In response to the concerns voiced by the first buyers of the Blu-ray edition of '
Highlander: Season One' (namely, that this was a 720p upconvert of a standard-definition source), Davis-Panzer has sent a statement (as a comment to blu-ray.com's news post of December 15), clarifying the production process for this title. In the studio's opinion, "the critiques about the quality of the Highlander Blu-ray experience seem to be due to a lack of awareness regarding HD/Blu-ray technology."
The statement reads as follows:
In response to the postings regarding Highlander Season 1 Blu-ray release, we would like to say (as the people who have lived with this show for 17 years), that our goal has been to deliver the very best product for our fans to enjoy. With respect to the Blu-ray version of the series, we did as much research as possible to come to a decision as to how to release the newest box set of the series.
In our opinion, the solution we came up with, will give our fans a great Blu-ray experience. We produced a product with quality that can best be described as follows: what the standard-definition DVD was to the VHS version of the show, our Blu-ray (digital 720p) release is to the standard-definition DVD (digital 480i).
We took the original digital masters that were made from 16mm film negative, removed grain, up-res'd and tweaked the original 720x480 image (480i) to 1280x720 (720p) progressive scan. In our opinion 720p gave us the best results from the material we were working with. Once again, our goal was to give our fans a great Highlander Blu-ray experience.
Another question was why we didn't go back to the original film negative. Primarily, once the film was transferred to digital, it was vaulted. The technology at that time has made it extremely difficult to trace back from the digital masters to the original film negative. Also, the visual effects, which were done digitally, in a standard-def (480i) format, would not up-res to the quality of original negative re-transfer to HD. To redo all of the effects, transitions, Quickenings, etc. would be incredibly cost prohibitive. So the original film solution was not a realistic option for us and our 720p solution achieved the best and most consistent quality overall.
We also tried various options to enhance the original stereo audio track (to 2.1 or 5.1), and decided on Dolby Digital 2.1 audio as the best solution. We are currently testing some new hardware to see if we can provide a more realistic Dolby Digital 5.1 audio experience for the next releases.
A final thought: we too are big fans of the Highlander series, and as fans, we believe we have brought you what will be a terrific Highlander Blu-ray experience.
Donald Paonessa
Producer, Post Production
Highlander: the Series
In related news,
Highlander fans can find solace in the purchase of the original movie '
Highlander', directed by Russell Mulcahy and starring Christopher Lambert, which was released in the UK by Optimum Home Entertainment on a region-free, NTSC-friendly Blu-ray (in a Steelbook edition to boot), which is currently only £8.88 on Amazon.co.uk - which translates to about $17.20 shipping included.