Lord of the rings DVD quality....not good [Archive]

Founder

6th August 2002, 02:33

I just bought the lord of the rings DVD (R4,PAL) and the encoding quality was not good. I have a large collection of DVDs and this looks the worst. In shadows and dark places there is a lot of pixelisation. It makes some parts almost unwatchable (ie moria and when frodo puts on the ring). You can see the difference between the encoding of the movie and the encoding of the preview of the game on the second disc, the preview is much better.

Is this the experiance of other lotr watchers?

I would like to make some tests of the video quality and compare it with other titles, does anyone know how I could do this? ( appart from with my eyes)

tanksimpson

6th August 2002, 04:56

I'm bummed to hear this, but I'm not surprised. It's a long-ass movie, and there's only so many bits to go around. I'll wait for the special edition coming out in November - hopefully it will be better.

Zhnujm

6th August 2002, 20:24

can you post a screenshot of this ?
im not a quality freak but i can compare it with my version. (R2 PAL)
dont see a low quality in my first look, i must say.

Slogra

6th August 2002, 21:45

The bitrate of my PAL (uk) version is 8.500 Mbps. It looks very good, even in high action scenes. I've attached a screenshot...

Maybe you got you set the brightness of your monitor/tv too high?

theReal

7th August 2002, 00:11

I've seen a 2CD Divx Rip of the DVD Screener and it looked like it had been a hard job to encode it to a decent quality.

diji1

7th August 2002, 04:48

hi - well, i have just watched the R4 LOTR DVD on my monitor. i can't say that i noticed any really bad quality scenes ( compared to the norm ), although i was kinda only half watching it being occupied with other things for some of the time. perhaps you were noticing edge enhancement artifacts ? seemed to have been applied quite strongly on that DVD. bah.

check this link -> http://home.t-online.de/home/bjoern.roy/Guide_EE/Html/Page_01.htm if you want some more info on edge enhancement. it's a lot easier to see on a monitor or large screen / high res television, but quite often you can see it on a conventional tv if you look closely.

ookzDVD

7th August 2002, 04:50

@Founder,

I think no people complaint about the DVD quality in the
DVDempire.

So.. I guess it was a bad DVD transfer :(

theReal

7th August 2002, 06:11

from www.currentfilm.com
VIDEO: New Line presents "Lord of the Rings" in 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen. [...]
Sharpness and detail are marvelous, as the film not only boasts a terrifically well-defined appearance, but wonderful fine detail - hairs and other such details are clearly visible. The picture often also offers solid depth and a smooth, clean appearance.

Yet, the picture falls just shy of perfection. Edge enhancement, noticable - if slight and only briefly visible - was occasionally spotted. Other than that, there really weren't any concerns; the print looked crisp and clean, with no marks, specks or scratches, and no pixelation or other faults were seen.

Colors were reproduced beautifully, appearing completely natural and with no smearing. Black level remained solid, while flesh tones looked accurate and natural. Some brief, slight edge enhancement does not detract from what is otherwise an absolutely outstanding transfer

maybe you just got a copy of the DVD screener? As far as I could tell from the Divx conversion of that screener, it seemed to be similar in quality to the first Die Hard III release: weak colors, edge enhancement, artefacts. Nothing at all like in this description.

ozmale

7th August 2002, 06:43

Please correct me if I am wrong. But I think the opening post will be a DVD Made or Pressed in Australia.
I am an Austrailian and my DVD collection exceeds 750. In the earily days I use to by my DVD's from the USA on the net then bought them locally when the dollar crashed. So I have a lot of double copies. I have gone back to buying them from the USA.

The rule is NEVER BUY A DVD ENCODED/MADE IN AUSTRALIA the quality is always bad compared to the overseas version. We just or can't do it right.

regards
Ozmale

theReal

7th August 2002, 06:52

If you also have ntsc in Australia, why don't they just sell the US version with another region code? Wouldn't that be more cost-effective?

ozmale

7th August 2002, 07:00

In answer to The real.

I don't really know. We are a PAL system in Australia. but the DVD's In Australia are always different to overseas versions. Often different additional features or none at all. One particular movie was 12 minutes shorter than the us version. Just so it could be fitted on a single layer disc.

windtrader

7th August 2002, 07:50

I just finished watching a R1 version and the pic quality is very good. I'm a bit suprised that the encoding maching can not create outputs for multiple regions at the same time. I guess there are a lot of other differences such as different audio tracks, menus, credits, etc, that are unique to each region.

wmansir

7th August 2002, 08:09

TheReal:

I'm getting the DVD tommorow, but I have a 4 disc SVCD from the DVD screener which looks very good. Pehaps it was a bad divx encode.

Latexxx

7th August 2002, 11:25

Originally posted by ozmale
In answer to The real.

I don't really know. We are a PAL system in Australia. but the DVD's In Australia are always different to overseas versions. Often different additional features or none at all. One particular movie was 12 minutes shorter than the us version. Just so it could be fitted on a single layer disc.

It's propably shorter because when movies are converted to pal the playback speed is changed, so you'll get a 25 fps progressive movie. When doing it ntsc, they add extra fields and you'll got 29 fps interlaced dvd which playback time is same than original movies, while pal goes faster. The same thing is why american tv-shows/series are shorter in europe.

dvd2svcd

7th August 2002, 12:56

I have heard that almost 90% of the DVD's R2 in Australia is interlaced where as it is the opposite in Europe. Maybe you could try ordering LOTR from amazon UK division and compare the two versions.

theReal

7th August 2002, 16:36

wmansir,
I didn't mean the quality of the divx was bad - I mean I was still able to see what the quality of the DVD must have been like, so the Divx is pretty good.
If you encode Die Hard III (first release) with 100% quality, it's a good Divx, but the movie still doesn't look really good. Then you can see it's not the Divx's but the DVD's fault.

Talking about bad DVD quality and bad Divx quality is two different leagues. With bad quality for DVD I meant something like The Big Lebowsky (R2) or Die Hard III (R1 non-anamorphic), compared to good quality like Con Air (R2, anamorphic).

Founder

8th August 2002, 00:17

diji1, your absolutly right. The problem is edge enhancement artifacts. You can especially see them when the scene fades to dark( ie at the start, around the moon). Also, when you zoom in you can see the effect very noticably. I was watching on a conventional TV (51cm) and it was very distracting. It looks like I'll have to get the special edition from Overseas.

bah

tenebrenz

8th August 2002, 01:32

I have heard that almost 90% of the DVD's R2 in Australia is interlaced where as it is the opposite in Europe. Maybe you could try ordering LOTR from amazon UK division and compare the two versions.
A good number of movies that I have got from Australia have been nasty NTSC to PAL convesions. There is one company RBC (they also have a few other names) that release stuff with "digitally remastered from original print" written on the cover and they look like they are conversions of old NTSC tapes. They are damn cheap but it's not worth it.

Commander XJL

8th August 2002, 03:13

I rented this movie (in America) and it looks beautiful

theReal

8th August 2002, 05:01

They are damn cheap but it's not worth it.We also have such releases in Germany, but usually not when the movie is still new. After a year or so, you can buy these in the supermarket and usually they only have German audio and no extras (plus a bad picture quality...)

auenf

8th August 2002, 05:21

Originally posted by tenebrenz

A good number of movies that I have got from Australia have been nasty NTSC to PAL convesions. There is one company RBC (they also have a few other names) that release stuff with "digitally remastered from original print" written on the cover and they look like they are conversions of old NTSC tapes. They are damn cheap but it's not worth it.

firstly, for all those people in australia, i do the authoring for Flashback Home Entertainment (www.flashbackentertainment.com) and we have samples of basically all the other budget players, and RBC arent the worst, payless is by a long way (RBC does crap NTSC transfers, Payless takes a VHS and puts it on DVD, you can see the bad tracking at the top.

most of the majors, ie warner, fox, etc, acutally make the same master for europe and australia, ie, R2 and R4 disc.

as for dvd replication in australia, there is only a couple of places that will produce good quality, but it costs, and basically everything is made off shore (asia) where the quality is either great, or crap (ie CD duplication plant slightly modified to make DVD's.

Enf...

Slogra

16th August 2002, 21:19

Oh no, my R2(UK) version DOES have artifacts! At first i didn't notice it but i just watched the movie with no lights on and then i could clearly see the artifacts. It's really nasty in Chapter 11.
The problem is that the bitrate drops to very low in these dark scenes. I think this is a limitation of MPEG2 and i guess the R1 version will have it too.
I'll know soon enough because i already ordered the R1 version and i'll be able to compare both versions.

So here's another screenshot. You won't really notice it untill you look at this picture in FULLSCREEN and your lights dimmed.

Mrafrohead

16th August 2002, 23:19

This is a really wierd thing here...

I have heard of MANY people having problems with this particular DVD... It worked fine for me though. And other than taking a super long time, the encoding also went really well...

Take a gander - granted this isn't DVD source, it's from my DivX but it's really close to the original quality, so you should get to see that the problems mentioned above aren't on this particular disk.

Although, I am wondering if there were different batches made. I have friends whose disks, won't play in any of their DVD players. And I'm talking about multiple friends and multiple players with multiple disks... Not just one disk on a bunch of different players.

But that's my two cents and here's my clip...

Mrafrohead

grug2k

17th August 2002, 01:13

OK, here we go again.

I own both the R1 and R4 of LOTR. The exact same source was used for both films, then an NTSC transfer and a PAL transfer were created. The R2 and R4 versions are _exactly_ the same transfer.

The R4 looks better, hands down. The 3:2 pulldown makes the R1 judder and look absolutely horrible. The increased resolution of the PAL transfer is amazing in many scenes.

The soundtrack on the R4 has also been pitch-corrected so it sounds absolutely wonderful when played at the 25fps.

Also, I would like to know what movie was shortened by 12 minutes? Are you sure it wasn't just PAL 4% speedup or R2 censorship?

(Unfortunately, living in R4, sometimes they just give us R2 transfers which have already been cut by the BBFC.)

Also, some good R4 reviews of LOTR:
http://www.michaeldvd.com.au/Reviews/Reviews.asp?ReviewID=1715
http://www.dvd.net.au/review.cgi?review_id=1785

grug2k

17th August 2002, 01:15

I have heard that almost 90% of the DVD's R2 in Australia is interlaced where as it is the opposite in Europe. Maybe you could try ordering LOTR from amazon UK division and compare the two versions.

Er...if he wants to waste his money he can. The R2 and R4 are exactly the same.

R2 and R4 are generally the same transfers. (Which is why we sometimes get censored versions from the UK (Tomorrow Never Dies, Bridget Jones Diary.) Many discs are dual coded for both R2 and R4.

I have yet to see an interlaced movie in R4. The only interlaced material you will come across is NTSC conversions (ie, most NTSC TV shows), Anime, and stuff shot on DV.

So when do R4 transfers suck? Basically when its not a major company. Village Roadshow, Columbia Tri-Star, and 20th Century Fox generally give you the best transfers. Any big movie release will normally have a fantastic transfer.

MichaelDVD also has a R4 vs R1 section, where they compare the DVD to its R1 counterpart, on the basis of video quality, audio quality, and extras.

Currently there are 739 movies where R4 is the clear winner, and 331 where R4 is the clear loser, and 1836 where they're about even.

wmansir

17th August 2002, 01:58

Originally posted by grug2k

MichaelDVD also has a R4 vs R1 section, where they compare the DVD to its R1 counterpart, on the basis of video quality, audio quality, and extras.

Currently there are 739 movies where R4 is the clear winner, and 331 where R4 is the clear loser, and 1836 where they're about even.

I just checked out the site and have to say those numbers are a bit misleading. Many of the R4 winners are listed as winners because they are not available in R1 (or at least were not when reviewed) for example All Buffy, Friends, Stargate SG1, Southpark, and Asterix.

Still, the general trend seemed to be that the R4 discs won because of 16x9 enhancment or lost because of their lack of extras.

kaml20

17th August 2002, 04:31

But I had recieved LOTR through 4 cds (VCD version) 2 weeks after it came out in the theaters. Of course I quickly returned them to their rightfull owner and said no I do not want to copy them...

When I viewed this it was both marvolous and beautifull (which has absolutely no bearing right here and now). So what I wish to say is this America is corrupt as all hell, and when your in college movies are on your hd faster then they can come out of hollywood.

On second thought, what if say upon buying a dvd it was at extremely bad quality. You cannot just go and return it (because of the rediculous 24 hour returning policy) especially if you wait to view your dvd. Now this question seems to boggle my mind and If it comes down to it you should return it (if it is way way WAY bad like it might be) and if you cant remember just go to the next level...
someone (who worked for consumer reports) reported a faulty toaster 4 yrs after she had bought it and the company did nothing, she then went on to complain to some safety board (i forgot thier name) and they actually paid her for the toaster 40 bucks and she subsequently recieved a free toaster.

Me im either waiting for the special edition or until the complete set (all 3) are on DVD.

It seems to me that america is always backwords; the language, the measuring system and the dvd format(?) jesus we are stupid arent we?

grug2k

17th August 2002, 05:20

Originally posted by wmansir

I just checked out the site and have to say those numbers are a bit misleading.

Still, the general trend seemed to be that the R4 discs won because of 16x9 enhancment or lost because of their lack of extras.

I would agree with you, but my point was that often in their reviews they make reference to the R1 versions, for example:

[Addendum March 22, 2001: Having just taken delivery of a copy of the R1 Gladiator DVD, I can confirm the following. The R1 version suffers from significantly more aliasing artefacts, and the 3:2 pull-down effect in the slow-motion combat sequences makes them ever so slightly more jerky. In spite of all the recent arguments, and the absence of some features, the R4 disc is also slightly better in terms of transfer quality.]

And that particular DVD is marked as "Same" in the R4 vs R1.

Slogra

19th August 2002, 12:28

I've heard that the sound of the R1 version is better than R2, so that's the reason i've ordered R1 as well.

I just sell the one which will sucks the most (probably R2)

diji1

19th August 2002, 12:52

grug2k : Village Roadshow, Columbia Tri-Star, and 20th Century Fox generally give you the best transfers. Any big movie release will normally have a fantastic transfer.

i unfortunately would have to respectfully disagree with that ... well, partly anyhow. Columbia releases, i am led to believe, have edge-enhancement applied at a standard strength - _regardless_ of the source. for every film. yes, that's right, people making backups seem to be taking more time to assess the quality of their resulting video stream than the people doing the dvd transfer. just a thought.

phamilton

20th August 2002, 12:11

I purchased an R4 LOTR DVD over the counter a few days ago. Played on my stand-alone system (Toshiba SD1300) it is top quality.

phamilton

20th August 2002, 12:12

I purchased an R4 LOTR DVD over the counter a few days ago. Played on my stand-alone system (Toshiba SD1300) it is top quality.

smiller667

20th August 2002, 22:18

Originally posted by diji1
Columbia releases, i am led to believe, have edge-enhancement applied at a standard strength - _regardless_ of the source.I got a similar impression, the difference being all my CT DVDs are R1 ... to be precise, I just own a handful of those, but on some of them (older titles in particular), EE is a major nuisance, even on a crappy old TV set. I did conversions on a few of those - and yes, when you do conversions, you pay a lot of attention to the quality of the source material.

atcronin

21st August 2002, 10:03

i agree with orginal post.

i got a copy and i must say compared to most other dvds ive seen it didnt look that great. didnt seem to have the sharpness/crispness of most dvds ive seen.

oh and yep aussie. and i love PAL, imagine all those extra mintues we have saved by watching at our movies at 1/24 fps faster.

all in all i think my Xvid looks better then the dvd. on both my sony g420 and 59cm wega. but it is a 4cd rip. kinda excessive but it is one of those movies.

atcronin

21st August 2002, 10:06

oh and before some wanker goes on about its impossible to gain quality.
well perhaps i didnt gain quality technicaly, "bud mi eyesa goot" and to my eyes it looked better. even when comparing with ati dvd player, as powerdvd looks so crapnall.

dar1us

21st August 2002, 19:44

If only the whole world saw sense and changed to PAL

theReal

21st August 2002, 23:38

If only the whole world saw sense and changed to PAL
So you propose that all ntsc countries switch from 1954 technology to 1967 technology? ;)

I think we should better all switch over to 2002 technology...

dar1us

21st August 2002, 23:49

All the same, 25fps seems far more civilised than 29.976, what a crazy number:)

GregS

21st August 2002, 23:51

I wasn't aware that Pal was superior to NTSC ?

And theReal , if you reply to this post it will
put you over the top at 1000 posts .

dar1us

22nd August 2002, 00:02

i was just talking rubbish:) but i personally prefer it, better for calculating cut points and small insignificences like that. also, i find that many NTSCs are interlaced (yet 2 come across one not, though i aint had many).

GregS

22nd August 2002, 00:16

Hey dar1us , that's OK .I just thought someone knew
something I didn't , there has to be a first time!LOL

BTW I ripped LOTR ,R1 ,DVD2SVCD ,vbr 3pass , 3 cds and the
quality was excellent .

jggimi

22nd August 2002, 00:57

Originally posted by dar1us
...also, i find that many NTSCs are interlaced (yet 2 come across one not, though i aint had many). Well all Telecined frames are interlaced, because they are blends of fields from adjacent frames. It's pretty strange to come across one of those frames at a scene change... But the majority of NTSC transfers I've dealt with, other than Telecined frames, are progressive. I guess you just have a smaller sample. :cool:

grug2k

25th August 2002, 09:19

If anyone still cares, 4 reviewers from MicahelDVD did a VERY comprehensive comparisoin of the R1 and R4 discs as a result of the heated debate over the different versions. The results were quite surprising...

http://www.michaeldvd.com.au/Reviews/Reviews.asp?ReviewID=1715