To very loosely paraphrase Shakespeare, I have come not to bury the Laserdisk, but to praise DVD. For over a decade, the Laserdisk was the Caesar of home theater. While everyone else was watching grainy VHS tapes with psychedelic color resolution, Laserdisk aficionados were enjoying darn good video. It was analog video but the clean, crisp picture established the Laserdisk as the home theater benchmark. Ironically, as the Laserdisk catalog grew to a respectable size, the medium ultimately remained relatively obscure.
Today, DVD has inherited the home theater mantle from the Laserdisk. Many Laserdisk enthusiasts were highly skeptical that DVD could duplicate, never mind surpass, their favorite medium. They looked at DVD, trying to find a flaw, but they universally agreed that DVD either equals or beats Laserdisk. The digital picture of DVD is extremely impressive, offering almost 500 lines of resolution - the limit of today's conventional televisions. As a result, the picture is very clear, providing an almost cinematic experience (provided your television is up to par). The picture is also absolutely free of noise; those annoying little white specks that you see in analog video recordings. Finally, the picture has stunning color realism, with true color reproduction and deep, vivid colors. True, some titles look better than others (that's because some video mastering houses do a better job than others). But overall, most DVD titles look absolutely great.
Most DVDs also provide other perks for videophiles and film buffs -- things not found on VHS copies. Following in the Laserdisk footsteps, some DVDs offer behind the scenes outtakes, the original movie trailer (the theater preview), the director's narration of how the film was made, and other materials that sweeten the home theater experience. Some DVD titles offer the choice of aspect ratio. The aspect ratio is the relative horizontal and vertical dimensions of the picture. Most TVs use an essentially rectangular aspect ratio of 4:3. That's too bad because most films are widescreen (something lime 16:9). Thus, when you watch a movie on a 4:3 screen, the sides of the picture are chopped off. To see the full screen width, some DVDs offer a 16:9 aspect ratio. To accommodate the wide screen, the picture may be letterboxed with black bands on top and bottom. Even better, some TVs directly show the widescreen picture. In any event, some DVDs give you complete choice - providing 4:3 on one side and 16:9 on the other. Also, look for titles that feature the director's cut of a movie. In these titles, the director has added extra scenes that were cut from the theatrical release and often remixed the sound tracks, adding new elements or creating surround sound. In some cases, an original, alternative ending may be included. Two examples of interestingly upgraded movies are Das Boot, and Bladerunner. Most DVD titles are priced from $20 to $30 - not bad for such high quality.
The picture quality of DVD is rivaled by the sound quality. The best DVD titles have Dolby Digital soundtracks, providing 5.1 channels of surround sound. The front left and right channels carry much of the music, the center channel provides articulate dialogue, and the rear surround channels provide room ambience and special effects. The subwoofer channel provides those all-important movie explosions that rock the room. Although most newer movies have 5.1 channel soundtracks, many older movies do not. (Hint: look carefully at the movie's jacket to see what sound coding is used). Some movies might be coded in Dolby Digital, but have fewer channels, or they might be coded in Dolby Pro Logic. Worse case, all DVD movies have digital audio sound. However they are coded, DVD movies provide sound quality ranging from good to great.
Of course, the only way to enjoy a DVD movie is to buy a DVD player. Although a DVD disc looks a lot like a CD, it definitely won't play in a CD player. (However, all DVD players will also play back conventional CDs). Players let you navigate through the disc, with forward and backward fast and slow scanning, freeze frame, and other goodies. All players also provide parental lock- out to skip potentially offensive scenes, and let you pick multiple language dialogue tracks and subtitles (if present on the disc). More expensive players offer better picture quality, have a greater range of control, provide smoother backward scanning, and provide far nicer visual onscreen menus.
Whatever your movie tastes, DVD has something wonderful to offer. As the catalogue of DVD titles continues to grow, DVD will increasingly eclipse the Laserdisk as the home theater king. Long live DVD!
by Ken C. Pohlmann
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