1043 Christ Stopped at Eboli

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mhofmann
Joined: Sun Dec 06, 2015 7:01 pm

Re: 1043 Christ Stopped at Eboli

#26 Post by mhofmann » Tue Nov 24, 2020 5:19 pm

No, I think he's referring to the visible quantization in image tones, e.g. toward the left of the picture. The purple line seems to be an artifact of the source, but the color banding likely isn't.

This shot doesn't exhibit too much of the sub-standard encoding that's the main issue of this disc. I find these shots even worse: 7, 12, 15, 16, and a god-awful 19 (with some added source limitations).

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Drucker
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Re: 1043 Christ Stopped at Eboli

#27 Post by Drucker » Tue Nov 24, 2020 5:52 pm

I gotta say, I'm sitting next to my 17" computer monitor and my face is 2 inches away from the screen and I can barely see the issue.

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TMDaines
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Re: 1043 Christ Stopped at Eboli

#28 Post by TMDaines » Thu Nov 26, 2020 6:07 am

Me neither. I ordered it with a coupon during the recent Amazon.com sale and looking forward to watching it with the missus, after we were in Matera a few years ago. Hopefully in motion it looks good.

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mhofmann
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Re: 1043 Christ Stopped at Eboli

#29 Post by mhofmann » Thu Nov 26, 2020 6:23 am

Everyone’s mileage may vary, but depending on equipment and experience with spotting these anomalies some people may see these issues a lot more than others. I can clearly see these artifacts in motion, too, on an OLED TV and a 32” LCD 4K monitor, both calibrated, and under reasonable viewing distances.

To be fair, that type of banding mentioned above isn’t what a YUV 4:2:2 DCT-based compression method would typically produce, given a pristine source, unless I’m overlooking something. So there might be other digital manipulation factors at play here (color grading without sufficient scan bit-depth?), but the compression artifacts I’m referring to are a byproduct of careless encoding.

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tenia
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Re: 1043 Christ Stopped at Eboli

#30 Post by tenia » Thu Nov 26, 2020 8:20 am

Even more than macroblocking, banding is something many people can't spot. Not blaming them, but I guess it's the kind of things that many can overlook while they might be more sensitive to other issues, so I've learnt that while it might be obvious to me or some others, it's probably one of the least spotted issue on a BD release.

bluesforyou
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Re: 1043 Christ Stopped at Eboli

#31 Post by bluesforyou » Thu Nov 26, 2020 12:45 pm

tenia wrote:
Thu Nov 26, 2020 8:20 am
Even more than macroblocking, banding is something many people can't spot. Not blaming them, but I guess it's the kind of things that many can overlook while they might be more sensitive to other issues, so I've learnt that while it might be obvious to me or some others, it's probably one of the least spotted issue on a BD release.
Also banding can easily be taken care off with features like Smooth Gradation on Sony TVs. LG also has an equivalent feature (although Sony's implementation is more effective).

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mhofmann
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Re: 1043 Christ Stopped at Eboli

#32 Post by mhofmann » Thu Nov 26, 2020 2:49 pm

I don't think whatever processing your TV uses is a good way to get rid of such an issue -- it will degrade the image quality in other cases. Any output device, be it TV, projector, speaker, etc. should just reproduce exactly what's on the medium, and not do more.

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tenia
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Re: 1043 Christ Stopped at Eboli

#33 Post by tenia » Thu Nov 26, 2020 4:35 pm

The best thing remains to have a competent encode that avoids banding in the first place.

bluesforyou
Joined: Sat Apr 04, 2020 6:35 am

Re: 1043 Christ Stopped at Eboli

#34 Post by bluesforyou » Thu Nov 26, 2020 7:37 pm

mhofmann wrote:
Thu Nov 26, 2020 2:49 pm
I don't think whatever processing your TV uses is a good way to get rid of such an issue -- it will degrade the image quality in other cases. Any output device, be it TV, projector, speaker, etc. should just reproduce exactly what's on the medium, and not do more.
That just ignores how displays actually work. Every company tone maps in a different way. Every display interprets the same color information in a different way. 4K TVs all upscale the picture. TV processers are very smart today. I have compared the picture with processing tech on and off and I strongly prefer it with on. The exact recipe depends on the particular BD or the particular source but for 1080p content processing is necessary.

For high bitrate content smooth gradation at the lowest works very well. For Sony TVs I even like using Reality Creation which adjusts the fineness and noise in the picture.

Ofcourse perfect encodes would be great but that is not the reality. You also have to consider the limitations of the format.

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mhofmann
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Re: 1043 Christ Stopped at Eboli

#35 Post by mhofmann » Thu Nov 26, 2020 8:10 pm

For adjusting colors to spec(!) there is possible display calibration. And an interpolation algorithm to upscale the picture (and where the impact is fairly well-constrained) is very different in terms of intrusiveness compared to the algorithms you mention. Which can wreak havoc on the picture, with effects or “improvements” that aren’t even meant to be there. Anyway, that’s off-topic... but I stand by my statement that as-close-as-possible reproduction is key.

bluesforyou
Joined: Sat Apr 04, 2020 6:35 am

Re: 1043 Christ Stopped at Eboli

#36 Post by bluesforyou » Fri Nov 27, 2020 1:18 am

mhofmann wrote:
Thu Nov 26, 2020 8:10 pm
For adjusting colors to spec(!) there is possible display calibration. And an interpolation algorithm to upscale the picture (and where the impact is fairly well-constrained) is very different in terms of intrusiveness compared to the algorithms you mention. Which can wreak havoc on the picture, with effects or “improvements” that aren’t even meant to be there. Anyway, that’s off-topic... but I stand by my statement that as-close-as-possible reproduction is key.
I didn't start watching movies last week. I have plenty of reference in terms of what natural image looks like. You have an OLED so you can see for yourself. Turning on these settings doesn't necessarily ruin the image. Also calibration for consumer displays doesn't fully neutralize their inherent differences.

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therewillbeblus
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Re: 1043 Christ Stopped at Eboli

#37 Post by therewillbeblus » Sat Jan 02, 2021 11:40 pm

senseabove wrote:
Tue Jun 16, 2020 3:17 am
I liked this enough to see all 4 hours of it (including intermissions) twice in theaters, and I'm very much looking forward to some more context for it in those extras. I can't think of another movie that lives so completely in the relationship between politics as ideology and politics as praxis the way this one does, so I'm sure there's a lot of contemporary and historical commentating that went completely over my head. And yet, as abstract as that makes it sound, it's an engrossing, profoundly mundane, physical experience. The main character's being in-but-not-of the world of the peasants of the extremely rural Eboli works as a proxy for us, both of us total strangers to this way of life, as the movie builds a radically different and thorough world through our mutual captivity and patient observance.

But while I'm making comments in the wrong threads, that cover is atrociously inappropriate for the content and themes of the movie. It has some loneliness, sure, but it's still an intimate, broad, and tactile movie—nothing expansive, isolated, or distant about it.
I like the idea of someone being banished to a space intended to be hell, but that instead can be heaven if one reframes their attitude. Okay maybe that's a bit extreme and polarized for what's going on here, but it's a philosophy that is embodied well in this film. Levi faces an unnerving transition with submerged humility thereby locating new opportunities to exercise agency, some that were unattainable when under a more harshly politicized milieu (yet that seeps into these walls as well, in a gradually-building, hard-hitting insight to how politics infect every environment in inescapable, complex ways). The nature of Levi applying his medical skills over artistic ones is a great allegory for this kind of open-mindedness and discovery through interactions with others, assessing the needs of his environment with compassion rather prioritizing his own selfish preferences. I wasn't fully on board with this until about halfway through, when it all began to sink in and I felt in step with Levi's own acclimation, so I can definitely understand why you'd go see this twice since the experience of adaptation is a gift only obtained in a detailed progression that breathes. The final 'meeting' scene in particular serves as an excellent coda, hitting a place both personally and professionally relevant to me, by demonstrating how social work is a necessary voice for political discourse. Only through becoming immersed in this novel social context on a clinical level can Levi accrue the perspective and advocate for policy on a macro one.

And I'll also agree that the cover doesn't seem appropriate to the meat of the film, which is far more intimately humanistic than coldly segregated, but it reminds me of (and may well be taken from) the shots as he enters the village, back when the place felt intimidating, distancing, and isolating. I also don't see the image as expansive, but conversely as an imprisonment, with the wall on the left and the houses elevated above trapping him in a sense. In a very reflexive way, it's appropriate to the theme of "don't judge a book by its cover"- where the cover of the film shows the beginning of a close-minded, fearful and insular adventure, head down, overwhelmed, and apprehensive about the people of the town.. but it's only the start of a long journey of affinity, possibility, and purpose. I don't think that's a great 'sell' for it being a good cover, but it seems more appropriate than any other image in the movie, certainly any one of Levi interacting favorably with the townsfolk, which is an evolution best left unshown.

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ellipsis7
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Re: 1043 Christ Stopped at Eboli

#38 Post by ellipsis7 » Sun Jan 03, 2021 7:09 am

The interesting thing is that there is a artistic triangle linking the book, the film & the paintings - those featured in the film are the actual ones by Carlo Levi from that time, his visual rendering of the reality then... So there is the dramatic portrayal of the housekeeper Giulia Venere and her young son Carmelino, but also the painting of the actual boy....

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