Eth Nick Posted June 13, 2020 Share Posted June 13, 2020 (edited) A personal fave sci-fi film of mine. Couldn’t wait for it to be transferred to UHD/Atmos. Impressions... I’ve compared some scenes on the HD BD & 4K BD discs following the viewing of the 4K BD recently. Firstly, I was shocked at how much they cleaned up the film, visually. I didn’t expect to see such an obvious difference. It was almost as if the HD BD was a DVD in comparison. I never really go back to the HD BD after getting the 4K BD, so it took me by surprise. There was still grain (as Spielberg intended, which I have no problem with), but it was refined & didn’t take away from the detail at all, whereas in the HD BD, it stood out more – think grains of rice on the HD BD & grains of salt on the 4K BD. The HDR, on the backdrop of the dreary colour palette, was even more pronounced & enhanced the 4K BD more than many other titles I’d say. For eg. The Tripod’s eye as it rises out of the ground was much more blinding & made the viewer feel the impact just as the characters did in the film, so Dolby Vision did it’s job. After comparing the two audio tracks, I’m was very relieved to hear no detrimental editing of the low end during both the lightning storm & the Tripod emergence scenes. They were as face-smashing as each other, only the Atmos on the 4K BD was more enveloping. They were the only two scenes I was concerned with, as I distinctly remember their impact when I first heard them on HD BD & thankfully I think that impact hasn’t been compromised. The rest of the film sounded just as aggressive as I remember, only with a more involving Atmos soundtrack that relentlessly shackles the viewer in their seat for 117 minutes of terror (& fun). So overall, WotW is going to sit right up there as one of my treasured UHD BD titles that has undergone a significant overhaul in video & improved audio (over an already demo track on HD BD). Edited June 13, 2020 by Ralfi 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
betty boop Posted June 13, 2020 Share Posted June 13, 2020 oh yeah... looking forward to seeing this on uhd as well. wont read one sentence said above just as yet and till i do 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kaynin Posted June 13, 2020 Share Posted June 13, 2020 I always loved the storyline to this. It’s a virus that gets them in the end. Given today’s environment, how appropriate... 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mobe1969 Posted June 13, 2020 Share Posted June 13, 2020 I'm kind of mixed on it. I agree the image is incredible and detailed and so HDR, but remember this was a movie of that era that used bleach bypass to give it that distinct look. That look was present on the DVD, the Blu Ray, and definitely at the cinema when I saw it. But the UHD had a different cleaner more detailed look. Don't get me wrong, I like it. But I felt it made it a totally different visual experience. I mean if you were a film making enthusiast and knew about bleach bypass films, but had never seen WotW, and I screened the UHD for you, you would be surprised if I told you it was a bleach bypass film. Unlike Saving Private Ryan, which was also a bleach bypass film. But the UHD is a truer representation of it. Watching it reminded me so much of the cinema experience, and surpassed the Blu Ray. On the audio side, I'm also a little mixed. The DVD and Blu Ray are notoriously recognized as benchmark low frequency explosive movies. The UHD isn't. There are plenty of spectral graphs over at AVS on this. But... With bass equalization, it can be more or less recovered. But even further to cloud this, although the DVD and Blu-ray are highly regarded as benchmark LFE, you can look at the waveforms of the individual tracks and during a lot of these reference scenes, the tracks, including the LFE track, are horrifically clipped, to the degree of 30% clipping. This isn't an issue with the new Atmos mix. It is definitely idiotically low frequency filtered, but it is recoverable with BEQ. So I'm kind of torn. I'm pretty sure I'll go with Atmos with BEQ and UHD in future, but I do feel it isn't quite true to the original image. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eth Nick Posted June 13, 2020 Author Share Posted June 13, 2020 Yeah, there were many reviews commenting on the bass being clipped. Many with capable subs may notice the difference, but most shouldn’t. I thought my sub would expose it, but after comparing the two, I couldn’t tell. I mean they both had an equivalent impact from the main seating position, so my smile was beaming. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mobe1969 Posted June 13, 2020 Share Posted June 13, 2020 I didn't notice much difference as I was using BEQ. Looking at the graph though, without BEQ I'd have noticed it. The ferry crossing martian was incredible still. I have Crowsons and that makes a huge difference as you are getting activity down to 0hz. Even my pair of svs pb2ks would notice. I don't appreciate the sub 30hz filtering. I do appreciate the fact it is not badly clipped like the DVD and Blu Ray though. And BEQ can fix the filtering. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Happy Sacks Posted June 14, 2020 Share Posted June 14, 2020 I've been waiting for this to come out and thought it was tremendous. TBH, I thought it was more thunderous than ever and if the bass was clipped I certainly didn't pick it up. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts