to 1080, Topaz has done the stretch so the TV won't have to. Nothing is gained, but nothing is lost. The image isn't better, but watching it on an HDTV won't make it worse. I'm going to do the other S1 episodes too, if only for myself.
**
I think Topaz might have further value as a noise and grain reduction process, but it's currently far too slow to be practical. Going back to CHUCK, a TV series shot on 16mm film: it is a very grainy looking show and every scene is covered in a pattern of static that's very solid and obstructive. Digital noise reduction is loathed by many film connoisseurs because it blurs out the underlying detail as well as the grain itself and many film restorationists urge viewers to enjoy and appreciate all the grain and never try to reduce it.
However, I imagine most of these purists aren't watching 16mm film projects made by relatively low budget TV shows. I don't intend to create new files for CHUCK, but just as an experiment, I ran a few shots from the pilot through Topaz's HQ preset and realized: Topaz's algorithm has created a 'denoised' version of CHUCK that has taken that grain and rebuilt it as pixel detail; the details within it are still present, but the random static over the image is gone.
This could be incredibly beneficial to 16mm restorations where you lose an obnoxious, unhelpful texture but the detail underneath is fully resolved as crisp pixel rendering.
DAWSON'S CREEK is currently available in HD on Netflix and as a 16mm film image, it's very noisy as well, but not to the degree of CHUCK, likely because the scan processing has lightly muted the grainy texture. However, Topaz could take DAWSON'S CREEK and re-render that those grains into pixel clarity.
The issue, unfortunately: my computer would have needed 28 hours to re-render the CHUCK pilot from grain to pixel. In contrast, I ran CHUCK's pilot through a denoise filter in Handbrake which simply applied a filter to lightly reduce the noise. 13 minutes later, CHUCK had a new file for the pilot: the static pattern of the noise was now a slightly diminished cloud, faded out, present but not prominent, and the underlying image had a slight loss of detail due to blurring out the noise; it was maybe 5 per cent less sharp.
I recognize that my computer is a aged gaming laptop (i7, SSD, 32GB of RAM, 4GB VRAM) and that this machine was considered a low grade machine even when I originally bought it. And that professional video editing computers would be so much faster. But I think most video distributors would go for the filter and a small, barely perceptible loss of sharpness since the AI option would take 129 times longer.
Topaz isn't currently practical for grain-to-pixel conversion on a 1080p scan of 16mm film, but maybe someday it'll get there.
Topaz isn't currently practical for grain-to-pixel conversion on a 1080p scan of 16mm film, but maybe someday it'll get there.
I am pretty sure or at least hope we will see more gains with the tech in the future. You have to believe that if AI can understand what a crisp image of at least a human (or car or building or tree) looks like, it can make an intelligent guess at what the SD content intented.
I was reading some 2004 DVD reviews of the dual dimension s1&2 release and surprisingly, the reviewers were almost all fairly complimentary of the transfer and image. Only one bad review on that. Everything probably looked good on tube tvs. A theme that was consistent though is the blacks were problematic. It would be good if AI had some HDR changes although I guess TVs can do that.
I think part of turbine's secret was simply PAL files and maybe less compressed dvd files. Other pal dvds may have been a gig or less per episode. Who knows if they re-scanned the tapes... i don't think we'll find out.
fwiw, just found this email reply from turbine in my spam folder:
> Can you tell me if you the SD on Blu-Ray release of SLIDERS in
> 2016 includes new scans of the master tapes from Universal Studios?
>
we used the SD masters provided by Universal that previous DVD releases were also based on.
As of today no HD masters exist.
So videotapes!
My german blu-ray came!
The packaging is very nice and the prints on the discs themselves are gorgeous.
The menus are also really nice.
Unfortunately, playing PAL didn't work on my blu-ray player where I have a projector. So I tried it on an XBox. Fortunately, Xbox played the episodes but I have to say I was pretty unimpressed with the image quality. I had it on a good quality HD tv (about 70 inches) and it may be that it couldn't scale for that size well or the xbox's upconvertor on the blu-ray didn't upconvert pal format (or maybe because it was sd on blu-ray it didn't upconvert it like a dvd it would).
I tried the pilot and the first episode of season 3. The pal format actually caused the strobe / frame rate effect that you commonly see with some of the European shows played on PBS. Weirdly, the english audio was blatantly out of sync in some spots (I wonder if this would happen on all blu-ray players or just xbox?) and the voices were a bit more high-pitched than i ever remember hearing them on other Sliders sources..
I'm gonna do a comparison against the universal dvds on that same xbox/tv to see how it compares as maybe I am being overly harsh.
Sorry to hear blu-ray playback is problematic. I have not experienced anything you describe, but I can see why some of what you describe is happening.
Turbine used PAL masters and is based in Germany, so their blu-ray is PAL. PAL video is played at 25 frames per second, but you may be using an NTSC player and NTSC is 30 frames per second, so your XBox may be playing the disc 20 per cent faster than designed and unable to sync the audio. That's also why the voices are sped up and high pitched.
Are there Xbox display settings to enable PAL framerates?
I'm not sure why my North American blu-ray player didn't have these issues; it was a bargain basement purchase. I'm surprised that it can accommodate PAL discs. My player has no upscaling whatsoever and my TV also doesn't have any upscaling aside from a noise reduction filter (which I've turned off). It is a monitor with poor speakers (plugged into a small PC subwoofer bought for $20 years ago).
I was happy with the Season 2 - 5 video quality, but I'm only watching it on a 55 inch TV (about one-fifth smaller than yours).
My external blu-ray drive was able to read the disc, but I've never tried to play the disc on my computer, just copy the files as MKVs for upscaling experiments for home viewing. The file framerate is 25 frames per second. Also, I've learned that PAL resolution is 720 x 576, that's why it's higher than the 480i files on the North American DVDs.
Sorry to hear blu-ray playback is problematic. I have not experienced anything you describe, but I can see why some of what you describe is happening.
Turbine used PAL masters and is based in Germany, so their blu-ray is PAL. PAL video is played at 25 frames per second, but you may be using an NTSC player and NTSC is 30 frames per second, so your XBox may be playing the disc 20 per cent faster than designed and unable to sync the audio. That's also why the voices are sped up and high pitched.
Are there Xbox display settings to enable PAL framerates?
I'm not sure why my North American blu-ray player didn't have these issues; it was a bargain basement purchase. I'm surprised that it can accommodate PAL discs. My player has no upscaling whatsoever and my TV also doesn't have any upscaling aside from a noise reduction filter (which I've turned off). It is a monitor with poor speakers (plugged into a small PC subwoofer bought for $20 years ago).
I was happy with the Season 2 - 5 video quality, but I'm only watching it on a 55 inch TV (about one-fifth smaller than yours).
My external blu-ray drive was able to read the disc, but I've never tried to play the disc on my computer, just copy the files as MKVs for upscaling experiments for home viewing. The file framerate is 25 frames per second. Also, I've learned that PAL resolution is 720 x 576, that's why it's higher than the 480i files on the North American DVDs.
I'll check re: PAL frame rates on the xbox settings and then see if i can try it on a couple of other blu-ray players to see if they handle it any different (assuming they can play PAL).
Perhaps the solution would be to rip the discs, then somehow convert it to NTSC but I assume I'd have to do it as non-SD files or the 576 lines of resolution might be bumped down to 480?
It is interesting your blu-ray player seemed to handle the frame rate thing better (and obviously audio as well). Xbox's blu-ray player is supposedly really good for upscaling content but not sure about other aspects.
Got it working on another DVD player. Certainly looks an order of magnitude better than the CometTV broadcast (happening now).
On a 40-inch tv, you can see the issues with the content upclose (sharp, pixelated noise on turbine vs a very fuzzy Comet image) but it looks pretty decent from 12-14 feet away.
I'll still have to compare against the universal blu-rays. I'm still hitting the higher pitched audio issue but I'm am not noticing the frame rate issue nearly as much.
Yeah I'm watching Greatfellas on WatchComet right now. As bad it is, it makes the Peacock version look remastered in HD.
Yeah I'm watching Greatfellas on WatchComet right now. As bad it is, it makes the Peacock version look remastered in HD.
Comet vs Peacock
Yeah I'm watching Greatfellas on WatchComet right now. As bad it is, it makes the Peacock version look remastered in HD.
ha!
I'll check re: PAL frame rates on the xbox settings and then see if i can try it on a couple of other blu-ray players to see if they handle it any different (assuming they can play PAL).
Perhaps the solution would be to rip the discs, then somehow convert it to NTSC but I assume I'd have to do it as non-SD files or the 576 lines of resolution might be bumped down to 480?
It is interesting your blu-ray player seemed to handle the frame rate thing better (and obviously audio as well). Xbox's blu-ray player is supposedly really good for upscaling content but not sure about other aspects.
Well, I used MakeMKV (paid version) to create MKV files which I have played on my Android TV box as a test. The MKV files are encoded with the specific frame rate of 25 frames per second. The video player apps (VLC or the paid version of MX Player) will play the video at 25 frames per second; MKV files aren't decoded based on whether they fall into NTSC or PAL standard, but by the information stored within the codec regarding framerate, and an MKV file can be any resolution. However, I don't know how your devices will handle MKV; my blu-ray player can't even recognize them, so they aren't universal.
I'm not aware of any free software for creating blu-ray backups.
I am very, very, very sorry for recommending a home video release that I now see has issues in being enjoyed by North American fans with NTSC hardware. I did not realize this would be the case as I didn't experience these issues myself, but I clearly got lucky. I am going to re-update the information in the first post of this thread with warnings about the PAL format.
I just did a comet vs. german release vs. original up-res samples comparison on goodfellas.
then universal dvd Rules of the Game vs. german release.
On the dvd/sd on blu-ray comparison, there was a clear advantage to the german release. The universal release had a comparative noisy haze over the entire picture.
On the greatfellas comparison, the upres blew the german release out of the water. The german release was an order of magnitude better than comet.
it's difficult for me to say if the german release looks better than peacock on goodfellas. Close ups may be better and peacock seems to have more of a greenish hue to the image (i think) but on farther shots there is a far amount of pixelation on the german release that is smoother with peacock. Then again, standing 12-14 feet, away the german release just looks better.
I think there are probably some differences in personal taste when it comes to aesthetics and priorities here when comparing the blu-ray to DVDs or streaming services.
In my highly personal opinion, the German blu-ray release's SD files are superior to the upscales of the Universal/Mill Creek DVDs. Others have disagreed. Cez (of LEGO SLIDERS) and I have been comparing upscaled DVDs to the SD blu-ray. Cez prefers the upscaled DVD files of Seasons 2 - 5 episodes, he says that they look cleaner and are at a higher resolution; the blu-ray SD files are covered in a grainy texture that looks, to him, like they're fuzzy, rough standard definition files that are trying to punch above their weight on an HDTV.
In contrast, a Topaz-upscaled DVD file looks clean, clear, and like it belongs on an HDTV. And I understand that.
I think that if you're looking up close at an AI upscaled DVD file, you might like how AI has cleaned up the rough noise of the videotape, smoothed it out, resolved it and added additional pixels to render it with clarity. In contrast, the blu-ray's video quality has a flickering noise texture to it that might be seen as pixelation to some and it's stretched from 576 to anywhere from 1080 to 2100 pixels high, so up close, that may seem like it isn't as clearly defined as the upscale.
However, to me, I prefer that pixelation because when watched at a living room distance, I see detail, texture and minute visual elements and I imagine that the smoother look in other releases is just file compression and the NTSC masters being 20 per cent smaller than the PAL versions. Seen at a sensible separation, that noisy pixelation is strands of hair, pores in skin, perforations in clothing.
Now that I understand that the Topaz HQ preset is designed to resolve grain into pixel detail, I can see that Seasons 2 - 5 would actually benefit greatly from being run through Topaz's HQ algorithm. All that grain in the image that some people dislike, upscaled from 576 to 1080 pixels high, would become pixel-rendered detail whether seen up close or at living room distance.
Personally, I am satisfied with the blu-ray as is. But Universal is capable of taking their PAL masters and performing an AI grain-to-pixel conversion on Seasons 2 - 5 and creating an excellent 1080p version of these seasons that would please Cez and RussianCabbie. The technology is there. The files are available (in PAL).
And Season 1 -- the PAL version looks to me like an okay DVD on the blu-ray and when scaled to an HDTV, it looks like a slightly below average DVD. When AI upscaled for an HDTV, it goes back to looking like an okay DVD at 1080p, no improvement, but also no degradation. It's possible that AI upscaling technology will improve and be able to fix the fuzziness of Season 1. There may be other AI upscaling technology out there now that I haven't personally encountered or heard of.
I am very, very, very sorry for recommending a home video release that I now see has issues in being enjoyed by North American fans with NTSC hardware. I did not realize this would be the case as I didn't experience these issues myself, but I clearly got lucky. I am going to re-update the information in the first post of this thread with warnings about the PAL format.
On balance, i'm glad I got it. I'd rather own a copy with files that have the best resolution that we know in existence. Even though I find it inferior to your up-res samples, I think it's good to have on hand the best looking files from an official release. I was surprised at some of the pixelation at times, so I almost wonder if Turbine tried to do some sharpening or something, or maybe that's just how the PAL looks in HD.
It's really a beautiful release from a packaging / menu standpoint as well. Maybe one day we can push Turbine to do an "upconverted hd blu-ray" although they probably wouldn't bite.
I wish we could take a look at the image The Hub had again as they may have done upconverting on that. I do recall it looking good.
On balance, i'm glad I got it. I'd rather own a copy with files that have the best resolution that we know in existence. Even though I find it inferior to your up-res samples, I think it's good to have on hand the best looking files from an official release. I was surprised at some of the pixelation at times, so I almost wonder if Turbine tried to do some sharpening or something, or maybe that's just how the PAL looks in HD.
It's really a beautiful release from a packaging / menu standpoint as well. Maybe one day we can push Turbine to do an "upconverted hd blu-ray" although they probably wouldn't bite.
I wish we could take a look at the image The Hub had again as they may have done upconverting on that. I do recall it looking good.
The pixelation is actually film grain. I don't believe it has anything to do with Turbine; it's the film stock. I don't think PAL is grainy in itself because the post-Pilot episodes don't have this graininess which means that Topaz AI can't properly upscale them.
RussianCabbie_Lotteryfan wrote:On balance, i'm glad I got it. I'd rather own a copy with files that have the best resolution that we know in existence. Even though I find it inferior to your up-res samples, I think it's good to have on hand the best looking files from an official release. I was surprised at some of the pixelation at times, so I almost wonder if Turbine tried to do some sharpening or something, or maybe that's just how the PAL looks in HD.
It's really a beautiful release from a packaging / menu standpoint as well. Maybe one day we can push Turbine to do an "upconverted hd blu-ray" although they probably wouldn't bite.
I wish we could take a look at the image The Hub had again as they may have done upconverting on that. I do recall it looking good.
The pixelation is actually film grain. I don't believe it has anything to do with Turbine; it's the film stock. I don't think PAL is grainy in itself because the post-Pilot episodes don't have this graininess which means that Topaz AI can't properly upscale them.
Mmm, I'm talking about what looks like digital noise (each "piece" very square) around the edges of let's say moving characters in wide shots (not on pilot). Perhaps it's an effect of my dvd player trying to keep up with the pal / ntsc conversion. I should prob try to buy a cheap pal player to check.. if they are avail in u.s.
I wonder if some dvd players process the pal to ntsc conversion better.
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