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  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

4K Delivery... get ready.

Tim Whitcomb said:
I think not... Redray specs at NAB 2010 was 4K delivery at 15 mb/s and actually worked... no way Sony is anywhere near that.
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"4K" or UltraHD Blu-Ray is imminent, demonstrated and essentially ready for launch. And I wouldn't be surprised if they have other delivery methods or systems in place as well. Look how many PS3 systems are out there.. Just sayin' Seriously, if anyone can pull off this 4K to the masses thing right now, by flipping a switch, it's Sony. And believe me, I'm anything but a Sony fan-boy, I rather detest most of their products and especially their marketing tactics.

They have used the PS3 to display 4K still imagery or slide-shows at CES nearly a year ago. I've heard from some people in the right positions that some models of PS3 could be upgraded via firmware/ software to play back motion as well.

Of course, the PS3 thing isn't directly related to the content delivery system built into their new 4K TV's. But they already have the network infrastructure via their PlayStation network to deliver content. They own tons of their own content as it is and have the muscle to license and deliver more....
 
Just thinking out loud here.... Wouldn't it be interesting if there were a direct connection between RED and Sony on this whole 4K thing? Sometimes things get interesting and even accelerate when technologies and other IP's are shared or cross-licensed.
 
Jeff Kilgroe said:
Just thinking out loud here.... Wouldn't it be interesting if there were a direct connection between RED and Sony on this whole 4K thing? Sometimes things get interesting and even accelerate when technologies and other IP's are shared or cross-licensed.
Click to expand...

on the topic of wild guesses... new content delivery mechanism built in to Red Ray... http://www.concentric.com/content-acceleration/streaming

EDIT: This is pure conjecture based on searching 4K content delivery mechanism.
 
the sony store at century city has had a 4K tv on display for a couple months now. it looks amazing. every time i go see a movie i stop by there, and the last time i was there the manager told me they had been instructed to mention the TV to everyone that came through the store.

the way he was acting it seems sony finally gets it and has a big 4K push coming soon.

side note... the TV's demo has a soccer clip that shows a wipe between '2k' and '4k'. no idea how accurate a presentation it is, but the 2k looks like absolute shit in comparison. i may or may not have been drunk and taken a friend that is a big supporter of the alexa to see a movie and 'casually wandered into the sony store' beforehand. 2k is good enough my ass.
 
I might guess that RED is rushing to beat Sony who also just mentioned they are launching a 4K TV and a 4K delivery device... Of course it would be crazy to think that it was one in the same, but that'd be near to impossible given the competing interests.
 
I wonder if Sony is really up for another brutal format war and facing another potentially crushing defeat? They may have beat HD-DVD, but Blu-Ray has not won the HD delivery war by a long-shot. IP distribution, satellite and other on-demand systems are a real thorn in their side, even kicking their ass at times. Format wars at Sony are a pretty sore subject.

The soccer clip was being shown at NAB and CES. It's actually 8K (or should I say 7.7K?) NHK footage. I think it looks like crap, generally speaking, but does show resolution potential at 4K. I think the 2K representation is doctored a bit, as we see the same practices used to compare HD with SD, make the SD look extra bad...
 
For 4K I don't think streaming and cloud services will be much of a problem for Sony. Yes, blu-ray is threatened by it, but let's see it from another angle. The streaming services deliver a very poor HD quality, bluray does not. The only thing that makes bluray hard to sell is that people don't need HD, most people doesn't give a shaite about resolution. So only those that really want the best quality use bluray, for the rest they stream movies. People watching bluray today will watch 4K tomorrow, but it's going to be a minority of people, no way near the amount to say it's mainstream.

4K will be a cinephile format, it will be something only a few values. People still watch SD, SD is still the primary workflow for television for the majority of stations around that world.

So, will sony fight the format fight? It all comes down to what is best, BluRay was the best format. If Red release RedRay and it's better and more simple then Sony's solution, then yes, that will probably in the long run win the fight, but Sony is also more established and they already own the disc format distribution format of today.

Time will tell, but 1080p hasn't even become a standard yet and SD still rules most of the world. The optimism of a 4K consumer market isn't very realistic in my opinion, even if I personally want a home 4K system.
 
Oh boy, looks like things are heating up. I just hope that RED is not making the same mistake like what HD DVD did during the format war by not having all the major CE manufacturers and major media studios to back them up like sony/blu ray did. that's what ultimately won the battle. You can't go alone in this war. I am hoping that RED has signed up sony with this. otherwise, it might be a tough road for RED. Don't get me wrong, I am all about having RED Player be the winner in this.
 
I like this guessing stuff. It's like, I get to sound knowledgable and informed without the burden of actually being either. It's exhilarating and liberating.

So, lets see what I can whip out of my own ignorance,

If they want this to become the standard they of course

a. Kill it on price. Make it widespread.
b. Make it super affordable for people who own RED gear already (Because it'll make it easy for these people to show off their amazing footage, on a perfectly suited player. Each presentation effectively pimps both the player and the camera)
c. Work out some interesting deal for independent cinema owners, so that all of a sudden every indie cinema uses the player.
d. Create an (optional?) method where each player is also a distribution point, kind of like torrenting. That way when I wanna get my 4k content it takes 20 minutes and not 4 days.
e. Get in with the porn industry because that's what dictates electronics right? Or is that whole beta / vhs thing an urban myth?



-Phil
 
DVDs are archaic technology with a finite future.

Why have one DVD with a single movie when you can have your whole collection in the highest quality on a single SSD?

I'm hoping RED delivers with RED ray an option which brings in the wave of the future. But RED is going to have to come up with a new format, good by R3D, to set the standard globally. Hard Drive storage already permeates every inch of the world and the drives get larger and their size continues to shrink.

I see the codec war intensifying, there will be many losers.


Jeff Kilgroe said:
I wonder if Sony is really up for another brutal format war and facing another potentially crushing defeat? They may have beat HD-DVD, but Blu-Ray has not won the HD delivery war by a long-shot. IP distribution, satellite and other on-demand systems are a real thorn in their side, even kicking their ass at times. Format wars at Sony are a pretty sore subject.

The soccer clip was being shown at NAB and CES. It's actually 8K (or should I say 7.7K?) NHK footage. I think it looks like crap, generally speaking, but does show resolution potential at 4K. I think the 2K representation is doctored a bit, as we see the same practices used to compare HD with SD, make the SD look extra bad...
Click to expand...
 
yeah i figured the soccer footage had been messed with (which sucks). and i would agree with jeff that the footage didn't look great, but the display looked amazing. after referencing stuff on hd monitors for so long, i think anything HD+ would look amazing on that 4KTV.

it will be really interesting to see what sony does in the 4K content market. they got beat by VHS, then learned enough from that to beat HDDVD, only to get crushed because they didn't foresee streaming content. however, the 'sony store' on PS3 does what they should have done with the bluray launch.. HD downloads that begin to play as soon as the download begins. it should be noted that it also supports 3D.

when bluray first came out, the PS3 was like $10 more than the cheapest bluray player. that was 90% of why i bought one. with the announcement essentially made that the PS4 is going to be 4K3D, and with sony's clear understanding that they screwed up focusing on hard copy distribution instead of download/streaming with bluray, i think sony could very well have learned their lesson and be in prime position to dominate 4K home distribution and exhibition with the PS4 and 4KTV's.

obviously, this all depends on whether or not redray is as amazing as i think it will be.

side note... damn i miss posts from jim and jarred of where they thought they were with new tech in development. why the hell did everyone complain when they missed target release dates? they were like, "we're gonna give you a better camera than any you have ever used, and it will cost less than half of what the closest competitor is offering" and then everyone got all pissy when they actually delivered on that insane promise, just because it was a little late. i waited almost 2 years for my stage 2 upgrade and could not have been happier. it seriously felt like a scam. 'you know that awesome camera you love? well we'll give you all your money back, and a bunch of new free stuff if you buy the new camera for way cheaper than it should be.'

but people complained, and now i just have to guess about redray. that sucks. i miss the old days. (i guess to be fair it had a lot to do with other companies watching the posts and adjusting their development plan, but still). rant ended. sorry if you read the whole thing.. :)
 
Christoffer Glans said:
For 4K I don't think streaming and cloud services will be much of a problem for Sony. Yes, blu-ray is threatened by it, but let's see it from another angle. The streaming services deliver a very poor HD quality, bluray does not. The only thing that makes bluray hard to sell is that people don't need HD, most people doesn't give a shaite about resolution. So only those that really want the best quality use bluray, for the rest they stream movies. People watching bluray today will watch 4K tomorrow, but it's going to be a minority of people, no way near the amount to say it's mainstream.
Click to expand...

Sony doesn't consider 4K to be a threat to Blu-Ray at all. Not when the next iteration of Blu-Ray supports 4K content. It's just another feature and format to add. Of course it won't be mainstream for a while, Blu-Ray is only now becoming mainstream with players finally falling below the $100 mark. It's going to take some time for UltraHD/ 4K to establish itself. 2013 is the year of the early adopter willing to spend big money. 2014 will bring more reasonable prices and some more options, but still early-adopter territory for sure. 2015 will start to see mainstream penetration when people in the market for new TV's will opt for the 4K models as they won't be much more, if any more, than good 1080p TV's are now. Big events like the SuperBowl, World Cup, etc.. will be delivered in 4K. That will push many over to the purchasing side.

Uptake will be slower than all us 4K nut-jobs on these forums would like it to be, but it's going to happen faster than the uptake of HD/1080P. Many places that are just now moving to HD broadcasts and distribution will go one of two ways. 1> They will opt for the new UltraHD standard to help get a jump on things and future-proof themselves as the buy-in cost for UltraHD / 4K is *LOWER* now at the start than FHD 1080P was only 5 years ago. 2> They will plod along on their slow course as the rest of the industry has and will probably seek to buy into HD tech for a fraction of the current rate or even make use of retired HD equipment from those migrating to UHD.

4K will be a cinephile format, it will be something only a few values. People still watch SD, SD is still the primary workflow for television for the majority of stations around that world.
Click to expand...

Yes, cinephiles will go for it, sure. But don't underestimate the sports and live event viewers. Watching sports in UltraHD is a huge jump over watching it in HD. Football, American or otherwise, is going to sell a lot of 4K / UHD TV's.

So, will sony fight the format fight? It all comes down to what is best, BluRay was the best format. If Red release RedRay and it's better and more simple then Sony's solution, then yes, that will probably in the long run win the fight, but Sony is also more established and they already own the disc format distribution format of today.
Click to expand...

...but discs are on the way out. Sony knows it as well as anyone, have even stopped developing many of the previously postulated Blu-Ray disc types. RED-RAY is media agnostic and Sony's new delivery system is also presumably so. Blu-Ray is a viable medium and will continue to be used, but that's neither here nor there for future content. It's quite probable that many people may archive or play some of their RED-RAY content from Blu-Ray discs.

Time will tell, but 1080p hasn't even become a standard yet and SD still rules most of the world. The optimism of a 4K consumer market isn't very realistic in my opinion, even if I personally want a home 4K system.
Click to expand...

SD does still rule most of the world, but to say 1080p hasn't become a standard is completely false. It's been a ratified standard for years. Many markets like North America, Japan, South Korea and some of Europe already have extensive 1080p options in place. The last three Olympic Games have delivered content in 1080p, so that's a 4+ year span now. Here in the USA, Blu-Ray has been available for a bit over 6 years. Players have been under $175 for 2 years now, they are currently under $100. Actually down to $88 at the local WalMart. Other than new releases, I can get most of the Blu-Rays I want for $12 or less. 46" 1080p LCD TV's are $175 this weekend at WalMart as well. In fact, I don't know where in the last 3 years you could even buy a 46" or larger TV that was not 1080p. The only TV's out there that are not 1080p to buy are some real crappy things no one wants anyway and they're disposable-cheap. Sure, that doesn't represent anything on a global scale, but that sums up mainstream USA pretty well. And most people are gadget-savvy these days. While a lot of people don't really care about the visual quality of what they watch, you will find most here in the USA think it's pretty laughable that the phone in their pocket has the same or better pixel resolution of that big-screen TV they just bought a year or two ago.

As TV's continue to become cheaper and UHD/4K emerges, people will gobble it up. Just as they gobble up new iPads, computers, etc.. There's a ton of 4K+ content out there (pretty much everything shot on 35mm+ film for the last 100 years) and tons more being created today. Shooting in 1080p isn't good enough to make dedicated content for the iPad and other new tablets. That's driving from that angle of the market.

Call me an idealist or dreamer or whatever you want. I've had no trouble shooting, posting and delivering 4K for nearly 5 years now and my market keeps growing. In fact, it's about to EXPLODE! The funny side of it all is that I still have to deliver DVD versions of 99% of what I shoot. But that is in addition to the Blu-Ray, web and 4K versions. More formats is fine with me, I get to charge $$$ for each one. :)
 
I agree with Jeff on this. And remember it's relative to the market you work in as well. Features films have been hitting 4K for a bit now. Next we'll see broadcast and video games. Youtube took a stab at allowing it, but there will be more options coming from "web content providers" soon enough.

Once the full swing 4K marketing begins it's going to move things along much faster. Between March and June of 2013 there will be a large push. People will want it. Games, movies, and television will be released and created for it. New hardware for playback will be available and new screens are going to be coming hard and fast for a while. 4K LCDs will drop quickly in price compared to the 1080p days. We might see a sub $4K panel in as little as seven months.

An interesting side note. I've been working since 1999 and never worked worked in SD. Relative to what you do and who you do it for.
 
The 4k delivery is a given... what's not yet a given, AFAIK, is the firmware or software that will allow the viewer to watch 6k or 8k content on a 4k screen and have the ability to zoom in to a certain part of the screen to watch one part of the scene, be it a movie or sports event. In my opinion, that's when people will take out a loan to own a home theater system.
 
(Different Jeff) Arri have had 4K film scanners for a long time and a good daylight film stock holds enough resolution for a 4K scan. Get ready for all those re-scan, re-release 4K movies coming your way (for more $$$$....)
 
Well, i checked the situation about display devices, because i really want to get REDRAY as soon as possible, but it looks like 4k isn't happening this year to me. There is only 1 screen available in Europe, and thats the 55"-Toshiba which actually can't take more than 1080p on its inputs. Two 84"-tvs are more or less announced, the LG and the Sony, but without a real launch-date or a pricetag... Sure there is the Sony SXRD projector, but i'm not going to buy this one for 19kEUR, because we know who is building a better one, a projector also doesn't fit my current needs, i "just" want a (big) screen.

So, what are you guys going to use with REDRAY? I guess i'll have to live with downsampling to 1080p for a while...
 
Sure Maik, in fact I'm not sure if there is a point of selling a 4K player without having the possibility of projecting the picture. Well, wait and see, as our English friends like to say ;-)

Kristin
 
Jeff is very insightful as usual, and though he's right, I don't share his optimism on that timeline.

Yes, BD is now finally getting mainstream acceptance, but DVD still outsells it 3 to 1. Why? Not so much the cost of the player which is a one-time purchase, but the cost of BDs is still very high compared to DVD. To say that the average cost of a BD is $12 is misleading, most of the titles that sell for that much are dumbed down, single discs without any extra features, and then, mostly older titles. The BD average cost is still over $25, compared to $14 for DVD, with most new releases pushing past $35. That's stiff for most people, buying only 3-4 movies for 100 bucks, and makes a strong argument for rentals and pirated copies. It could be said that the high prices of BD are one of the reasons Netflix and others stay in business, cementing one of the mantras of later years: if owning is expensive, then rent. Likewise, the upgrade to widescreen, HD capable televisions has finally become mainstream in the more affluent countries, but that is very much an ongoing process, with millions of buyers upgrading to widescreen , or from 720p to 1080p, or DLP to LCD, or LCD to LED, etc, etc. It is very much a live process, and one where giants like Samsung and Sony are fighting tooth and nail over. So, are we really that naive to think that those millions of people who patiently waited for those TVs to sell for $500 will now trash those units and spend $thousands for 4K Tvs that will be able to play very limited content, which will likely cost $50-60 a title or play over cable at horrendous quality. If you think HD is commonplace, with most cable looking still awfully pixelated and macroblocked, so what will over-the-air 4K look like?
 
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