Platinum: Beauty Or Beast?

[BubbleGumUK]

Is it just me, or is anyone else worried that the first disc in the 2-disc "Beauty and the Beast" Platinum edition set is gonna contain the three available versions of the film??

Okay, granted, the original theatrical and extented special edition cuts could be combined via branching, but the inclusion of the work print version surely means a complete file for itself? It's a totally different version, so they can't branch from that!

Plus, the release says that all three versions will use the 5.1 sound created for the 2002 re-issue. But that can't be true for most of the original and work print editions?

Added to all that the inclusion of several bonus features, and I'm just worried that we're gonna get quantity over (just-not-as-good-as-it-could-be) quality...

[Riddick]

something to think about for sure but after Snow White I'll give'm the chance to pull it off

[samuelk]

I saw the "work in progress" version on laser disc about 6 years ago, and it can be done with seamless branching. There are some completed shots.

But a lot of the work-in-progress scenes are storyboards, which of course take up far less space than moving video. Considering that the film is under 1.5 hours long, it won't be hard to fit onto the disc.

The only video needed for the WIP version is some of the footage that was in pencil-test form.

[BubbleGumUK]

Seemless branching is a "myth". Sure, it's there, but it actually works usually during the layer change, when a second or third video file is played. The audio remains the same.

This is how "Tarzan" can have English, French and Spanish front titles, as these three versions of the first half of the film have been included up to the layer change. With "Die Hard", the extended power-shutdown scene is inserted within a second full file of the latter half of the movie.

The WIP version of Beast could never be done with branching - not unless you want to wait the 1-4 seconds each time it flips into the fully colored version. Plus, although as you say the WIP version is storyboards, I have this on LD, and the frame stability, as so often is the case with rough cuts, is such that it will have to be compressed as a normal film. The other way of doing this is to freeze frame all the boards and run them sequencially, but that's a lot of bother and would detract from the "rough edge" look of the rest of the print - the scratches and pops that are integral to this particular WIP version.

The theatrical and re-issue cuts will use the same front end, but will have a layer change half way through that will then revert to the original theatrical cut if you've chosen that version, or a seperate last 40 minutes or so of the extended cut, if you've chosen that version.

So on this disc will be a fully compressed WIP version, a fully completed first half, plus two versions of the second half of the completed film - theatrical and extended 2002 release.

Just still think it might be a bit much...

[Beware_the_Creeper]

Personally I wish they had stayed to the original release schedule so that Beauty and the Beast wasn't the 2002 edition. I much prefer the original 2002 title Aladdin.

The Creeper

[LBPound23]

Originally posted by Beware_the_Creeper
Personally I wish they had stayed to the original release schedule so that Beauty and the Beast wasn't the 2002 edition. I much prefer the original 2002 title Aladdin.

Wrong. Aladdin was never supposed to be the 2002 title. It was going to be the 2003 title, but it now appears that The Lion King will be next.

BubbleGum, you seem to have different DVD functions confused - seamless branching is an instant thing...just as in the end credits come up in a different language with NO pause on many Disney films...this has NOTHING to do with a layer change. It could be done seamlessly or if not, 3 hours of video content is not going to be very difficult to fit on a SSDL disc. Plus there is no way that they are going to need to put the entire film on the disc twice, for the IMAX and theatrical cuts. The differences are minor.

[dvd-fanman]

We'll see if the new tentative release schedule holds up now.

Fall - 2001) Snow White
Fall - 2002) Beauty and the Beast
Fall - 2003) The Lion King
Fall - 2004) Aladdin
Fall - 2005) Bambi
Fall - 2006) Jungle Book
Fall - 2007) Cinderella
Fall - 2008) Little Mermaid
Fall - 2009) Lady and the Tramp
Fall - 2010) 101 Dalmatians

[Robert Cook]

BubbleGumUK wrote:

Is it just me, or is anyone else worried that the first disc in the 2-disc "Beauty and the Beast" Platinum edition set is gonna contain the three available versions of the film??

You're not alone. Of course, we want all three versions, but how would they all fit on one disc?

Okay, granted, the original theatrical and extented special edition cuts could be combined via branching, but the inclusion of the work print version surely means a complete file for itself? It's a totally different version, so they can't branch from that!

I'm not sure whether any of the branching scenarios would even be possible, and I'll discuss the reasons below.

Plus, the release says that all three versions will use the 5.1 sound created for the 2002 re-issue. But that can't be true for most of the original and work print editions?

The press release is not quite that specific about this point, but it does not mention that the original soundtrack will be included. The new soundtrack is nice, but sounds very different, and more importantly, has been changed in other ways. For example, they added the sound of things being broken while the Beast is howling over Belle's departure--this is not just a new mix we're talking about. The work-in-progress version definitely needs a totally separate soundtrack, too.

Seemless branching is a "myth". Sure, it's there, but it actually works usually during the layer change, when a second or third video file is played. The audio remains the same.

That's not true. It's a method of arranging the data on the disc (with no layer switching) such that DVD players are (supposed to be) able to skip scenes without pausing, subject to the limitations of their memory buffers. The same happens for the audio--you do not need additional soundtracks for seamless branching (unless they've been changed in other ways, as I mentioned above). Correctly implemented, it can be seamless, but it's a compatibility risk.

This is how "Tarzan" can have English, French and Spanish front titles, as these three versions of the first half of the film have been included up to the layer change.

This feature is implemented using multiple angles. It's more similar to how multiple soundtracks are done than seamless branching. All of the alternate scenes are stored together, and you pick which one to play. In this case, it depends on the language of the soundtrack that is selected. All of the alternate scenes must be of the same length, of course. Seamless branching is different and much more complex, allowing the player to selectively skip over scenes of variable length, effectively creating a number of variable-length versions of a film.

By the way, some of Disney's DVDs have alternate scenes besides the opening and end credits. For example, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs has alternate versions of the Evil Queen's spell book.

The WIP version of Beast could never be done with branching - not unless you want to wait the 1-4 seconds each time it flips into the fully colored version. Plus, although as you say the WIP version is storyboards, I have this on LD, and the frame stability, as so often is the case with rough cuts, is such that it will have to be compressed as a normal film. The other way of doing this is to freeze frame all the boards and run them sequencially, but that's a lot of bother and would detract from the "rough edge" look of the rest of the print - the scratches and pops that are integral to this particular WIP version.

I totally agree, and furthermore, a large number of changes were also made to the supposedly "common" portions of the special edition.


LBPound23 wrote:

It could be done seamlessly or if not, 3 hours of video content is not going to be very difficult to fit on a SSDL disc.

Unfortunately, if seamless branching is not used, then well over 4 hours of video would be required. This would result in unacceptable artifacting, especially since this is "traditional" animation, which is both relatively difficult to compress, and revealing when it comes to artifacts.

Plus there is no way that they are going to need to put the entire film on the disc twice, for the IMAX and theatrical cuts. The differences are minor.

The differences are many, not just the "Human Again" scene, as most people seem to believe. In addition to the changes in the soundtrack, there were many scenes which were altered artistically. To give you some idea of the scale of the changes, here is a relevant excerpt from the official production notes:

"Nearly 200 scenes in all required some additional animation, effects, background painting or other details...Before we added in this song, we had several scenes in the latter part of the film where the castle is in a shambles. So the minute they sang 'Human Again,' we had to literally go into the rest of the film and clean up the castle. This affected about 80 to 85 shots and we had to digitally repair ripped wall paper, straighten crooked picture frames and generally look for any inconsistencies created by the addition."

I doubt that any implementation of seamless branching has ever had to deal with such a magnitude of differences, or that players would be able to play such a monster. Obviously, you'd have to combine most of these individual changes into longer branched scenes, but if they are as spread out as they seem to be, you could potentially end up with more total video than if you had encoded them independently! This is because combining the changes would result in many identical scenes being duplicated. In this particular case, the additional problem is that except for the added scene, there are two versions for all of the changed scenes. For current DVDs which incorporate seamless branching, there are few real difficulties in comparison, because we're only talking about a handful of scenes being inserted or removed, not literally hundreds of changes all over the place.

There is simply no guarantee that seamless branching could be done at all, assuming that Disney are going to give us the REAL original version, which is another issue I'm concerned about--perhaps even more concerned about. They may just use seamless branching to encode the original version as the special edition without the new scene, figuring that most people would not care or be able to tell the difference. It's bad enough that the original film will be replaced by the special edition on VHS, but getting a mangled version of the original film on DVD would not only be going too far, it would be fraudulent advertising.

I think that I have a decent understanding of the technical aspects of the DVD format, but I don't know everything about it. If anyone knows how three versions of this film (over 80 minutes for each) can fit on one disc, please let me know about it. Obviously, I've thought about the DVD-18 and DVD-14 formats, but based on what Chris Carey said in his interview on The Digital Bits, I doubt that double-sided discs would be seriously considered for such a major release:

"...generally speaking on a DVD-9, if you put two versions of a movie on - meaning you're talking about three hours of programming - you're really compromising the quality. The MPEG-2 compression levels that you have to drop down to to get that much run time on a movie is really questionable...right now replication capabilities for the double-sided means that it's DVD-5... actually, I mean DVD-10, which means it's single-layer but dual-sided. The replication capacity for DVD-18 just isn't there yet. There's only a very limited number of facilities that can do that. We are looking at that. But then, the issue with double-sided is that, particularly when you're talking about a family title, you're giving up the ability to put disc art on it. You've got only that inner ring to put text on it. And for a little kid who's trying to navigate it, he's not sure which side is up and which side he's gonna get."

He's concerned about compression quality, which is good of course, but he's not convinced that DVD-18 is quite ready, so how do you think Beauty and the Beast is going to be authored? If it were up to me, I'd add a disc to the set (bumping up the price a little, if necessary). This could be good for promotion, because consumers would perceive more value in more discs. If that's not an option for some reason, I would place the work-in-progress version on the second disc, sacrificing some supplements or their encoding quality, if necessary. I just don't see how this DVD set could be as described in the press release without major changes (like an additional disc or DVD-18), crappy encoding quality, or dumping artistic integrity. The only available miracle they could pull off would be an amazing, unprecedented feat of seamless branching (which therefore might not work on many players), which is not all that likely, based on my arguments above.

[SolidSnakeASS]

Thanks for the info, Walt.

I'll being buying it for sure anyway, but I wish Aladdin was the last release and that they did 2 releases a year.

[feldon23]

What are the odds the work-in-progress will be DD5.1? If it's only DD2.0, then it only needs 192kbps of bandwidth.

[Robert Cook]

feldon23 wrote:

What are the odds the work-in-progress will be DD5.1? If it's only DD2.0, then it only needs 192kbps of bandwidth.

I figure that it will definitely be encoded separately, with its own DD 2.0 soundtrack. I just hope that the original version also has its own DD 2.0 soundtrack, whichever way they choose to encode the film. It's true that we could save some space if some of the versions only require a DD 2.0 soundtrack, but even the full audio load of 1216-1408 kb/s is not that large a factor compared to the serious space issues of this DVD set.

In order to spare everyone from tedious calculations, I left them out of my original message, but I just realized that my technical arguments are a bit vague without them. Disney's DVD producer Chris Carey said that 3 hours of video was questionable even on a DVD-9, in terms of compression quality, so we'll use that as a baseline goal. The three versions of the film add up to 84+84+90 = 258 minutes (4 hours and 18 minutes) of running time. There are a couple of minor supplements, as well as animated menus and other overhead, so let's add about 6 minutes to the total, making it 264 minutes. To get to 3 hours, we'd need to save 264-3*60 = 84 minutes. Oops! That's the length of the entire original theatrical film! If we look at this from a different angle, you could say that the special edition, work in progress version, and some overhead stuff already add up to 3 hours, leaving no room to encode the original film in any form.

Of course, in reality, we could go above 3 hours to a certain extent, but it all depends on the average length of the differences between the original film and special edition. If we encode the single additional scene using seamless branching, and the rest of the original film and special edition using DVD's multi-angle feature, each second of the average length of the changed scenes would translate to 200 additional seconds of video, because there are 200 such scenes. So an additional 15 minutes of video would allow for an average of 15*60/200 = 4.5 seconds for each changed scene. The problem is that we're already over 3 hours to start with, the point at which Chris Carey said "you're really compromising the quality." The bottom line is that if the average length of a changed scene is short enough (4.5 seconds or less, which is probably true, but I'm just guessing), they might be able to get away with three versions of the film on one DVD-9, but the quality would still be compromised.

It's true that they managed to encode over 3 hours of video on the A Bug's Life Collector's Edition, but CGI animation compresses extremely well, while "traditional" animation compresses relatively poorly, and they were apparently using a superior encoder back then. Their more recent animated DVD releases have had much more noticeable compression artifacts at the same or greater bitrates.

[Daniel Shock]

Could you explain to me why traditional animation compresses relatively poorly?

I have always thought that animation backgrounds are VERY static. Much more so than live action. Also, the color palette is much more limited so the difference from pixel to pixel should be less.

[Robert Cook]

Daniel Shock wrote:

Could you explain to me why traditional animation compresses relatively poorly?

That's a good question, and I'm well aware of the myths about compressing traditional animation that had surrounded the DVD format in its infancy, so I have to be careful about what I say. Back then, some people said that animation could not be represented well on DVD at all, which has obviously been proven false. However, I believe it's still true that higher bitrates are necessary to maintain a given level of perceived quality for traditional animation.

I have always thought that animation backgrounds are VERY static. Much more so than live action.

That's generally true, which means (as you're implying) that the temporal compression ("motion compensation") will be quite effective, possibly saving even more bits on the average than for live action. Most of the detailed types of backgrounds (the ones that look like what most people consider "paintings") compress very well.

The problem is the characters, which consist mainly of flat areas of colors and hard outlines. This is difficult to compress well using DVD's MPEG-2 video encoding standard, and is compounded by the fact that it makes compression artifacts more visible. If the encoded video does not have enough bits, you'll see "halo" (or what some people call "ringing") artifacts around the edges of characters, and easily visible noise or blocking artifacts in the flat areas. The backgrounds might compress and look great, but most of the time, I assume that our attention is focused on the characters.

Also, the color palette is much more limited so the difference from pixel to pixel should be less.

You might be thinking that I'm side-stepping rather than answering your question, and you'd be right, because I'm not sure how to explain it. To respond to your last point, video compression on DVD does not benefit from flat colors, because of the way it transforms data from one representation to another. As far as an individual frame is concerned, MPEG-2 is neither a run-length ("this many pixels of the same color here") nor delta ("use fewer bits to represent just the differences between adjacent pixels") encoder, in the sense that most people are familiar with. In semi-layman's terms, it transforms spatial information (what most people would simply refer to as the different pixels in their various places) into a mathematical form that more directly represents details (the frequency domain). It does this on little blocks (I think it's 8x8 pixels at the lowest level) at a time, not the whole image at once. As you probably know, it's a "lossy" encoder, and the lossy part occurs when some of the detail is sort of smoothed out by essentially zeroing (i.e. "quantizing" or basically just reducing the precision of) some of this data, making it much more compressible later in the process, when the data compression is actually done. Experts in the field might find this explanation amusing or grotesque, but I'm rather courageously (or foolishly) trying to describe it in English for "normal" people. You will lose some detail and the picture will be changed somewhat in other ways when decoded later, but this process is carefully tuned to ensure that the effects are as unnoticeable as possible. For a typical image of real life, for example, this is much more effective and higher in quality than reducing the detail in the image directly, which is similar to the benefit of using MP3 to compress music.

It's quite logical to think that flat areas with little or no detail to start with would be a snap to compress on DVD, based on the above description, but the algorithm was selected and tuned to work best with continuously variable images, like we would see most of the time in real life and live-action films. Flat areas of color (well, color is handled separately from brightness, but I won't get into that here) transform into a lot of non-zero data--that is, it might not look like detail to us, but it does to the algorithm--which might decode poorly after it's reduced in precision, resulting in a lot of visible artifacts. As I've pointed out before, the fact that there is little detail (to us) to mask the artifacts, and because it's so simple for our perception to expect perfectly solid colors in those areas, defects are relatively visible. The only way around this is to throw more bits at these areas, so that they are more accurately represented, which of course requires more disc space. Don't get me wrong, you could possibly tune encoders to handle this a little better, like recognizing flat areas and automatically favoring them when distributing bits, but there's no getting around the fact that a higher overall bitrate is necessary for a given level of quality. Hard edges are also difficult to compress, because the change is so abrupt, which takes a lot of bits to represent on DVD, which is optimized for smooth images.

It's very much like JPEG encoding, in fact, and if you're so inclined, you could experiment with different types of images. For images of identical dimensions, I think you'll find that animation images look worse (the areas containing the characters) than realistic images for a given file size, or require a larger file size to get the same perceived quality. It depends on the person, too, and I for one definitely don't want to see Beauty and the Beast compressed to the point that there is over three hours of video on one DVD-9, unless Disney has had some kind of breakthrough in encoding technology. Unfortunately, their encoding has gotten worse over time, so how much hope is there of that?

Anyway, I sure hope that my explanation was comprehensible.

[BubbleGumUK]

Thanks Robert Cook, for touching on my original issues and perhaps explaining them a little better. I had, in fact forgotten about Don Hahn's comments about the "cleaning of the castle" - surely that at least means a seperate file for the movie from "Human Again" onwards??

It will definately be interesting to see how this turns out on DVD. I have the WIP and original theatrical release on LaserDisc, and will be looking very closely at the way they handle this!

[Crow331]

I didn't hear that they were releasing the Work In Progress ... Damn !!!! Now I guess my WIP Laser Disc won't be worth the fortune I thought it might bring somewhere down the road. I didn't think there was a chance in hell they would release it ... rat bastids.

[Robert Cook]

BubbleGumUK wrote:

I had, in fact forgotten about Don Hahn's comments about the "cleaning of the castle" - surely that at least means a seperate file for the movie from "Human Again" onwards??

Unfortunately, they also changed a lot of other scenes which didn't need to be changed (artwork and/or sound effects), in ways that would be apparent on any medium. In addition to the sound effect I had mentioned in an earlier message, another change that comes to mind is the flowing blood they added to the Beast's wolf bite wound. They could have saved themselves a lot of effort and money if they weren't so hell-bent on mangling the film so much. Most people believe that they only added the "Human Again" scene, so most of their effort was for nothing--the IMAX presentation was impressive because of the size and clarity of the format, not screwed-up effects and other added stuff. They should have made the new scene (animated recently) conform to the existing film, not the other way around. Now there are major issues on DVD they have to deal with, and they'd better get it right.

It will definately be interesting to see how this turns out on DVD. I have the WIP and original theatrical release on LaserDisc, and will be looking very closely at the way they handle this!

To me, the special edition definitely looks and feels wrong, especially after "Human Again." It is clearly inferior to the original film. That is merely my opinion, of course, but it's just to emphasize the real issue of being faithful to the original.

[BubbleGumUK]

My worry is that they will give precidence to the re-issue edition.

After all, as if "Platinum Edition" wasn't enough, the actual disc title is (as seen on the cover and current DVD trailers) "Beauty and the Beast: Special Edition).

I hope the theatrical cut IS the theatrical cut, and not the SE simply missing "Human Again". I actually didn't have a problem with the added sequence, and felt it was intergrated quite well. Initial worries about animation quality (would it be too "new/better" looking, or cheap DTV stuff) were unjustified, and having watched the original version to death, it'll be nice to have this refreshing moment within the film. The song was written by Ashman/Menken for the actualy film anyway, so it's not like it's a totally new portion. Not like "Evita" slipping in "You Must Love Me" to better give the film a chance at winning an Oscar (which it did)!

[JakeLipson]

Last night I had the urge to watch the Beauty and the Beast DVD trailer again, so I called up the official site and clicked View the Trailer. To my suprise, it was an all-new trailer spicifically featuring the DVD bonus features...and it looks damn good. Film clips mixed with DVD screenshots and a fancy voiceover describing the features; I was already superhyped for this release, and now I'm even more excited.

See it for yourself at http://www.beautyandthebeast.com and post your reactions here.

[Rogue]

Originally posted by dvd-fanman
We'll see if the new tentative release schedule holds up now.

Fall - 2001) Snow White
Fall - 2002) Beauty and the Beast
Fall - 2003) The Lion King
Fall - 2004) Aladdin
Fall - 2005) Bambi
Fall - 2006) Jungle Book
Fall - 2007) Cinderella
Fall - 2008) Little Mermaid
Fall - 2009) Lady and the Tramp
Fall - 2010) 101 Dalmatians

I can't believe Pinnochio is not on this list. IMHO it is Disney's finest work.

[JakeLipson]

There are plenty great ones that deserved Platinum Collection status that they couldn't fit in because of their 10-year release cycle.

In my opinion, Disney's Platinum Series should have been like New Line's; unlimited number of titles, more than one per year, etc. If that were the case, here's how I would have had it done. All 2-disc sets (except where noted) with fully restored audiio and video, all featuring DD5.1 and DTS soundtracks in English, French, and Spanish. Also widescreen (always anamorphic) when applacable.

Jan 2001 - Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Pinocchio
Mar 2001 - Fantasia, Fantasia/2000, Dumbo, Bambi
June 2001 - Cinderella, Lady and the Tramp, Sleeping Beauty
Sept 2001 - 101 Dalmatians, The Jungle Book
Oct 2001 - The Little Mermaid SE, 3 discs
Nov 2001 - Beauty and the Beast 10th Anniversary SE, 4 discs*
Jan 2002 - The Hunchback of Notre Dame SE
June 2002 - The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh 25th Anniversary SE
Nov 2002 - Aladdin 10th Anniversary SE, 3 discs**
Jan 2002 - Lilo & Stitch SE
Feb 2003 - Peter Pan 50th Anniversary SE
Mar 2003 - Mary Poppins Ultumate Collector's Special Edition, 3 discs (two bonus discs)
Jun 2003 - Toy Story 2
Oct 2003 - Tarzan
Dec 2003 - The Great Mouse Detective, The Fox and the Hound, Robin Hood, The Black Cauldron SE***
Jun 2004 - The Lion King, 10th Anniversary SE, 3 discs**
Oct 2004 - A Bug's Life
June 2005 - Monsters Inc.
Nov 2005 - Toy Story 10th Anniversary SE

*Disc 1 - Special Edition cut, Disc 2 - Original cut, Disc 3 - Work in Progress, Disc 4 - Bonus disc
** Disc 1 - Special Edition cut, Disc 2 - Original cut, Disc 3 - Bonus disc
*** Yes, I DO believe The Black Cauldron worthy of Platinum status, despite the fact that 95% of the people who have seen it hate it.

But alas, there are so many great movies denied Platinum Collection status. *sigh* Oh well...

[Jerm]

Originally posted by JakeLipson
See it for yourself at http://www.beautyandthebeast.com and post your reactions here.

Jake, thanks, that was cool. I can't wait for this release

[Minority617]

What a great trailer, (I was already going to buy this), but my money will quickly be disappearing this holiday season.
ET, Band of Brothers, Monsters Inc, Beauty and the Beast, MIB 2, SW 2, Spiderman, and oh yeah Back to the Future,
But Beauty and the Beast looks great

[JakeLipson]

Uhh...this just occured to me and is rather disturbing.

The press release from February 28 indicates that the Platinum Edition DVD (and, it has been revealed since, the reissue VHS as well) will contain a new music video for the Oscar-winning title song Beauty and the Beast by, quote "pop sensation Jump 5." I don't have a problem with a second video being created, but it doesn't denote that the original 1991 music video is being included. This worries me, as I've always loved the Celine Dion/Pablo Byrson version of the song and want the very well done music video included, if only for histor's sake.

Also, if both the video and DVD are slanted to have the new Jump 5 video, what's to stop Disney from removing the Celine Dion version from the end credits and replacing it with the Jump 5 remake. especially on the Special Edition cut? I don't have a problem with a new video being produced as long as the original end credit version is maintained on the film and the original video is included as well. But I fear that they won't include both, just give prefrence to the new Jump 5 version.

Is it just me, or is anyone else concerned about this?