Bluray is growing on me.

Laurence wrote on 8/29/2007, 8:36 AM
Lately I've considered myself to be more in the HD DVD camp than Bluray because of the ease of which I can make an HD DVD compatible 3x DVD disc on a regular cheap DVD+-R.

Now Bluray has the AVCHD disc which lets me basically do the same thing.

In addition to this however, The Bluray directory structure seems to allow for things like viewing photos from digital cameras, viewing raw AVCHD footage from the new AVCHD camcorders, playing back roughly edited playlists from AVCHD camcorders, playing back mp3s, slideshows from playlists, etc.

All of this is really cool stuff that really should be included in any home theater.

Is there any way to find out more about this type of thing. As I realize what Bluray has got planned and is starting to implement, I must say that it is really starting to be quite appealing.

Comments

apit34356 wrote on 8/29/2007, 9:14 AM
Laurence, I believe that is many more options yet to come, but Sony and partners are trying to get enough products out before announcing its BLuray connection. Sony and partners are more focused on consumer interconnectable products ( cameras, PSP3, HD TVs, etc) than just movies. HD DVD will be trying to catch up(ie like they did with1080p), so Sony and partners are not going to give away they plans until the consumer products are out.

In the FAR, FAR Future---------------One of the tech issues that most everyone misses with BluRay is its reading bandwidth, way above HD DVD and its maintainable. SO here is a techO rumor, this extra bandwidth with a Cell processor using AVCHD(2) (protype) can drive a 2k display(sony's 4k projector) with ease. What does this mean, this means BluRay design has legs, but the market isn't yet developed enough for 1080p, so getting "content" for bigger screens will be tough and HD TVs are not producing the profit margins that would push manufacturer to upgrade product lines.
Jay Gladwell wrote on 8/29/2007, 9:48 AM

Then you'd better see the doctor and talk to him about having it removed!

Laurence wrote on 8/29/2007, 9:51 AM
The interconnectivity between my CX-7 and PS3 really impresses me. Everything you do on the CX-7 (stills, SD video, HD video and playlists) is immediately viewable on the PS3. That is just too cool. If this is any indicator of the future of Bluray, I can see this resonating with consumers.

Many of us on this forum have preferred HD DVD over Bluray, not because of movie playback, but because of what it allows us to do with our own content.

I can see the same thing happening in the consumer world, this time in Bluray's favor. If Bluray lets consumers look at their kids birthday parties and vacation photos and videos in HD on their home theaters and HD DVD doesn't, this will be a huge point in Bluray's favor for many consumers.
apit34356 wrote on 8/29/2007, 10:06 AM
Sony has been pushing products, in the past, using the memory stick where you could plug it in and view the pictures, a little too soon and not enough consumers using the products.

But today, everyone talks about interconnectable, Sony and partners can flood the market with friendly PSP3 products that work together, saving the stress of managing those pics and home movies. I know a lot of professional individuals that still struggle getting their pics out of camera,( teenagers have become usefull ;-) ) That showroom display of the 60" HDTV 1080p just become easier to sell with that little black Sony box--PSP3.
4eyes wrote on 8/29/2007, 3:31 PM
It's fairly easy for me to make a home video avchd disk with menus, chapters, background music, motion menus (if you want) from my mpeg2@25MBS files. Anyone with a Blu-Ray player that plays the avchd format (Sony/Pioneer) can view the HD footage or watch it in HD on their computers using WinDvd8, PowerDvd 7 or NeroShowtime. I'm only rendering them on a P4-3.2Ghz single pass & they look pretty nice.

Another feature I've growing to like with these disk is the capability to re-import them back into the computer to get the original files back. It's very similar to dvd's.

Even right now if you have a Sony mini-dvd avchd camcorder after you finalize the mini-dvd just put it into the PS3 or Sony Blu-Ray player. It has a menu and everything plays nice, although I don't like recording directly in the avchd format, I think one needs a tripod to keep the motion to a minimum compared to panning & compresssing each frame.

So for the highest quality I can get 40 minutes on a cheap single layer dvd using 14MBS.
I don't know to many that actually watch home videos for over 30 minutes anyway.

mbryant wrote on 8/30/2007, 1:49 AM
I don't think can render back out to AVCHD format in Vegas though, is this correct? So you can put AVCHD clips onto a disc and play it in a PS3 etc, but not Vegas edited ones? Or do I have this wrong? I know Vegas 7 can edit AVCHD, but I don't see any option to render out to this format.

Mark
Terje wrote on 8/30/2007, 10:46 PM
"I don't think can render back out to AVCHD format in Vegas though"

File > Render As...

Save as type "MainConcept AVC/AAC (*.mp4)

Chose or modify the appropriate template and you should be fine.
mbryant wrote on 8/31/2007, 4:22 AM
Interesting... the only templates I have under this are ipod ones.

Has anyone succesfully used Vegas to render back out to AVCHD format (and created a disc which will play on a Blu-ray player/PS3)? If so what settings did you use?

Mark
4eyes wrote on 8/31/2007, 7:27 AM
Chose or modify the appropriate template and you should be fine.As just posted, in Vegas you would click on Options & modify the template, give it a name & save your new template.
When I used the trial version of Vegas 7 & created a highdef mp4 file it didn't play on the PS3, show up as unsupported data although the PS3 will display the video/audio information within the h264 file correctly.
None of the Vegas products create a avchd disk yet, but is the only software I've used so far that can properly convert the avchd files .m2t/m2ts to hdv.m2t/cineform or another codec and still retain it's quality. This takes time and is worth the wait for Vegas/VMS to convert them because both programs do a great job.

H264 encoding for windows commonly uses 3 container formats (MP4 & M2TS/MTS), they are different containers. Apple puts their H264 in the MOV container of course.
But the common container for AVCHD is M2TS on Optical Media.

I wouldn't suggest buying a AVCHD cam if you plan to edit the video unless you have a super computer.
mbryant wrote on 8/31/2007, 8:31 AM
Thanks... I don't have a supercomputer, but I have tried editing AVCHD clips on my decent (core duo) laptop, and it performs good enough for me (doesn't seem much different to HDV in terms of performance).

I was trying to understand if Vegas can create an AVCHD disc... it seems the answer is no. Maybe that's not important as I can convert to HDV and use that.
apit34356 wrote on 8/31/2007, 8:36 AM
"but I have tried editing AVCHD clips on my decent (core duo) laptop", it would nice to off-load AVCHD to the GPU on the video side.