AVForums Podcast: 27th August 2014 - podcast discussion

Phil Hinton

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This week we discuss

00:00:50 RIP Richard Attenborough
00:03:10 Best TVs for gaming
00:11:54 Ask the Idiots - Based on today’s available content, what TV technology would you choose from the current models and would the answer be different if 4K Blu-ray had been announced?
00:17:44 Ask the Idiots - Almost all AV amplifiers have auto EQ, so why don’t HiFi amplifiers?
00:23:21 Amazon buys Twitch
00:27:58 Sony’s PSN disrupted after cyber attack
00:30:02 What’s at the cinema Steve? - Lucy
00:35:22 What’s at the cinema Steve? - Into the Storm
00:38:48 Blu-ray releases next week - The Amazing Spider-man 2, Sons of Anarchy Season 6, The Honourable Woman, Ghostbusters 1 & 2, Cosmos
00:42:14 What’s your favourite war move?
00:44:45 What’s your favourite war movie?
00:58:17 Goodbyes

Presented by Phil Hinton with Steve Withers, Mark Botwright and Ed Selley.


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Time: 00:59:14 | File Size: 81mb | Direct Link
 
Correct me if I'm wrong but did the whole episode not stray off topic even once!? Not sure I could take that for more than two weeks! I mean no mention of the Saving Ryans Privates!?!

I haven't watched many war films so have a small list to choose from.
I do like Private Ryan though (not the alternative version) even the bit after the 1st 20 mins. But I'm with Phil, Band Of Brothers is superior. Just treat it as a really long film!

Platoon I have only seen once, and thought it not as good as the hype, but still pretty good.

Also Full Metal Jacket.

So
1. Band Of Brothers,
2. Full Metal Jacket
3. Saving Private Ryan

So will check out Bridge Too Far and there is a Blu Ray for Stalingrad also. Just watch out, US version (on Amazon UK) I think has only audio track only......dubbed!

Or that could be the DVD version. Bloody Amazon's commenting system is atrocious. Bluray.com has the same version showing english and german tracks

Stalingrad Blu-ray
 
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Correct me if I'm wrong but did the whole episode not stray off topic even once!? Not sure I could take that for more than two weeks! I mean no mention of the Saving Ryans Privates!?!

It's unforgivable I know but I'm sure I'll find a tangent to wander off down presently.
 
Gents, many thanks for asking my TV technology question. I'm tempted to replace my 2005 panny this year, but the final gen plasmas are hard to find, whilst OLED is still a bit new technology for my liking.

I'll probably hang on until next spring then.

On the basis that you'll need a large screen (>60"?) or PJ to benefit from 4k, even assuming content, there seems a chance that Jo Public won't be very interested (like 3D) ?

MB
 
Thank you, back to how it used to be. I shall start listening again (who am I? I here you say). I heard a very long time ago that 85'' and above was the size to really benefit 4K, I think (don't shoot me if I'm wrong, Joe Kane said that) also one of the CGI animation studios were using monitors to animate with and found that the resolution wasn't big enough to spot fine detail, so they switched to Projectors!

Fave War Film..
Full Metal Jacket
Band Of Brothers
The Big Red One.

JOE KANE NOT BOB!!!
 
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Best war movies:
The Thin Red Line....by far Terrence Malik's best film, IMO
and also
Come And See...a Soviet masterpiece about the Nazi invasion..brutal, realistic and most surprisingly, not at all propagandistic in that it does not show the Soviet people in a particularly flattering light
and not to forget Sam Peckinpah's classic
Cross of Iron.
 
ON the topic of TV's, I hope my Kuro last's until OLED gets to be around 2K+ for a very good model

If I'm honest I don't think 4K in my viewing situation is worth it and would rather try and have a projector set-up.

So I will certainly give LCD a miss and will probably just stick to 1080p OLED unless when the time comes the better 1080p picture happens to be on a 4K TV that's the right price.
 
As stated earlier, bit of a surprise how on topic it all stayed. Very confusing. Don't make that a habit please or it will be too much for us all :)

Good question on the TV though. Like most, not touching LCD (however it is lit). I have a Panasonic VT30 which I hope will last me a while yet until OLED is proven to be the answer that we all hope. Less concerned about 4K on a 55 inch TV, but if it comes as standard then that is fine.

Favourite war films I am going with the majority on here, Band of Brothers, Saving Private Ryan, Full Metal Jacket. I do have a soft spot for some of the earlier films which I saw many years ago like the Battle of Britain, Longest Day, 633 Squadron. They haven't aged particularly well, but still enjoyable enough. One that has aged better though, is Bridge Over The River Kwai, watched the Blu Ray a month or so back and is still a good film.

Did spot Ed's favourite Stalingrad on Amazon pre order for November - 20th Anniversary Edition. Looks like a buy.
 
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This podcast really is an education ! I wasn't even aware that you could read a BA in "Waaaar".

I'd like to nominate a comedically tragic "war move": The Maginot Line. The French build a line of heavy fortifications along their border with Germany after 1st WW. So the Germans march straight through Belgium with ease....

MB
 
This podcast really is an education ! I wasn't even aware that you could read a BA in "Waaaar".

BA, MA and PHD. Think of it as a combo of history, sociology, philosophy and politics based around a central theme.
 
A little like Phil, I just can't get my head around wanting to watch other people play live video games. I've used Youtube walkthroughs many times for parts of games I'm stuck on, but I can skip directly to the part I'm stuck on. When I first heard of Twitch, I thought being a game streaming site meant it streamed playable games, and when I found out what it actually does, I remember thinking, 'That's actually a thing?' I'm baffled at its popularity.

I never really watched TV when Band of Brothers was first broadcast, but since my body decided to give up on me and rob me of all the physical activities that took up my time, I've been playing catch-up with the great shows I missed. I just finished BoB a couple of days ago, and absolutely loved it. Episode Nine: Why We Fight, has to be the most realistic depiction of the horrors of a concentration camp I have ever seen. It was exactly as I've seen in the countless documentaries I have watched about WWII. It was a truly heartbreaking episode, and I don't mind saying, that the conversation the soldiers had with the camp prisoner brought a tear to my eye. Harrowing stuff.

With actual war movies, I used to watch a lot of them when I was a kid, and I loved Where Eagels Dare, The Bridge on the River Kwai, and The Dirty Dozen. Of the more modern war movies, aside from the usual suspects of Full Metal Jacket, Private Ryan, Platoon etc, I also love Casualties of War. I really wish it would get a Blu-ray release.
 
^^ I had forgotten about "casualties of war". I went to see that as a date with a fairly new GF when at sixth form. Needless to say after sitting through that, my luck wasn't in that night !!
 
Chaps, this staying on message thing is rather disconcerting...good work as always :thumbsup:

The article regarding best TV's for gaming was very useful. Having dabbled in competitive Call of Duty for a bit (I was handy at Ghosts, 2.1 K/D ratio) I ended up getting an Iiyama gaming monitor, supposedly 1ms response time - absolutely horrendous PoS in the end. Whether it's related to the change from PS3 to PS4, and the frame rate issues that CoD sometimes has, I'm not sure.

It was a real struggle to perform well after the console change. I gave up in the end and switched back to my ancient 32" Panny LCD that seems to just get on with it without having a fit every so often during a gunfight...

If 4K Blu-Ray was to appear tomorrow, I'm not sure what PJ route I'd go. a VW1000 / 1100 would be the money no object plan, but an X500 can produce a stonkingly good picture when fed native 4K content, for many squid less. It would be a nice problem to have, in any case :D.

Twitch has been quite handy, or at least was for me late last year, when Ghosts first launched and the chaps in my clan were livestreaming. The share button on the PS4 makes it quite easy, I'm told. I never use it enough to warrant setting up a channel though.

I went to watch Lucy last night - I think Steve's right on the money, it really really falls flat on its face in the 3rd act. It reached a point where a large percentage of viewers in the cinema all sighed at the daftness of it all. A shame really, as it showed early promise, and I thought my future wife was quite good in the role. Overall it felt like a cut & shut job, mixing Leon, Ronin and 2001. It should have been better than it was.

The Ghostbusters box set is a release day purchase for me. I have the non mastered in 4K BD already, my understanding was that both films had a new scan done (could be wrong), so it's not a re-issue of the previous 'Mastered in 4K' for the original, and the 2nd has never had a BD release of any sort anyway. In any case, that chuffing Prince Vigo painting scared the crap out of me when I saw it during the theatrical release (I was only 4 - don't laugh).

War moves & war movies - this one could drag on, bear with me...

The Zulu 'horns of the buffalo' approach gets a worthy mention :thumbsup:. That is one of my favourite war films actually, along with Where Eagles Dare. Both of which are from a time where historical accuracy was secondary to entertainment.

I'd absolutely agree that Saving Private Ryan should be shown to all youngsters, as an education. I visited Normandy in 1999, having always had an interest in all things war (growing up with nothing but war books available on the book case at home). It's a surreal, heart breaking place to visit, but even as a kid I understood the importance of what took place all those years ago. The importance of the film, in telling it how it was (in terms of the beach landing itself), is what stands out for me.

It set the modern benchmark for all to follow in terms of its style (Black Hawk Down et al). In terms of films made before Private Ryan, one that struck me as bucking the trend of glamourising war, was The Deer Hunter, as it looked more at the psychological effect of war on an individual.

As Phil mentioned, war films are almost awkward to class as good, in some respects - they all cover subject matter which by its nature, is grim, unpleasant, and shouldn't make for good entertainment. Historical accuracy and visually representing & recreating past events, are what they ought to be about IMO, but they often serve as merely a vehicle to carry a story that has little to do with actual events. I sometimes wonder if those involved in more recent conflicts, that watch films depicting these events, mutter a 'WTF' at what they see on screen.

And on that miserable note, I vow to stop with the deep & meaningful essays. Honest. :D
 
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Great entertainment as always gentlemen.

Favourite war film? I can't say I have a 'favourite' per se - I've always enjoyed the Dambusters flim although watching it now saddens me as the enginuity of Barnes Wallis & the bravery of the 617 squadron led by Guy Gibson (made up of pilots and aircrews from the many Commonwealth countries) is overshadowed by the rather grim outcome for civilians who lived around the dams that were destroyed. I presume this happens as one gets older...

High on the anti-war, no patriotic bullshit film list next to Ed's pick Stalingrad is Kubrick's Paths of Glory. Der Untergang A.K.A Downfall was also pretty powerful viewing aided by a stellar cast headed by Bruno Ganz. Sadly, it's probably more famous because the key scene has been turned into a zillion internet parody videos.
 

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