The Blu-Ray Revolution

Get ready, Blu-Ray will be taking over the world. So, what is this new technology and how will it affect my home theater experience?



Blu-ray, also known as Blu-ray Disc (BD), is the name of a next-generation optical disc format jointly developed by the Blu-ray Disc Association (BDA), a group of the world's leading consumer electronics, personal computer and media manufacturers. The format was developed to enable recording, rewriting and playback of high-definition video (HD), as well as storing large amounts of data. The format offers more than five times the storage capacity of traditional DVDs and can hold up to 25GB on a single-layer disc and 50GB on a dual-layer disc. This extra capacity combined with the use of advanced video and audio codecs will offer consumers an unprecedented HD experience.
Blu-ray is currently supported by more than 180 of the world's leading consumer electronics, personal computer, recording media, video game and music companies. The format also has broad support from the major movie studios as a successor to today's DVD format. In fact, seven of the eight major movie studios (Disney, Fox, Warner, Paramount, Sony, Lionsgate and MGM) are supporting the Blu-ray format and five of them (Disney, Fox, Sony, Lionsgate and MGM) are releasing their movies exclusively in the Blu-ray format. Many studios have also announced that they will begin releasing new feature films on Blu-ray Disc day-and-date with DVD, as well as a continuous slate of catalog titles every month.


Many in the industry have equated Blu-Ray vs HD DVD to the VHS vs BETA war back in the early 80's. Blu-ray software sales have recently surpassed HD-DVD for the first time the week of December 24 and they did so by an impressive 20 percent.

Netflix CEO Reed Hastings says both Toshiba's HD-DVD and Sony's Blu-ray will survive the high-def DVD war. Hastings, whose company offers both high-def DVDs online via the mail, tells The Hollywood Reporter that all that's needed is for the studios to release their films in both formats.

One of the driving factors behind the growth in Blu-Ray movie sales is the PlayStation 3 (PS3), which was launched on November 17, 2006 in North America. The PS3 has been selling out at retail outlets since it was launched and despite shortages Sony has been able to meet its target of shipping 1 million PS3s in North America by the end of 2006. What's even more impressive is that they did it faster than their top-selling PlayStation 2 (PS2) platform did when it was launched. Sony is now targetting 6 million PS3 consoles shipped worldwide by the end of the fiscal year (end of March 2007). While many have doubted the effect the PlayStation 3 would have on the format war between Blu-ray and HD-DVD it's hard to argue with the numbers. Blu-ray sales are up 700 percent since the mid-November launch of the PlayStation 3 and other Blu-ray players from Sony, Panasonic and Philips. According to a recent survey by Sony Computer Entertainment America (SCEA) of over 10,000 PS3 owners, 80 percent indicated they will buy Blu-ray movies and 75 percent said they use the PS3 as a primary device for viewing movies. However, this shouldn't come as such a big surprise as those that have bought the PS3 might as well take advantage of the Blu-ray playback capability, which still is the cheapest Blu-ray player on the market at just $499. The content advantage that Blu-ray enjoys is another major factor that should become more and more evident now that the Blu-ray exclusive studios (Disney, Fox, Sony, MGM and Lionsgate) are starting to release more titles in the format. When looking at the 20 top selling DVDs of 2006 almost all were released by movie studios supporting Blu-ray, which means that titles such as Pirates of the Carribean and Cars will only be available for Blu-ray. The content advantage should further shift in Blu-ray's favor as the format neutral studios (Warner, Paramount) catch up their Blu-ray release schedules with HD-DVD so that the same movies are available for both formats. Overall the Blu-ray backers are confident that it's only a matter of time before the Blu-ray format becomes the dominant format in the US market, just as it already accounts for 96% of the market in Japan.

Visit www.theatricalconcepts.com

Or call Robert Matt @ 636-938-7666

Industry Glossary Part 1

*1080i - 1080 interlaced; one of two formats designated as high-definition television in the ATSC DTV standard, with 1,080 vertical pixels by 1,920 horizontal pixels. The i stands for interlaced, as opposed to progressive scanning, used in the second HDTV standard, 720p. Contrary to myth, 1080i is not superior to 720p; 1080i has more scanning lines but also suffers the disadvantages of interlaced scanning.

*Blu-ray - Format for next-generation recordable HD DVD that uses a shorter-wave blue laser and is supported by most major DVD manufacturers. A single-sided, single-layer disc can hold 25GB of data.

*Dolby Digital - Six-channel digital audio standard that is part of the U.S. digital television standard; also called AC-3 or Digital 5.1. The channels consist of front left, front right, front center, surround or rear left, surround or rear right, and a separate subwoofer (the .1).

*HDMI - High-Definition Multimedia Interface. USB-like digital video connectivity standard designed as a successor to DVI; can transmit both uncompressed digital audio and video signals; protected by HDCP digital copy protection.

*rear projection - TV system where the picture is projected onto the rear of a translucent screen via a series of mirrors and viewed as you would an average television.

*front projection - Type of TV system in which the picture is projected onto a reflective screen or even a wall. The larger the picture, the more visible the pixels or scan lines and the darker the image. CRT systems use three tubes (red, blue, and green), whereas LCD and DLP uses a single projection lens.

*plasma - Display technology used in large-screen, flat-panel TVs. Each plasma panel contains thousands of tiny tubes that are like miniature fluorescent lights, filled by ionized gas in a plasma state. When excited by electricity, the tubes--which are backed by red, green, or blue phosphors--glow in different colors and intensities to create an image.

*LCD - Liquid-crystal display. System used on many DTVs, clocks, answering machines, handheld organizers, camcorders, and personal computers. Liquid crystals are sandwiched between two glass plates. Minor temperature variations are introduced to particular points in the display using pinpoint electric charges, illuminating or causing the crystals to change colors in predetermined patterns.

Visit www.theatricalconcepts.com
or call Robert Matt at 636-939-7666