What are lightning quick white specs on ALL DVD movies?

[defense]

I'm just curious why there are little, tiny white and sometimes black dots or specs that you can see when watching a DVD. It is tough to notice them, and at first I thought it was just with some of my backups, but it's actually with many of the original DVD's I have. It's hard to describe what they are, but you see the specs when you go to a movie theater. Except in the movie theater, you sometimes hear a crackling sound. They are much better on DVD's. I am just glad that they are on regular DVD movies, because I thought when I first noticed them, it had something to do with the media, or burning software, etc. I had NEVER noticed them before, but being that I had some problems with certain movies freezing and skipping towards the end of the movie, I started watching my movies MUCH more closely. I got so paranoid, that I actually was watching for ANY potential glitches, pauses or freezes, that i actually watched for those, more then the actually movie itself. You can't enjoy a movie like that, so I have stopped worrying about it and just watched the movie as I would normally. My point though is that there are almost microscopic white specs or black specs that appear in a flash on the DVD movie itself, and I'm just wondering why that is. It's amazing as to how I never noticed that before, but when I tried to focus so hard, I guess I would of noticed a spec which was 1000th a grain of sand on the picture.

If anyone that knows why this occurs, please let me know because it is very interesting. Thanks in advance!

[BJ_M]

you should work in our quality control dept ...

it is dust on the film print or negitive , if you see white it is dust on the neg and black is dust on the film (depends if the film was scanned (VERY expensive but superb quality) or telicine (not the download movies type telicine) so so quality but a lot cheaper to do)

same in a theatre ... it can also be dust/dirt on the mirror or heat shield , dust on the lens doesnt really show up.

Film is cleaned and handled in a clean room before being scanned or telicine but its not always perfect depending on a number of factors ..

when you have a digital edit done and are printing TO film , the image is burned onto the neg with a laser film printer , in the various analog to digital to editing to printing (back to analog) you can get digital artifacts ...

another thing is just simply bad encoding.

[defense]

@BJ_M, lol...thanks for the reply. That is DEFINITELY INTERSTING. I think I can rule out the "encoding" problem because some of the movies that I tested which were "originals" were movies such as Dumb & Dumber, & Home Alone. Those are both on single layered disks, so it was easy for me to make back-ups. I also checked out Me, Myself, & Irene, which I did reencode, and I notice it on that movie as well, but no more then on the others which I just ripped and burned. I use CCE and I think it's an amazing encoder. I do have one question for you though if you don't mind. I noticed that the specs were more apparent on Home Alone then any of the other originals I tested. I am just curious as to what "level" of specs a movie can have or not exceed before it is burned or pressed? I know that may sound odd, but I'm just curious, because I got a migraine focusing so hard on those movies, lol. It's amazing how I never noticed ANY of that before, but when I had a few errors with the end of certain DVD+R's freezing, I really made sure I focused hard on the burned movie and I noticed them. The thing is that I relate this to blinking, you have to do it, and most of the time you don't pay any attention that you are blinking. Well, with those specs, they are there, you just don't realize that most of the time. I wonder if I put my original of the Matrix in, if I would notice any of those specs then. That is probably one of those "scanned" films which is very expensive, right? I think I will try it.

Thanks again for the info, it really is very interesting and helpful. If you get a chance, please let me know if there is any quality standard for those specs, lol..Thanks

[BJ_M]

there are no specs for specks ....

[defense]

@BJ_M, thanks again for the info. One other thing I was just curious about is...is it safe to say that movies like Home Alone, Ace Ventura Pet Detective, Dumb & Dumber, are movies which are "telecine?" And Movies like The Matrix, and Abyss, etc..are "scanned?" And if so, is it safe to say that the movies which are "scanned" are much better quality, and as a result, you can't notice the specks as easily, or even at all? I checked out my original of the Matrix, and couldn't notice even miniscule specks. Thanks again for your time.

[Gazorgan]

Interesting Sidenote:

Star Wars 2, Attack of the Clones is the first movie to be printed from an all Digital master. This stems from the Digital projectors it was shown on at the intital opening, and where the movie industry is eventually heading.

That means you won't see any of the specks on the DVD. You may see a digital artifact, but none of the film problems so common to any movie more than 5 years old, and recently released on DVD.

[BJ_M]

well the sad thing is that there "dust busters" avaiable as options on all the high end scanners .. but not always used ot used correctly or present ...

keep in in mind a full scanner w/ workstation , color corrector and et. al. runs into the 100's of thousands.

here are a few links on the scanning proccess. these mostly all deal with 35mm scans but I deal w/ 65/70mm 5 and 8 perf and the price triples or more ..

http://www.studio-systems.com/broadfeatures/MarApr1997/DigitalFilmEffects/102%20MAR-APRIL.htm

http://www.cinetech.com/html/news/mm800.html


http://www.duart.com/pdf/cinematographers.pdf this is intersiting and good info for all you budding camera guys/gals

http://www.celco.com/news-centropolis_godzilla.asp

[BJ_M]

Interesting Sidenote:

Star Wars 2, Attack of the Clones is the first movie to be printed from an all Digital master. This stems from the Digital projectors it was shown on at the intital opening, and where the movie industry is eventually heading.

That means you won't see any of the specks on the DVD. You may see a digital artifact, but none of the film problems so common to any movie more than 5 years old, and recently released on DVD.

Star Wars 2, Attack of the Clones is the first MAJOR RELEASE to be printed from an all Digital master , there have been many done before on a smaller scale or special venue applications ..

[dcsos]

There are two kinds of film transfer to ELECTRONIC MEDIA or VIDEOTAPE
1. Direct Transfer by Scanning the Negative
2. Projection thru a film chain

Obviously, the first method, invented in the seventies by RANK CINETEL
is superior, and used for most of the DVD we see today.

Originally, fillms were transferred by a camera trained on the projected image. This evolved into the second method involving cameras adjusted for the differing frame rates (FILM 24fps-VIDEO 30fps) and projection into a prism and the lens of the camera directly instead of a screen...this is called a positive film transfer and is sill used for some 16mm work.

The trick in transferring theFILM without "specks" is two fold
1.as explored above, cleaning the negative (with foul chemicals, btw)
2. noislessly with DIGITAL VIDEO NOISE REDUCTION or DNVR..
that is, the suites where films are transferred must have a clean signal path with no electronic noise" in the signal..

btw, the "specks" are white or black depending on whether the positive or negative was transferred