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Post by nicadare on Nov 9, 2015 19:19:20 GMT
The quality of much of the deluxe blu-ray is awful. Unlike a DVD disc a blu-ray disc can be encoded with different frame rates, the videos encoded at 23.976fps look ok but some of the motion blur on the videos rendered at 29.9 fps is shocking. Hey Jude looks awful in places, although it's nice to see a better quality version of Penny Lane but still not what one would expect from a 35mm film source. The audio on the blu-ray is pretty drab in places, as many of the videos are being lip synched why haven't these been overdubbed into CD quality? In general a disappointing effort from Apple, despite all the hype.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 10, 2015 14:04:10 GMT
Nic, I have to say I totally agree with you.
I've been so looking forward to this release, but why oh why have they opted for the American NTSC format? Not only is it vastly inferior to our PAL system, but the conversion has of course upset the frame rates! As if that wasn't enough, they have changed some of the video material from interlaced to progressive.
As a HUGE Beatles fan (who got interested in early 1963, so worshipped them through virtually all their career as a group), I am most reluctant to criticise - but can we expect to see a spanking brand new PAL release in the future?
In other words, is this just a way to double the profits here in Britain?
Colin.
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Post by johnpater on Nov 10, 2015 14:21:12 GMT
I was really looking forward to this set but from what I have heard so far, I do not think I shall be investing in it. The de-interlacing / filmising of what should have been pristine videotaped promos has been the decider for me. I have waited so long to get good copies of these in the form they were originally seen. The tragedy is that this set will be the default way we are to see these clips from now on. It is extremely annoying that Apple have again re-mastered to NTSC rather than PAL (as they did with Magical Mystery Tour), meaning that the 625 line material had to be downgraded in the transfer. It would have made more sense to re-master to the higher quality standard. It means though that I will seriously question buying any future product from Apple if it is done in this way.
Can anyone confirm that the DVD version has the same filmising problem? I have only seen reactions from people so far who have the Blu-ray set.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 10, 2015 15:15:20 GMT
John, I should have mentioned that I bought the DVD - not the blu-ray. From what I've read in reviews elsewhere, I probably made the right decision, as I cannot for the life of me see the sense in putting this stuff out on blu-ray, only to degrade the quality by making it in NTSC!!!
Sorry to be the bearer of bad news - but perhaps if enough people protest, Apple might have a rethink.
Colin.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 10, 2015 16:11:14 GMT
I don't understand how anyone is not happy with a lot of the promos though - Strawberry Fields Forever, Paperback Writer, Rain, Eight Days A Week, Penny Lane and all 3 of the Hello Goodbye promos look and sound absolutely sensational! The old tv material like Drop In also is a vast improvement on the old bootlegs we all used to have. I think people are being way too critical about this, one of the best releases this year...
The one glaring error they made with this release was "Free As A Bird" being presented letterboxed. The issue with NTSC DVD releases is of course a real pain. It's getting harder and harder to find a DVD release in PAL these days.
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Post by johnpater on Nov 10, 2015 17:02:04 GMT
It's two things really. First the filmising of video clips, which is not needed and changes the look of them. Secondly they mastered to 525 / NTSC, which is an inferior standard of 100 less lines than 625. Being as most of The Beatles' (a British based group) material was shot in the UK anyway, it should have been mastered to our higher line standard, rather than to the US one. It is unnecessary. I won't be buying this set on reflection as quite a few of the clips aren't presented in the way they were shot and I will be voicing my disapproval to Apple regards their unwarranted tampering with the source material. If enough people voiced their displeasure (and there is a lot of controversy about it from what I have seen on various review and Beatles forums), then Apple might be forced to think again in future. A perfect opportunity missed yet again.
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Post by johnpater on Nov 10, 2015 18:34:18 GMT
Just a follow up to the above. Some of the reviews online are saying that there are quite marked motion blur issues with some of the video clips. It shouldn't and wouldn't have to be like this if they mastered the material in PAL in the first place. Oh well, it saves me from forking out yet another £30+ at Christmas time.
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Post by chrisstratton on Nov 10, 2015 18:49:15 GMT
I've got the DVD version and generally i'm happy with it but I did notice on 'Let It Be' there appeared to be marks on the film in places (like there was a hair on the film). The John Lennon spoken word at the end of 'Free as a bird' was a bit of a surprise though...the backwards vocal has now been reversed back - wonder why this was done?
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Post by Sal Mohammed on Nov 10, 2015 18:51:20 GMT
Not being an expert but if the release was only on blu-ray, as both PAL and NTSC use 1920 x 1080 size, could the frame rate differ from clip to clip? This could keep the original frame rate.
I will assume the blu-ray release has more to do with the audio than trying to improve old videotape recordings. The audio on the blu-ray will be uncompressed unlike DVD's which is uses compression to be able to fit surround audio, namely dolby digital at 448kbs.
I'm with Mike Morton, I enjoyed watching these clips in the best quality I've ever seen, having seen many bootleg versions, it's great to have this blu-ray. As for the audio, from 1966 onwards the audio for the surround versions is stunning especially 'A Day In The Life'the clarity is like nothing I've heard before. I haven't listened to the stereo versions yet but the blu-ray is the only version that has HD audio compared to CD quality wav audio.
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Post by nicadare on Nov 10, 2015 19:34:02 GMT
I don't understand how anyone is not happy with a lot of the promos though - Strawberry Fields Forever, Paperback Writer, Rain, Eight Days A Week, Penny Lane and all 3 of the Hello Goodbye promos look and sound absolutely sensational! The old tv material like Drop In also is a vast improvement on the old bootlegs we all used to have. I think people are being way too critical about this, one of the best releases this year... Mike the promos which are in their original frame rate are fine, 35mm film for example is 23.976 frames per second, although Penny Lane looks a lot better than previous versions for 35mm film it's still below standard and the stereo audio track is poor, an overdub from the Beatles "1" CD would take about 2 minutes to execute and would improve it immensely. my.jetscreenshot.com/11869/20151110-bmii-265kb.jpgPaperback Writer is a total disaster, I have this on a bootleg DVD and looks far superior to this Blu-ray version which is jerky and full of motion blur and has been needlessly re-encoded to NTSC. The less said about Hey Jude, the better, the quality is an embarrassment. This post is not a downer on the Beatles, their music is fab and their sound engineers did a fine job, the quality of their recordings is superb, my beef is with Apple for all the hype of the Blu-ray release which is in fact mostly sh**e. I will send my copy back to Amazon for a refund as it's not fit for the purpose, and the fact that NTSC has not been printed on the box.
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Post by johnpater on Nov 10, 2015 21:05:01 GMT
I was really excited when I saw the trailers, being a big Beatles fan from way back. The end result visual aspect-wise is simply not up to standard though.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 11, 2015 10:50:16 GMT
Regarding the audio, how about the fact they used the stereo version of Help!? John appears to do an extremely bad mime job during the first verse ("Now I find, I've changed my mind") - but in fact when you see it with the mono audio (being a video editor, no problem for me), it fits very nicely, as the mono and stereo versions were different.
I know some may disagree with this, but personally I regard the mono recordings as the "official" ones. After all, apart from the last two albums, the Beatles worked to mono in the studio. I feel the stereo efforts were rather poor, and usually had little or no input from the boys themselves. As a good example, Sgt Pepper in mono is superior in every way to the stereo.
Colin.
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Post by Richard Marple on Nov 11, 2015 13:29:17 GMT
I've heard the mono mix of Sgt Pepper's took 3 weeks to do, & the stereo one 3 hours, as it was left to studio engineer Geoff Emerick.
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Post by nicadare on Nov 11, 2015 18:02:49 GMT
Not being an expert but if the release was only on blu-ray, as both PAL and NTSC use 1920 x 1080 size, could the frame rate differ from clip to clip? This could keep the original frame rate. I will assume the blu-ray release has more to do with the audio than trying to improve old videotape recordings. . A blu-ray disc can contain videos with various framerates, and as such theoretically anything recorded onto videotape should be as good as the original source material. 35mm film can resolve about 4K of horizontal resolution, in most cases. Even promos made decades ago can have astonishing transfers to today's standards of HD. Blu-ray, with its 1080 x 1920 standard resolution, offers just under 2K horizontal resolution. So if anything the original 35mm film of Penny Lane, Strawberry Fields and Paperback Writer would have to be 'downgraded' to suit the blu-ray format. That's not what has happened on the Beatles disc it's simply a case of amateurish encoding which makes all the hype about the 're-mastering' a farce. Incidentally on ITV1HD tonight the Beatles favourite no.1, it will be interesting to see the quality of the footage they show, even if it's upscaled SD it will still probably look better than the Blu-ray disc.
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Post by Phil Chappell on Nov 12, 2015 9:18:00 GMT
I was wondering about the film look to some of the videos, trying to work out if it was a setting on my blu ray player or not. However, and I know I shouldn't have to do this, on my LG Tv it has a 'smooth' picture option, and this immediately gives the videos the correct interlaced look. I'm still wondering if there is a hidden setting on my player though, so I wouldn't have to do this. I thought the overall quality was pretty good considering some of the source material, I don't see a problem with 'Hey Jude' that some of you are talking about, is the problem more with the DVD than the blu Ray? The 'free as a bird ' aspect ratio though, that is very annoying! And doesn't the blu Ray version change frame rates between videos to preserve the original rate? Sure I read that is the case ( at least it is for disc two) but I've yet to prove it, I've only watched it all once so far.
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