The new phone book's here, the new phone book's here

[Peel Paint]

Um.....I thought [a disjointed mess] was what the Blue Devils were going for???

My wife watched the DVD with me, and she hadn't seen Blue Devils this year, and she asked, "What's with those incredibly ugly guard uniforms?" And I said, "Remember, the announcer said the theme of the show is 'Constantly Risking Absurdity'. It's deliberate, it's a design choice, to reflect the theme." And then she asked, "Why are they making those ridiculous faces and moving around that way?" And I said, "The theme of the show is 'Constantly Risking Absurdity'". And then she asked, "What's Sweeney Todd got to do with all this?" And I snapped, "THE THEME OF THE SHOW..." and she left the room. She just didn't get it.

I'm sure she wasn't alone this year.

Edited November 10, 2008 by Peel Paint

[hughesmr]

I'm going to be contrary. I haven't viewed everything yet, but in general I'm very disappointed in the editing. ... The first half of Blue Devils is a disjointed mess that never shows you what's going on.

Are you referring to the video editing or the editing of music in BD show design? Because if it's the latter, I agree wholeheartedly.

[Peel Paint]

See?

[KakkoiiOtaku]

Okay, I called DCI after mine weren't here today. I figured if someone it Texas is getting their set today, then I would too since I'm in NC. They gave me my tracking number and mine should be here tomorrow! So, if anyone needs to know when their set is coming, just call DCI and they'll get you your tracking number if you didn't get it in an e-mail.

[MikeN]

Just got mine - resisting the urge to pop them in the laptop.

Mike

[kickhaltsforlife]

like seriously... i'm so jealous right now... i can't read this thread anymore... why can't christmas be today... maybe i can convince mother for the birthday present.. since that come before christmas.. AHHHH

[DMCK]

"He hates these cans!!!"

Sorry, I was wrapped up in the reference to "The Jerk."

Johnson, Navin R.

typical run of the mill bast*rd.

lol

Can't wait for my DVD's!

[Matt_S]

Just got mine - resisting the urge to pop them in the laptop.

Mike

... why???

I guess laptop speakers would hardly make it worth it. Best to watch that #### at a volume that'll make the walls shake.

[On the 50]

I'm sure others who haven't been hanging out since finals missed the numerous threads we've had discussing this. You can search the archives to find them. Though DCI didn't explicitly put out a statement saying, Hey, they're gone, and anybody ordering in Bloomington ordered without knowing these things were gone, once DCI put out its advertising on its website by late August for the DVDs, we knew the commentary tracks and extra camera angles were gone, yes, and we have been discussing it.

It came down, it seems likely, to two factors. DCI wanted to go to anamorphic widescreen. This helps those who have HDTVs, which is crossing the 50% penetration threshhold these days, see better picture quality in 16:9 than they could see without it. Anamorphic widescreen means, though, that the file sizes for the shows are bigger, so there isn't as much room for other extras. DCP has been split. I would rather have anamorphic widescreen than commentary and camera angles; though I liked those, frankly, I only watched or listened once. Others, especially those who still have SDTV, would get more out of the missing bonus features. But the great majority of viewers will be stepping up to HDTV soon.

Actually, there is no difference in file size with anamorphic content. The DVD spec is 720x480 (non-square pixel aspect), which is a 4:3 projected ratio. When 16:9 (1.78:1) content or movies (1.85:1 and 2.35:1 are common) are encoded anamorphically, the image is "squeezed" horizontally to fit in the 720x480 DVD spec. Hence the term "anamorphic." There is a flag in the data portion of the disc to tell the DVD player that the video material is anamorphic. The player then "unsqueezes" the image horizontally to achieve the proper aspect ratio on-screen. If you were to watch the video as it is encoded on the DVD without unsqueezing, everything would look stretched vertically and in a 4:3 picture. The advantage of encoding anamorphically instead of letterboxing (where black bars are encoded at the top and bottom of the picture) is that all of the available pixels in the 720x480 raster are available and used for actual video content. If the encoding is done at the original aspect ratio with letterboxing, up to 40 percent of the available pixels are simply encoded as black bars. So, anamorphic encoding yields a better picture for original widescreen content, but it does not take up any more space on the disc. File size is determined by the bitrate of the encode and the length of the program.

The decision to reduce costs by going with a two-disc set for Top 12 instead of a four-disc set as in the past left no room for the additional camera angles. The additional audio tracks (judges, commentary tracks) take up very little space and could probably have been included with little effect on the video quality. The (good) decision to do anamorphic widescreen, however, has nothing to do with the missing features.

[Peel Paint]

Actually, there is no difference in file size with anamorphic content. The DVD spec is 720x480 (non-square pixel aspect), which is a 4:3 projected ratio. When 16:9 (1.78:1) content or movies (1.85:1 and 2.35:1 are common) are encoded anamorphically, the image is "squeezed" horizontally to fit in the 720x480 DVD spec. Hence the term "anamorphic." There is a flag in the data portion of the disc to tell the DVD player that the video material is anamorphic. The player then "unsqueezes" the image horizontally to achieve the proper aspect ratio on-screen. If you were to watch the video as it is encoded on the DVD without unsqueezing, everything would look stretched vertically and in a 4:3 picture. The advantage of encoding anamorphically instead of letterboxing (where black bars are encoded at the top and bottom of the picture) is that all of the available pixels in the 720x480 raster are available and used for actual video content. If the encoding is done at the original aspect ratio with letterboxing, up to 40 percent of the available pixels are simply encoded as black bars. So, anamorphic encoding yields a better picture for original widescreen content, but it does not take up any more space on the disc. File size is determined by the bitrate of the encode and the length of the program.

The decision to reduce costs by going with a two-disc set for Top 12 instead of a four-disc set as in the past left no room for the additional camera angles. The additional audio tracks (judges, commentary tracks) take up very little space and could probably have been included with little effect on the video quality. The (good) decision to do anamorphic widescreen, however, has nothing to do with the missing features.

OK, thanks. I appreciate the corrections.

So I guess what it really came down to was the additional cost of producing the extras. DCI was trying to save money and boost profits on the DVD package.

And as I stated in another post here, the improvement in picture quality of the anamorphic widescreen on an HDTV (again, the DVDs are not HD, and they couldn't make them HD on standard definition DVD discs, I know) is only slight compared to last year's DVDs if the 2007 DVDs are resized to widescreen on the same HDTV. They do not look as good or as detailed, IMO, as a standard definition movie on DVD in anamorphic widescreen. I don't know if they used compression to reduce the file sizes to fit multi-cam and high cam for six corps plus finale on two discs, or what, and if the compression took a PQ hit, but I'd hoped for better than we got this year.

Don't misunderstand, I highly recommend the 2008 DVDs. If that's all DCI could afford, I'm glad we got it. Unlike pinwiz, i think the shot selection for each show is really good. Not to put his view down, and he's entitled to it, but they're never going to completely please everyone with the shot selection.

Edited November 10, 2008 by Peel Paint