'Tis because, for the MPEG video bitrate, they have it somewhere between 5-6 Mbps, but yet, had Brian NOT insisted on using the very high-bitrate-ish DTS soundtracks, they could've put the video bitrate at the maximum of 9.8 Mbps!
The only reason the videos look good somewhat, even with the low bitrate, is that, instead of sizing it to 720x480 before unsqueezing the video to 16:9 AR widescreen when played, they used a dimension of 520x480 (or 502x480), at least on the GVH2 DVD (NTSC) (haven't checked the Fred tribute or GVH1 DVDs to see if that's the case too yet)
That annoys the hell out of me :-P
I guess the DTS thing also explains why they don't include a DD 5.1 mix for us poor unfortunate souls who bought a receiver without DTS.
And uncompressed PCM takes up some extra space too from what I understand.. so it seems Bri is more concerned with audio than video... I can't really complain about that.. first and foremost Queen is about the music :)
Jeffrey
It is one thing to compromise on the video bit rate as the quality is still better than VHS, but forcing a square peg into a round hole is an entirely different issue. Yes, it is about the music, but there is no rational reason for cutting off the top and bottom of the picture when a widescreen TV could have shown the entire picture (but with bars on the sides).
If you guys don't care, then don't post! :P This has been talked about before. Or is it because it was Dark's topic, and you felt you needed to negate his positivity on the subject?
I think it's great there is a logical explanation about this quality issue, and it seems that Dark was the first person on the board to come up with it. Good stuff.
Funny...I'm not alone on the audio thing! A lot of my friends thought I was mad because I was looking forward to the sound quality FIRST on both volumes! (Some asked me, "But what about the quality of the videos??" I told them, "Sound first, then the pictures!")
Very good engineering, but on the second disc, the One Vision documentary simply does not compare with the Magic Years version...for more info on that, it's on another thread!
I agree with Guitar Hero, good topic, Dark. Defniately better than all that "Will you love me, ah yeah" shite.
Because the masters for GHI were strung together ala GFI, didn't Brian use a poorer quality master to get the vids on GVHI single (on there own)? Maybe this explains the bitrate for this, at a higher bitrate, the video looked poorer.
I'm not to sure what should come first :-) We already have the music in pretty good quality, so shouldn't the video take precedence, since thats the name of the release - Greatest VIDEO Hits, not Greatest Hits DVD-A. Mmmmm, interesting discussion. Personaly I think a well balanced compromise should be made between the two, and so far I think the guys have been quite successful in this....
GVI had a truly shitty picture quality, this one is a bit better but still a substandard. Watch, for example, Bowie's Best of dvd and see the difference
David Jones has a good point. I would have liked to see them do just a standard Dolby Digital 5.1 and 2.0, and leave the ratios alone, and truly get the best possible video available. Queen was always tops in the music video field, so for what is probably the definitive archive of this work, to have them in this state is a bit sad. I must retract my statement about the music mattering most, LOL
And QueenSite, the Bowie set is truly awesome. I was amazed how super the video quality was, particularly the early BBC stuff.. they must take really good care of their archives. And that one has PCM sound, but no surround mixes.
<>
Exactly, I'm happy with both sound and vision...
But if sound was really more important for Brian than the visiuals- I have to say, that's the attitude I like...!
Well, I've examined the GVH2-disc1 and found the following:
1. There are 3 different audio options...
a) LPCM = 944MB (2ch)
b) DTS = 882MB (5ch)
c) AC3 = 112MB (2ch)
2. Subs take up 16MB
3. All Video = 3,334MB
Now, the total for the disc was 5,312MB. The only reason I bring this up, is because that's not much more than a 4.7GB disc. Why have they not gone for bigger 9.4GB discs? At least, this would have given the videos more quality. And probably a little more for DTS as well. Just a little food for thought.
Peace,
Adam.