[Eug Wanker]

Not impressive.

The menus are pixarla...errr...pixelated up the yin yang. The video in the menus are as bad as foreign bootlegs.

The movie itself is better but it's just merely OK.

Disappointing.

[Landos Mustache]

Looked ok to me.

And my TV is bigger and better

[JLFanboy]

How are you watching it? On a tv or on your computer? I agree that some of the video looks pixelated on my PowerBook, but most of it looks fine. And the movie itself looks great.

[MaxPower2k3]

that's too bad... i was looking forward to trying it out on our new Sony HD set. I guess i'll just have to go back to the old reference DVD, Monsters, Inc.

[Landos Mustache]

I guess we should be glad it is just the menus and not the MOVIE.

I did notice the menues on the full screen are a little crappy but that one is for kids anyway so who cares.

The screensavers are too die for!

[Eug Wanker]

Originally posted by JLFanboy:
How are you watching it? On a tv or on your computer? I agree that some of the video looks pixelated on my PowerBook, but most of it looks fine. And the movie itself looks great.

For a Pixar product, I'd hope the video were better. IMO, some of the menus are almost unwatchable. The movie is definitely watchable and is OK, but that's it. There are areas where you can really notice problems though (if you look for it).

Then again, I guess I'm not that surprised, since there are so many extras on each disc.

But previous Pixar/Disney discs have been better.

Hardware:

Panasonic RP91 progressive scan DVD player
Toshiba 34" 16:9 widescreen progressive screen TV.

Looked ok to me.

And my TV is bigger and better

Check out the menu transition with the circle of fish. Very pixelated.

I guess we should be glad it is just the menus and not the MOVIE.

But it is in the movie. Like I say, it's not bad, but it's not great, like I'd expect for a Pixar movie.

[NYCFarmboy]

I STRONGLY STRONGLY DISLIKE/HATE the menu set up..being forced to watch all the crap before the movie starts.

It is like a flash website where you have no control and have to watch some idiot graphic designer's idea of fun before you get what you want.

The movie itself looked ok to me though.

I believe in "theory" DVDBackup software might get rid of that crap though so in theory that might be an answer.. only in theory of course.

[Eug Wanker]

Originally posted by NYCFarmboy:
I STRONGLY STRONGLY DISLIKE/HATE the menu set up..being forced to watch all the crap before the movie starts.

Same. A few Asian DVD players allow you to skip that, but most of those DVD players have poor video quality.

I believe in "theory" DVDBackup software might get rid of that crap though so in theory that might be an answer.. only in theory of course

If you do it for your own use and you already own the disc, it's not illegal. It would work. I'm not sure I'd bother just for that though. Maybe if you need an copy so your kids don't destroy the original, it'd be worth it.

[ReggieX]

Don't have the DVD yet, however,about "Knickknack"

Original release:


DVD:


Who do they think they are, George Lucas?

[Face Ache]

Yeah my DVD copy has crappy quality too.

But it's a pirate.

Hey the DVD release of Nemo isn't even on the radar yet Down Under. Screw that.

Maybe they'll iron out the bugs for the PAL release (in five months or so).

[Eug Wanker]

ReggieX:

She's smiling in the top picture but is sad in the bottom picture. I wonder why...

[Face Ache]

Originally posted by ReggieX:
Original release:

Ah, nurbs.

[Cipher13]

Mine has perfect video quality... though it's a pirate. It's superb.

[thePurpleGiant]

My copy is terrible - I keep seeing the edge of the Cinema screen, and its a bit wobbly, as if someone is just filming it in the cinema.

And to top it off, it didn't even have a printed case, and its on a CD not DVD!!

Bloody waste of $1.50 at the market.

[Eug]

OK, for the record, this is not a bootleg. I got the Canadian release in the store.

Pixelated menu:


Screengrab from movie (with my added arrows on left):


What the heck is that on the left? Could it be that they simply made the DVD from a film print/negative, instead of the original digital version? You can also see the same effect on the right. I don't remember seeing this in the theatre (but then again I could have missed it).

Enlarged:


Besides the weird lines on the left, also note mild artifacts on/around the fish, esp. Nemo's dad. Not too bad, but it could be better.

[Landos Mustache]

Ya ok the menus look a little ~fishy~ on my Dual with 20" lcd also but the movie is fine so I am not going to get my panties in a bunch over it.

The screensavers look friggin sweet!

[Eug]

OK. I'm not imagining it. Here are Bjoern Roy's initial comments (quoted at the AVS Forum):

"Yes, Toy Story 2 is the best effort yet from Pixar 'compression wise'. Finding Nemo obviously the worst (no surprise with this low bitrate). Monsters Inc is somewhere in between."

Also, posted in this Finding Nemo thread:

[CaseCom]

"Poor video quality"? Are we talking real-world poor, or videophile examine-every-frame-with-a-microscope poor? A little perspective please.

Even many of the people who posted to that AVS thread think the DVD looks great.

A movie that is just a notch below "Toy Story" or "Monsters Inc." will still look better than 99.9% of DVDs on the market.

[Landos Mustache]

Originally posted by CaseCom:
"Poor video quality"? Are we talking real-world poor, or videophile examine-every-frame-with-a-microscope poor? A little perspective please.

Guess.

The menues are sorta crappy but the movie itself is great unless you do side by side crap like above.

[Lando Griffin]

Don't make a thread about this...people like me who own the movie are going to have a totally different (negative) view on the movie looking for video quality while watching it. Honestly, I haven't noticed anything yet.

[MindFad]

Originally posted by thePurpleGiant:
My copy is terrible - I keep seeing the edge of the Cinema screen, and its a bit wobbly, as if someone is just filming it in the cinema.

And to top it off, it didn't even have a printed case, and its on a CD not DVD!!

Bloody waste of $1.50 at the market.

[::maroma::]

Originally posted by Landos Mustache:
The screensavers look friggin sweet!

What sort of screensavers are there? Can you post any screens?

[- - e r i k - -]

Originally posted by ReggieX:
Don't have the DVD yet, however,about "Knickknack"

Original release:


DVD:


Who do they think they are, George Lucas?

WHAT THE F*CK?

Just, why? What the hell is the point? Did they replace the sharks with whales as well? Or at least file it's teeth? Is anything replaced with walkie talkies?

[Eug]

Originally posted by Lando Griffin:
Don't make a thread about this...people like me who own the movie are going to have a totally different (negative) view on the movie looking for video quality while watching it. Honestly, I haven't noticed anything yet.

If you didn't notice it then that's great.

As for me, I noticed it within the first couple of minutes of the movie. I wasn't even looking for it - it was just obvious. It was quite disappointing.

[Naz]

Originally posted by - - e r i k - -:
WHAT THE F*CK?

Just, why? What the hell is the point? Did they replace the sharks with whales as well? Or at least file it's teeth? Is anything replaced with walkie talkies?

I was just thinking that

Yet I think that has to be a joke they better did not do that

please tell me the pics above are a joke

[thePurpleGiant]

Originally posted by Naz:
I was just thinking that

Yet I think that has to be a joke they better did not do that

please tell me the pics above are a joke

No, they really did it. Possibly because the original came out as a short clip. When incorporated into a general release movie, it needs to closely adhere to the intended audience and themes of that movie.

She has had the tiny-tits instead of the boulder boobs since its release at the cinema. It's just not the same without them

[Oneota]

I've got a movie of the original somewhere - when I get home from work I'll find it and plop it up on my webserver for your enjoyment. Just promise not to overwhelm my bandwidth.


Oh, and the "blah blah blah" portion of the soundtrack is longer in the original. Overall, the first version is much more enjoyable.

[Eug]

Interesting.

Looking at the screengrabs on my CRT monitor (with Rage 128) at work, the artifacts are less obvious. They are much more pronounced on my LCD monitor (with Radeon 9100) at home, and on my ISF-calibrated progressive scan TV (with progressive scan RP91).

[davesimondotcom]

I didn't notice poor video quality on mine.

It's my least favorite of the Pixar films. Probably because I'm a huge Pixar toy collector, and the Nemo toys are severely lacking the quality the Toy Story, Bugs Life and Monsters Inc. toys had (mainly due to subject matter, it's REALLY hard to make a toy fish that looks anything like the "gummi" quality of the movie fish.)

[Eug]

Originally posted by davesimondotcom:
I didn't notice poor video quality on mine.

It's my least favorite of the Pixar films. Probably because I'm a huge Pixar toy collector, and the Nemo toys are severely lacking the quality the Toy Story, Bugs Life and Monsters Inc. toys had (mainly due to subject matter, it's REALLY hard to make a toy fish that looks anything like the "gummi" quality of the movie fish.)

Yeah, it's not my fave either, but mainly because of the story and voice acting. It's not as strong as the other movies IMO (although still pretty good).

That, and because I didn't think the video quality was that great, means that I won't be buying another copy.

I viewed and screengrabbed my GF's copy. Had the quality of the video been better I would have bought it myself too. But it isn't and so I won't.

[petehammer]

Fromm DVDfile.com, the best DVD review place (IMO):

Disney and Pixar have teamed up to bring you Finding Nemo on DVD in a two-disc set that tries to be everything to everybody. Which is not an aim entirely lacking in nobility. Here we get THX-certified 1.78:1 anamorphic widescreen and 4:3 "recomposed" full screen transfers, each on a separate disc. And no surprise, they look gorgeous. Colors are simply magnificent - deep blues, blistering oranges, lush greens and rich reds leap off the screen, perfectly saturated and free from any noise or bleeding. THe sense of depth here is often amazing - it is, literally, like looking at a fish tank. The image is sharp and detailed, with even the "dark" scenes flush with fine textures and no jaggedness or rough edges to destroy the illusion. Unfortunately, both of these discs are pretty packed, and if there looks to be a tad bit of fuzziness in some shots - and most of the video-based supplements are compressed to hell - one wonders if the image could have been improved even more had they dropped the full frame version and moved all the extras to disc two. Otherwise, Finding Nemo looks all-around wonderful.

Haven't seen the movie myself, in any form.

[Eug]

Unfortunately, both of these discs are pretty packed, and if there looks to be a tad bit of fuzziness in some shots - and most of the video-based supplements are compressed to hell - one wonders if the image could have been improved even more had they dropped the full frame version and moved all the extras to disc two.

That's exactly what I was thinking.

Too bad on-the-fly pan-and-scan never took off. That would have solved the problem here. Just keep the movie widescreen, with flags for on-the-fly P&S for those who desire it, and move all the extra crap to the second disc.

Here we get THX-certified 1.78:1 anamorphic widescreen

More evidence that THX certification is a complete waste of time.

And does anyone have any idea what those weird lines (highlighted by the arrowheads in the picture above) I saw are? I haven't seen an explanation yet.

[starman]

THX certification is only as good as the "to video" transfer. If that's the reason why it looks bad, then you're right. However, if they were given a bad master, it's not THX's fault. It wouldn't be the first time this happened (*cough*STARGATE*cough).

I popped it in over the weekend and I IMMEDIATELY noticed how bad it looked.

Mike

[OwlBoy]

Originally posted by Eug:
That's exactly what I was thinking.


And does anyone have any idea what those weird lines (highlighted by the arrowheads in the picture above) I saw are? I haven't seen an explanation yet.

Its just banding from a tad too much compression.

-Owl

[OwlBoy]

You have to admit the menus are pretty funny though.

And having the time on the highlight is a very cool idea.

-Owl

[Eug]

Originally posted by OwlBoy:
Its just banding from a tad too much compression.

Is it? If you watch the movie it looks like a moving splotch. Could be just be colour banding I suppose though.

And having the time on the highlight is a very cool idea.

I don't understand. Which feature are you referring to? Are you asking me to post the time on the DVD so other people can see it?

If so I can do that when I go home. The Nemo screengrabs are from the first time we see Nemo (not the egg), before he goes to school.

[The Godfather]

All DVDs have enough quality for me.

When I watched the Nemo DVD, I hoped it would become my favorite CG movie. The technology might have been the best, but the story was not too interesting, and the characters are too flashy for the short time they get on screen.

My favorite CG movie is Shrek, because it has a good story, and all the characters are well described*.

Shrek is so good in itself, that I verily oppose the production of Shrek 2. Why not another mythological tale?

[wvx]

I was shocked. I watched it last night on my iBook. The compression artifacts were awful. There was a halo around the clown fish almost through the entire film. I almost want to ask for my money back.

I thought it was just do to the nature of the colors and motion of the film... but I haven't seen bad MPEG2 like this in DVDs for a few years... at least on new releases.

[The Godfather]

I first assumed that my video perception was humble. I liked the quality of the Nemo DVD.

But then I started to think: maybe your Sonys, Panasonics, iBooks have MPEG decoders of less quality than my $50 Cyberhome player

[scottiB]

I've not seen the DVD (nor the movie, for that matter) but I'd think that trying to compress Nemo must be devilishly hard: all the constant motion of close hues and particles on various depths of field all over the frame. This combined with all the stuff that's being shoved onto the DVDs, and I'd think, echoing Eug, that one version of the the film (widescreen or fullframe), itself, be on one disc, and all the other stuff on the second--or third if need be.

How do the scenes in the dentist's office compare with the underwater scenes in terms of quality?

[daimoni]

.

[OwlBoy]

Originally posted by Eug:
Is it? If you watch the movie it looks like a moving splotch. Could be just be colour banding I suppose though.

I don't understand. Which feature are you referring to? Are you asking me to post the time on the DVD so other people can see it?

If so I can do that when I go home. The Nemo screengrabs are from the first time we see Nemo (not the egg), before he goes to school.

No no, when you Highlight different menu choices it shows how long that item runs.


And does ANYONE feel that some of the "bad quality" might be due to the fact that the fish are under water... In the scenes with the Fish tank, and the dentists office, the picture is much sharper...

-Owl

[The Godfather]

The quality in the Nemo DVD is a s good as the Jacque Cousteau films.

The blur is the realism of these computer graphics.

And the pixelation you pointed out, Eug, is not really pixelation, as defined by Adobe Photoshop. Pixelation (more technically, Mosaic effect) is the effect in NSFG's dick.

The artifacts you see in the Nemo menus are called Posterization, where you can see the individual colors of a "smooth" color gradient.

In the Nemo DVD, the smooth gradients are so big, flowy, long lived, and numerous, like in the "Tuna Swirl" menu, you will definitely see posterization. I'd think that the designers of MPEG-2 have not foreseen a movie like Finding Nemo.

[Eug]

Originally posted by The Godfather:
And the pixelation you pointed out, Eug, is not really pixelation, as defined by Adobe Photoshop. Pixelation (more technically, Mosaic effect) is the effect in NSFG's dick.

The artifacts you see in the Nemo menus are called Posterization, where you can see the individual colors of a "smooth" color gradient.

In the Nemo DVD, the smooth gradients are so big, flowy, long lived, and numerous, like in the "Tuna Swirl" menu, you will definitely see posterization. I'd think that the designers of MPEG-2 have not foreseen a movie like Finding Nemo.

Yes but it's only more reason to reduce compression, and move all the other junk to the second disc.

MPEG-2 can duplicate colour gradients fairly well, but usually only with high bit-rates and attention paid to the compression. eg. Colour gradients on those "superbit" DVDs can be quite good.

As for the Tuna swirl menu, that's just plain bad. It doesn't have much to do with colour gradients. Look at the white stripe on the fish at the lower left of the word "Sandy". I think this would be best called macroblocking (blockiness in high motion areas). Fortunately, it's just a menu.

How do the scenes in the dentist's office compare with the underwater scenes in terms of quality?

Actually, to be honest I haven't yet watched the whole thing. I had to quit part way through (ran out of time). I'll watch the rest this week.

There are no bugs to be ironed out. You've just been reading a bunch of ignorant/whiney/bitchy posts.

If you read the AVS Forum thread (which I read AFTER I posted this one), the general consensus is that the colours/detail overall are good (and I would agree), but the artifacting is quite noticeable because of the relatively low bitrates used.

This guy sums it up quite well in his post today:

"I loved the movie/DVD, the transfer is great, the color, details, etc, fabulous (completely digital, yay!) , but the MPEG2 compression is certainly not perfect. For me there was a noticable amount of artifacting in the high motion sequences, and some ringing in some of the more detailed scenes with a fair amount of motion. Personally and professionally I would have recommended encoding at a higher bit rate and booting all the extra content to another disk if necessary.

For what it's worth, I deal with video compression day in, day out for a living, we have 4 engineers dedicated to algorithm research, and many more on digital video implementations of various sorts. In most cases, compressing realistic water is harder to do than you might think!"

Originally posted by The Godfather:
My favorite CG movie is Shrek, because it has a good story, and all the characters are well described*.

Really? It is your opinion, but I gotta say, I enjoyed Shrek the first time, but after that I didn't care if I saw it again. Jokes were a tad predictable, not that clever (the birds singing fading to eggs frying was the best joke in the movie, but once you've seen it, it loses its edge), and the story was just "ok". The movie didn't seem to have much "replayability".

I liked Shrek, but not as much as any of the Pixar films. I also liked Ice Age better than Shrek.

I guess what everyone is saying is that there needs to be a Suberbit version of Finding Nemo.

[chris.p]

lol, buy the pal version- they generally give us less extras, 1 disk as appposed to 2, its a winner. After all the bitchiness, I'm glad thats how I will be buying it

[rezonate]

Have a look here.

http://www.dvdreview.com/html/dvd_re...nterview.shtml

[Aric]

Originally posted by hayesk:
Really? It is your opinion, but I gotta say, I enjoyed Shrek the first time, but after that I didn't care if I saw it again. Jokes were a tad predictable, not that clever (the birds singing fading to eggs frying was the best joke in the movie, but once you've seen it, it loses its edge), and the story was just "ok". The movie didn't seem to have much "replayability".

I liked Shrek, but not as much as any of the Pixar films. I also liked Ice Age better than Shrek.

I'd have to say that Shrek is my favorite cg film so far too. The story was in my opinion was very good and the jokes were funny too. I think it's more of a grown up humor compared to the Pixar films. Both me and my wife love Shrek while my daughter loves nemo. Don't get me wrong, I've liked all the pixar releases so far and I actually like Nemo the best of them yet, probably cuz i like aquariums. Antz was the same way, more geared for older people compared to Bugz Life were it was totally a kids movie. I don't think Pixar/Disney would've allowed that scene where he's talking to the ants head that was chopped off in the battle.
Anyway, I can't believe some of you are bitching about the quality and some aren't going to buy it now that they hear there's jpeg artifacts or how they set up the freakin menu. If you look hard enough, you'll see artifacts on any dvd movie...

[wdlove]

I hope that it's not true, because I just purchased the DVD yesterday.