Question:
I watched Women on the verge of a nervous breakdown today, taped off Channel 4 last Christmas.
It was an NTSC print, evident from the jerky nature of camera pans, plus of course the lousy picture quality.
But the yellow subtitles, which I have rarely if ever seen before on television, but often on R1 DVDs, made me wonder whether this print had been taken from a DVD...
Anyone know?
Great question - I suspect they must but does anyone know for sure?
Highly unlikely and getting more unlikely all the time.
TV stations would normally use digi beta tapes, but more and more of them are going totally computerised, so for the purposes of playout they would use computer files direct from a fileserver.
Semi-related point:
I have noticed over the last couple of years that TV channels are using much better prints than they used to. 5 or 6 years ago a movie would probably be sourced from a blurry scratched print. But most films shown on TV now look identical to a remastered DVD release.
So has the advent of DVD indirectly improved the quality of movies on TV, by providing much better versions than TV channels would previously have had access to? (In the sense that, without DVD, old movies would have no reason to be remastered, and only older prints would remain).
so the TV companies would obtain the same remastered prints that were used for the DVDs ?
i have noticed that too, was watching Tora Tora Tora the other week and man was the image quality fantastic !
Originally posted by KeyserSoze
i have noticed that too, was watching Tora Tora Tora the other week and man was the image quality fantastic !
Unfortunately the same cannot be said for Citizen Kane which was shown on BBC 4 (?) tonight - the image quality was very poor indeed.
What about Spartacus this afternoon? I haven't seen the film before but considering its 40 odd years old it was pretty impressive for a TV broadcast I thought - good film too, still the worst Kubrick film ive seen todate however, just got Paths Of Glory and Barry Lyndon to go now...
Well, I watched Bruce Lee's Way Of The Dragon at Christmas on C4, and not only were the subs the usual standard white font but C4 left it running after the credits; three screens of MegaStar copyright print (in Chinese/English) were shown. It was obviously the HK R3 disk, being shown on the fly.
As for the quality, pity they didn't use the HKL...
all prints of Way of the Dragon are pretty pants.
Originally posted by KeyserSoze
pretty pants.
My girlfriend wears them
think it depends on the channel in question...
as some have said, some channels the quality is almost as good as DVD. C4 & BBC1-2 seem to have very good prints.. some but not all sky premier films also.
the rest are variable at best.
watched a few Bogart films on TCM the other night and they were all pretty awful... really bad prints full of dirt and scratches.
Originally posted by Raphph
My girlfriend wears them
:nuts: I thought Girls wore knickers?, perhaps a word in her shell like is in order ;)
Only very slightly related to the topic at hand but a hotel I stayed at in Bali used to have it’s own channel (some kind of closed circuit thing I assume) and it played out a couple of movies a night from laserdisc - complete with side breaks and pauses when they put a new disc in! (max running time per side was 1 hour).
It was an NTSC print, evident from the jerky nature of camera pans, plus of course the lousy picture quality.
But the yellow subtitles, which I have rarely if ever seen before on television, but often on R1 DVDs, made me wonder whether this print had been taken from a DVD...
Anyone know?
Answers:
Great question - I suspect they must but does anyone know for sure?
Answers:
Highly unlikely and getting more unlikely all the time.
TV stations would normally use digi beta tapes, but more and more of them are going totally computerised, so for the purposes of playout they would use computer files direct from a fileserver.
Answers:
Semi-related point:
I have noticed over the last couple of years that TV channels are using much better prints than they used to. 5 or 6 years ago a movie would probably be sourced from a blurry scratched print. But most films shown on TV now look identical to a remastered DVD release.
So has the advent of DVD indirectly improved the quality of movies on TV, by providing much better versions than TV channels would previously have had access to? (In the sense that, without DVD, old movies would have no reason to be remastered, and only older prints would remain).
Answers:
so the TV companies would obtain the same remastered prints that were used for the DVDs ?
i have noticed that too, was watching Tora Tora Tora the other week and man was the image quality fantastic !
Answers:
Originally posted by KeyserSoze
i have noticed that too, was watching Tora Tora Tora the other week and man was the image quality fantastic !
Unfortunately the same cannot be said for Citizen Kane which was shown on BBC 4 (?) tonight - the image quality was very poor indeed.
Answers:
What about Spartacus this afternoon? I haven't seen the film before but considering its 40 odd years old it was pretty impressive for a TV broadcast I thought - good film too, still the worst Kubrick film ive seen todate however, just got Paths Of Glory and Barry Lyndon to go now...
Answers:
Well, I watched Bruce Lee's Way Of The Dragon at Christmas on C4, and not only were the subs the usual standard white font but C4 left it running after the credits; three screens of MegaStar copyright print (in Chinese/English) were shown. It was obviously the HK R3 disk, being shown on the fly.
As for the quality, pity they didn't use the HKL...
Answers:
all prints of Way of the Dragon are pretty pants.
Answers:
Originally posted by KeyserSoze
pretty pants.
My girlfriend wears them
Answers:
think it depends on the channel in question...
as some have said, some channels the quality is almost as good as DVD. C4 & BBC1-2 seem to have very good prints.. some but not all sky premier films also.
the rest are variable at best.
watched a few Bogart films on TCM the other night and they were all pretty awful... really bad prints full of dirt and scratches.
Answers:
Originally posted by Raphph
My girlfriend wears them
:nuts: I thought Girls wore knickers?, perhaps a word in her shell like is in order ;)
Answers:
Only very slightly related to the topic at hand but a hotel I stayed at in Bali used to have it’s own channel (some kind of closed circuit thing I assume) and it played out a couple of movies a night from laserdisc - complete with side breaks and pauses when they put a new disc in! (max running time per side was 1 hour).
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