I don’t know, I preferred Gobots. I liked the consistent size with Gobots. Maybe because Transformers has a jingle.
@davenipples3 күн бұрын
These are lovely mate. I need to watch the movie again soon. Keaton is such a good Batman. 👍
@user-ow1jb7wg8u3 күн бұрын
I still have some of my ST: Innerspace sets and the Strike Force version of the Enterprise D
@javeedsultan84844 күн бұрын
Have the video tapes, the dvd and now the blue ray Unfortunately, in my opinion the Blue Ray sucks Having been there at the beginning it's the casting and story arc that hooked me Have all the videos as they came out, DVD was an improvement and nicely presented I too recently purchased a blu-ray version In my opinion the blu-ray version is purely a money making endeavour The packaging sucks, returned mine 3 time due to loose scratch disc No info on the disc or information leaflet identifying which episodes are on each disc No extra features, I mean nothing, no interviews, no make of, no bloopers apart from the episodes nothing extra I never regret anything I buy, untill know The should have put a bit of time and effort into 5he blu-ray release
@joseph.irvin.photography4 күн бұрын
The 4K scans are sharp and detailed far & above what the DVDs can show, the only problem is that evidently no one went back to the DVDs to look at the color grade or be faithful to that! So there are strings of episodes (like nearly the entirety of season 2 disc 3) which look just awful and this is the nearly unforgivable gaff that keeps me from recommending the blu-ray set wholeheartedly. My recommendation is to buy it, but don't throw away your DVDs because they still have their worth, with the special features, but also to show WB how poor some of the blu-ray episodes look in their colors. I'm surprised that I've found no one who has griped about this yet besides me. The blu-ray and DVD both have their upsides and downsides. If the producers had paid to have the CG rendered in widescreen or paid extra to preserve the computer files then things could have been different but for all the foresight that the creators had they were constrained by the money men. 4:3 on blu-ray is the only practical compromise and anyone who whines about it might as well whine about STTNG not being widescreen. The composite shots are the weakest element but those were all done 4:3 as well, there are articles and interviews about all these issues going back years. And back when the DVD box sets were originally sold we were paying $100 per season, so having all 5 seasons for less than that is a deal no matter which way you look at it. Yeah the packaging is a joke but whatever, it's the show's presentation itself that matters.
@portland-1825 күн бұрын
The Mole is possibly popular because it's cool, and it's on the end titles, so every episode. Bandai also created the chrome finished Electronic Thunderbird 1 that came out in the late 80s. Tomy Takara later did the Thunderbirds Are Go animated series diecast metal toys, that were released in English speaking markets by Vivid Imaginations. There were many more released in Japan, including the 1965 vehicles, so that's 2 more Moles. What you are calling 'Carlton' toys are Vivid Imaginations toys. Carlton were the owners of Thunderbirds at the time of the mini figures and Supersize Sound Tech which were made by Vivid Imaginations. The Supersize Mole and Firefly were both available carded, and were not exclusive to the big TB2. There was a small silver Mole with the JR21 TB2 in some markets, otherwise you got a red jeep. Your final Mole needs the helicopter blades removing, before you add the drill, and the tracks...
@keithmartin13287 күн бұрын
I'd forgotten about these. Me and my baby brother (who like me is now in his 40's) got a box of these as a hand me down from my cousin.
@portland-18210 күн бұрын
Your figure is Gordon from the Thunderbird 4 that comes with the Supersize Thunderbird 2.
@lysith3aPS511 күн бұрын
Losing the side elements from the wider perspective for the 4:3 presentation is unfortunate but very much the lesser of the evils IMO. If it were purely CGI that required 4:3 then I'd have no real issue with a changing ratio between live-action and CGI, but it's the composite shots that are the issue, and there are loads and loads of those. They would still need to be 4:3 too, and together with the pure CGI, the constant changing between 4:3 and 16:9 would be far too jarring. As it is, yes we lose the additional detail from the live-action scenes, but what we do get is a night and day improvement over the DVD presentation, both in terms of detail and colour-grading. The live-action elements were re-scanned to 4K resolution and it really shows. CGI/composite's are upscaled 480i, but it's pretty good upscaling, and together with the lack of crop/zoom again it's a big difference. The lack of extras, and the abysmal packaging is what really lets the set down. I had to re-house my blu ray discs into the old DVD packaging as the jumbo box for the blu rays is absolutely hideous. Fortunately it's fewer discs so I used the extra slots in the DVD sets to retain the actual DVDs with extras on them, hence managed to save the commentaries/bloopers etc. Now, I still have everything in the "complete universe" DVD box. The Gathering, is in the blu ray set, but it's an unaltered version of the special edition. It looks very poor compared to all the other episodes, and tbh, I kept my DVD-copy of the "unspecial" edition, which is both a better edit, and a better presentation than what we get as the extra on the blu ray. Still, if it's a choice between the DVDs and the blu rays, then for me it's no choice at all. Packaging, extras, are superfluous compared to the main draw, the actual episodes. And even with the 4:3 presentation (which it was originally anyway), it's still vastly superior to the DVD-presentation.
@P3SS3SSOd11 күн бұрын
Great stuff, you really got some very nice pieces there, I'm not a toy fair person but appreciate seeing your experience of it.
@paulschulz587211 күн бұрын
love Flash Gordon gun!
@Dezimondo11 күн бұрын
Interesting video and some good points regarding toy fairs. Btw awesome pickups especially the Transformer picture book and Gerry Anderson blueprint manual 👊🔥👍
@johnnycarrotheid13 күн бұрын
In the UK, ,the big dvd boxset ic movies and crusade, the massive boxset. It has misprint discs and duplicate episodes I think on season 4. Duplicates mean others are missing. Ruins the boxset
@movieflicktube13 күн бұрын
What has been overlooked here is that only the 4:3 masters were created on film . These were filmed & made back in the day alongside the video recordings . Thus the 4:3 masters were scanned in HD for the blu ray release .This is also why the 4:3 masters were used for the LASERDISC releases on home video which to this day are superior to the DVD release
@ExcelsiorsDomain13 күн бұрын
So where in your view would the DVD have gotten its extra side footage from? I think we've established that film isn't necessarily 4:3 by they would have adopted that ratio for broadcast purposes.
@edale214 күн бұрын
Now what I remember is Babylon 5 airing in widescreen, as one of the first series to do so. I think they started airing in widescreen with season 3. So why don't we have a 4:3 seasons 1 and 2, and widescreen seasons 3-5?
@ExcelsiorsDomain13 күн бұрын
Well this might be a daft observation, but is it possible that you got an early widescreen TV at that time and the picture just got auto-stretched to fill it? I think some early ones probably would have done that unless you told them not to. Unless someone else can give an idea on that I'm not aware of them having switched to widescreen for live transmission, but then I'm only speaking from a UK standpoint?
@edale213 күн бұрын
@@ExcelsiorsDomain they literally advertised it as "filmed in widescreen", and had a little intro bit about it before the start of every episode (just a little screen that said "TNT presents Babylon 5 filmed in widescreen"). I had a 4:3 TV at the time, and it showed up on screen with letterboxes.
@Dezimondo14 күн бұрын
Awesome video mate 👍
@Geerladenlad15 күн бұрын
I think I'll wait and see if a 4k version comes out and then consider the options.
@ashquiventures861915 күн бұрын
The live action material for B5 was shot for 16x9 with the 4x3 extraction framing being a priority. All the CGI was rendered at 4x3 "Standard Definition". I believe it was interlaced. They were expecting that when 16x9 displays became sufficiently available to the public that WB would provide funds to redo all the CGI at a higher resolution and at 16x9, instead of the original 4x3 renders. There are various factors to why the CGI material was rendered at 4x3 rather than 16x9 and the main reason was time and cost. When the DVDs were done the 16x9 framing was utilized but as noted by you and others all the CGI material was cropped from the 4x3 masters which results in the clear disparity in visual quality between the pure live action material and any shot that is uses CGI. The B5 HD remastering from what I understand was an absolute labor of love by the team who did it and likely completed it before the recent dark times at WB today. In that they did not have the funds to recreate all the CGI and CGI composites but with their budget they did manage to find and scan the vast majority of the live action 35mm elements. Which is an immense task even with all the possible funding and optimal available materials. The HD 4x3 presentation is a perfectly valid and is an original intended aspect ratio for the show which also makes the best use of the SD CGI material. By opting for the 4x3 framing it really is the best compromise to accommodate the lower quality of all the standard definition materials. If they had gone with 16x9 and replicated the approach used with the widesceen DVDs then the picture quality for all the shots that make use of CGI would appear dramatically inferior. Much of the original CGI working files were lost but a good number of them have been recovered and some fans have made use of them to rerender some shots at greater quality. To why WB did not coordinate with these people, only WB knows. And even if they did, there would still be a lot of material that would have to be redone. On the audio front, from what I understand it is effectively the same as the DVDs. Unfortunately, they did not address some issues even from the DVD mixes and might have introduced an error or two. They should have fixed some audio level disparities which is more evident in Seaon 5, the Credits are extremely loud in comparison to the main programing. There is one episode that has always had poor audio quality and that remains the case with the HD release. As it stands, the current HD presentation of B5 is a miracle that has some shortcomings but accounting for the forest for the trees we are very fortunate to have this release.
@ooklathemok15 күн бұрын
Thank for this. I remember they did a "remaster" which was released online in 2021 ? which i think was all A.I. so i was hoping that this would be a proper remaster AND re-render the effects but it still doesnt sound like that.
@ExcelsiorsDomain15 күн бұрын
No I missed the online releases, I didn't have the right services, but I believe this is probably that release?
@ooklathemok15 күн бұрын
@@ExcelsiorsDomain hi there. I've had a look at the online "remaster" and i use the term loosely because it was all AI..and I've checked it against this Blu-ray release and as far i can see its a swizz. Coupled with your excellent side by side dvd comparison I'm more convinced now that all theyve done is take this poor man's remaster off the web and stuck it on Blu-ray and packaged in a shitty box whereas I was sure , but incredulous nonetheless, that the whole point of the Blu-rays were to do a proper remaster of the video and re-render the effects.Im not convinced because the effects look the same and the video is just as soft looking as on the web.
@ExcelsiorsDomain15 күн бұрын
@ooklathemok Well I rather assumed this would be the case, but I suppose having it on Blu Ray does avoid additional subscription charges chasing it round providers. Do we know it was an AI job as such? The treatment of the text and other comments here suggest it may have been AI assisted but not wholly automatic?
@ooklathemok13 күн бұрын
@@ExcelsiorsDomainThank you for replying and you'll forgive my turn of phrase but I'm rather pissed off over this whole situation mainly because I'm finding it difficult to get information. This is why your video is invaluable because I was under the impression that with Star Trek the Next Generation for example they remastered the video properly without any AI taking the original film and then reproduced a lot of the effects. Because Babylon 5 effects were CG rather than models I was under the impression that the whole point of this Blu-ray release, even though it's woeful in terms of extra features, was that they would remaster the video properly from the original print and if they wanted to use AI as well for some of the fine work that was okay but really it was supposed to be a proper remaster and on top of that they were going to re-render the special effects from scratch. Now that's what I read but comparing the 2 it doesn't seem any different from the AI remaster that was available online a couple of years ago. Now it could very well be the case that they have extracted as much quality as they're able to but my caveat is that the Next Generation looks a lot sharper and I'm not only referring to the special effects. Maybe some time have a look at the small print on the back of the box because it has to be there somewhere and it wouldn't surprise me if they actually says that this is not a proper remaster but instead has been put through some kind of AI filtering process
@gapafterdark203415 күн бұрын
Nice
@EvieDoesYouTube16 күн бұрын
AI outpainting could render a widescreen version
@MattyB57416 күн бұрын
can’t really see anything poor video nothing is close up all from a distance
@ExcelsiorsDomain15 күн бұрын
I understand, this is the GoPro portion of the day and by its nature it's more unguided because I wasn't looking at its feed in real time. So unless I got particularly close to a table I agree it won't be close up. I was tempted to say something like "get a bigger TV" but thought I'd try serious first!
@RavenShinyThings16 күн бұрын
None of the movies or crusade were included i think that is sad
@ExcelsiorsDomain15 күн бұрын
Now you've said that I wonder what scale the Crusade CGI was done at...
@Muck00616 күн бұрын
Budget comparison (adjusted for inflation) read it and laugh/weep: - Babylon 5: ~$1,3 million per 45 minute episode - Star Trek TNG: ~$3 million per 45 minute episode - Star Wa(r)s "The Acolyte": ~$22 million per 22-30 minute episode
@MattLathrum14 күн бұрын
Are those all in 2024 dollars?
@Muck00616 күн бұрын
Having more people at the sides is more important than the full CGI IMO, because it ads more life to the station / scenes.
@ExcelsiorsDomain15 күн бұрын
That's a really interesting observation. I always thought they did incredibly well with making it a "living" station and you're right, the widescreen does show off the extras various.
@Muck00616 күн бұрын
It is a shame they couldnt do "best of both worlds" and use the 4:3 for the "full CGI" and widescreen for the rest. You just have to "add black bars to the sides of the CGI". There is an example that does this: the german version for the "Robin of Sherwood" series had missing scenes that were 4:3, but ads them on the DVD version. They additionally only have the english language version, which doesnt really matter because you should watch it in english anyways.
@rtex202016 күн бұрын
Thank you for doing this analysis... I'm still not convinced that I want to get the Blu Ray version.
@JavaJunky16 күн бұрын
So, I get that the 4:3 loses the extra side details from the live action shots. But, none of that info was viewable on the original broadcast. I am assuming that the shots were framed for TV sets at the time. Not pan and scan, which is a modified picture. Please confirm...the blu-rays give us the same experience of the original broadcast (with a slightly improved picture quality).
@ExcelsiorsDomain15 күн бұрын
Well I would hope they wouldn't be worse than the original broadcast! To be perfectly honest I'd be lying if I said to you it's the same experience because I don't have a reference point, but I can't see how it could be anything different unless they somehow used the DVD footage and looked at a non-central area of it?
@Dularr16 күн бұрын
My understanding is when they filmed Banylon 5, they didn't have a high definition monitor to inspect the video output. So while the broadcast video looked fine, the higher definition video was a disaster. It apparently took a long while before the technology was available to fix the series.
@dlarge650216 күн бұрын
As HD didn't exist in the 90's I'd expect that to make it difficult if not redundant to have a HD monitor to hand. I mean why render for video standards that were not even on the radar when it's clear they didn't even render for wide-screen which certainly was on the radar?
@Dularr16 күн бұрын
@@dlarge6502 1990s is when cable companies were investing in digital TV. So many shows were preparing for a digital signal.
@Dularr16 күн бұрын
@@dlarge6502 read the mastering problems for Babylon 5. Very colorful tale.
@ExcelsiorsDomain15 күн бұрын
@@dlarge6502 Keep in mind as well that for the really CGI heavy episodes they often barely completed the rendering in time as they ran week to week. They didn't have anywhere near the lead time they would have needed (nor indeed the processing power) to render up to a higher degree. Future proofing unfortunately wasn't in the budget...
@ImagineMySurprise51016 күн бұрын
It's curious that the image in the Zocolo has the Zocolo sign illuminated in the DVD image but not in the Bluray image. I have no idea why.
@ExcelsiorsDomain15 күн бұрын
I noticed that too. I think it's a colour saturation issue, someone ramped up the Blu Ray primary colours I think so it ends up looking merged with the surrounding area as it's all blue tinted. It's little things like that where it falls down a touch, presumably they felt the colour balance was off or some such?
@dsolosan4 күн бұрын
Does the sign blink in the show? It doesn't look like he used the exact same frame.
@OneAngryDeacon16 күн бұрын
Can't tell you how glad I am you were wearing clothes when you filmed the TV
@ExcelsiorsDomain15 күн бұрын
I learned that lesson from that episode of ST TNG where a member of the crew appears in an ornament chewing gum on Romulus!
@thorgrimb241616 күн бұрын
I am watching season 5 on the Bluray at present. I love B5 it is my favourite sci fi series followed by Sapce Above and Beyond. But the Bluray has been a real disappointment for me I was hoping for a really good quality upscaling as well to justify the price but on my old 55 inch sony 4k tv it looks so grainy as if they had some college student working on the Bluray and not real proffessionals. I have seen many old B&W movies done to a really nice high std all it needed was the same passion that the millions of fans have for this series to be put into the Bluray edition. Now yes I still am enjoying watching the series for god knows how many run throughs now but I am really disappointed that they did not take the time to make this series really special.
@ExcelsiorsDomain16 күн бұрын
I remember many, many years ago just running video captures through some despeckling filters and the like and I really need to sit and watch this properly to get an overall impression of the quality of it as against something that's had more money thrown at it rather than just some default settings applied. For my channel, this video has had a large number of views in a short space of time and now that the Babylon 5 embargo seems to have been lifted at WB we can but hope the Blu Ray sales might prompt them to take a harder look at remastering the series given what might be possible these days with a little budget...
@Muck00616 күн бұрын
What's so hard about "re-rendering/upscaling"? It shouldnt be expensive because all you need is one person and a set of computers doing the rendering. The person just has to do the quality control and maybe change the settings for some scenes ... and swap out the old widescreen CGI for the full "4:3 with added black bars to the sides" one. It isnt that hard and should not be too expensive, basically the only real COST for creating the Blu-Ray (apart from production cost).
@Zen-Dragon7116 күн бұрын
So i have yet to upgrade my B5 Does the BluRay set contain the Movies?
@edf542416 күн бұрын
No, it only has the pilot, The Gathering. If they were to release the movies on Blu-ray, I would have expected an announcement by now.
@Kuji916 күн бұрын
There is a second weight in the compartment at the back of Zoidzilla's head. This allows the head to drop back so the mouth can open. So, when switched on, he will walk forward, his arms move. His head moves from side to side and the mouth will open. Also his eyes will flash red when the back part is switched on. Amazing piece of engineering for an 80s toy.
@ExcelsiorsDomain16 күн бұрын
I should really have another crack at cleaning him and his battery contacts up, but yes, Zoids was a great line for "practical" effects as most were just wind ups...
@Dezimondo16 күн бұрын
29:27 I used to have alot of Captain Simian and the Space Monkeys sets including the Primate Avenger but I sold them cheap. They are now on my to buy list. Btw awesome video mate 🔥👍
@ExcelsiorsDomain16 күн бұрын
It's not a series I'm familiar with in the slightest but every time I see that ship on that stall I do consider it, because SPACESHIP! Do you film at all yourself?
@Dezimondo15 күн бұрын
@@ExcelsiorsDomain yeah it is a great series and the toys were fantastic imo. I didn't film at the fair as I mostly use Instagram but I do want get back into KZread. It's on my to do list.
@MutantProductions17 күн бұрын
thanks for the detailed comparison. shame the love and care given to the DVD release didn't really extend to the latest version... almost feels like a cashgrab...
@dlarge650216 күн бұрын
Cash grab? Seriously it's hard enough to keep this kind of thing alive. They know that us physical media weirdos will pay for discs with no artwork. Almost all Blu-ray discs have no artwork, sad but true so why would this set be different? All I care about are the discs are numbered correctly.
@MutantProductions15 күн бұрын
@@dlarge6502 minimum effort to get maximum return... sounds to me it's the very definition - whether other titles do the same or not. :/
@deswynne817217 күн бұрын
I have the DVD box sets, surprisingly, I think it's series 3, the booklet is in French.
@dsolosan17 күн бұрын
"The DVD reminds us that analogue film isn't 4:3." Tell that to the thousands of movies produced before the 1960s. The aspect ratio of 35mm film is entirely dependent on how the filmmakers choose to use it.
@joseph.irvin.photography4 күн бұрын
Yet he's still right. Films from the 1950s and earlier shot with 4-perf 35mm whereas a lot of more modern productions shot 3-perf which is wider by virtue of not being as tall. B5 was shot 3-perf 2.85:1 and then cropped 1.33:1 for broadcast.
@dsolosan4 күн бұрын
@@joseph.irvin.photography You've just confirmed my point that he was wrong. He said that "analogue film isn't 4:3." Filmmakers create a variety of aspect ratios using 35mm film, with 4:3 being a standard for decades. He also quoted someone that B5 was "shot 2-perf, instead of the standard 3-perf," which is also wrong. Shot 3-perf instead of 4-perf is probably what he meant. Little details.
@dsolosan17 күн бұрын
"Standard film is widescreen by its nature." Do you mean 35mm? The traditional old-timey frame size on 35mm is 1.33:1 Which is not widescreen. To get anything wider, filmmakers have had to come up with a couple of jury-rigs, such as cropping the top or bottom of the frame (1.85:1), or using an anamorphic lens to squeeze a wider image into the frame (2.35:1).
@ExcelsiorsDomain16 күн бұрын
Well I found this short explanation on a site, but apparently they may even have shifted to shooting it differently in later seasons to save money? This degree of knowledge is a touch beyond me I'm afraid: "Like many TV shows of the era, Babylon 5 was shot on 35mm film in 2-perf format (as opposed to the 3-perf theatrical standard), which yielded an aspect ratio pretty close to 16:9 on the camera negative."
@gallendugall891317 күн бұрын
I bought the BluRay as the play copy, so my DVD copy can stay better preserved in a case along with a packet of oxygen absorber.
@kirishima63817 күн бұрын
In a few more years, the AI upscaling built into TVs and smart devices will remaster old shows in real time.
@Muck00616 күн бұрын
Just use the AI to make the remastering for the Blu-Ray easier/cheaper. AI on its own will not work properly and needs guidance.
@mattimusprimal63718 күн бұрын
Jetfire was only named ‘Skyfire’ in the original G1 cartoon (plus some Takara Tomy Jetfire toys). All other forms of TF media, comics, cartoons, films, toys are known as Jetfire!
@ExcelsiorsDomain18 күн бұрын
Ah did I mis-speak somewhere? It's funny because at a toy fair on Sunday someone picked up a Jetfire and I had to mutter "not my Jetfire" under my breath! As I dropped out of cartoon continuity largely after G1 I'm not sure I really registered they dropped Skyfire?
@mattimusprimal63717 күн бұрын
@@ExcelsiorsDomain Beast Wars was my introduction to Transformers. I saw all series, TV films, movies onwards. He’d always been known as Jetfire everywhere, exception being the G1 cartoon! (and Takara Tomy Jetfire toys based on said cartoon)
@blacko353918 күн бұрын
Careful with the DVD version. In my season 4 set I had some repeated discs so have a few episodes missing :(
@ExcelsiorsDomain18 күн бұрын
Gosh. Less than ideal. Happily when I worked through my very lightly played DVDs the only glitch was that I missed the opening few minutes of the Fall of Centauri Prime
@dhplayground17 күн бұрын
Same, I had 4 duplicates DVD's that were mis-printed across seasons and I bought it when it original came out. I lost all my DVD's while moving, around 17 years ago, so this Blu Ray box set was perfect for me since all I had left to watch B5 were very low resolutions mp4
@johnnycarrotheid13 күн бұрын
Same here. Think the season 4 from that big boxset was a particular mess up. Think I found others through the box, but tbh I ended up binning it long ago. Useless as everything wasn't there/mistaken named discs etc
@cornkid310518 күн бұрын
£30 was a good price for that SHADO 2 . I love UFO stuff and just got the product enterprise SHADO 2 , but made sure it was the "clean" version as someone who did the weathering on the other versions needs to go to specsavers
@cornkid310518 күн бұрын
Art Asylum did some cracking stuff. You should have a look for their series of 3 assimilated borg figures. It tooks me ages to hunt down the full set unopened at a good price. The boxes look like the pods that the borg rested in.
@ExcelsiorsDomain18 күн бұрын
I have one that I accidentally picked up from iCollectables, agree, very nice figures
@Snatcher4219 күн бұрын
About the on-screen text: it's been re-created on both the DVD & blu-ray, but the blu-ray actually looks a lot closer to the original broadcast. On DVD they changed the font to what they were using in some of the later movies (River of Souls, A Call to Arms). The blu-ray puts it back to the way it should look, just re-rendered in HD. It's actually one of the small touches of the remaster I most appreciate, because they could have easily gone the lazy route of just upscaling the old text.
@ExcelsiorsDomain19 күн бұрын
@Snatcher42 Ah super thank you for that, I hoped someone might have a definitive answer. All these little details would have made for an interesting making of segment if nothing else. Somebody somewhere put effort into this. I wonder if they're credited somewhere...
@greyeyed12319 күн бұрын
"I will throw up at points in this video", lol. You made be do a spit take!
@ExcelsiorsDomain19 күн бұрын
@@greyeyed123 Apologies, poor choice of words!
@ryanbaker740419 күн бұрын
It was convenient for the broadcast TV of the time, but the entire "shoot it on film, finish it on video" mantra has locked some great TV away in Video Hell (TM), unfortunately. Thank goodness Paramount/CBS Digital were willing to eat the expense to give us TNG in all its glory, going back to the Edit Decision Lists (EDLs) to re-edit every episode, rather than just upscaling the finished video product. Also, sticking with the 4:3 aspect ratio instead of "pushing in" was the right call. Give me the OG. I am afraid because of the added elements of lower res, digital CGI elements, we'll likely never get DS9 and Voyager.
@greyeyed12319 күн бұрын
Give it a few years, and AI will be able to upgrade everything with the flip of a switch.
@ryanbaker740419 күн бұрын
@@greyeyed123 I’m holding out hope for this actually! Let’s hope we’re not disappointed!
@Niblonian8819 күн бұрын
This is some really useful info, thanks. I do love B5 and have been toying with picking up the Blu Ray set for a while but the lack of extras and additional films had always put me off. I'm happy I did wait after this review, it is likely I will snag it one day but am now more than happy to wait until I see it for a really competetive price.
@ExcelsiorsDomain19 күн бұрын
I am certainly normally one to wait for a deal but it had been stubbornly high for a while. As I mentioned on the video it may be cheaper through Warners, as I was told after the fact, but I went old school and physically picked it up from a physical store! Whilst I'm sure it will come out on clearance eventually, I do wonder to some extent just how big the production run would have been in the first place - scarcity could keep the price up?
@ExcelsiorsDomain19 күн бұрын
A mild irony given the aspect ratio on everything else, I just looked at the Gathering before putting the Blu Rays away and as I imagined it's the TNT Special Edition, but it isn't cropped! Which makes we wonder if its CGI was done in widescreen by exception because it was made as a proof of concept, or if they adopted the DVD approach to life and just used a chunk of the CGI instead. Answers on a virtual postcard...
@garytilford650319 күн бұрын
The Gathering has been cropped and zoomed in for 16:9 and it looks absolutely terrible on the blu ray. Even the original DVDs were in the correct 4:3 ratio. Because the blu ray version is zoomed in it has lost a ton of detail making it look blurry or out of focus. My dvd looks far better with the full 4:3 screen and much sharper detail. It's a pity they didn't give us the original unchanged 4:3 version for the blu ray.
Пікірлер
I don’t know, I preferred Gobots. I liked the consistent size with Gobots. Maybe because Transformers has a jingle.
These are lovely mate. I need to watch the movie again soon. Keaton is such a good Batman. 👍
I still have some of my ST: Innerspace sets and the Strike Force version of the Enterprise D
Have the video tapes, the dvd and now the blue ray Unfortunately, in my opinion the Blue Ray sucks Having been there at the beginning it's the casting and story arc that hooked me Have all the videos as they came out, DVD was an improvement and nicely presented I too recently purchased a blu-ray version In my opinion the blu-ray version is purely a money making endeavour The packaging sucks, returned mine 3 time due to loose scratch disc No info on the disc or information leaflet identifying which episodes are on each disc No extra features, I mean nothing, no interviews, no make of, no bloopers apart from the episodes nothing extra I never regret anything I buy, untill know The should have put a bit of time and effort into 5he blu-ray release
The 4K scans are sharp and detailed far & above what the DVDs can show, the only problem is that evidently no one went back to the DVDs to look at the color grade or be faithful to that! So there are strings of episodes (like nearly the entirety of season 2 disc 3) which look just awful and this is the nearly unforgivable gaff that keeps me from recommending the blu-ray set wholeheartedly. My recommendation is to buy it, but don't throw away your DVDs because they still have their worth, with the special features, but also to show WB how poor some of the blu-ray episodes look in their colors. I'm surprised that I've found no one who has griped about this yet besides me. The blu-ray and DVD both have their upsides and downsides. If the producers had paid to have the CG rendered in widescreen or paid extra to preserve the computer files then things could have been different but for all the foresight that the creators had they were constrained by the money men. 4:3 on blu-ray is the only practical compromise and anyone who whines about it might as well whine about STTNG not being widescreen. The composite shots are the weakest element but those were all done 4:3 as well, there are articles and interviews about all these issues going back years. And back when the DVD box sets were originally sold we were paying $100 per season, so having all 5 seasons for less than that is a deal no matter which way you look at it. Yeah the packaging is a joke but whatever, it's the show's presentation itself that matters.
The Mole is possibly popular because it's cool, and it's on the end titles, so every episode. Bandai also created the chrome finished Electronic Thunderbird 1 that came out in the late 80s. Tomy Takara later did the Thunderbirds Are Go animated series diecast metal toys, that were released in English speaking markets by Vivid Imaginations. There were many more released in Japan, including the 1965 vehicles, so that's 2 more Moles. What you are calling 'Carlton' toys are Vivid Imaginations toys. Carlton were the owners of Thunderbirds at the time of the mini figures and Supersize Sound Tech which were made by Vivid Imaginations. The Supersize Mole and Firefly were both available carded, and were not exclusive to the big TB2. There was a small silver Mole with the JR21 TB2 in some markets, otherwise you got a red jeep. Your final Mole needs the helicopter blades removing, before you add the drill, and the tracks...
I'd forgotten about these. Me and my baby brother (who like me is now in his 40's) got a box of these as a hand me down from my cousin.
Your figure is Gordon from the Thunderbird 4 that comes with the Supersize Thunderbird 2.
Losing the side elements from the wider perspective for the 4:3 presentation is unfortunate but very much the lesser of the evils IMO. If it were purely CGI that required 4:3 then I'd have no real issue with a changing ratio between live-action and CGI, but it's the composite shots that are the issue, and there are loads and loads of those. They would still need to be 4:3 too, and together with the pure CGI, the constant changing between 4:3 and 16:9 would be far too jarring. As it is, yes we lose the additional detail from the live-action scenes, but what we do get is a night and day improvement over the DVD presentation, both in terms of detail and colour-grading. The live-action elements were re-scanned to 4K resolution and it really shows. CGI/composite's are upscaled 480i, but it's pretty good upscaling, and together with the lack of crop/zoom again it's a big difference. The lack of extras, and the abysmal packaging is what really lets the set down. I had to re-house my blu ray discs into the old DVD packaging as the jumbo box for the blu rays is absolutely hideous. Fortunately it's fewer discs so I used the extra slots in the DVD sets to retain the actual DVDs with extras on them, hence managed to save the commentaries/bloopers etc. Now, I still have everything in the "complete universe" DVD box. The Gathering, is in the blu ray set, but it's an unaltered version of the special edition. It looks very poor compared to all the other episodes, and tbh, I kept my DVD-copy of the "unspecial" edition, which is both a better edit, and a better presentation than what we get as the extra on the blu ray. Still, if it's a choice between the DVDs and the blu rays, then for me it's no choice at all. Packaging, extras, are superfluous compared to the main draw, the actual episodes. And even with the 4:3 presentation (which it was originally anyway), it's still vastly superior to the DVD-presentation.
Great stuff, you really got some very nice pieces there, I'm not a toy fair person but appreciate seeing your experience of it.
love Flash Gordon gun!
Interesting video and some good points regarding toy fairs. Btw awesome pickups especially the Transformer picture book and Gerry Anderson blueprint manual 👊🔥👍
In the UK, ,the big dvd boxset ic movies and crusade, the massive boxset. It has misprint discs and duplicate episodes I think on season 4. Duplicates mean others are missing. Ruins the boxset
What has been overlooked here is that only the 4:3 masters were created on film . These were filmed & made back in the day alongside the video recordings . Thus the 4:3 masters were scanned in HD for the blu ray release .This is also why the 4:3 masters were used for the LASERDISC releases on home video which to this day are superior to the DVD release
So where in your view would the DVD have gotten its extra side footage from? I think we've established that film isn't necessarily 4:3 by they would have adopted that ratio for broadcast purposes.
Now what I remember is Babylon 5 airing in widescreen, as one of the first series to do so. I think they started airing in widescreen with season 3. So why don't we have a 4:3 seasons 1 and 2, and widescreen seasons 3-5?
Well this might be a daft observation, but is it possible that you got an early widescreen TV at that time and the picture just got auto-stretched to fill it? I think some early ones probably would have done that unless you told them not to. Unless someone else can give an idea on that I'm not aware of them having switched to widescreen for live transmission, but then I'm only speaking from a UK standpoint?
@@ExcelsiorsDomain they literally advertised it as "filmed in widescreen", and had a little intro bit about it before the start of every episode (just a little screen that said "TNT presents Babylon 5 filmed in widescreen"). I had a 4:3 TV at the time, and it showed up on screen with letterboxes.
Awesome video mate 👍
I think I'll wait and see if a 4k version comes out and then consider the options.
The live action material for B5 was shot for 16x9 with the 4x3 extraction framing being a priority. All the CGI was rendered at 4x3 "Standard Definition". I believe it was interlaced. They were expecting that when 16x9 displays became sufficiently available to the public that WB would provide funds to redo all the CGI at a higher resolution and at 16x9, instead of the original 4x3 renders. There are various factors to why the CGI material was rendered at 4x3 rather than 16x9 and the main reason was time and cost. When the DVDs were done the 16x9 framing was utilized but as noted by you and others all the CGI material was cropped from the 4x3 masters which results in the clear disparity in visual quality between the pure live action material and any shot that is uses CGI. The B5 HD remastering from what I understand was an absolute labor of love by the team who did it and likely completed it before the recent dark times at WB today. In that they did not have the funds to recreate all the CGI and CGI composites but with their budget they did manage to find and scan the vast majority of the live action 35mm elements. Which is an immense task even with all the possible funding and optimal available materials. The HD 4x3 presentation is a perfectly valid and is an original intended aspect ratio for the show which also makes the best use of the SD CGI material. By opting for the 4x3 framing it really is the best compromise to accommodate the lower quality of all the standard definition materials. If they had gone with 16x9 and replicated the approach used with the widesceen DVDs then the picture quality for all the shots that make use of CGI would appear dramatically inferior. Much of the original CGI working files were lost but a good number of them have been recovered and some fans have made use of them to rerender some shots at greater quality. To why WB did not coordinate with these people, only WB knows. And even if they did, there would still be a lot of material that would have to be redone. On the audio front, from what I understand it is effectively the same as the DVDs. Unfortunately, they did not address some issues even from the DVD mixes and might have introduced an error or two. They should have fixed some audio level disparities which is more evident in Seaon 5, the Credits are extremely loud in comparison to the main programing. There is one episode that has always had poor audio quality and that remains the case with the HD release. As it stands, the current HD presentation of B5 is a miracle that has some shortcomings but accounting for the forest for the trees we are very fortunate to have this release.
Thank for this. I remember they did a "remaster" which was released online in 2021 ? which i think was all A.I. so i was hoping that this would be a proper remaster AND re-render the effects but it still doesnt sound like that.
No I missed the online releases, I didn't have the right services, but I believe this is probably that release?
@@ExcelsiorsDomain hi there. I've had a look at the online "remaster" and i use the term loosely because it was all AI..and I've checked it against this Blu-ray release and as far i can see its a swizz. Coupled with your excellent side by side dvd comparison I'm more convinced now that all theyve done is take this poor man's remaster off the web and stuck it on Blu-ray and packaged in a shitty box whereas I was sure , but incredulous nonetheless, that the whole point of the Blu-rays were to do a proper remaster of the video and re-render the effects.Im not convinced because the effects look the same and the video is just as soft looking as on the web.
@ooklathemok Well I rather assumed this would be the case, but I suppose having it on Blu Ray does avoid additional subscription charges chasing it round providers. Do we know it was an AI job as such? The treatment of the text and other comments here suggest it may have been AI assisted but not wholly automatic?
@@ExcelsiorsDomainThank you for replying and you'll forgive my turn of phrase but I'm rather pissed off over this whole situation mainly because I'm finding it difficult to get information. This is why your video is invaluable because I was under the impression that with Star Trek the Next Generation for example they remastered the video properly without any AI taking the original film and then reproduced a lot of the effects. Because Babylon 5 effects were CG rather than models I was under the impression that the whole point of this Blu-ray release, even though it's woeful in terms of extra features, was that they would remaster the video properly from the original print and if they wanted to use AI as well for some of the fine work that was okay but really it was supposed to be a proper remaster and on top of that they were going to re-render the special effects from scratch. Now that's what I read but comparing the 2 it doesn't seem any different from the AI remaster that was available online a couple of years ago. Now it could very well be the case that they have extracted as much quality as they're able to but my caveat is that the Next Generation looks a lot sharper and I'm not only referring to the special effects. Maybe some time have a look at the small print on the back of the box because it has to be there somewhere and it wouldn't surprise me if they actually says that this is not a proper remaster but instead has been put through some kind of AI filtering process
Nice
AI outpainting could render a widescreen version
can’t really see anything poor video nothing is close up all from a distance
I understand, this is the GoPro portion of the day and by its nature it's more unguided because I wasn't looking at its feed in real time. So unless I got particularly close to a table I agree it won't be close up. I was tempted to say something like "get a bigger TV" but thought I'd try serious first!
None of the movies or crusade were included i think that is sad
Now you've said that I wonder what scale the Crusade CGI was done at...
Budget comparison (adjusted for inflation) read it and laugh/weep: - Babylon 5: ~$1,3 million per 45 minute episode - Star Trek TNG: ~$3 million per 45 minute episode - Star Wa(r)s "The Acolyte": ~$22 million per 22-30 minute episode
Are those all in 2024 dollars?
Having more people at the sides is more important than the full CGI IMO, because it ads more life to the station / scenes.
That's a really interesting observation. I always thought they did incredibly well with making it a "living" station and you're right, the widescreen does show off the extras various.
It is a shame they couldnt do "best of both worlds" and use the 4:3 for the "full CGI" and widescreen for the rest. You just have to "add black bars to the sides of the CGI". There is an example that does this: the german version for the "Robin of Sherwood" series had missing scenes that were 4:3, but ads them on the DVD version. They additionally only have the english language version, which doesnt really matter because you should watch it in english anyways.
Thank you for doing this analysis... I'm still not convinced that I want to get the Blu Ray version.
So, I get that the 4:3 loses the extra side details from the live action shots. But, none of that info was viewable on the original broadcast. I am assuming that the shots were framed for TV sets at the time. Not pan and scan, which is a modified picture. Please confirm...the blu-rays give us the same experience of the original broadcast (with a slightly improved picture quality).
Well I would hope they wouldn't be worse than the original broadcast! To be perfectly honest I'd be lying if I said to you it's the same experience because I don't have a reference point, but I can't see how it could be anything different unless they somehow used the DVD footage and looked at a non-central area of it?
My understanding is when they filmed Banylon 5, they didn't have a high definition monitor to inspect the video output. So while the broadcast video looked fine, the higher definition video was a disaster. It apparently took a long while before the technology was available to fix the series.
As HD didn't exist in the 90's I'd expect that to make it difficult if not redundant to have a HD monitor to hand. I mean why render for video standards that were not even on the radar when it's clear they didn't even render for wide-screen which certainly was on the radar?
@@dlarge6502 1990s is when cable companies were investing in digital TV. So many shows were preparing for a digital signal.
@@dlarge6502 read the mastering problems for Babylon 5. Very colorful tale.
@@dlarge6502 Keep in mind as well that for the really CGI heavy episodes they often barely completed the rendering in time as they ran week to week. They didn't have anywhere near the lead time they would have needed (nor indeed the processing power) to render up to a higher degree. Future proofing unfortunately wasn't in the budget...
It's curious that the image in the Zocolo has the Zocolo sign illuminated in the DVD image but not in the Bluray image. I have no idea why.
I noticed that too. I think it's a colour saturation issue, someone ramped up the Blu Ray primary colours I think so it ends up looking merged with the surrounding area as it's all blue tinted. It's little things like that where it falls down a touch, presumably they felt the colour balance was off or some such?
Does the sign blink in the show? It doesn't look like he used the exact same frame.
Can't tell you how glad I am you were wearing clothes when you filmed the TV
I learned that lesson from that episode of ST TNG where a member of the crew appears in an ornament chewing gum on Romulus!
I am watching season 5 on the Bluray at present. I love B5 it is my favourite sci fi series followed by Sapce Above and Beyond. But the Bluray has been a real disappointment for me I was hoping for a really good quality upscaling as well to justify the price but on my old 55 inch sony 4k tv it looks so grainy as if they had some college student working on the Bluray and not real proffessionals. I have seen many old B&W movies done to a really nice high std all it needed was the same passion that the millions of fans have for this series to be put into the Bluray edition. Now yes I still am enjoying watching the series for god knows how many run throughs now but I am really disappointed that they did not take the time to make this series really special.
I remember many, many years ago just running video captures through some despeckling filters and the like and I really need to sit and watch this properly to get an overall impression of the quality of it as against something that's had more money thrown at it rather than just some default settings applied. For my channel, this video has had a large number of views in a short space of time and now that the Babylon 5 embargo seems to have been lifted at WB we can but hope the Blu Ray sales might prompt them to take a harder look at remastering the series given what might be possible these days with a little budget...
What's so hard about "re-rendering/upscaling"? It shouldnt be expensive because all you need is one person and a set of computers doing the rendering. The person just has to do the quality control and maybe change the settings for some scenes ... and swap out the old widescreen CGI for the full "4:3 with added black bars to the sides" one. It isnt that hard and should not be too expensive, basically the only real COST for creating the Blu-Ray (apart from production cost).
So i have yet to upgrade my B5 Does the BluRay set contain the Movies?
No, it only has the pilot, The Gathering. If they were to release the movies on Blu-ray, I would have expected an announcement by now.
There is a second weight in the compartment at the back of Zoidzilla's head. This allows the head to drop back so the mouth can open. So, when switched on, he will walk forward, his arms move. His head moves from side to side and the mouth will open. Also his eyes will flash red when the back part is switched on. Amazing piece of engineering for an 80s toy.
I should really have another crack at cleaning him and his battery contacts up, but yes, Zoids was a great line for "practical" effects as most were just wind ups...
29:27 I used to have alot of Captain Simian and the Space Monkeys sets including the Primate Avenger but I sold them cheap. They are now on my to buy list. Btw awesome video mate 🔥👍
It's not a series I'm familiar with in the slightest but every time I see that ship on that stall I do consider it, because SPACESHIP! Do you film at all yourself?
@@ExcelsiorsDomain yeah it is a great series and the toys were fantastic imo. I didn't film at the fair as I mostly use Instagram but I do want get back into KZread. It's on my to do list.
thanks for the detailed comparison. shame the love and care given to the DVD release didn't really extend to the latest version... almost feels like a cashgrab...
Cash grab? Seriously it's hard enough to keep this kind of thing alive. They know that us physical media weirdos will pay for discs with no artwork. Almost all Blu-ray discs have no artwork, sad but true so why would this set be different? All I care about are the discs are numbered correctly.
@@dlarge6502 minimum effort to get maximum return... sounds to me it's the very definition - whether other titles do the same or not. :/
I have the DVD box sets, surprisingly, I think it's series 3, the booklet is in French.
"The DVD reminds us that analogue film isn't 4:3." Tell that to the thousands of movies produced before the 1960s. The aspect ratio of 35mm film is entirely dependent on how the filmmakers choose to use it.
Yet he's still right. Films from the 1950s and earlier shot with 4-perf 35mm whereas a lot of more modern productions shot 3-perf which is wider by virtue of not being as tall. B5 was shot 3-perf 2.85:1 and then cropped 1.33:1 for broadcast.
@@joseph.irvin.photography You've just confirmed my point that he was wrong. He said that "analogue film isn't 4:3." Filmmakers create a variety of aspect ratios using 35mm film, with 4:3 being a standard for decades. He also quoted someone that B5 was "shot 2-perf, instead of the standard 3-perf," which is also wrong. Shot 3-perf instead of 4-perf is probably what he meant. Little details.
"Standard film is widescreen by its nature." Do you mean 35mm? The traditional old-timey frame size on 35mm is 1.33:1 Which is not widescreen. To get anything wider, filmmakers have had to come up with a couple of jury-rigs, such as cropping the top or bottom of the frame (1.85:1), or using an anamorphic lens to squeeze a wider image into the frame (2.35:1).
Well I found this short explanation on a site, but apparently they may even have shifted to shooting it differently in later seasons to save money? This degree of knowledge is a touch beyond me I'm afraid: "Like many TV shows of the era, Babylon 5 was shot on 35mm film in 2-perf format (as opposed to the 3-perf theatrical standard), which yielded an aspect ratio pretty close to 16:9 on the camera negative."
I bought the BluRay as the play copy, so my DVD copy can stay better preserved in a case along with a packet of oxygen absorber.
In a few more years, the AI upscaling built into TVs and smart devices will remaster old shows in real time.
Just use the AI to make the remastering for the Blu-Ray easier/cheaper. AI on its own will not work properly and needs guidance.
Jetfire was only named ‘Skyfire’ in the original G1 cartoon (plus some Takara Tomy Jetfire toys). All other forms of TF media, comics, cartoons, films, toys are known as Jetfire!
Ah did I mis-speak somewhere? It's funny because at a toy fair on Sunday someone picked up a Jetfire and I had to mutter "not my Jetfire" under my breath! As I dropped out of cartoon continuity largely after G1 I'm not sure I really registered they dropped Skyfire?
@@ExcelsiorsDomain Beast Wars was my introduction to Transformers. I saw all series, TV films, movies onwards. He’d always been known as Jetfire everywhere, exception being the G1 cartoon! (and Takara Tomy Jetfire toys based on said cartoon)
Careful with the DVD version. In my season 4 set I had some repeated discs so have a few episodes missing :(
Gosh. Less than ideal. Happily when I worked through my very lightly played DVDs the only glitch was that I missed the opening few minutes of the Fall of Centauri Prime
Same, I had 4 duplicates DVD's that were mis-printed across seasons and I bought it when it original came out. I lost all my DVD's while moving, around 17 years ago, so this Blu Ray box set was perfect for me since all I had left to watch B5 were very low resolutions mp4
Same here. Think the season 4 from that big boxset was a particular mess up. Think I found others through the box, but tbh I ended up binning it long ago. Useless as everything wasn't there/mistaken named discs etc
£30 was a good price for that SHADO 2 . I love UFO stuff and just got the product enterprise SHADO 2 , but made sure it was the "clean" version as someone who did the weathering on the other versions needs to go to specsavers
Art Asylum did some cracking stuff. You should have a look for their series of 3 assimilated borg figures. It tooks me ages to hunt down the full set unopened at a good price. The boxes look like the pods that the borg rested in.
I have one that I accidentally picked up from iCollectables, agree, very nice figures
About the on-screen text: it's been re-created on both the DVD & blu-ray, but the blu-ray actually looks a lot closer to the original broadcast. On DVD they changed the font to what they were using in some of the later movies (River of Souls, A Call to Arms). The blu-ray puts it back to the way it should look, just re-rendered in HD. It's actually one of the small touches of the remaster I most appreciate, because they could have easily gone the lazy route of just upscaling the old text.
@Snatcher42 Ah super thank you for that, I hoped someone might have a definitive answer. All these little details would have made for an interesting making of segment if nothing else. Somebody somewhere put effort into this. I wonder if they're credited somewhere...
"I will throw up at points in this video", lol. You made be do a spit take!
@@greyeyed123 Apologies, poor choice of words!
It was convenient for the broadcast TV of the time, but the entire "shoot it on film, finish it on video" mantra has locked some great TV away in Video Hell (TM), unfortunately. Thank goodness Paramount/CBS Digital were willing to eat the expense to give us TNG in all its glory, going back to the Edit Decision Lists (EDLs) to re-edit every episode, rather than just upscaling the finished video product. Also, sticking with the 4:3 aspect ratio instead of "pushing in" was the right call. Give me the OG. I am afraid because of the added elements of lower res, digital CGI elements, we'll likely never get DS9 and Voyager.
Give it a few years, and AI will be able to upgrade everything with the flip of a switch.
@@greyeyed123 I’m holding out hope for this actually! Let’s hope we’re not disappointed!
This is some really useful info, thanks. I do love B5 and have been toying with picking up the Blu Ray set for a while but the lack of extras and additional films had always put me off. I'm happy I did wait after this review, it is likely I will snag it one day but am now more than happy to wait until I see it for a really competetive price.
I am certainly normally one to wait for a deal but it had been stubbornly high for a while. As I mentioned on the video it may be cheaper through Warners, as I was told after the fact, but I went old school and physically picked it up from a physical store! Whilst I'm sure it will come out on clearance eventually, I do wonder to some extent just how big the production run would have been in the first place - scarcity could keep the price up?
A mild irony given the aspect ratio on everything else, I just looked at the Gathering before putting the Blu Rays away and as I imagined it's the TNT Special Edition, but it isn't cropped! Which makes we wonder if its CGI was done in widescreen by exception because it was made as a proof of concept, or if they adopted the DVD approach to life and just used a chunk of the CGI instead. Answers on a virtual postcard...
The Gathering has been cropped and zoomed in for 16:9 and it looks absolutely terrible on the blu ray. Even the original DVDs were in the correct 4:3 ratio. Because the blu ray version is zoomed in it has lost a ton of detail making it look blurry or out of focus. My dvd looks far better with the full 4:3 screen and much sharper detail. It's a pity they didn't give us the original unchanged 4:3 version for the blu ray.