Quality differences in blu-ray??

[ot_welder]

Has anybody with a discriminating eye noticed any video quality differences when comparing older Blu-rays to todays releases? I've been having video quality problems with older (2008) Blu-rays when I'm encoding with h264/AVC using the .mkv container. Maybe there are quality differences with Blu-rays in general?

[poisondeathray]

Yes there is a wide range of quality with blu-ray titles, it doesn't necessarily have to do with the release date

It depends on many factors , including the source quality (some are upscaled SD) , the transfer quality, encoding quality

[lordsmurf]

A lot of them are unfiltered, unlike DVD.

I see a lot of movies where the Blu-ray version is clearly worse quality than the DVD version, even if it does have "more detail" (mostly more noise).

I refer entirely to older film movies, of course.

[ot_welder]

So if a title was originally released on DVD then you will see limitations of the source on the Blu-ray version? Why I didn't think about that earlier is beyond me. Wasted a lot of time with encoder settings!

[Cornucopia]

In general, yes that's possible, but you really have to evaluate these on a case by case basis.

Scott

[lordsmurf]

So if a title was originally released on DVD then you will see source limitations on the Blu-ray version? Why I didn't think about that earlier is beyond me.

Only if the Blu-ray is sourced from the DVD -- which is unlikely.

The bigger issue is how processing was done during film > DVD, vs film > Blu-ray transfers.
And then there are encoding considerations, too.

I need to explain this more in depth sometime. I just can't do it today. It's lengthy.

[sparkyar]

vc1 and h264 are far from perfect, u can have quality issues even with newer encodes at +25mbps, it depends en several factors

[fritzi93]

Just to mention a couple factors in regard to source quality:

1) This one's obvious:

Some (many?) older films require extensive restoration, and that can get to be very expensive. I suspect sometimes it was thought that kind of investment would not be worth the expected return. So they gave it a lick and a promise and released it anyway. If there's enough demand to warrant it, they might get a do over.

One really impressive restoration was The Searchers (1955). especially considering the poor surviving prints they had to work with. Love that Vistavision.

Some newer movies get re-done, like the first Lord of the Rings movie. So it goes from having ever-so-slightly orange-ish skin tones to blueish/greenish snow. (Look at the shadows in the snow scenes at the mountain pass). This was a hot subject on many review sites. [shrugs] I can't say that got me very upset.

2) Some recent movies suffer from rather sub-par quality having little to do with deterioration. Off the top of my head, Predator is a good example. They filmed it in difficult conditions, and the decision was made to go with a certain camera/film combination that would be easier (I forget the particulars now).

The first Blu-Ray release was poor. Predator also got a do-over, but the result is disappointing. I would characterize the first release as grainy, dirty and dim, the second as waxy and bright. A matter of taste, perhaps, as the limitations of the source mean this one's unlikely to ever be called a "reference" Blu-ray.

[ot_welder]

Thanks for the replies! I now know not to expect the same results with every Blu-ray.

Even with that said can somebody tell me what settings within h264 I should be concerned with the most. It seems to me that a lot of these settings and parameters are just for tinkering; anything different is negligible. Keep in mind I'm only encoding new movies, nothing older than 6 years.

I've been using the latest version of RipBot264 and I'm using high profile 4.1, slow preset, CRF of 16, and default with the tune setting. I'm also encoding the audio to AC3 with the highest bitrate option. These movies are for storage and playback on a laptop. Any suggestions are welcomed!

[victoriabears]

I think far more emphasis on the quality of the content rather than the quality of picture might be in order.

[ot_welder]

Last I knew this forum was dedicated to the technical aspects of Blu-ray ripping, anything else is off topic.

[fritzi93]

I wonder if you should just use Copy Stream for the video. With a CRF of 16, you can't be saving much space, and any re-encode degrades the quality, however slightly. I can see re-encoding to 640 kbps AC3, both for saving space and perhaps for hardware compatibility.

The default tune is fine. I use Film Tune, but there's not all that much difference.

[EDIT] BTW, if these re-encodes are to be viewed *primarily* on a laptop, CRF16 is overkill. CRF 20 is okay on my 65" TV. I've been meaning to re-do my MKVs to CRF 18, but that would be a big job with 200 plus Blu-rays.

[ot_welder]

If I use Copy Stream for video that is no different than the data already on the Blu-ray, right? With my current settings using RipBot264 I compressed the main movie from 16 GB to 7.8 GB. I also noticed that the playback on my 17" HP laptop, using Pot Player, is indiscernible from the actual Blu-ray (at least for me). Not only does the file take up less space on the HDD but demands less from the resources available for playback.

On my desktop it's a different story when it comes to visual quality even with the actual source (.m2ts) file. When I play the movie back at full screen on my 26" ViewSonic I can see slight distortion in areas where there are dark colors or from low lighting. I can only assume that the physical size of the monitor is having an affect on quality. I know my video card is capable of handling Blu-ray because I had to upgrade when I bought the burner for my tower. Have you guys with your huge HD TVs come across this problem when you re-encode to a smaller file size? How about not re-encoding?

[fritzi93]

A CRF16 re-encode should be indistinguishable from the original to the unaided eye on darn near any size screen likely to be found in a home theater.

Output size is unpredictable, though generally a very smooth, clean source will "compress" better than a grainy one. Motion also affects output size. Your test encode must have been very clean indeed. Animation, by chance? Try something grainy like Saving Private Ryan or Defiance, and you'll save almost no space by re-encoding at CRF16.

[EDIT] I suspect your Viewsonic's image processing and/or resize to its native resolution is the culprit. You shouldn't be seeing any posterization or banding at CRF16. I have to look hard for it on my 65" TV at CRF20. For some movies it's more obvious than with others.