Well, in his defense ... if the movie is good enough, it shouldn't matter what you watch it on.
Now, what bothers me are when people watch movies in high definition 120hz setting that makes them look like hi-def video. Stores have their TVs set like that to attract buyers. It's good for Sports, Nature, video Sitcoms, News programs, but for film movies, it makes them look like a home movie with good lighting. Please use the 24p mode, the way film was intended.
That's true to some extent. A crap movie is still crap in HD. Resident Evil, Alien vs Predators or Underworld (for example) would still be steaming piles of crap even if they were projected onto the side of a mountain.
But if you're watching a *good* movie, why not benefit from seeing it with the biggest screen and the highest definition you can see it in. Even older movies can benefit massively from HD in the detail they reveal. I really don't understand why a movie reviewer of all people would be against HD. Does this person derive no additional benefit from watching a movie in a theatre as opposed to on DVD?
The only good thing about 24p is that these 120Hz TVs happily convert it to 48fps. How they then update the screen smoothly I do not know, nor care, but it looks infinitely more pleasant than 24fps. I hate going to the cinema now, its juddery, blurry and too dull. I really do not understand cinema purists as in my opinion, modern HDTVs are far superior, much more comfortable on the eyes.
Sure, there are artifacts as inventing none-existent frames can never be perfect, but at 24fps there is such drastic differences from one frame to the next that I feel dizzy and you can't make out the detail in the scene anyway (this is at the cinema as well as HDTV). The higher the frame-rate, the smoother the transition, the more detail you can perceive. There is even talk of Hollywood adopting 48fps as soon as its cost effective to do so. People forget, 24fps only exists because it was the worst frame-rate they could get away with, it was about money, the cost of film, how quickly the camera can expose the film, it was NEVER about being the best frame-rate for human viewing. Just like how MP3 is "good enough" for most people, its not ideal by any means, as is 24fps.
I prefer to watch any movie in HD format, but there are times when I don't have that ability to do so and watching an older movie on an older TV is fine by me when I get involved in the story.
Sometimes when a picture is too good, you stop and say to yourself "Wow, this picture quality looks really good." This brings you out of the story if only for a moment. Of course, you can say the opposite if you got some old VCR copy of a movie with scan lines and snow and be like "Wow, this picture quality is crap."
I'm a movie buff and HD enthusiast (which is why I visit this site), but I'm just saying I think I know where he's coming from. I think it's like when people compare vinyls to CDs. Some love the analog, while others can't stand it and need the digital remastering.
With all that said, this critic really doesn't deserve that much defense because of his anger towards HD. It's as if he's comparing HD viewing to colorizing b&w movies or dubbing foreign films or Pan & Scan. Like it was already stated in the blog, HD does make films of the past appear more like they were intended. There are many older Hitchcock films that I wish were remastered in HD and I'm sure Hitchcock would love it too. No offense to Bogart, but he wasn't the director.
I think Peter Bradshaw just remembers watching movies on an old round, blurry television and wishes that all were shown like that to bring back his childhood days. I'm sure he doesn't mind these comments, since we are just criticizing a critic and how can he be upset with that?
it doesnt matter if you feed a 120hz tv 24, 30, or 60fps- it's still going to be displayed @ 120hz. i think what bothers you is the dejudder processing, as TVs set in retail demo modes usually have this at full strength.
24 fps is not the frame rate of film choice because the studios were pinch pennies. It's because that's an ideal frame rate for the optical illusion that is moving pictures. Also, 120 hz was originally intended for video games. And that's what it's great for. Movies, not so much. Wave your hand in front of your face. There is motion blur. Because our eyes see motion blur. The crisp lines around everything in 120hz makes everything feel cheap and video-y. 120hz was put into blurays to sell TV's and blurays. It's just marketing. They know some videophiles will adopt whatever they put out. But HD is better resolution. If you want a projected theater experience, buy a f*#king HD projector, you boneheads. Take a wild guess if an HD projector looks better than an SD.
“An engineer explained to us that hundreds of ear impressions were gathered in the name of research, and while each one obviously boasted its own unique shape and size, one single characteristic remained uniform across the board: the entrance into the ear canal is not a perfect circle, it's an oval.”
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Well, in his defense ... if the movie is good enough, it shouldn't matter what you watch it on.
Now, what bothers me are when people watch movies in high definition 120hz setting that makes them look like hi-def video. Stores have their TVs set like that to attract buyers. It's good for Sports, Nature, video Sitcoms, News programs, but for film movies, it makes them look like a home movie with good lighting. Please use the 24p mode, the way film was intended.
That's true to some extent. A crap movie is still crap in HD. Resident Evil, Alien vs Predators or Underworld (for example) would still be steaming piles of crap even if they were projected onto the side of a mountain.
But if you're watching a *good* movie, why not benefit from seeing it with the biggest screen and the highest definition you can see it in. Even older movies can benefit massively from HD in the detail they reveal. I really don't understand why a movie reviewer of all people would be against HD. Does this person derive no additional benefit from watching a movie in a theatre as opposed to on DVD?
The only good thing about 24p is that these 120Hz TVs happily convert it to 48fps. How they then update the screen smoothly I do not know, nor care, but it looks infinitely more pleasant than 24fps. I hate going to the cinema now, its juddery, blurry and too dull. I really do not understand cinema purists as in my opinion, modern HDTVs are far superior, much more comfortable on the eyes.
Sure, there are artifacts as inventing none-existent frames can never be perfect, but at 24fps there is such drastic differences from one frame to the next that I feel dizzy and you can't make out the detail in the scene anyway (this is at the cinema as well as HDTV). The higher the frame-rate, the smoother the transition, the more detail you can perceive. There is even talk of Hollywood adopting 48fps as soon as its cost effective to do so. People forget, 24fps only exists because it was the worst frame-rate they could get away with, it was about money, the cost of film, how quickly the camera can expose the film, it was NEVER about being the best frame-rate for human viewing. Just like how MP3 is "good enough" for most people, its not ideal by any means, as is 24fps.
I prefer to watch any movie in HD format, but there are times when I don't have that ability to do so and watching an older movie on an older TV is fine by me when I get involved in the story.
Sometimes when a picture is too good, you stop and say to yourself "Wow, this picture quality looks really good." This brings you out of the story if only for a moment. Of course, you can say the opposite if you got some old VCR copy of a movie with scan lines and snow and be like "Wow, this picture quality is crap."
I'm a movie buff and HD enthusiast (which is why I visit this site), but I'm just saying I think I know where he's coming from. I think it's like when people compare vinyls to CDs. Some love the analog, while others can't stand it and need the digital remastering.
With all that said, this critic really doesn't deserve that much defense because of his anger towards HD. It's as if he's comparing HD viewing to colorizing b&w movies or dubbing foreign films or Pan & Scan. Like it was already stated in the blog, HD does make films of the past appear more like they were intended. There are many older Hitchcock films that I wish were remastered in HD and I'm sure Hitchcock would love it too. No offense to Bogart, but he wasn't the director.
I think Peter Bradshaw just remembers watching movies on an old round, blurry television and wishes that all were shown like that to bring back his childhood days. I'm sure he doesn't mind these comments, since we are just criticizing a critic and how can he be upset with that?
it doesnt matter if you feed a 120hz tv 24, 30, or 60fps- it's still going to be displayed @ 120hz. i think what bothers you is the dejudder processing, as TVs set in retail demo modes usually have this at full strength.
24 fps is not the frame rate of film choice because the studios were pinch pennies. It's because that's an ideal frame rate for the optical illusion that is moving pictures. Also, 120 hz was originally intended for video games. And that's what it's great for. Movies, not so much. Wave your hand in front of your face. There is motion blur. Because our eyes see motion blur. The crisp lines around everything in 120hz makes everything feel cheap and video-y. 120hz was put into blurays to sell TV's and blurays. It's just marketing. They know some videophiles will adopt whatever they put out. But HD is better resolution. If you want a projected theater experience, buy a f*#king HD projector, you boneheads. Take a wild guess if an HD projector looks better than an SD.