PinoyDVD: The Pinoy Digital Video & Devices Community
DVD Forum => DVD Releases and Reviews => Region 3 => Topic started by: techdude on Aug 28, 2008 at 10:58 PM
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Short review:
Beijing 2008 Olympics Opening Ceremony DVD
Released by Solar Multimedia Corporation (which owns the TV rights as well). This is released on DVD9! Most of Solar's previous releases were DVD5s, so I was surprised it's on dual-layer media. Content is 7.7 gigabytes and around 4 hours 20 minutes of video.
The DVD is of the opening ceremony from the start until just after the fireworks that follows the lighting of the Olympic cauldron. Video quality is just above VCD quality, which means it's not good. On my 32" screen, the crowds is a blurry mess. Details on the costumes and items are lacking and blurred. You can still enjoy the show as it's still TV-quality but of course, DVD-enthusiast like most-of-us demands more. It's fullscreen. The whole show is probably the live-feed recorded by Solar Multimedia then put on DVD. No onscreen commercial nor commercial interruptions.
Sound as stated is 2 channel but feels like mono. Again TV-quality. No subtitles.
Another downer is that it doesn't have chapter selection, so you can't skip to say, the lighting of the Olympic cauldron on ordinary DVD players.
So is it worth the asking price of 450 pesos? Maybe, maybe not. The show is indeed spectacular and you can still enjoy the show, so to speak, but people who watch DVD are a pickle bunch, and we pay the premium because we wanted to see more of the details. And in that respect, the video quality fails.
Still, this is the only legal way to rewatch (or watch, if you miss it the first time) the Opening Ceremony, so whether it's worth paying for is up to you...
For me, I might spring for the MSNBC (Opening/Closing plus highlights of US athletes, I suppose) one but it's pretty expensive (@$40 yata) and September 15 pa release...
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;D To me, the Beijing Olympics so far has the best and the most entertaining Opening Ceremony showcasing China's very rich culture..The giant moving digital scroll and the performances especially the depiction of the invention of the printing tablets left me awestruck. So I might get this....
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Short review:
Beijing 2008 Olympics Opening Ceremony DVD
Released by Solar Multimedia Corporation (which owns the TV rights as well). This is released on DVD9! Most of Solar's previous releases were DVD5s, so I was surprised it's on dual-layer media. Content is 7.7 gigabytes and around 4 hours 20 minutes of video.
The DVD is of the opening ceremony from the start until just after the fireworks that follows the lighting of the Olympic cauldron. Video quality is just above VCD quality, which means it's not good. On my 32" screen, the crowds is a blurry mess. Details on the costumes and items are lacking and blurred. You can still enjoy the show as it's still TV-quality but of course, DVD-enthusiast like most-of-us demands more. It's fullscreen. The whole show is probably the live-feed recorded by Solar Multimedia then put on DVD. No onscreen commercial nor commercial interruptions.
Sound as stated is 2 channel but feels like mono. Again TV-quality. No subtitles.
Another downer is that it doesn't have chapter selection, so you can't skip to say, the lighting of the Olympic cauldron on ordinary DVD players.
So is it worth the asking price of 450 pesos? Maybe, maybe not. The show is indeed spectacular and you can still enjoy the show, so to speak, but people who watch DVD are a pickle bunch, and we pay the premium because we wanted to see more of the details. And in that respect, the video quality fails.
Still, this is the only legal way to rewatch (or watch, if you miss it the first time) the Opening Ceremony, so whether it's worth paying for is up to you...
For me, I might spring for the MSNBC (Opening/Closing plus highlights of US athletes, I suppose) one but it's pretty expensive (@$40 yata) and September 15 pa release...
swerte pala ako cause i was able to watch an HD version :)
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For collectors who enjoyed Beijing Olympics ;)
2008 Olympics Unlimited (DVD) (English Subtitled) (China Version) - $235.99 (http://www.yesasia.com/us/2008-olympics-unlimited-dvd-english-subtitled-china-version/1011443771-0-0-0-en/info.html)
(http://img523.imageshack.us/img523/8973/tempip2.th.jpg) (http://img523.imageshack.us/my.php?image=tempip2.jpg)
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Will they come out with a Opening and Closing Ceremony DVD set?
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For collectors who enjoyed Beijing Olympics ;)
http://www.yesasia.com/us/2008-olympics-unlimited-dvd-english-subtitled-china-version/1011443771-0-0-0-en/info.html
According to Google Translate, That doesn't seem to include the Opening nor Closing ceremonies. It seems to include a lot of discs profiling the Chinese athletes, history of China, tour of China. Not to mention it's pretty expensive but does include a ton of discs...
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A friend lend me his copy of the MSNBC edition of the Opening ceremonies in high-def. It's was amazing! After watching that one, the Solar Multimedia version looks like crap. And it's smaller in file size to boot....
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But doesn't the NBC version have lots of commercials and cuts?
I think the best version is the BBC broadcast, only, the commentator is supposedly a bit irritating.
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But doesn't the NBC version have lots of commercials and cuts?
I think the best version is the BBC broadcast, only, the commentator is supposedly a bit irritating.
i have the NBC version, almost 5GB in capacity (around 4 hours) ... commercials were already cut ... video/audio quality is superb (hi-def 720p) ... got it from torrent .... it is a good demo for large plasma tv
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I think there's also an 8G version of the NBC broadcast.
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NBC doesn't have those short films that accompany each performance (ie papermaking).
Is the Solar Sports (Philippine) broadcast the same as BBC's? The commentator sound British...
it's annoying when you have to resort to illegal means to get a decent higher-quality of any program when you are willing to pay for it (and actually did - I bought the DVD)...
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I think the Solar Sports broadcast of some events is from NBC. Wasn't able to see the opening so I'm not sure if that wasn't from NBC.