Muppet/Henson DVDs in the US and UK

[smcguire]

A lot of the problems of NTSC - the shifting and bleeding colors, etc. - don't happen when the material is on a DVD (they were mostly transmission problems). So PAL's main advantage on DVD is a higher resolution (more detailed picture). Of course, if the program's source is originally NTSC TV (and I don't know if that's the case for Muppet TV shows or not), a PAL disc created from an NTSC master isn't going to look at lot better because the source material didn't have PAL resolution to begin with!

--Scott McGuire

 

[anathema]

Actually, the worst problems with NTSC occur when (non-broadcast) videotape is copied. DVDs are neither PAL nor NTSC - they're YCrCb. PAL and NTSC are analogue composite colour formats: nothing more, nothing less. (The two acronyms have nothing to do with the line/field rates of the underlying video systems, which are 525/60 in the US, Canada, Japan and a few other countries, and 625/50 everywhere else.)

A 625/50 DVD made by standards-converting a 525/60 disc master is *always* going to look worse, by definition (no pun intended!). You're throwing away 10 fields per second as well as having to invent around 100 scan lines per frame. Going the other way is no better, since 100 scan lines are lost and 10 fields have to be invented every second. It's always best to get video material in its original format if possible. (To see a *really* bad conversion, check out the French DVDs of Muppet Family Christmas and Emmet Otter!)

The Muppet Show was shot in the UK, and is 625/50 PAL. Most of the specials were shot in Canada or the US, and are 525/60 NTSC (just 525/60 for the B&W ones, of course I don't know where Muppets Tonight was made.

Muppets Go To The Movies is 625/50 PAL, and it's possible that Tale Of The Bunny Picnic is (the MC timeline states that it was shot in London, which suggests UK cameras/video). All other specials - with the exception of VMC - are 525/60 NTSC. VMC was shot on 24p video, so the US DVD will be a 3:2 pulldown job, and the UK disc *should* be a 2:2 pulldown. I haven't seen the running times for the two releases yet, so I can't confirm that.

The Storyteller was made in London, so again, it should be 625/50 PAL, hence I will be waiting for UK DVD releases. Rocky Mountain Holiday, on the other hand, was shot in 525/60 NTSC, so I wouldn't be interested in a UK release should one happen.

 

[MuppetDanny]

"Tale Of The Bunny Picnic" was definately made in the UK beacuse Henson required a lot of UK puppteers

"The Storyteller" has a good chance being on UK DVD due "Muppet Family Christmas" & "The Christmas Toy" being released in November

 

[anathema]

"Tale Of The Bunny Picnic" was definately made in the UK beacuse Henson required a lot of UK puppteers

So with any luck it was shot on 625-line equipment

"The Storyteller" has a good chance being on UK DVD due "Muppet Family Christmas" & "The Christmas Toy" being released in November

The Storyteller I'll buy. The other two will of course be standards-conversions :-(

 

[Whataday]

The Muppet Show was shot in the UK, and is 625/50 PAL. Most of the specials were shot in Canada or the US, and are 525/60 NTSC (just 525/60 for the B&W ones, of course I don't know where Muppets Tonight was made.

I think Muppets Tonight was made in the US, as it was definately converted into PAL. You can just tell. I remember Sesame Street used to look particularly bad on UK TV, but towards the end of its run here, it got better. I'm sure the conversion techniques are always improving.

What does PAL look like after it has been converted into NTSC?

 

[Whatever]

I have heard that Muppets Take Manhattan isnt available in the US
(region 1) or was that title just a late arrival.

I thanks,
from Paul

It is available in the US, my mom got it free in cereal boxes! I think there is a store version too.

 

[jediX]

It is available in the US, my mom got it free in cereal boxes! I think there is a store version too.

Yep, there is.

 

[anathema]

I think Muppets Tonight was made in the US, as it was definately converted into PAL. You can just tell. I remember Sesame Street used to look particularly bad on UK TV, but towards the end of its run here, it got better. I'm sure the conversion techniques are always improving.

Sure. You should see some of the stuff done back in the 70s! Mind you, I've seen some appalling ones done in the last couple of years too...

What does PAL look like after it has been converted into NTSC?

Depends on how it was done. For a cheap'n'nasty conversion, you can simply drop every 6th line and repeat every 5th frame. You'll get vertical twitter and motion artefacts, but it's watchable. This is basically how converters worked 30 years ago ;-) A more sophisticated approach interpolates the new frames from the old. Techniques vary; the best ones use motion-prediction algorithms, but of course you're talking about a fair bit of money for these.