What are your favorite Blu-rays for Picture Quality?

[rsbeck]

+1 Lives is an excellent film that received an excellent transfer to blu-ray. I would say the source material; what is shot as well as how it is shot results in a disk that may stop short of refence demo material visually, but I would put this in the category of terrific films that will impress on blu-ray, but won't challenge for the blow 'em away extravaganza. Personally, this is the type of blu-ray I really enjoy owning.

IMO, you want a few blu-rays for their blow 'em away technical eye candy prowess, but if you're a film buff, you'll soon find that there are a lot of great films that look their best on blu-ray, but fall just a couple of hairs short of reference eye candy and there are a number of incredibly impressive visual feasts for the eyes that are not great films.

IMO, it just seems to work that way.

It's rare to find both in in the same package.

 

[Johnny Vinyl]

You're comparing apples to oranges here. The Lives of Others was never meant to be a blow' em away extravaganza, so to even suggest a comparison to a shoot'em up Hollywood blockbuster is ludicrous.

In terms of the genre that is The Lives of Others...let me quote this from a review:

Framed at 2.35:1, this 1080p high definition image is almost flawless, and is, in my opinion, the de facto reference disc for the drama genre.

 

[Mark (Basspig) Weiss]

I was impressed with the detail and clarity of The International. Also pretty good was SALT. The latter also had a good audio track.
I liked the color grading and the general look of Changeling. It had a soft, warm glow about the lighting and colors that was very "1920s".
In animation, Final Fantasy Advent Children was gorgeous. Also check out Ghost in the Shell 2.0.

I have Monsters on order, because I hear it looks pretty good and it was shot in digital HD, using the exact same camera that I use to shoot orchestra videos. I will report on it after it arrives and I've had a chance to digest what I've seen.

 

[Lee]

I'm watching Live Free or Die Hard now and it looks spectacular.

 

[Mark (Basspig) Weiss]

Yep. For picture quality, I'll go for Planet Earth. Digital animation is too easy. Nature film that looks that amazing and takes full advantage of 1080p is a wonder to behold. And while we're on the subject, am I the only one who thinks full 1080p only matters on big screens? It seems to me that the difference between 1080 and 720 is lost of a 50" TV from more than 10 feet or so...

Tim

I'm surprised you consider Planet Earth to look good. It was shot with a first generation HD Cam from Sony and it wasn't even full raster and the CODEC used by the camera wasn't as good as we have today and the picture was (cough, cough) .. interlaced. In the helicopter scenes over dense trees, you could see the CODEC artifacts blatantly. In addition, the camera only had about 7-8 f-stops of lattitude and there were a lot of blown highlights. Noise levels were also a constant distraction.
The cinematography was very good however. But picture quality? It's pretty far down on my list.

 

[Johnny Vinyl]

I'm surprised you consider Planet Earth to look good. It was shot with a first generation HD Cam from Sony and it wasn't even full raster and the CODEC used by the camera wasn't as good as we have today and the picture was (cough, cough) .. interlaced. In the helicopter scenes over dense trees, you could see the CODEC artifacts blatantly. In addition, the camera only had about 7-8 f-stops of lattitude and there were a lot of blown highlights. Noise levels were also a constant distraction.
The cinematography was very good however. But picture quality? It's pretty far down on my list.

While I agree that it is NO Baraka, PE still offers up plenty and I'm suprised that someone would rank it way down the list. Remember also that there has been a significant amount of confusion about the actual transfer, and I have yet to hear the definitive answer. Supposedly the U.S. version with Sigourney Weaver is a 1080i and the British David Attenborough a 1080p transfer.

 

[Mark (Basspig) Weiss]

I have the British version and it looks like the BBC has chosen to use a number of Panasonic AJ-HDC27FE (Varicam) High Definition Camcorders to film the topside footage. It's a bit dated now. HD cameras have improved a LOT since 2005-6 when this was shot. Most of this footage, with rare exceptions, seems to be from 720P source material, upsampled to 1080P. I also note a fair amount of lens chromatic aberrations in many of the segments on several of the discs.

 

[rsbeck]

You're comparing apples to oranges here. The Lives of Others was never meant to be a blow' em away extravaganza, so to even suggest a comparison to a shoot'em up Hollywood blockbuster is ludicrous. In terms of the genre that is The Lives of Others...let me quote this from a review:

I wrote that Lives "received an excellent transfer to blu-ray."

I think it is also clear that I intended to put Lives of Others in a separate category from Shoot 'Em Up.

I wrote, "I would put this in the category of terrific films that will impress on blu-ray, but won't challenge for the blow 'em away extravaganza."

I agree that it would be ludicrous to suggest that Lives of Others was intended to be a blow 'em away visual extravaganza, but as far as I can see, that idea was not introduced by me.

It was introduced by you.

<scratching head>


.

 

[Johnny Vinyl]

I wrote that Lives "received an excellent transfer to blu-ray."

I think it is also clear that I intended to put Lives of Others in a separate category from Shoot 'Em Up.

I wrote, "I would put this in the category of terrific films that will impress on blu-ray, but won't challenge for the blow 'em away extravaganza."

I agree that it would be ludicrous to suggest that Lives of Others was intended to be a blow 'em away visual extravaganza, but as far as I can see, that idea was not introduced by me.

It was introduced by you.

<scratching head>


.

I reread your original post, and I admit I responded carelessly. For that I apologize.

 

[Phelonious Ponk]

I'm surprised you consider Planet Earth to look good. It was shot with a first generation HD Cam from Sony and it wasn't even full raster and the CODEC used by the camera wasn't as good as we have today and the picture was (cough, cough) .. interlaced. In the helicopter scenes over dense trees, you could see the CODEC artifacts blatantly. In addition, the camera only had about 7-8 f-stops of lattitude and there were a lot of blown highlights. Noise levels were also a constant distraction.
The cinematography was very good however. But picture quality? It's pretty far down on my list.

No doubt I'm influenced by the material. I long for decent transfers of good cinematography of material like Planet Earth. I'd be perfectly happy to stream salt at less than 480p. I can easily imagine better fidelity in old recordings of David Crosby over SOTA Justin Bieber, too. My personal expectation bias, I suppose.

Tim

 

[Lee]

Watched The Social Network. Great movie, mediocre transfer.

 

[rsbeck]

I didn't scrutinize it that carefully, but the transfer seemed okay to me. Did you spot some problems?

 

[amirm]

I just went though all of my planet earth discs trying to find reference material. As noted, only a handful of scenes do that. I think the appeal there is that the material is interesting and when you add good color and resolution to it, it really is captivating. HD DVDs of Planet Earth were #1 seller for a long time after the format came. Even block busters could not unseat it for extended amount of time.

 

[audioguy]

I picked up a Demo Disk I found by searching on AVS

He charges about $60 or you can download it free if you have a burner. He changed a few of the clips from the ones listed below but it is FUN to use. Highly recommended !!!

 

[Lee]

I didn't scrutinize it that carefully, but the transfer seemed okay to me. Did you spot some problems?

Not anything horrific but it just did not have the black levels of some other discs. It seemed really grainy in places but to an extent I don't remember the theater version being.

I remember an AVS forum thread on BD picture quality but I cannot find it anymore.

 

[rsbeck]

Fincher uses HD Digital cameras, so there shouldn't be any grain. There can be video noise, however, but I am guessing that some of the problems seen in The Social Network are in the source material, not the transfer. Blacks can be problem with HD Video, there can be noise in low-light situations, some crushing of blacks, some banding. Fincher also did Zodiac and there was a lot of debate about that film, too.

The blacks in this film, just like those in Zodiac, look good to me (Sim2 C3X1080), but others complained about the blacks in Zodiac and now you're complaining about them in Social Network. Maybe various gear handles reproduction of this material differently?

In general, I think Fincher and his cinematographer do a nice job with HD Video and are pretty adept at avoiding the pitfalls.

I prefer the look of film for films, but he's the director and it's his choice of medium.

I think I would file any problems with PQ on this title under director's intent.

 

[Lee]

It's possible but the black levels in Live Free were perfectly displayed by the 570 so I don't think the player was the issue. I could be wrong.

 

[Mark (Basspig) Weiss]

Planet Earth's strong point is the baffling production setups they have managed to accomplish in remote, hard to reach locations, like underground caves. Those smooth track and dolly camera moves are what make it visually beautiful. But the topic was about image quality, which I assumed meant pixel resolution, color quality, etc. Cinematography is a little different matter.

 

[rsbeck]

It's possible but the black levels in Live Free were perfectly displayed by the 570 so I don't think the player was the issue. I could be wrong.

Live Free or Die Hard was shot on film. In general, I think film is better at handing low light situations. There are lots of variables to consider for our differing reactions to the black levels in Network.

I didn't come away from the experience thinking the PQ was demo-worthy. I also tend to lower my expectations when watching a film shot on HD digital.

Coming from LFoDH, your next blu-ray had a tough act to follow.

I came away from Network thinking, "for a film shot in digital, they did a pretty good job."

My expectations may have colored, so to speak, my reaction.

 

[Mark (Basspig) Weiss]

I saw the Monsters movie on Blu-ray a few hours ago on my 12' screen and was pretty amazed with how it looked. Of course, I may be biased, as I own 3 of the same HD camera that was used to make this entire film. That said, the director did make some mistakes which I would have avoided, but over all, he did very well, considering this film was shot, traveling light, guerilla-style in five countries, mostly south America.
The picture was smooth and mostly noiseless on the daytime scenes. A few of the camp scenes at night where they had virtually no light, had grain/noise. I would have used some type of lighting to augment so that using electronic gain would not be necessary. But the film overall maintained good dynamic range.. night scenes were truly dark, but detailed into the shadows. The film had warmer earthtone palette, more typical of the RED camera. It looked better than Pan's Labyrinth, which was shot on film, had more dynamic range and better exposed without excessively blown highlights.
What I didn't like was so many non-stablized hand held shots, especially walking shots. Since Gone With the Wind, I have been a lover of sweeping vistas and smooth dolly shots.
I did a little shooting myself a couple of nights ago, in a stage production that had a blackout background and some incredibly-saturated primary colors in the outfits of the musicians.





The compression of web graphics utterly destroys the image quality, but I can tell you that the original footage looked like being there. I'm a fan of the trend of digital cinema, for it's 20/20 vision-like clarity and accurate colors. Film is outdated. Grain is a look, but it's the look of fantasy, not reality, though maybe that's something storytellers want..