Date : Sun, 26 Jul 2009 16:46:34 +0100
From : philpem@... (Philip Pemberton)
Subject: Fw: Fwd: ITV Teletext to shut down in January
Rick Murray wrote:
> Philip Pemberton wrote:
>> Filmfour is "alright" if you can live with the adverts,
>
> It's amazing what you can do with VirtualDub. :-)
Avidemux FTW :)
The frame-cutting stuff is a little quirky, but once you figure out how
it figures out which frames to delete (it deletes the frame at the start
of the selection, but not the one at the end) and what buttons to hit to
make it work, it's actually not bad.
I still prefer Cuttermaran, though. Mainly because the frame-cutting
buttons are within ~20 pixels of each other, and the button icons make
it obvious which button does what...
> When you are dealing with a pre-letterboxed picture, like most of those
> on Zone Horror, you don't have that choice. I wonder how a widescreen TV
> would handle a widescreen film letterboxed into a traditional frame? I
> would like to think it would throw away the black bars and zoom the
> picture up, but I have doubts as to if many TVs are that clever. Quality
> would suck, in any case.
The Sony Bravias aren't that clever, or at least my KDL-32D3000 isn't.
That said, it's clever in other ways -- the colour adjustments,
reasonably quick MHEG engine, and the way it handles the dozen or so
inputs (it probably doesn't have that many, but it seems like it
sometimes). Being able to only have the commonly-used inputs on the main
Input Select menu is handy, too.
> Don't have that option, and as I tend to like the subtitled oddities
> (from "I'm A Cyborg, But That's Okay" to "Battle Royale" (not the
> sequel) to "Princess Mononoke"),
OK, let's see....
"I'm A Cyborg, But That's Okay": Not sure about that one.
"Battle Royale": UK DVD release has two audio tracks and one subtitle:
audio is switchable between JP and EN, subtitle is EN only. Been a while
since I've seen this, I borrowed it from a friend.
"Princess Mononoke": Same as above. I seem to recall Film4 aired the
English dub during the "Miyazaki Season" a few years ago, then aired the
Japanese dub (with subtitles) later on.
> I wonder how well such a service would
> suit? I'm not really 'in' to blockbusters.
I'm not either -- 95% of the stuff on my LOVEFiLM queue is anime.
I will, however, admit to having something of a soft spot for the "Die
Hard" series, the "Planet Earth" series (from the BBC), and.. um...
Stargate (SG1, Atlantis, and the movies). Don't judge me!!! :)
> What's the reasoning behind a DOG these days? People who are so inclined
> can download MPEG4 movies in an acceptable quality, so I don't think
> plastering a branding on stuff is going to help much. They can't use the
> logic of letting people know what channel they are watching - the
> constant adverts do that, and if you really need to know right this
> instant, the 'i' / 'info' / 'prog' (etc etc) button will tell you the
> channel and the programme.
The reason the BBC do it on BBC HD is ostensibly because of the current
value of HD content -- they basically want to stop other channels
ripping it off and either downscaling it and airing it in SD, or airing
it as-is. Though I haven't heard of a single instance of anything like
that happening... And I'd expect the BBC (and/or the content producer)
would be more than happy to slap anyone who did it with a nice, big
court summons for copyright infringement.
I honestly have no idea why they do it on the hideously low bitrate "BBC
206".. sorry, BBC Three and Four.. channels (and equally why ITV do it
on ITV2, 3 and 4). That said, why bother airing stuff in MPEG2 at <2Mbps
anyway, the quality is so poor as to be almost intolerable ("Welcome to
Macroblock City, where the TV is always blocky and unwatchable!"). Well,
unless you want to waste bandwidth that could be far better used on one
decent channel...
--
Phil.
philpem@...
http://www.philpem.me.uk/