History Channel's WWII in HD..Starts TONIGHT !!

[frankderrico]

You're a good guy Charlie. I thank you for doing that.....Frank

[JimF4M1s (Deceased)]

Charlie,

Too few people now a days, other then those of us who participated and our families, really remember Viet Nam. It was over 38 years ago when I came home from my last tour. Time washes away many things. Memories fade.

We were not the Glory Wars like WW1 & 2. We did not have a comedy TV show like M.A.S.H. to make us acceptable to the public as did Korea. We were the first War put on live TV. People at home saw the horrors of war in their livingrooms each night. No matter that it happens in every war, it put a bad taste in the mouths of a lot of Americans. We were the first and I think only servicemen to come back to spitting and protests. People looked down on and picked on the servicemen. It was a horrible feeling.

We went where we were sent. Do folks think 58,209 KIA, 303,635 WIA along with 1,948 MIA wanted to be listed as Casualties?

I am very pleased to see the treatment given our returning men and women today.

I applaud your understanding and the time you spend with your friend. Even little things mean alot. A hunting trip is huge and will be with him forever.

Good going,

Jim

[dnikkor]

Jim, thank you and all your comrades-in-arms for your dedicated and dangerous service. Hopefully you know that many people were against that tragic war but did not spit upon, nor blame, the soldiers who did their duty. That spit is best reserved for the politicians who avoided service when it was their time to serve but then had no problem sending somebody else's son or daughter into harm's way so they can appear "tough."
Welcome home.

[larrynb25]

I use to fly a B-17, B-25 and some other WWII airplanes on tour around the country until a couple years ago. The WWII vets that came out (not just aircrews) to see these airplanes was unbeleavible. These airplanes brought back memories of their past and stories were heard, some good , some bad, some that have never before heard by anyone. It was an honor to visit with these men and listen to there stories that are going away every day and will never be heard again. I was in Viet Nam in the Air Force (66-69).

[Mike Henning]

Of course, most of this footage was shot using 16mm and the film often spent days in the can before it was developed. At best, 16mm is grainy in anything less than idea circumstances. Sitting in uncontrolled environments after being exposed increases that grain. But it was shot 16x9 in a format designed to be shown in theaters. What ARE Hi-Def are the transfer and cleanup methods used to resurrect these sources. We are able to do so much for old footage with so little effort and expense these days that a series like this in HD is just becoming possible.


More on Williamsburg's film restoration, HERE and HERE .

Hate to rain on your parade, but the 16mm film used during WWII was in a 4x3 (1.33) aspect ratio. Widescreen digital TV uses the 16x9 (1.78) aspect ratio. Here are the 16mm sizes (via Wikipedia)
16mm
1.37 aspect ratio
enlarging ratio of 1:4.58 for 35 mm Academy format prints
camera aperture: 10.26 by 7.49 mm (0.404 by 0.295 in)
projector aperture (full 1.33): 9.60 by 7.01 mm (0.378 by 0.276 in)
projector aperture (1.85): 9.60 by 5.20 mm (0.378 by 0.205 in)

Here is a link to a Wikipedia page about film formats. (That's more than I want to know): List of film formats - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Also a page on Sub 35mm formats: http://www.saunalahti.fi/animato/filmhist/filmhist.html

Also a page on aspect ratios: Aspect ratio (image) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Here is a very interesting site about the film to video conversion: ProVideo Coalition.com: CUT.N.COLOR by Steve Hullfish

I'm not sure what choices they made about the masking of the 4x3 image to fit the 16x9 HD format, but think I would prefer that they left in the original 4x3 ratio. BTW, the result is to lose information (picture) at the top and/or bottom of the picture in order to fill the width. I don't like "full screen" movies which uses "pan and scan" to fit a wide image into the old 4x3 screen and am willing to lose some vertical resolution to maintain the image that the director and DoP created them.

On another note, note that the series is billed as "WWII in HD", not "WWII in COLOR". This means that there likely is b&w as well as colorized material in the series.

On the whole, I did feel that the portions I watched were interesting and worth buying a DVD, but I won't cough up the extra for Blu-Ray.

Don't get me started on the film stock and grain.

MIke

[dastier]

Charlie, I know this is off topic but it was a wonderful that you took your disabled veteran friend out deer hunting. Kudos to you. I hope your friend has many more years in the deer blind. God bless.