Yes, you'll notice, and the bigger the screen, the more you notice. Also, your TV/Monitor won't have to realign/recalculate the pixels, as they're displayed in native resolution (presuming you have a full HD TV/Monitor).
I remember being shown Serenity on HD-DVD (lol) on a big tv ages ago, and I couldn't really tell the difference I certainly can't spot the difference between Blu-Ray and DVD through my PS3 on my 32" tv, but then again my eyes are rubbish anyway
The upscaler in the PS3 is also one of the best you'll find for an upscaling DVD player. Just for fun we tried to play a DVD on the PS2 as well on the same 46" PDP HDTV and it was definitely worse quality. I'm thinking that maybe people who dis DVD on large HDTVs may not be using a proper upscaling player or so.
Yes and no. Again, it all depends on the original source, the capability of the player, and the display. Using a good player, on a good TV, you may not see much difference between an upscaled DVD and a Blu-ray version that features an upscaled version of the movie, rather than a proper transfer. For something like Avatar, you'll most definitely see a difference between the DVD and Blu-ray offerings. For an older movie that hasn't been re-mastered, it will be much more difficult to see any difference.
For anyone who doubts supermonkey's wise post, buy the non-remastered release of Gangs of New York, then the remastered one. The difference is phenomenal.
I get all my new releases on BR now as it's so much easier on the eye, I moved to Virgin HD as well because Freeview just started to look naff. MTV HD is one of the higher bit-rate channels and you can tell the difference instantly. A lot of it comes down to the TV you've got as well as the BR deck. If you go cheap and cheerful you're not going to get the same experience as someone who spent a little bit more. In no way do i endorse spending thousands on a setup but it's worth stretching to get something better than what is now the bog standard. Oh and the PS3's BR playback is the lowest I'd call for standard ; )
I have a logik blu ray player that upscales DVDs really badly. I have a sony DVD player that upscales awesomly. Regards the quality, it mainly depends on the player and the quality of the recording. Can I tell a difference between blu ray and DVD? Hell yeah.
depending of the movie lawl I dont think you can see a difference between 'First Blood' VHS and the same in Blu Ray ^^
films arent recorded in the quality to suit the medium theyre going on so re scanning a film reel can bring it upto blu ray quality. thats why there are alot of films that came out b4 blu ray that are now coming out on blu ray.
That's utter bullocks. The media the movie is shot on is determined completely by what it's going to be used for. No one is going to throw away money by recording on film with far higher specs than required to be shown on a cinema screen or so. Else everybody would be shooting on IMAX film. Lots of film masters out there absolutely suck. Grainy, low-resolution, full of glitches. The first movies released on BD were largely far less impressive than even the DVD version. You make it sound like film has some kind of infinite, CSI-like resolution. Instead there's a definite limit to the amount of detail recorded, much like how you can't expect to create a poster-sized picture out of a 35 mm photo and expect it to look reasonable.
so your saying cinema quality was the same quality as VHS when it was about im not saying there are infinite levels of detail available, just that the media its put on isnt always like for like in terms of the quality it was originally filmed in
Pan's Labyrinth is a great film in Blu-Ray, as are the Transformers films and Avatar. Didn't notice better quality much in Trainspotting, or Young Guns though.
DVD-quality looks piss poor on my 24" fullhd screen. It's still OK for tv-series, but for movies 720p is the lowest I "can" watch. Still there's a step between 720p and 1080p. Some 1080p titles have been so stunning I've had to come back and take a look at some still frames after just watching the film. I guess I should congratulate Elledan and whoever can't see the difference or don't mind the DVD-quality.
It's been pointed out like a dozen times by now that the quality of the master and the mastering plus conversion to DVD/BD process pretty much determine what the final product will look like. For that reason it's absolute nonsense to claim that BD will always look better than (upscaled) DVD. Maybe there is a significant difference between a DVD and BD version of a particular movie, but you'd have to put both versions side by side or watch them front to back to really notice anything. Yes, BD has more pixels, but the real questions are how they're used and whether you'll notice it when you're actually focusing on the story instead of nitpicking the visual details. I actually watched the 1942 movie Casablanca last week in a small cinema (~50 seats) and was quite impressed by the quality of its video and audio. Now that movie is in black/white and before digital mastering was even a dream. It didn't degrade the experience at all, nor did I ever wish I had that movie in BD quality
This is not entirely true. Before digital cinematography started taking hold in the early 2000s, just about every movie in the last few decades was shot on a cinema-grade film. That film has higher native resolution than "HD." For reference, NASA is scanning the old Apollo-era film stock (including quite a bit of 16mm stuff) at 4K resolution. The exception would be low budget productions that were never destined for the theater in the first place, such as the safety/training videos I helped make when I was in high school. Even then, such productions were recorded on a high-quality SD tape format, not VHS. IMAX is a unique beast, but even they are not opposed to using different formats. For example, the recent Hubble 3D movie was shot using both traditional IMAX film as well as a video from a Canon G1 camcorder. The point I've made a few times regarding the film masters is that a number of the early Blu-ray releases were not made from "grainy, low-resolution" masters. They were made by simply upscaling the DVD version of the film and printing it on a Blu-ray disc, rather than going back and re-scanning the original film negatives. This is because cleaning, restoring, and re-scanning an old film negative is an expensive and time-consuming process, and if you're going to spend that kind of time and money it might as well be for a good film. In other cases the original film stock has either been lost, destroyed in a fire, or since turned to vinegar. Some archivists estimate that 75% of the US silent films, and 50% of the films made prior to 1950, are gone.
this is along the same line as my point. the film reel for want of a better word was better quality than VHS or DVD for that matter, and to put it to blu ray it just has to be rescanned and itll look better than the VHS/DVD version thats true when the original is the limiting factor. what i was saying was the medium VHS/DVD was the limiting factor and that the original is much higher quality and rescanning to blu ray will make it look better. in your metaphor what your saying is take a 35mm photo(original reel), put it to stamp size (DVD/VHS) and bring it back up to photo size(blu ray), now that wont look any better your right there. but what im saying is forget the stamp size altogether and just go back use the original higher quality version
BTW use a proper photo scanner and you wouldn't believe how much information there is in a (good quality, ofcourse) 35 mm negative.
From this, the basic rule of thumb to derive is: If the visuals comprise a large part of your enjoyment of a given film, it is worth buying in Blu-Ray. This doesn't just restrict you to SFX feasts like Avatar. The Assassination of Jesse James is well worth it for all the beautiful lingering landscapes and detailed close-ups that your attention is drawn to by the slow pace (it's a much more visual film by nature). Whereas the ostensibly similar The Proposition is not worth it because it was filmed with a metric ton of dust blowing around most of the scenes, a generally less pleasing aesthetic, and a much faster pace with lots of chaos and action.
