Is it worth getting a 4K player, or should I stick with blu ray?

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This.


A lot of money for something that is physically impossible to see.

It's like spending thousands and thousands on a new surround sound system because it has sub-sonic and ultra-sonic frequencies... and thinking you're getting a good deal... even though those frequencies are far outside of the human hearing range.
Except it's not true; 4K does make a visual difference. Christ, back before the entire forum went to crap, we had gone over and over this at avsforum because there were a *lot* of crap articles in the field claiming that 4K was unseeable.

The problem is that the common acuity charts that try to make the resolution case were actually based upon what they used to make eye charts. That has a fundamental flaw in this endeavor that was never addressed.

Eye charts were based upon whether or not you could distinguish one glyph from another, not whether you can actually see one "better" than the same one at a different range. Completely different comparator.

In any case, this not being a science forum, I'm not going to do too much of a deep dive into this stuff. But you can absolutely see 3840x2160 vs 1920x1080, even at larger distances than your couch.
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It depends on many things. How good the transfer is, how good your equipment is etc.

Some of the best 4K stuff I've seen is older (Apocalypse Now, Alien, Suspiria) . However the cornetto trilogy on 4k is extremely disappointing in quality despite is being relatively newer release.

Then again Blade Runner 2049 looks sensational in 4k too. As I said before, the quality of Blu-Rays on 4K equipment is the big bonus. Some of the great noirs from the 50s and 60s look exceptional.

Also, Take a look at this:

In some ways I think UHD is actually best suited to cinema shot on film. With 35mm film your perhaps not talking massive increases in detail(although it generally is there) but when you are getting is more finely resolved film grain which IMHO makes for a more natural experience viewing it and less tendency for the use of noise reduction.



In some ways I think UHD is actually best suited to cinema shot on film. With 35mm film your perhaps not talking massive increases in detail(although it generally is there) but when you are getting is more finely resolved film grain which IMHO makes for a more natural experience viewing it and less tendency for the use of noise reduction.
Yeah it's just a different experience. Black Hawk Down looks absolutely stunning in 4k. Shot on film.

I watched Better Call Saul this week in 4k - and it too looks totally out of this world.



Yeah it's just a different experience. Black Hawk Down looks absolutely stunning in 4k. Shot on film.

I'd say 4K does actually play up the differences between film and digital more.



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I'd say 4K does actually play up the differences between film and digital more.
It's a matter of the film makers learning how to film it in the first place.

If you want a humorous lesson in this, take a look at the HD version of Star Trek TOS. Now this was a series filmed (on film) but with a foreknowledge of the inherent information loss in NTSC.

Seen today in FHD (1920x1080), it's a riot. You can see spock's eyebrows under the makeup. You can see scotty's hairy arms. The intercom on the wall looks like cardboard. In fact, they had to replace all space scenes, because the ship models in 1967 looked precisely like ship models and not ships.

Someone back then seeing the results today might think that this is an inherent limitation of digital vs film, and worse, might think that it's some kind of problem with higher resolution.

It's not.

Nor is it a problem with the upcoming HFR films (hopefully we'll get to 120fps movies.) Occasional movies that bumped from 24fps to 60 were routinely panned as "not looking right".

That's not because there's something magical about film or 24fps. Good grief. 24fps is a motion joke. It's because we don't yet know how to perfectly film with the metrics pushed to 11 yet. (Yes, that was spinal tap).