4K UltraHD Vs Blu-ray

4K UltraHD Vs Blu-ray
AdrianH

AdrianH

Administrator
I see they have released a 4k version of Aliens. In the box you get both the 4K UltraHD disc and also a Blu-ray disc.

@KenMasters What's the difference because I actually thought they were the same?
 
Plain Blu-ray is SDR 1080p, Ultra HD Blu-ray is 4K and HDR10 and/or Dolby Vision.

Aliens was shot using low quality film stock to impart a rough, grainy look that invokes Vietnam footage. However Cameron is on a mission to update his films to look like modern releases. To that end he took the existing Blu-ray master and applied AI upscaling and grain removal to create a new Ultra HD version (the Blu-ray included in the pack is derived from this tinkered with version).

Some like the processed look, some, like myself, don't. I'll be sticking with my Blu-ray but don't begrudge anyone going for this release (the Ultra HD version of the first film, Alien, is unequivocally excellent though).

The Abyss also received the AI treatment, but the difference there is it's actually derived from a new hi-res scan of the original negative, so comes through the process looking a lot better (less guess work for the AI). Also helps no 1080p Blu-ray exists of it anyway, so I'll be picking that one up at the end of the month.

The third disc to get released in this series is True Lies, which is the worst of the bunch, that one pretty much no one is willing to defend.

Apparently T1 and T2 are due for release at the end of the year. T2 transfers are notoriously bad, since Cameron can't resist "updating" the image quality - but I have high hopes it's going to be more Abyss than True Lies.
 
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KenMasters said:
Plain Blu-ray is SDR 1080p, Ultra HD Blu-ray is 4K and HDR10 and/or Dolby Vision.

Aliens was shot using low quality film stock to impart a rough, grainy look that invokes Vietnam footage. However Cameron is on a mission to update his films to look like modern releases. To that end he took the existing Blu-ray master and applied AI upscaling and grain removal to create a new Ultra HD version (the Blu-ray included in the pack is derived from this tinkered with version).

Some like the processed look, some, like myself, don't. I'll be sticking with my Blu-ray but don't begrudge anyone going for this release (the Ultra HD version of the first film, Alien, is unequivocally excellent though).

The Abyss also received the AI treatment, but the difference there is it's actually derived from a new hi-res scan, so comes through the process looking a lot better (less guess work for the AI). Also helps no 1080p Blu-ray exists of it anyway - I'll be picking that one up at the end of the month.
Click to expand...

What, only 1080p, wow?

I don't know if it's because never owned a Blu-ray but I was expecting something higher-res for some reason. I think it's because I misunderstood back in the day DVDs were "720p" based on the horizontal resolution instead of the vertical resolution, so going up to 1080p seemed like a small jump. But knowing now that DVD was only 720x480/576 (not 720p), Blu-ray being 1080p seems logical.

What the usual bitate for a UltraHD? I know the streaming service are around 16Mbps or so. Also, do they even bother with different angles that you used to get on DVDs?
 
AdrianH said:
What, only 1080p, wow?

I don't know if it's because never owned a Blu-ray but I was expecting something higher-res for some reason.
Click to expand...

When Blu-ray came out it was hi-res - we're talking the start of the Xbox 360 / PS3 era when most people didn't even have full 1080p displays.

1080p Blu-ray can still look excellent though, to the point that it's not always worth the upgrade. I use sites like this to decide if the upgrade's worth it if I already own the Blu-ray:

https://caps-a-holic.com/index.php

(You search the film, then pick the two versions you want to compare).

AdrianH said:
I think it's because I misunderstood back in the day DVDs were "720p" based on the horizontal resolution instead of the vertical resolution, so going up to 1080p seemed like a small jump. But knowing now that DVD was only 720x480/576 (not 720p), Blu-ray being 1080p seems logical.
Click to expand...

Not even progressive, DVD was 480i / 60Hz in NTSC territories and 576i / 50Hz in PAL territories. If you wanted to view the content progressively at 24fps you needed an expensive CRT with component inputs capable of displaying such a signal and an expensive DVD player that had a deinterlacing chip onboard.

AdrianH said:
What the usual bitate for a UltraHD? I know the streaming service are around 16Mbps or so. Also, do they even bother with different angles that you used to get on DVDs?
Click to expand...

Most of the better releases are around 80Mbps but depending on the scene might go down to 50Mbps or as high as 128Mbps. As for what features you get, it depends on the disc, multi angles aren't much use for typical content but seamless branching is common (in which you pick a version of the film and the disc will seamlessly integrate the scenes from the alternate cuts).

Besides the higher bitrate, you also get lossless audio in the form of True HD and Master Audio (streaming is limited to lossy DD+).
 
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