MSCL.com

DoubleBilled wrote:<snip>

...Anyone? Anyone? What are your video quality reviews?

DB

Sounds like this set is roughly the same quality as the original Ep. 1-3 DVD. I noticed some of the same stuff back then:

http://news.mscl.com/showtext.phtml?key=20000610053719

It's disappointing as hell to hear that they didn't come out any better this time. Some of these problems can be attributed to the source material, but there's no excuse for all those MPEG artifacts. Grrr!!

Cap'n Fool

Well i watched the pilot yesterday. Since i havent seen it in 8 years i figured I will go in order. I was pleasantly surprised by the picture quality of the pilot actually. Granted it is pretty damn washed out, but i think i went into it expecting the worst after reading all these bad reports on here.

I havent checked out any of the other episodes yet really, caught a few mins of the next ep before i fell asleep and it looked as good as i coudl expect it to look.

My equipment isnt the best, but it isnt bad: Phillips 27" Flat Screen TV and a Samsung player (havent tried it on my JVC multi Region player yet). S-Video using Monster cables.

Doublebilled it seems to me like you got a bad disc. Hopefully there wasnt a small batch fucked up. You'll just have to fight to get a new set.

So i remember a few days back i was saying how i thought that the menus looked crappy by the photos someone had put up of them. Well since i watched an episode last night i can confirm that they are the crappiest DVD menus i have ever seen. The only thing they have going for them is that they are very functional and easy to use, unlike some of the more out there menu systems ive seen.

But the "art" of them is just horrendous. Real cheesy effects, bad font usage, horrible color choices....<sigh> i expected so much more. But atleast from what i saw they look and play fine, so no real complaints, yet.

Was my description of the menus (from the marathon) accurate?

fnordboy wrote:So i remember a few days back i was saying how i thought that the menus looked crappy by the photos someone had put up of them. Well since i watched an episode last night i can confirm that they are the crappiest DVD menus i have ever seen. The only thing they have going for them is that they are very functional and easy to use, unlike some of the more out there menu systems ive seen.

But the "art" of them is just horrendous. Real cheesy effects, bad font usage, horrible color choices....<sigh> i expected so much more. But atleast from what i saw they look and play fine, so no real complaints, yet.

Jason Rosenfeld wrote:Was my description of the menus (from the marathon) accurate?

To be honest i will have to look back at what you said, i don't remember. I was just saying my personal observation.

At this point, the only DVD menu I have seen that is WORSE is Girls Just Want to Have Fun. That said, I really hate the font on the MSCL menu. Jason did mention that in his review. Who the heck thought that crappy font was aesthetically pleasing?!

Link to Jason's review of the test discs:

http://www.mscl.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=941

I just re-read Jason's live six page marathon review and man does he get punch drunk funny!

I haven't watched the first disc yet so I can't confirm the layer change problem, but no one has complained about it...yet.

I concur with the "high school yearbook" font used for the menu - LAME! I would have preferred a boring font in all honesty. I've only watched two episodes, but that is my sole complaint as of this time. I mean besides the usual "AU sucks!"

I didn't want to beat a dead horse and mention the God awful menus, and that "Swwoooshhh" sound when you make a choice! Oh. My. God!

A little more about my music staff. It's like the picture was divided into six parts, and then stitched back together, allowing these horizontal lines to show with a fair amount of vertical camera movement. When the scene is still, you can't see it, but when the scene moves, you can notice it.

Good luck with that 60 incher. After that you'll want to drive to BMG and kick their ass. Maybe I should just watch MSCL on a 13" B&W to make me happy.

db

Episode 4, start of chapter 2, or 9 minutes in. Look closely at Jordan's shirt, you may have to replay several times to notice it -- I would describe it as an intermittent horizontal schism in the picture, resulting in a misalignment of about 1 or 2 pixels on an 800x600 PC monitor. I don't want to strain my eyes, but you could probably find more examples throughout the DVDs. Bottom line: it's very slight, temporary, and unless you are a video expert you'd never notice it if you weren't specifically looking for it.

I can also confirm a very obvious flickering broken white line at the top of the picture in some of the episodes, probably the anti-copy feature mentioned earlier. The line was about 3 pixels deep and was only visible on my PC monitor, not on my friend's TV DVD player. This flaw is annoying at first, but I find that as I become involved in the show I develop an unconscious "mental block" that filters that line from my visual perception.

I now believe that DoubleBilled is seeing real flaws common to all of the MSCL DVDs. That said, it is a cliched but true fact of life that a trained gemologist can spot a cheap piece of glass a mile away, while 95% of the population thinks it is just as pretty and sparkly as a real diamond.

Believe me, I sympathize with DB's perfectionism; by way of comparison, my own vice is computer games. As far as I can tell, there has not been a game made after say, 1995, that lives up to the high standards set in the "Golden Era" of the late 80's and early 90's. Oh, sure, the graphics and sound have leaped ahead, but the gameplay has gone to hell in a handbasket, IMHO. So until I get hired as a creative consultant at EA, all I can do is sit back and bitch. Meanwhile, 95% of gamers don't know what the hell I'm ranting about; they think the current crop of games is the best ever, and I can't really blame them.

Anyway, that's the end of my raving, which probably helps no one.

Thats why you should ditch the computer and go for console games!

Unless your into FPS games, then i HIGHLY recommend GORE on the PC. Not as pretty as Unreal 2k3 but so much more playable.

Nostradamus wrote:I can also confirm a very obvious flickering broken white line at the top of the picture in some of the episodes, probably the anti-copy feature mentioned earlier. The line was about 3 pixels deep and was only visible on my PC monitor...

DITTO.

candygirl wrote:At this point, the only DVD menu I have seen that is WORSE is Girls Just Want to Have Fun.

The UK Xena DVD's have the worst menus I've ever seen. I really hope MSCL hasn't "beaten" those. Do I take it from these comments that they are not on par with the original 3ep release (which I always liked, I thought they were a good balance of attractive and functional)?

I watched both Life of Brian and the Pilot last night on a 50 inch TV screen and noticed no flaws. Then again, I'm one of the 95% that are admiring the glass diamond from afar.

Me too. So pretty.



I think our tv has a 36" screen, but I could be wrong. It's bigger than a breadbox, but smaller than our wall.