Question About DVD Reviews
Dear Gary: Would you make one relatively minor addition to your DVD video rating descriptions, please? Have the reviewer(s) stipulate what kind and size of display(s) were used in making the ratings. This is crucial, and here’s a prime example: the most recent version of To Catch A Thief gets a picture rating of “3” on your system, which is not bad, and reasonably accurate when viewing on my 27-inch Sony flat-screen CRT. However, watching this new disc on my RCA Scenium 65-inch HDTV reveals a transfer that can most charitably be described as “terrible” when the image is blown up to that size. It is more amazing that the original film is a VistaVision 30-frames-per-minute superfilm—the same process that resulted in the superb reference-quality DVD North By Northwest. In short, most any DVD looks pretty good on a smaller screen, and particularly so on flat plasma displays, but it’s often a totally different result on a big projection screen. You should have your readers know which type of display was used in making a rating(s). At least one of the competing DVD rating services already does this, although they do not have the number of films in their database that you have. Good work!
Milt R. Smith
Research Editor and Staff Writer Michael Coate Comments:
We have on occasion mentioned in our reviews certain visual characteristics or anomalies as they relate to viewing on large displays. We have had a page or two in every issue of our magazine that identified in both text and graphics our review systems, and the pages are updated whenever new equipment comes or goes. We have a link in the Web site versions of our reviews which allows readers to download those pages. The link is located in the upper right box (WSR Review Scores) of the “full detail” reviews. In the “limited info” hit-list version the link is included as well near the upper right corner of the info box underneath the disc scores. Specifically, the displays used for critical picture quality reviews of DVD (and D-VHS) titles are the two 9-inch CRT projectors in our Reference Holosonic™ Spherical Surround™ Home Theatre Laboratory, the Runco DTV-1101 and the Sony VPH-G90U. Both are installed in rear-projection mode, and are viewed via a Stewart Filmscreen AeroView 100 screen, which measures 7-feet wide. The examples you noted regarding watching To Catch A Thief on a large display points to a common concern (complaint?) our readers have occasionally mentioned to us and that is (a) many DVDs simply do not look great on large displays, and (b) many viewers who use smaller displays often wonder what it is we see (and criticize) in our reviews when they do not see the same things during their viewing experience using smaller displays and/or completely different equipment. Again, our picture reviewer could elaborate further on that topic. A minor correction regarding “VistaVision 30 frames-per-minute superfilm—the same process that resulted in the superb reference-quality DVD of North By Northwest.” No film running at 30 frames per “minute” would ever be “super”!!! I’m sure that’s a slip-up and that you meant to state frames per “second”! And actually, VistaVision was a 24 fps process; its superiority over conventional 35mm was based on it being a large-gauge format. Comparing the To Catch A Thief disc to North By Northwest is not necessarily an even comparison because the route in which the two titles took to get to DVD may not have been identical. The only similarity may be that the two productions were originated on the same process.
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