SD Blu Ray

Discussion in 'Visual Arts' started by DarylB, Mar 25, 2015.

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  1. DarylB

    DarylB Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Hello folks,
    This is my very first thread but wrote replies on other people's threads.Two years ago,Eagle Rock Entertainment released a new format called SD Blu Ray.I understand it's a format disc with video that was only done in standard definition as opposed being done in high definition but the audio makes up for it.My questions is do you like the format and its idea?Do you think other companies will later pick up on it and release their catalogs?I read somewhere back when it was being,it should open the floodgates for other studios.Please give your opinions and thoughts!Thanks.
     
  2. Have several of these titles...it's a worthwhile tradeoff IMO...you get lossless 24-bit stereo & surround soundtracks for these concerts and the video, while still only standard definition, is as good as it's ever going to look...
     
  3. Deesky

    Deesky Forum Resident

    I'd rather trade off sound quality than video quality. An SD-Bluray? The idea sounds daft to me.
     
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  4. BeatleJWOL

    BeatleJWOL Senior Member

    Except that in the cases thus far, there is absolutely no tradeoff as the SD Blus contain material that will never and can never be available in HD. It's just upscaled on the disc as opposed to trusting a $50 player with the job.

    I'm sure the laziness will kick in down the road, of course.
     
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  5. Deesky

    Deesky Forum Resident

    I see, okay then, fair enough,
     
  6. BeatleJWOL

    BeatleJWOL Senior Member

    I had the same thought, believe me, and I will definitely be doing my digging before buying any of them :p
     
  7. Jrr

    Jrr Forum Resident

    I just got the Bee Gees One Night Only in this format and it's going back to Amazon. Picture quality was not good, and although the sound was great, it is great on my standard DVD. No more SD Blu Rays for me! They are only going to muddy the reputation of blu rays. This format should not have the term blu ray in it. If it can't be upconverted to blu ray, it needs to be called something else.
     
  8. amoergosum

    amoergosum Forum Resident

    Location:
    Germany
    If the source material is in SD, I'd still love to purchase quite a number of concerts on Blu-ray.

    - lossless audio
    - the SD material will still look better on Blu-ray (not as many artefacts)

    For example, "Nirvana Live & Loud" was only released on DVD (source material was SD). I'd love to
    own it on Blu-ray because of the lossless audio.
     
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  9. MichaelCPE

    MichaelCPE Forum Resident

    I watched the SD blu-ray of Lou Reed live at Montreaux in 2000 just last night.

    Of course the picture is only SD as that is the way it was shot. But I love this upgrade (I had the DVD before it) because of the significant improvement in the sound quality. The surround mix is incredible and works really well for this concert.

    If the audio of this concert was released in hi-rez on it's own I think it would get praise in this forum. But because there is video it seems that the amazing audio gets ignored and the disc dismissed as just a concert video.

    So as long as the buyer is aware that the video is only SD, I think the concept is great because the hi-rez audio can make a huge difference.
     
  10. GeoffC

    GeoffC Forum Resident

    A while back a good friend of mine showed me a DVD of Marcus Miller live which had what looked like an HD picture. I think it even said HD DVD on the box, and I have to say it the sound and picture were both excellent!
     
  11. Vidiot

    Vidiot Now in 4K HDR!

    Location:
    Hollywood, USA
    Upconverting standard-def material to Blu-ray doesn't really gain you anything. You can still have surround-sound on regular DVD. I don't buy that there's any improvement anywhere. Once the project is shot or edited in standard-def, it's doomed forever to be in SD.

    There are ways to remaster standard-def material to make it look better, but I don't see the point at uprezzing it to HD. If the material was shot on film, then it's basically resolution-independent, and you can rescan the films in HD (or even 4K) and get more visual information out of it. But if it was shot in standard-def video (videotape or digital), it's doomed.

    That's correct. Now, it's possible that the people doing the uprezzing have access to sophisticated algorithms that could actually make the final HD image look better than it would being uprezzed from a Blu-ray player. But it'll be a subtle difference at best.
     
  12. MichaelCPE

    MichaelCPE Forum Resident

    The Lou Reed concert looks like SD, so whether or not the upconversion for my TV was done beforehand for the blu-ray or in my system doesn't make much difference. And as the product was advertised as SD quality video it's what I expected.

    The reason for upgrading from DVD is all to do with the audio, and to me there is a huge difference between good blu-ray quality hi-rez audio and the lossy system used on DVD.
     
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  13. Deesky

    Deesky Forum Resident

    There is no technical reason why so called 'hi-rez' audio cannot be put on a DVD. It's just a digital file storage medium just like a bluray disk, and given the low quality video, there should be enough space on a DVD to fit it all in. The only reason why this may or may not be happening (I don't know for sure as I don't but DVDs) is for marketing reasons. But if that's the case, then they're devaluing the bluray brand by putting on SD quality video.
     
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  14. MichaelCPE

    MichaelCPE Forum Resident

    There are several very good reasons:

    One is that DVD has a maximum bit rate of about 10Mbps. So you can only have hi-rez audio on the disc if you don't have video.

    The second reason - which is key - is that DVD players are designed to play DVDs - not any data file that is put on the disc. That is why when they put lossless hi-rez onto a DVD they had to create a new standard - DVD-Audio.
     
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  15. Lonson

    Lonson I'm in the kitchen with the Tombstone Blues

    Yes, I can personally understand that this would be great for concert videos, any material where high quality audio could be best presented--Blu-ray holds great potential for audio playback, far greater than DVD. (DVD-A as Michael points out is a different animal.)

    I think they should have just not created a market term "SD Blu-Ray." Just call it a Blu-ray and note that the video material was not originally shot in a format that would allow High Definition playback. Stress the high resolution audio. Those interested in the material would get it. Bad marketing move as is as it seems to create misunderstanding and negative bias.
     
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  16. DarylB

    DarylB Forum Resident Thread Starter

    I asked do you think the major companies will support it?
     
  17. daglesj

    daglesj Forum Resident

    Location:
    Norfolk, UK
    Plus you can have the SD video mastered and pushed out at 20Mbps rate than say the more usual 5Mbps/4GB size that most DVDs are nowadays. Every little helps.
     
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  18. There is no such format as SD-BD.
     
  19. liveshowz

    liveshowz Forum Resident

    Location:
    On Tour
    does it need to be upconverted ?? (on the disc)


    I personally would love this 'format' to be used more for older source material..
    leave it SD resolution.
    gimme lossless stereo/surround...

    And lots of hours of playing time...
     
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  20. ferdinandhudson

    ferdinandhudson Forum Resident

    Location:
    Skåne
    No it doesn't need to be upconverted. There are a number of titles being issued on blu-ray in Germany in standard definition, most commonly tv series, cramming several episodes onto a lesser number of discs than a DVD release would normally get. Usually branded as "Standard Definition on Blu-ray" or words to that effect.
     
  21. DarylB

    DarylB Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Which TV series are you talking about,German television shows or domestic shows?
     
  22. guidedbyvoices

    guidedbyvoices Old Dan's Records

    Location:
    Alpine, TX
    I recall owning some DVDs that were compressed and macroblocked images like Beatles anthology. I'd take an sd Blu if it had the best sd image plus lossless soubd
     
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  23. ferdinandhudson

    ferdinandhudson Forum Resident

    Location:
    Skåne
    Both German and US TV shows, some animated shows although most of these releases only feature the German dubbed audio. One notable exception, which is due to be released shortly, is the complete series of Parker Lewis Can't Lose which according to the distributor will have the original audio as well as the German dub.

    It should also be noted that these are 50Hz and virtually unplayable on most US-/Canada-based BD players.
     
    Last edited: Mar 25, 2015
  24. mj_patrick

    mj_patrick Senior Member

    Location:
    Elkhart, IN, USA
    I'm okay with it as long as it's marketed as such. We're already getting lots of SD material on blu-ray for bonus content. I would rather have lossless audio whenever possible. If it's older content previously offered on something like the "first wave" of DVDs where the MPEG video encoding had issues (lesser quality, encoding artifacts, etc), I would welcome the improved video compression a modern SD blu-ray could offer.

    I'm still wondering how bad SD content will look on 4K.
     
  25. Vidiot

    Vidiot Now in 4K HDR!

    Location:
    Hollywood, USA
    It's B.S. I'm not convinced anybody can hear the difference. To me, any qualitative difference you're going to hear is purely in the mastering, particularly with video sound, and particularly with 640mbps, which is extremely benign. Sure, there's a difference theoretically between lossless and 640mbps, but I suspect if you were able to do an A/B comparison, you'd never be able to pick it out 10 out of 10 times, not with the same master.
     
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