UHD Titles Worth/Not Worth Upgrading [Archive]

[Finch]

I actually hadn't added Bringing Out The Dead to the OP yet because I wanted to see more feedback first but also because I'd prefer not to have to edit the OP more often than necessary. I'd rather wait a little longer to avoid having to move one title from one tier to another.

[JamesF]

David Mackenzie replied to my question at BR about the encode of The Chronicles of Riddick and he actually did the encodes of all discs in the set. The mentioning of Engine House is (another) Arrow printing error in the booklet.

It may not have been a printing error as such - booklets typically go to press some time before discs, and the information may have been correct at the time.

For example, I'm listed as the QC inspector on Arrow's original 2013 BD of Cinema Paradiso, which was certainly the plan, but in the event I got bogged down on another project and someone else took over. And I'm listed as the Technical Producer of Indicator's The Bingo Long Traveling All-Stars and Motor Kings, a film I haven't seen to this day - again, I was supposed to oversee it but in the event there were no problems with the supplied materials so my involvement wasn't needed.

Thank you for that! Your perspective "from the trenches" is always interesting and learning that booklets are usually printed earlier was certainly new to me.
It is understandable as they're releasing the film simultaneously in the UK and US, which probably takes even more time off their schedule once the release is announced.

Just to add to this as the producer 100% responsible for said error - yes, when the Word doc with the booklet text was originally sent to the designers some weeks before authoring actually commenced, it was believed that Leroy from the Engine House would be authoring this due to a conflict with David’s schedule, which subsequently cleared up. However, without wanting to sound like I’m making excuses for myself, the booklet sign-off coincided with a general clusterfuck of deadlines at the same time that included the latest Shawscope set, and I totally missed it even though David was already well underway on the authoring. Again, 100% my error, and I’d planned to post something when I was back from holiday in Toronto, but you guys beat me to it. Before I went away I asked our new Production Assistant (who briefs the project to the designer and helps with the proofing) to use “TBC” for placeholders in future and add another layer of checks on credits before sign-off. Sorry everyone, David most of all!

[dwk]

I actually hadn't added Bringing Out The Dead to the OP yet because I wanted to see more feedback first but also because I'd prefer not to have to edit the OP more often than necessary. I'd rather wait a little longer to avoid having to move one title from one tier to another.

I am curious, since Bringing Out the Dead was never released on Blu-ray until this UHD and said UHD is the only way to get the Blu-ray, is it necessary to even list it? Or any title that goes from DVD to UHD. Unless the UHD is some hideous abomination, I can't imagine a case where even a flawed UHD isn't a substantial upgrade over a DVD. I had assumed this thread was mainly to discuss upgrades from Blu-ray to UHD or comparing one UHD release to another UHD?

[therewillbeblus]

That would also make it automatically a Red release, I'd think, since Blue is usually reserved for how substantial an upgrade it is over previous BDs

[nicolas]

It may not have been a printing error as such - booklets typically go to press some time before discs, and the information may have been correct at the time.

For example, I'm listed as the QC inspector on Arrow's original 2013 BD of Cinema Paradiso, which was certainly the plan, but in the event I got bogged down on another project and someone else took over. And I'm listed as the Technical Producer of Indicator's The Bingo Long Traveling All-Stars and Motor Kings, a film I haven't seen to this day - again, I was supposed to oversee it but in the event there were no problems with the supplied materials so my involvement wasn't needed.

Thank you for that! Your perspective "from the trenches" is always interesting and learning that booklets are usually printed earlier was certainly new to me.
It is understandable as they're releasing the film simultaneously in the UK and US, which probably takes even more time off their schedule once the release is announced.

Just to add to this as the producer 100% responsible for said error - yes, when the Word doc with the booklet text was originally sent to the designers some weeks before authoring actually commenced, it was believed that Leroy from the Engine House would be authoring this due to a conflict with David’s schedule, which subsequently cleared up. However, without wanting to sound like I’m making excuses for myself, the booklet sign-off coincided with a general clusterfuck of deadlines at the same time that included the latest Shawscope set, and I totally missed it even though David was already well underway on the authoring. Again, 100% my error, and I’d planned to post something when I was back from holiday in Toronto, but you guys beat me to it. Before I went away I asked our new Production Assistant (who briefs the project to the designer and helps with the proofing) to use “TBC” for placeholders in future and add another layer of checks on credits before sign-off. Sorry everyone, David most of all!

No problem James, glad everything’s now sorted out and people were made aware. I wouldn’t have brought this up anyway had David not confirmed it himself on the other forum and mentioned that a similar error happened before with Wild Things. Here’s what he wrote: “It appears the credit in the booklet is incorrect. This has happened a few times before (Wild Things I think was another that was mis-credited to our friends at the Engine House).”

[Finch]

I forgot that BOTD never had a BD until now, and as you say, the BD is only available as part of the 4K, so I can see the side of the argument that it should be a Red anyway. Especially when I said in the OP that Red means Reference OR most significant upgrade. If they had released the 4K and BD separately, then it might feel more appropriate to stick the 4K in the blue column. I'll hold off until Nicholas has watched the 4K (maybe it's a Great in DV only disc?) and maybe the BD because it'd be interesting to hear how the BD is handled.

[nicolas]

I’ve now got Bringing out the Dead and the 4K is a Good in DV disc. If you’re DV compatible, the 4K UHD is a modest “upgrade” to the very nicely encoded BD solely due to the HDR grade which brings out Robert Richardson’s bleach bypass look even further than the SDR grade. In HDR, the film looks appropriately washed out, drab and dark whereas in SDR it’s a more colorful and flashy experience but it also looks great to me. Due to the quite drastic grading differences, I wonder which one is more correct and reflective of Richardson’s vision.

Encoding on the 4K is really just average and more on the level of KL. I was actually surprised as people called this a flawless release (in capital letters) because the increased resolution of the 4K affects the highlights more and also brighter ares that aren’t highlights, such as the surface of the ambulance. In HDR10, it’s very blocky and just not good. DV FEL restores some of the visual information and in my mind makes for a seamless viewing experience in motion where the blockiness is generally only subtly present. The UHD is a BD-66.

The BD on the other hand looks as if one of the top authoring houses did it as the troublesome spots in the 4K resolve beautifully. Objectively, grain resolves better across the board on the BD but the slight difference to the 4K is that the encoder took the top off the grain and applied a touch of filtering to ease the encode - similar to what Criterion’s doing. Since the film is largely very dark, that isn’t a problem and the resolution increase on the 4K is not significant enough to write the BD off.

Audio-wise, it’s true that the UHD has Atmos and the BD a Dolby TrueHD 5.1 mix. Since I haven’t seen the full film yet, I’m not familiar with the mix but the Atmos doesn’t come across as something overtly revisionist. Both tracks have a similar volume and the Atmos didn’t sound much wider and dynamic either. It could be that the 5.1 is a downmix but someone else needs to dive into that.

The new interviews range from 6 to 14 minutes and can be found on the BD! By the way, the BD is region A locked and the top menu trick on Panasonic players does not work on region B players.

Another thing: Finch, for the future, I’ll wait with sharing early judgments and impressions especially with studios and labels like Paramount until more voices join the conversation.

[bfaison]

I’ve got to strongly disagree with you recommending the BD over UHD because of encode, the HDR for this makes Richardson’s cinematography look as it should and swapping back to the BD is a completely flat experience in comparison. There is zero chance I’d ever watch the film on BD in the future after seeing the UHD and while I can see in motion the issue with the highlights its nowhere near bad enough to knock this down from a blue category listing. I’m also seeing the optical fade mentioned on the other forum and wondering if that’s a mistake. It’s like most opticals where they “snap” back to full resolution once the fade is complete except here it “snaps” back to original luminance.

[mfunk9786]

Hello! If you've come here to discuss new releases or reissues, please follow me to UHD New Releases, Reissues, and Upgrades. Discussions on the quality of these titles is obviously permissible, but if it gets in the weeds it's going to be moved over.

If you've come here to discuss HDR encoding, color timing, and all things technical information on these discs, please follow me to UHD Encodes and Technical Discussion. Feel free to navel gaze about these topics to your heart's content in their appropriate thread.

This thread will remain locked and available for your reference in full. Finch's excellent lead post exists in the New Releases/Reissues thread.