thank god michael bay didn't direct alot of other movies. can you imagine michael bay directing the Sixth Sense? I don't see dead people or ghosts or anything else cause the scene was like 2 seconds filled with aerosmith songs can you imagine michael bay directing Lawrence of Arabia? the scene would like this "camels running", "people shooting", Linkin Park song -In the end it doesnt really matter.. he directed Gone in sixty seconds, but the scenes are like 10 seconds?!!? Can you imagine if he directed Rocky? You wouldn't know what was happening in the ring, James Brown would be left out of the movie and replaced by Steven Perry.
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/technology/article2300109.ece It means that the two competing systems must use a different coating on their discs – HD-DVD uses a surface layer that is 0.6mm thick. Blu-ray’s is much thinner at 0.1mm. This is the root of what makes Blu-ray more expensive to produce – the thinner surface means standard DVD plants need to be re-tooled. A special hard coating must also be added to protect the information stored on a disc’s surface.
Someone win please, who cares if it is HD DVD or blue ray, why couldn't these guys settle on one format? Oh, they all want to make more bucks.
quick question though it says it would be exclusive for 18 months. does that mean in a year and a half paramount/dreamworks would be making both formats again? and would they go back and release movies in blu-ray afterwards? not really "exclusive" then is it? i mean ok so shreks 1-3 on HD-DVD lets say by early 2008 but whats the point if then when the 18 months are up that shreks 1-3 are on blu-ray in early-mid 2009? there is a time difference yeah but would it cause that many people to flock to HD-dvd? i mean it would be one thing if the movies released by paramount/dreamworks during that 18 month period were only going to be released on HD even after the 18 months is up.
Who's to say what'll happen in January 2009? The exclusive deal could be extended another year. HD-DVD might have so much momentum at that point that Paramount decides to stay put. I'm still inclined to say Blu-ray wins this war, but then again 48 hours ago I would never have predicted Paramount/Dreamworks would go HD-DVD exclusive.
Yeah I know what you mean Michael Bay isn't a Martin Scorsese or a Francis Ford Coppola but that is not why he makes movies. His stuff is made for the hordes of people that love mindless entertainment. He is uses all the cliches you could possibly imagine in one movie. That stuff is made to kill time on a hot summer day inside a theater with AC blowing ice cold. Armageddon and Pearl Harbor are some of the most ridiculous movies I have ever seen. Anyway the point is crazy teenage kids and testosterone pumped boys love his movies because there is very little narrative and structure in the movie. No characters or plots to follow. Just ridiculous stunt after stunt with one liners and uninspired acting in between. In the end his movies are big business and losing that kind of cash crop could be bad for any studio. Finally I am more interested in what Steven Spielberg has to say about this because is one my favorite directors and well respected throughout the industry. The man knows how win at both the box office and award show. A Living legend!
Why are you such a Blu-ray hater? As the self proclaimed HD expert of the board, you should be welcoming all types of HD for the masses.
how am i hating on blu-ray? cause i'm pointing out that multimillionaires are ticked off that they have to buy another format? boo hoo, that michael bay is mad.
It doesn't matter...prices will go down for both formats eventually. That's when the real 'war' begins. By then, dvd players that support BOTH formats will be affordable. Everyone will buy the player that plays both blu disc and hd dvd. Once all that happens, it will dwindle down to which format has the better extras. You can't go wrong with either format. I think a big reason that blu disc is outselling hd dvd right now is the PS3.
It would have been interesting if Microsoft had included HD-DVD on the 360's. It was definitely an oversight not to do so on the new Elite models.
Why would Microsoft bet the farm (i.e, the Xbox 360) on HD-DVD if it might lose the war with Blu-ray? They made a smart decision to hedge. Maybe in a couple of years the decision will be obvious for them.
Even if they were up in arms, they probably kept it to themselves rather than posting their initial thoughts on their personal websites (although maybe some did?). I didn't see this as an official statement from Bay, or anything like that. He was probably just a little angry that he knew nothing about this (despite his latest blockbuster movie being a big factor in this deal), and that consumers wouldn't be able to pick up his movies in the format they preferred. He probably was informed on all the details since then (and maybe got ballpark figures for how much money Transformers 2 could get him ), and maybe he isn't as up in arms as he appeared to be initially. The thread was deleted FWIW. The only director I can think of that has been somewhat vocal about this stuff is Spielberg, and even then, his stance is still a little unclear (seems to really support Blu-ray, but I'm guessing he'd be OK with supporting both). Of course, there is some other stuff that I'll get to later in this post... They probably do, although the details never came out. Doesn't help that most people see this as a negative move anyway (prolonging the format war), so the fact that money was a (or probably the) deciding factor and not something more important to consumers doesn't really help. Not sure if this would be a big deal to people, but it does seem slightly different compared to other exclusivity deals. I'm sure he will. I think that post was taken a little out of context. He obviously didn't seem to like the decision, but I don't see why he would turn down an offer to do Transformers 2, especially since by the time that movie comes out, this deal would most likely be over already. And even if Paramount was still HD DVD exclusive, Bay might be able to negotiate with them to release on both formats if he really cares that much (might even do that with the Transformers, but I doubt he has the power to do that right now, especially with the release not that far away). BTW, did anyone read something about the cast not wanting to return for a sequel if Bay (and/or Spielberg) were not involved? Guess that would make this more interesting, although as I said, I'm sure $$$ could change a lot minds (not to mention that I don't even know if people care about the cast that much). I know there is speculation that perhaps Paramount thought that it was hard to pass up $150M since profits are still pretty low with HD movies. When the deal is over, they could re-release their movies on Blu-ray, assuming it is the dominant format, and that would make them a lot of money ($150M now + releasing major titles on a larger userbase in 2009 or whenever). If the move would, at the very least, prolong the war and keep HD movie adoption low, they probably would consider doing this more than you might think (especially if they only included it in the Elites). Anyway, here are some interesting comments by someone who got in contact with a PR person at Paramount: Just some posts on message boards, but it would be interesting if all this stuff is true.
Why would they pay $150 million to Paramount plus God knows what to DreamWorks now when they could have put that money into a product beforehand that could have had HD-DVD even or passing the Blue-ray DVD sales? I don't know the numbers of 360 owners vs. PS3 owners in the states, maybe RC-Cola does, but it definitely would have made a huge difference as far as DVD sales go.
they aren't betting the farm on HD-DVD. the 360 games don't use HD-DVDs. you don't have to buy the hd-dvd player add on. most HD DVD players sold are not the xbox add ons, its the Toshiba stand alones. I dont know the % of people who buy PS3 for bluray movies, bluray plus game, or just games, but the blu-ray standalone (non ps3) sales are low. they are battling themselves. PS3s vs Sony Bluray players. What matters is attach rates. how many discs are being sold per unit.
