BLU RAY vs HD-DVD QUALITY STANDARDS

BLU-RAY AND HD-DVD MOVIE QUALITY STANDARDS

Ok, so im not going to review the movies, as that would only be my opinion, and that is not what this blog is about! When a movie studio releases a movie on the blu-ray or HD-DVD format, the result is dependent on a couple things.

1) A successful transfer to the HD format from what ever format the movie was originally shot on. Some movies are shot on 35mm film. Others are shot on HD-CAM. Film has the ability to be transfered to any resolution. In the years to come, the ULTRA-HD format may see the light of day. The reported resolution for Ultra-HD is 7,680 × 4,320 pixels!!! That's about hmmmmm, four times the quality of 1080p! Film has the ability to be transfered to that and any other resolution.

2) The appropriate use of compression codecs used. There are several codecs being used at the moment. All are just different ways of compressing the film footage to an HD format. AVC, MPEG-2, MPEG-4, VC-1 are some of the major ones. They all have different properties. MPEG-2 for example has large file sizes whereas VC-1 has proven to have excellent picture quality while maintaining small file sizes. Superman Returns for example was shot on the much touted Panavision Genesis cameras. Both the Blu-Ray and HD-DVD versions of this film had very average picture quality. Something went wrong somewhere! Perhaps it was the compression method used?

So that's the basic run down. People have seen a poorly transfered film to one of the HD formats and judged the entire format on it. NOT the formats fault! Both formats are capable of producing a near flawless picture.

AVSForum have an excellent post with picture quality ratings for both HD-DVD and Blu-Ray. I happen to agree with 99% of the ratings, so I'll reference their site which is updated regularly:


Blu-Ray Picture Quality Ratings


HD-DV Picture Quality Ratings



Happy watching and remember to stay objective and not one-sided!!!!