4K TV Article

Seiki has already popped the price bubble, don't know how other manufacturers can charge big bucks. If I were in the market for a set of any size it would be a no brainer.
 
The time will come so fast that it will cost no more for manufactures to make 4k than 1080, so they just wont bother with 1080. The top manufactures don't bother making 1360x768. Its not worth it taking up the space in the factory.
So despite the fact there will be no content for 4k, they will just make them anyway. I don't think anyone is bothering to make LCD tv's anymore, they have all gone LED LCD. Look what they cost when they first came out, how long ago was that? I haven't bothered to keep track its been so fast!

Now LG are doing this

http://www.gizmag.com/lg-worlds-largest-curved-tv/30190/

and this

http://www.gizmag.com/lg-ultrawide-computer-monitors-ces-214/30166/
 
Doing Christmas shopping for more mundane things yesterday I saw the 4K demo in two stores yesterday. (On the Sony 55" set, and showing wildlife footage, and the football that they did the trial with for FIFA earlier in the year.) I felt there was a difference, even standing a couple of metres back, let alone closer to.

The big question may be how much it was due to actual 4K, how much due to the fact that it was showing pristine "shot for" material? As against run of the mill HD with maybe higher compression?

Technology aside, from a sales point of view they seem to be onto a winner. Whatever the reasons, it was getting attention, even in the short time I was there, with an actual sale taking place in the one store. So in the general publics eye all they could see was "set A is better than set B - set A is 4K - 4K is good."

From the makers point of view, it means they can either therefore charge a premium for their product - or have a lead over non-4K screens if they keep the same price. Past history suggests the former will lead to the latter, as the early adopter market saturates. Eventually it will be as Phil vG above says, you won't be able to buy anything else. And as far as time scales go, then remember that less than 10 years HD was still a novelty in the high street, occasional demos but a lot of people thinking it could never be mainstream.

And technically, even upscaled HD is likely to look better on a 4K screen than on a 1920x1080, for the same reasons an upscaled photograph can look better than the original. You can't gain detail that isn't there originally, but the upscaling can have a smoothing effect.

Would I buy one? Not at the moment, certainly not whilst my main (big) TV is working fine. If that died tonight? Not sure. But if my current TV can last for another year or two, the answer is almost certain to be yes. And in 3-4 years, I doubt you'll see much other than 4K screens on sale, at least from the brand leaders. What the content situation will be by then remains to be seen. I'm pretty sure most high end acquisition will be 4K by then, but how much will make it through to the home?
 
roxics said:
I just want everything to settle down for a few decades so that the movies we shoot today will still have a valid resolution 30 years from now.

I (like many of you probably) got caught with my pants down shooting my first feature on DV due to budget. Upscaled to 1080p it doesn't look so great. Muddy. That was only 10 years ago. I would like to know the work I produce in my life will be somewhat valid when I'm gone. With film it was possible to go to higher resolution scans. I'm waiting for us to get to that point of diminishing returns with lower cost digital cinema cameras so that we don't have to worry about resolution and color anymore.

I think we're already there with HD distribution.
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There will probably be some software voodoo in the future that will be able to upscale any resolution to perfection.

Except for valued cultural treasures, I would anticipate that most art of today won't survive into the distant future. I think people just won't care to keep archiving/preserving digital media that is deemed unimportant.

i.e.:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2003/12/03/mp3_com_archive_is_destroyed/
 
It's cheap, but doesn't look very good, especially, apparently, when showing anything other than 4K, and that's going to be a big problem for the foreseeable future. So if that's all you want, then have at it. But that doesn't mean better TVs, with better pictures, and which display other formats well, can be as cheap.
 
GHKAM said:
Except for valued cultural treasures, I would anticipate that most art of today won't survive into the distant future. I think people just won't care to keep archiving/preserving digital media that is deemed unimportant.
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That could probably be said for most art. No one knows how many paintings or sculptures have been lost to time. As for film, probably more than half of all sound films made between 1927 and 1950 no longer exist, and according to Martin Scorsese's Film Foundation, more than 90% of American films made before 1929 have been lost. Only relatively recently in film's history has preservation been seen as important, let alone desirable.
 
David Jimerson said:
My point is that the Seiki TV is cheap because . . . it's cheap. The review shows why. You get what you pay for.

PC Mag says more or less the same thing:

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2421100,00.asp
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This is true! But it's what get's the ball rolling on the big price war and the reduction in price as a result of compertition. It isn't the same in the high end camera market because they are not "off the shelf" items, unlike ALL tv's.
 
Phil vG said:
This is true! But it's what get's the ball rolling on the big price war and the reduction in price as a result of compertition. It isn't the same in the high end camera market because they are not "off the shelf" items, unlike ALL tv's.
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I have to repost this, because it's true… for every consumer who actually cares and is geeky enough to get this over that, there are 5-6 more who will settle for less and find the Seiki just fine.
Manufacturers have to deal with this, and the only way is to pop their own bubble.

This is the reason B&O is selling crap… no one wants to pay for the so-called premium tvs except for those who have more money than they can spend sanely.

So now the ball is rolling. The only thing stopping consumers from buying completely into it, is because non of US (as in you and me) are really mainly acquiring and delivering 4K. Once we pop that bubble… things will start rolling nicely. ´

If I had the money right now, I'd invest in a 4K aquisition, editing and delivery setup, and not raise my daily fees a single bit, just to get the ball rolling really good.
 
legrevedotcom said:
I have to repost this, because it's true… for every consumer who actually cares and is geeky enough to get this over that, there are 5-6 more who will settle for less and find the Seiki just fine.
Manufacturers have to deal with this, and the only way is to pop their own bubble.

This is the reason B&O is selling crap… no one wants to pay for the so-called premium tvs except for those who have more money than they can spend sanely.

So now the ball is rolling. The only thing stopping consumers from buying completely into it, is because non of US (as in you and me) are really mainly acquiring and delivering 4K. Once we pop that bubble… things will start rolling nicely. ´

If I had the money right now, I'd invest in a 4K aquisition, editing and delivery setup, and not raise my daily fees a single bit, just to get the ball rolling really good.
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I understand that video people will quickly buy into 4K...
But, regarding mass adoption of 4K cameras - do you think the average consumer is willing to buy higher spec PC's, video card, monitors, storage just so they can do a basic edit and upload 4K?

When everything went from SD to HD, desktops were still the main computing device. Now PC's are on the decline, with smartphones and tablets showing increased sales.
http://www.tomshardware.com/news/lenovo-china-smartphones-fiscal-first-quarter-laptops,23894.html

4K TV's will come down in price - I'm talking seperate from TV's as viewing online video via a smartphone, tablet or PC monitor is way more common than hooking up a camera directly to TV. Even if direct upload of 4K video from a WiFi-enabled device (without acquiring a better PC), what will the benefit of 4K content be if many are viewing online videos on a tiny smartphone screen?

I'm just wondering if the present way of doing things will be transferable to 4K? (Again, I'm talking mass consumer adoption, not video enthusiasts or pros who work with video.)
 
GHKAM said:
I understand that video people will quickly buy into 4K...
But, regarding mass adoption of 4K cameras - do you think the average consumer is willing to buy higher spec PC's, video card, monitors, storage just so they can do a basic edit and upload 4K?

When everything went from SD to HD, desktops were still the main computing device. Now PC's are on the decline, with smartphones and tablets showing increased sales.
http://www.tomshardware.com/news/lenovo-china-smartphones-fiscal-first-quarter-laptops,23894.html

4K TV's will come down in price - I'm talking seperate from TV's as viewing online video via a smartphone, tablet or PC monitor is way more common than hooking up a camera directly to TV. Even if direct upload of 4K video from a WiFi-enabled device (without acquiring a better PC), what will the benefit of 4K content be if many are viewing online videos on a tiny smartphone screen?

I'm just wondering if the present way of doing things will be transferable to 4K? (Again, I'm talking mass consumer adoption, not video enthusiasts or pros who work with video.)
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The higher specs on machines will come out 'naturally' over time. When DV was brand new you needed a card providing hardware acceleration to smoothly playback the footage. When DVDs were becoming popular you needed a dedicated MPEG2 decoder chip to smoothly playback a DVD in a computer. I remember when Apple first put up HD movie trailers on its website and trying to play them brought my dual 1ghz G4 tower to its knees. In a similar vein when the iDevices got video editing capabilities they could edit their natively recorded H.264 video files like a hot knife through butter, thanks to their specialized hardware, even though the same footage would be a struggle for regular desktops and laptops.

With regard to viewing on mobile screens, sure they are small screens but they are also viewed significantly closer to your eye than a computer monitor or TV. The iPhone was the first screen to go high density and get the "retina" moniker and there certainly is a visible difference in image quality even on such a small screen. The current iPads have a resolution of 2048x1536 which is about 1/3 more pixels than HD at 1920x1080.

I don't think 4k will be mainstream for another 4-7 years and that's a very long time in terms of tech.


-Andrew
 
Mark Williams said:
Interesting article on 4K TVs. Apparently they have surpassed the limits of human vision. "And consumers will soon realize that they aren't seeing much, if any, visual resolution and sharpness improvements," Soneira continued. The sets will likely be better than today's in other ways, he noted, "but the higher pixel count will not be the reason."
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This has been known for about two years concurring with the TV makers' reluctance to roll out 4K panels till recently. It's especially irritating to think that the industry is going to try to force consumers into upgrading their consumer displays, just to make more money, even thought the payoff simply will not be visible by the end user.
4K capture is one thing ( great for cropping leeway) but to foist 4K displays is another. :angry:
Then there's 4K projection in theaters...which makes huge sense.:laugh:
 
Zephyrnoid said:
It's especially irritating to think that the industry is going to try to force consumers into upgrading their consumer displays, just to make more money, even thought the payoff simply will not be visible by the end user.
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Who is being forced to upgrade? Already purchased TV sets and cameras will continue to function as advertised for years to come. Even when HD TVs start being phased out, which I think will happen, the 4k sets will already be at comparable price points so if your TV dies then buying a new 4k set won't be anymore expensive than buying a new HD set.


-Andrew
 
adkimery said:
Who is being forced to upgrade? Already purchased TV sets and cameras will continue to function as advertised for years to come. Even when HD TVs start being phased out, which I think will happen, the 4k sets will already be at comparable price points so if your TV dies then buying a new 4k set won't be anymore expensive than buying a new HD set.


-Andrew
Click to expand...

That's a good point.
 
I am a 1d c owner and user. I've been wanting to build a full production rig, so, after much hemming and hawing- should I go C300 or C500, Red, Sony f5/55, Blackmagic or just wait awhile longer?- I bought into the C500/CN E Prime/Odyssey7 deal on last Saturdays rebate deadline, mainly to stay in the Canon ecosystem.

I live, work and shoot in Medellin Colombia, and NYC. I finished a shoot late Wed night in Medallo and was booking a flight to NYC to pick up the the new baby. I had pre registered for CES some months ago, but decided not to go and wait for NAB. Realizing I could catch the last day of CES by routing thru LAS, and catch a couple days "rest" I hit the airport. Am I glad I did.

REVALATION-

The Juggernaut is upon us. I have read on all the various forums peoples opinions and forecasts etc of 4k...yeah and nay, should I shouldn't I. Forget the discussion-

It is here like the Borg.

The manufacturers are geared up for full frontal assault on the world and frankly it is fabulous.

Every iteration of screen type, size, style and purchasing point was there in multiples ,and, the retailers and purchasers were frothing at the mouth. They know that when people get on to this it is the easiest sell since chocolate. And I feel, the public is going to get its moneys worth.

I felt 1080p was more an audio progression then a visual one. 4k is all about the eyeballs.

(Did I drink the coolaid? Yes.)

The Panasonic 4k projection room BMTFAway. Man do I want to see my work on that rig.

I caught Shane Hurlbuts presentation at Canon on the using C500 ("the best lowlight production cam in the world") to shoot " Need for Speed". Awesome. I went home and slept like a baby. Buying the C500 was the right thing to do.

Kudos to Shane, a guy who is making the point about giving back and sharing his knowledge. When I came into the industry it was a closed shop father/son entitlement operation, well still is....but better.

I am now going full in on 4k. The tools are there and in short order people will be living in a 4k viewing world.

No looking back.
 
The special package was the C500 with the Odyssey7. Of course by the time you get the 4K codec and the storage and cables the Od7 doubles in price, but it is a great unit
 
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