Is there going to be SD stuff on HD Discs to take advantage of extra capacity?

[ajw000]

Was thinking about this the other day-technically,is it going to be possible to put SD stuff on HD discs to take advantage of the extra capacity? Will studios release stuff on HD-DVD/Blu Ray discs in SD?

For example old TV shows that would not benefit from HD-it would be awesome to have the entire series of a show on 1 disc!

Is this going to happen?

[camaj]

Possible yes, nothing's been announced but I'm sure it will.

Most old TV shows WOULD benefit from HD, unless they were made outside the USA.

[kiran_mk2]

Can't see it happening - boxsets mean more income for studios. Besides, did we get a load of VCD quality stuff on DVD?

[Chris]

Was thinking about this the other day-technically,is it going to be possible to put SD stuff on HD discs to take advantage of the extra capacity?

The public blu-ray spec says that it supports SD (PAL or NTSC resolution).

[Spectre07]

Moneyspinning-wise from the companies point of view, it would be difficult to get people paying big bucks for a single disc, so putting a complete series on a single disc would probably not happen.

[zantarous]

One disc would be cheaper to produce for the studios though, I really can see this happening although the likes of Paramount will probably still sell for the twice the price of everyone else.

[Spectre07]

One disc would be cheaper to produce for the studios though, I really can see this happening although the likes of Paramount will probably still sell for the twice the price of everyone else.Wouldn't the cost savings be in the region of mere pennies? Balance that against the price the Studios could charge for a boxset.

[zantarous]

I would have thought that the cost of producing one disc and packing for one disc would surely be lower then producing 6 discs and unique packaging, plus I would imagine that it would also make production quicker as only one or two discs need be pressed which will also reduce the time spent at the authoring house. I could of course be completely mistaken.

Also just because it comes on one disc doesn’t necessarily mean that the studios have to make it any cheaper, I am sure with buzz words like mastered in hi-def and what not plastered over the box they will try and justify the high price point but just look at the reissues of Buffy and X-files box sets are already quite cheap and can be had at very good prices if you wait a bit and have a good hunt around.

I can certainly see studios repackaging TV shows again on HD media to sell to people again just like they will do with films.

[camaj]

Can't see it happening - boxsets mean more income for studios. Besides, did we get a load of VCD quality stuff on DVD?

They may mean more income, but that's not because it's a boxset, it's because people want to buy entire series of their favourite programs. Having something on one disc isn't going to change that.

Even at VCD quality, you'd have a hard job fitting everything in to 9gb!

[Grandmaster]

Was thinking about this the other day-technically,is it going to be possible to put SD stuff on HD discs to take advantage of the extra capacity? Will studios release stuff on HD-DVD/Blu Ray discs in SD?

For example old TV shows that would not benefit from HD-it would be awesome to have the entire series of a show on 1 disc!

Is this going to happen?

Extremely unlikely. For a start you're talking about mass consumer confusion/annoyance. Buying an HD product to find it crippled to SD would irritate mass swathes of the potential market.

Also, a lot of old TV shows shot on film (eg Star Trek TOS) would actually benefit from an HD release, which muddies the waters still further if some shows are in HD and some in SD.

[TinTin]

I would have thought that the cost of producing one disc and packing for one disc would surely be lower then producing 6 discs and unique packaging, plus I would imagine that it would also make production quicker as only one or two discs need be pressed which will also reduce the time spent at the authoring house. I could of course be completely mistaken.
.I don't think there's that much difference in the packaging costs between single and multiple packs. This might not be a good example but I used to work in a crisp factory and there was little difference in packaging cost between single packets and 'family size' packs. Most of the cost was in the design side, and the manufacturing of the packaging didn't add significantly to the price.


Also just because it comes on one disc doesn’t necessarily mean that the studios have to make it any cheaper, I am sure with buzz words like mastered in hi-def and what not plastered over the box they will try and justify the high price point but just look at the reissues of Buffy and X-files box sets are already quite cheap and can be had at very good prices if you wait a bit and have a good hunt around.If people are paying £13 for a BS with 6 - 7 discs, I doubt they'll be prepared to pay much more for a new set even with HD plastered all over it. They'll be even less inclined to pay a high price If the set only contained 1 disc.

[Martin Ball]

What would you rather, pay $40 for 1 disc or $40 for 6 discs?

Fact is that most of the cost goes into clearance issues (royalties etc), so the SRP is unlikely to be lower (in fact since it will be on a new media it will probably be higher).

Also, instead of cramming as many episodes as possible onto one disc, why not take full advantage of the extra space per disc and use much less compression to remove all those horrible encoding artefacts.

Personally I would rather have more space taken over to the episodes to give the absolute best picture then trying to get 24 episodes onto 1 disc.

[USDirect]

I am sure they would be happy to sell a season on 1 hd-dvd in addition to the dvd boxset, maybe even charge more for the new format.

[Nebiroth]

That's really a number of issues, for example - is it possible to put material that wasn't made in high-definition in the first place onto an HD disc? Yes. Would there be any point? Maybe - you could put the bitrate up a lot, doing away with compression artefacts etc, and you could fit more on there (a whole season of stuff on a single disc, maybe). But would you want to?

Is it possible to cram so much onto an HD disc that when you play it back it only looks as good as an SD? Almost certainly, yes - since you can make such a lousy job of putting together a SD DVD that it looks as bad as VHS. Some studios being better at this than others!

Lastly, is it possible to put an SD layer onto an HD disc? I believe that it's possible to put an SD layer onto a Blu-Ray disc that is readable by an SD player..

[thescrounger]

That's really a number of issues, for example - is it possible to put material that wasn't made in high-definition in the first place onto an HD disc? Yes. Would there be any point?

All the ported special features on the HD-DVD of The Last Samurai are SD.

It's quite likely that shows like TNG or the X-Files that only exist as SD masters will be released 'as is' on HD discs. The main benefit being extra bitrate.