Did the Laser VideoDisc matter ?

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The Laserdisc may be a dead format today, but it was a major stepping stone for the industry to reach modern technologies such as the CD, DVD, HD-DVD and the current Blu-ray disc.

According to various sources on the web

it's estimated that in 1998, roughly a mere two million LaserDisc players were in U.S. households.

By contrast it's estimated that even to this day there may still yet be some 100 million VHS Vcr's out there and before the dawn of Blu-ray there were some 137 million DVD players. 
The top selling DVD of all time, Disney's Finding Nemo, sold almost - get this - 40 million copies at the peak of DVD's popularity.  Even today, 
in the decline of SD DVD video format,
 in the HD / Streaming era, a title can still sell well over 4 million copies in the US alone..and Yes Pinky– they count those disc packaged together with the Blu-ray's.

90's Billboard Sales Chart

A blockbuster Laserdisc, by contrast, might have “only” sold a mere a half-million copies. ( US Sales figures)

Keep in mind that this is back when those titles were $34-$100 bucks each, and that's in 1990 dollars. This was during the height of VHS' dominate – not only for “sell-through” but for rentals!

But sell they did. They were even more popular in Japan because prices were kept low to ensure adoption, resulting in minimal price differences between VHS. Their higher quality helped to ensure that it quickly became the dominant consumer video format! Anime collectors in every country also quickly became familiar with the Laserdisc, and sought the higher video and sound quality of that it offered and the availability of numerous titles not available on VHS. 

                 
                                     

       
                                           

Laserdisc's major contribution was during the days of the old analog big screen TV's when VHS resolution simply failed to go the distance. We are talking before the days of progressive scan or 60 or 120Hz. - when the monitor was only capable of an interlaced picture at a mere 30 frames a second. These large boxes might have been capable of producing 800 plus lines of resolution but the only way that was going to happen was IF you had a Laserdisc player connected to a line doubler – which so few people – other than those video nuts with deep pockets ever saw. If all you had was broadcast resolution or a VCR however – that picture left a lot to be desired., which I believe was one of the major reasons why these things didn't sell nearly as well as the old 35 -40 direct view CRT's – that, along with their $2799+ price tags. 
                                                                 

               
Speaking of dollars, Laserdisc was always expensive, even in its death throws when player's dropped to a mere $500 bucks – American. By contrast –
 VCR's were always cheaper -and allowed the consumer to do the one thing they really wanted to do – which was to record their own tapes. 
 Dvd players might have started out expensive ( and by expensive – I'm talking average price $350 – 800 ) but they got cheap quick. Never the less – in 1997 Pioneer released the world's first Laser LVD/DVD combination player. To everyone's surprise, the DVL-700 outsold all other DVD & LD players that year, regardless of the brand or the price! Personally - I've owned two of these machines. After my 1st one of 10 years died - my brother bought me a replacement one, and it's still the player I use today.
                                                       

The average retail price of this machine: $739 !

 That unit along with the last Laserdisc player Pioneer ever produced, the DVL-919 - contained modern AC-3 digital outputs, component video, S-video & composite video outputs,  96Khz/24-Bit digital audio decoding, and even used an on-screen display graphical user interface. ( GUI ). All the features that would later be found on almost all DVD players were already there with these LD units. 

Joe Kane Productions produced and released “Video Essentials” on Laserdisc in June of 1996 as a tool to help measure & adjust  audio / video systems. The program was released at the height of the Laserdisc phenomenon. It was a source of signals for system calibration, including Dolby Digital
 ( more about this latter)‚ test tones and conventional video patterns. By including anamorphic video test patterns this disc was ahead of its time in anticipating the widescreen video revolution and contained highest possible quality composite video that could be put on laserdisc at the time. Reformatting it for DVD a year later proved to be difficult because they were attempting to reproduce many of the same features like - topic search, stop frame and step frame capabilities found in ON The Laserdisc. 
   Guess what? 

 Joe Kane still produces an HD Video Essentials program today.

The format's instant-access capability made it possible for a new breed of LaserDisc-based video arcade games and several companies saw potential in using LaserDiscs for video games in the 1980s and 1990s, beginning in 1983 with Sega's Astron Belt. American Laser Games and Cinematronics produced elaborate arcade consoles that used the random-access features to create interactive movies such as Dragon's Lair and Space Ace.
 Check THIS link out !

These games still exist in one format or another today.

Also of importance:
In the mid-1980s Lucasfilm pioneered the EditDroid non-linear editing system for film and television based on the LaserDisc jukebox players .

Instead of printing dailies out on film, the processed negatives would be sent to the mastering plant to be assembled from their 10-minute camera negative elements into 20-minute film segments which would then be  mastered onto single-sided blank LaserDiscs, just as a DVD would be burnt at home today with a recorder and allow for much easier selection and preparation of an Edit Decision List. In the days before video assist was available in cinematography, this was the only other way a film crew could see their work.The EDL then went to the negative cutter who then cut the camera negative accordingly and assembled the finished film. Only 24 EditDroid systems were ever built, even though the ideas and technology are still in use today.

Thanks to it – we now have the famous “Lost Editdroid” Star Wars footage that was just “discovered” in 2013 .

 Introducing Digital Sound
 Laserdiscs originally had only two analog hi-fi tracks, roughly equivalent in sound quality to hi-fi stereo in VHS. However-  In the 1980's, after the rise of the CD, Laserdiscs gained two 44.1 kHz 16-bit Red Book LPCM stereo digital tracks, the very same Digital sound as was found on the CD. Furthermore, today's Digital Sound formats, DTS - and Dolby, would make their debut on the  Laserdisc. 

 One of the DTS Inc.'s initial investors was film director Steven Spielberg, who felt that theatrical sound formats  were no longer state of the art. Spielberg debuted the format with his 1993 production of Jurassic Park.  Jurassic Park also became the first home video release to contain DTS sound when it was released on LaserDisc in January 1997,  a mere two years after the first Dolby Digital home video release of A Clear and Present Danger on Laserdisc,  in January 1995.  

 Laserdiscs with Dolby Digital Soundtracks replaced the right analog track with the compressed 5.1 AC-3 track. DTS, on the other hand,  replaced both digital tracks. The Dts tracks on Laserdisc were BETTER than their later DVD counterparts, thanks to the extra room on the larger disc. The DTS tracks were recorded @ the full Bit rate of 1500kps, compared to the DVD's reduced 750kps bitrate. As of matter of fact - it would take today's Blu-ray disc to finally match or exceed the sound quality that could once be found on the old Laserdisc. 

Quality Control Program.

Which brings us to : The "THX Digital Mastering Program",
  Lucasfilm's program of monitoring the transfer of film to home video, which began in the Laserdisc era, unofficially with "Apocalypse Now" and officially with "The Abyss" as
 "The THX Laserdisc" Program.

Then there's that whole "Criterion Collection" thing,  er - company which specialized in licensing "important classic and contemporary films". They began in 1984 with the releases of Citizen Kane (1941) and King Kong (1933) on Laserdisc. Criterion pioneered the correct aspect ratio letterboxing presentation of movies, as well as commentary soundtracks, multi-disc sets, special editions, and definitive versions. These ideas and the special features have been highly influential, and have become de facto industry-wide standards for premium releases.  On March 16, 1999, Criterion issued its final Laserdisc release, Michael Bay's Armageddon, ( Disc #384) as the industry converted.
The company is still in business today, alive and well, thanks to Blu-ray. Many of the Laserdisc releases were later re-released on the DVD format 
(but NOT ALL of them were. )
 If you would like to know more about their LD's releases, then simply
 watch THIS Youtube video by Culturedog Sam Hatch.

 Furthermore, many DVD's "extra's" stem from their Laserdisc counterparts -  For Example:

DVD screen 

  


 "THE MAKING OF T2: JUDGMENT DAY"
 Documentary found on the DVD (also available as a download on the SkyNet Blu-Ray Edition ) was originally available as a Bonus disc in the T2: CAV LVD Box set.

       or for that matter " Through the Eyes of Forrest Gump" 
           which again was 1st Released on Side 4 of the THX laserdisc.

                                                       
 


















Did all that matter ? 
 You better bet your ass it did. 

All About the Sound.

I loved this. It's awesome ! It's all about the sound quality, or I should say, the lack of it on today lo-res gear. Way to go HK ! Thank you for producing THIS !

Old school film to Laserdisc transfer: Why they are different from modern releases.

 
I use to be an old school I.A.  35mm Motion Picture projectionist. When handling film, you had to be real careful not to scratch the print, and that meant wearing protective gloves and making good proper splices , threading the damn projector correctly, thereby not making the loops to big or small to ensure that the print would not get scratched. It also meant screening the print, not to mention maintaining the equipment . Any mistake you made might cause damage, which would end up on screen (as dirt or scratches, bad splices, etc.) I became so familiar with the types of film stock and prints, I could tell you the type of film stock ( Fuji , Kodak - Estar /  Technicolor / Eastman , etc- that was being projected -simply by looking at the screen.     These 35mm positive prints were used in Telecine machines.
Go to this link:
Film stocks   
if you want to know more.

Telecine (/ˈtɛləsɪni/ or /ˌtɛləˈsɪniː/) is the process of transferring motion picture film into video and is performed in a color suite. Telecine enables a motion picture, captured originally on film stock, to be viewed with standard video equipment, such as television sets, video cassette recorders (VCR), and Laserdisc. This allows film producers, television producers and film distributors working in the film industry to release their products on video and allows producers to use video production equipment to complete Tv production, such as was done in Star Trek : TNG.

So, since every print was different, it meant that very release of a Laserdisc that was produced was also different. Since the days of Laserdisc, Telecines were replaced by High-Def film scanners , and now film has been replaced ( for the most part) with Direct to Digital Ultra High-Def video cams and then mastered in High-Def before being transfer ( down-converted) to Blu-ray, so gone are the days of having a film source.

The above was copied from Wiki. A 35 mm film print.  At far left and far right, outside the perforations, is the SDDS soundtrack as an image of a digital signal. Between the perforations is the Dolby Digital soundtrack (note the tiny Dolby "Double D" logo in the center of each area between the perforations). Just inside the perforations, on the left side of the image, is the analog optical soundtrack, with two channels encoded using Dolby SR noise reduction that can be dematrixed into four channels using Dolby Pro Logic. The optical timecode used to synchronize a DTS soundtrack, which sits between the optical soundtrack and the image, is not pictured. Finally, the image here is an anamorphic image used to create a 2.39:1 aspect ratio when projected through an anamorphic lens.

I love comparing the difference in film stocks and prints that you can clearly see in the film stocks ( and the film weave as it travels via sprockets through the gate ) and seeing the difference in the dirt and scratches that the different prints have while watching the Laserdisc, and then comparing the different Laserdisc releases of the same film-  before the days when everything was Digital - remastered in Ultra 8 and 4K. ( Not that I don't love that too.)

What I like BEST about the old LaserDisc. Remember them?

     

                  Ok, I know it's a DVD, Blu-Ray, Netflex, Digital Down Loading world out there.  Don't for a moment get me wrong, I love the picture quality that a Digital Flat panel provides me when I'm watching a HD broadcast or when I've fired up my LG Blu-ray player and it's either spinning a disc    ( The Remastered 4K transfer of "The Wizard of Oz on Blu-ray - WOW! )            or Streaming some Netflex HD content from over the net.

        I mean, like Holy Cow! Right? Seriously. Streaming 720p over the net without a computer? I mean, HD video without a disc in the player! 

        Who would have dared dreamed of that 16 years ago when the 1st Big Screen CRT rear projection HDTV's from Hitachi first hit the market ?

But hold on.

 Wait a minute.

 Where does the old Laserdisc fit into this?

  Well, they don't, right?

 Come on, lets face it,

 they are a throwback to the pre-digital era gone by, 

  left behind by current technology. Right?

 I mean a mere 400 lines of analog resolution !

 Who cares, right? 

They (sometimes) can look horrific

 on these new 1080p LCD displays,

 so why keep them?

 Throw them away, and leave then behind already. 

 Heck, LD's are barely a step above that old analog

 video recording system call VHS, so what's the big deal?

 Get over it. The industry is Moving on....Next.

Now, just hold on there. Wait a minute.

  Wait a minute....

 Not so fast there young whipper-snapper, not so fast.

 So, please tell me,  why is it , that,  to this day,

 I still find that I both want and desire them?

 I mean, I not only do I like them, but I actual like some of them

 more than their DVD and Blu-ray HD counterparts,

 even though the analog picture most certainly doesn't stand up 

on modern day HDTV's. ( Upscaling not included. ) 

 Why? - you ask. 

 Well, I was reading a response that some young adult posted
 in regard to a picture that someone else had posted of their CD, record and old reel to reel tape collection over on  Audioholics Facebook Page

In which he said: 

      “It's interesting how the notion of your own collection changes when you have it stored on an external hard drive. You tend to forget about the CD/DVD/LP object, as your relationship with it is through your screen; reading the scanned booklets, loading tracks to your player, ripping CDs, converting WAV to FLAC, etc.

Now-
      The real change happens when you start purchasing online.

      The entire chain of buying an the product at the store, carrying it home, opening it up and reading the booklet, while playing it on your DVD/ CD player or turntable, and then finding it a place among your personal indexing system, is now -          Forever Broken.
                   With just a couple of mouse clicks, now you can, without converting, embedding cover images, or even writing out track names when CD's have no tags, etc. Now you can simply drag and drop the file into the rest of your collection -                where it finds it's own alphabetical order, while you sit down   and read a book, either on your phone or tablet,                                       and sip your drink.
                     After a while, you're no longer grabbing DVD's or CDs or LPs to play.  You become accustomed to your collection on a screen and the DVD/CD player and the turntable have started collecting dust. Suddenly all you want is a DAC that will do everything, and you end up getting a Macmini - that exceeds the energy star requirements several times - to avoid plugging in your laptop and putting it on top of the CD player every time you want to jam.
                 Since the Macmini has now turned you into a believing minimalist,   you buy a super accurate pair of active studio monitors with DSP crossovers      in order to get the old Pre-Amps and Power Amps out of the way and to make room for your new HD 3D 42" ( or larger) 1080p  LED TV. And bang!      --                Without noticing it much, you've gone from HiFi to computer.
                 Now you can even start to brag about doing your part to contribution to helping to stop catastrophic climate change, and how small  your footprint has become- in both plastic and electronic components, not to mention the electric bill. 

Now you can finally enjoy the full size of your living room, as your collection will never grow beyond the size of your external drive, and you can comfortably select your track or movie from the remote App on your tablet without letting your Latte getting cold.

Welcome to the future.”

I  thought about this for a while and I've come to this conclusion:

 All the things that I like BEST about Laserdisc, 

are NOT digitized.

 Well, ok, shit-  truth be told , they can be,

 simply by using my scanner to digitally transfer the pics

 and store them on my computer's hard drive.

 ( which IS what I did )

 Oh sure,

 I can do a frame capture and share it with the world,

 But that's not it.

              NO,  what I like BEST about the Laserdisc is 

 the Gatefold jackets  and the artwork and letter's

 from the producer's and director's that came with them.

 I mean, just look at some this................................

     Now, another feature of the LaserDisc format  I like, just like a CD, is that “instant play” feature. I don't even have to turn on the monitor. Since I have a large collection of music on Laser, I just insert the giant shiny disc, and a couple of seconds later, sound erupts from my old school 3-way JBL monitors. No ads that Disney forces me to have to endure; no menus to deal with, no set up process is needed. No internet to verify if my copy is legal. No need to tell the government or an ad agency what I'm watching.
 No, not at all.  
             The disc just starts playing.
      It's like that moment when the needle 1^st make contact with a record. Bliss. Another feature that seems to be going away with today's Blu-ray DVD discs, is the chapter listings in the paperwork. In some cases, like with the disc you will find in the Wal-mart / Dollar General $4 – 5 dollar bin, for example, all you get is the disc. Period! No booklet, or additional information comes with it. ( Yeah, I know, what can you expect for less than $5 bucks, right?)

Some of today's younger disc buyer's simply have never known or experienced the joy of opening a disc box that not only included some great color production photos, but also the chapter listings, some back ground info, and may included both a booklet and a letter from the director of the film included. ( like w/the Terminator Laserdisc box-set.)

Let's NOT even get started on the Star Wars Laserdisc Box sets, ok? 

Sure, they use to from time to time come out with some nice collector's DVD stuff , back when when these disc were retailing for $30 bucks for a new release of a Two-Disc “Special Director's Edition” of a film, this 2008 release of "Bonnie & Clyde" comes to mind ,  

  or even the 4 disc collector's set of Pearl Harbor.  However I'm not seeing these type of movie boxsets being produced anymore. Keep in mind I'm not discussing TV series box-sets here . Now it's the $5 – 12 dollar three to 4 pack of movies on DVD that are being offered, like with the Superman, Alien, and Arnold movies box sets, with all that extra stuff being left out in order to move a shit ton of back logged manufactured disc out of the vender's warehouses before it becomes out dated by the ever spiraling downward cost of the even more popular Blu-ray version, before the 4K Ultra HD BR Disc's debut in 2015 .

Now all the “extra's” are coming by way of the “BD Live” - internet streaming feature. Even Blu-ray Skynet Edition of T2 didn't have a “book” with it like what had come before with  both The Artisan Extreme  & Ultimate Edition DVDs.

Booklet insert T2 DVD

Much like Vinyl, you can frame Laservideo Disc covers and display them on the wall. If you hang a couple of them close enough together, they can be displayed like mini movie posters.

 Since I started working in the projection booth
 @ my local Carmike Movie theatre during the late 80's,
 I've really liked this.

That's why I own some of the disc in my collection.
those are the movies I have fond memories of,
 the ones that we showed while I was working in all those different movie houses, from that little Carmike three – screen hole in the wall named The Astro III ( which really wasn't a real “job”
 It was more like - party central) in a college town, to the Big AMC 10, 12, and 18 multi-plexes. From General Cinema to Fox to all the independents, once I had become certified to operate all the different gear, I then ran hundreds of films at dozens of locations.

Those frame disc jackets remind me of some great times I had screening those movies with some great friends on all those late Thursday nights.

One more thought, if I may ?
 Ever give a Laserdisc as a gift ?        

 I've received some of the best reactions from friends when I handed them their favorite film on a Laserdisc - even if they don't have a player ! They are just blown away ( Ever just given away A Star Trek Laserdisc @ a Trek Convention?)by a Laserdisc Box set that you know they have never seen before,and it's not in the store and they know they will never see it available for sale to the public again. Trust me - Laserdisc may be dead, but to this day - they STILL make the best gifts ! 

My thought's and responses to Roddenberry's Mission Log Podcast:

So, I have a question. IN the Original Trek series episode "Amok Time"-  Why don't "we" meet Spock's parent's in this episode ( as opposed to later, in "Journey to Babel"), where he goes "home" for his ""wedding", where he is not only well-known but he states that his family has "owned the land here for over 2000 "Earth-years" right, and the high priest shows up, and yet, no parents @ the prearranged wedding?

If Vulcan weddings are prearranged from when a Vulcan male is 7 years old, how is it then that Spock's Dad skipped this and ended up with Amanda? Did he get rejected in the past by another Vulcan women as well?

Maybe? JUst maybe this was one of Trek's way of saying something about how truly stupid our TV censorship rules were @ that time,, where in @ this time Trek Actress Mariette Hartley, and Mary Ann from "Gilligan's Island," Jeannie from "I Dream of Jeannie," and "Gidget" are all barred from baring their navels on the TV screen, however it was perfectly "ok" to show two men using hand held weapons in a battle to the death. Today it's even worse because it's perfectly ok to show realistic gun violence,( hell how many people can been seen getting shot in the head in and on primetime today?) but Lord forbid if a female performer has a Epic wardrobe failure and they show some cleavage!!! Please. Just Imagine if Mr. "Spock" had been Mrs. "Spockette", and it was the female Vulcan's who went "into heat" and had 2 have "it" every 7 years? They would have never gotten any talk of "sex" past the censors in those days. Ironically enough, Trek was produced by Desilu, and back when Lucy Ball was pregnancy for and during an entire season of the "I Love Lucy," show, the actual word "pregnant" was not allowed because it could not be used on air. Instead, the show uses phrases that seem equally informative but (somehow) less fraught with sin, such as "with child," "having a baby," and "expecting." I don't know, maybe I'm wrong here, but it was just a thought I wanted to share, and isn't that what Mission Log is all about?

Time

      "I  believe that time is a companion that goes with us on the journey and reminds us to cherish every moment, because it will never come again." - Captain Picard.

Well, it's about time. About time for an event, one designed by our old friend Steven Hill for us "Space Traveler's", over @ Hearts of Space, in order to celebrate their  40TH ANNIVERSARY !

By producing their 1st ever live concert.

Details here: AMBIcon 2013.. 

 Episode 76 of Star Trek: TNG Copyright 1990 Paramount Pictures

 

I hate 2 admit it, but the greatest Blog site of all time is NOT mine.

A Real Retro McCoy Poster 

Ok, so there. I said it. Not that I'm hanging my head in shame, I've tried to produce a good read, but OMG I love art, (always have) and I just love this guy's Blog. I mean like it's 4 Stars, 2 thumbs up, and all that plus a bag of chips. I'm telling you, dress in drag and go go Mountain Dew the hula.  It may well be one of the greatest Blogs covering different 'geek related pop culture" Artwork ever produced to date: I just can't get over the collection of great stuff that he's gathered together all in one place. I've spend days here because it's just so easy to get lost in all of it. I hope you enjoy it as much as I have;  so here is both my wholehearted endorsement and the link:

http://geekartgallery.blogspot.com

                                

 Now, I'd say, try not to get lost, or dare you not to     get lost, but really, go get lost. It's a futile attempt not to.However, even though I know u don't have 2 have it, or even need it, you most certainly have my permission.