This topic

What am I watching? (BBC Red Button HDR)

naylor2006 — Sat, 15 Jun 2024 19:46:18 GMT

Pretty sure I read an article about UEFA’s lack of UHD coverage for these Euro’s and also that BBC weren’t providing UHD on iPlayer as they have done before.

So I put on the Italy Albania game and saw ‘Press Red for HDR’, yes please and it loaded iPlayer from the EETV Box and eventually HDR HLG, looks pretty good, to me it looks like it is also 4K, I’ve seen crisper 4K but it’s definitely sharper than the standard footage and ITV’s coverage so far. It’s also crisper than NowTV 1080p SkySports.

I can’t find the same feed/option on my ATV iPlayer app and I don’t have other devices to test, so I’m pretty happy about it but are BT indeed offering higher resolution? Just weird it would say ‘Press Red for HDR’ and not for UHD if it was.

Re: What am I watching? (BBC Red Button HDR)

zulu17 — Sat, 15 Jun 2024 20:24:49 GMT

I believe this summer’s European Championship is being produced in 1080p HD HDR as the host production format.

That is i believe the same format as used for the recent UEFA champions League final . For that event I believe WBD upscaled the 1080p HD HDR host feed to UHD HDR on its channel.

UEFA’s multi-feed offering provides its broadcast partners with access to a variety of live feeds, including the main match feed – the live stadium feed, available in SDI 1080p50 HDR, 1080p50 SDR and 1080i50.

Re: What am I watching? (BBC Red Button HDR)

naylor2006 — Sat, 15 Jun 2024 20:21:59 GMT

The images quality via the red button this evening looks not too dissimilar from some of the TNT Ultimate coverage for sure, maybe some upscaling going on. It 100% looks better than the 1080p on NOWTV Sports. I’ve got a 65” TV so resolution difference gets a little easier to spot.

Looks like only some games are selected for HDR on BBC also as England’s game isn’t it tomorrow according to one of Gary’s segues…

If the host content is 1080p HDR always it makes little sense why BBC wouldn’t present the England game in HDR.

Re: What am I watching? (BBC Red Button HDR)

NigelB72 — Sat, 15 Jun 2024 20:49:48 GMT

The native broadcast is 1080p HD with HDR, this is what BBC are carrying on iPlayer. I'm watching via an alternative TV provider on iPlayer and the quality is very good but I suspect either either our TV box or actual TV is also upscaling to UHD, quality still isn't as good as Sky Sports UHD but it's not far behind.

Re: What am I watching? (BBC Red Button HDR)

naylor2006 — Sat, 15 Jun 2024 20:54:32 GMT

I’d agree, it’s not quite there but it’s very good, not far off, for what it’s worth I have upscaling switched off on my AVR and TV, I never have it on, there isn’t an option on the EETV box to switch it off incase this is doing something. You can never really tell what you’re watching because the box always outputs at 4K anyway when it’s switched on.

Re: What am I watching? (BBC Red Button HDR)

NigelB72 — Sat, 15 Jun 2024 21:05:30 GMT

@naylor2006 the main difference I can see is on the wide shots, on UHD you can read the names on the players shirts but 1080p UHD you can't. It's a massive step up from from ITV's picture quality though which seems very blurry in comparison.

Amazon Prime did a similar thing with Star Trek Discovery & Picard S1, 1080p HDR because CBS All Access wouldn't let them have the UHD HDR files. They looked very good but not quite UHD HDR

Re: What am I watching? (BBC Red Button HDR)

naylor2006 — Sat, 15 Jun 2024 21:11:36 GMT

I just switched back to normal BBC before I switch off and it’s noticeably blurry and washed out, the latter probably just the missing HLG, but it’s definitely more blurry.

BBC have often offered UHD streams via iPlayer for national football, usually for every game they covered, it was a bloody tough watch going back to ITV. Problem with that though is sometimes I could hear neighbours celebrating before I saw the goal. Shouldn’t be such a snob should I….

Re: What am I watching? (BBC Red Button HDR)

NigelB72 — Sat, 15 Jun 2024 21:28:59 GMT

@naylor2006 we have a streaming based TV platform from the Comcast group of companies so I'm used to a delay. Play we're detached, our house is quite well sound proofed and the majority of our neighbours are cricket fans so no loud spoilers going on here. Oh and the patio doors where closed so we couldn't hear the gobby **** that lives in the flats behind us 🤣

Re: What am I watching? (BBC Red Button HDR)

naylor2006 — Sat, 15 Jun 2024 21:45:51 GMT

It’s not an issue now but when I used to live in inner Bristol there was no escaping it especially being quite near pubs. Also during the 2018 World Cup it was about 9 million C outside so windows were open!

Nowadays I’ve been lucky enough to move to somewhere far less built up, didn’t hear a thing during the last Euros and world cup. My neighbour is Scottish so I reckon I might hear something if they make it out the group 🙂

Re: What am I watching? (BBC Red Button HDR)

naylor2006 — Sun, 16 Jun 2024 18:47:21 GMT

Serbia game is in HDR sorta 3-4K also, lovely stuff.

30 seconds delay or so though, going to battening down the hatches.

Re: What am I watching? (BBC Red Button HDR)

NigelB72 — Sun, 16 Jun 2024 19:32:49 GMT

@naylor2006 it's 1080p/50 with HLG HDR... Looks very good though 👍🏻

Re: What am I watching? (BBC Red Button HDR)

naylor2006 — Mon, 17 Jun 2024 19:04:15 GMT

So what is ITV then?

Point is this BBC HDR stuff is crisper then NowTV with boost which is supposed to be 1080p. HLG is not making anything more crisp but the BBC HDR mode looks better than the 1080p I’m used to.

Re: What am I watching? (BBC Red Button HDR)

NigelB72 — Mon, 17 Jun 2024 19:47:57 GMT

@naylor2006 ITV is 1080p/50 but no HDR.

The HDR makes a huge difference by opening up the colour pallet... I've stolen the info below from t'interweb

HDR works by increasing the bit depth of color in each pixel. Standard images have 8 bits (resulting in 256 brightness levels), while HDR uses 10, 12 or even 16 bits. This allows accurate reproduction of a wide range of brightness, from dark shadows to dazzling reflections

Re: What am I watching? (BBC Red Button HDR)

Anonymous — Mon, 17 Jun 2024 19:51:35 GMT

I've tried the supposed iPlayer HDR twice now & found no difference at all to the Freeview broadcast on my Samsung TV. Haven't tried the Pro Box yet.

Re: What am I watching? (BBC Red Button HDR)

naylor2006 — Mon, 17 Jun 2024 19:59:53 GMT

Okay then it’s my ignorance then, I accept what HDR does, I just thought it couldnt make an entire moving image crisper.

Re: What am I watching? (BBC Red Button HDR)

NigelB72 — Mon, 17 Jun 2024 19:58:28 GMT

Haha no worries. If you're bored one night, have a look at what 4K and HDR can do on YouTube

Re: What am I watching? (BBC Red Button HDR)

naylor2006 — Mon, 17 Jun 2024 19:59:05 GMT

Its night and day, I don’t have another device to try, can’t find the HDR feed on my ATV.

Trust me, it looks so much better, it is not far off TNT Sports Ultimate, at least some of the feeds this season.

Re: What am I watching? (BBC Red Button HDR)

ozsat — Mon, 17 Jun 2024 20:03:36 GMT

ITV will be 1080i in SDR - and for some reason quite a delay for a live broadcast. They always do for live football.

ITV is stuck in the dark ages. It took them ages to get HD. They've never done UHD and/or HDR. In fact they don't even do 5.1 audio.

Even Britbox US is now doing HDR.

@naylor2006wrote:
So what is ITV then?
Point is this BBC HDR stuff is crisper then NowTV with boost which is supposed to be 1080p. HLG is not making anything more crisp but the BBC HDR mode looks better than the 1080p I’m used to.

Re: What am I watching? (BBC Red Button HDR)

naylor2006 — Mon, 17 Jun 2024 20:18:04 GMT

Don’t get me wrong, generally I’m clued up on it, I’ve had 4K before HDR was even a thing, yeah I was one of those guys with a 4K non HDR TV….I adopted HDR early also.

I think here the problem is I’ve never seen 1080p HDR before, only ever in conjunction with 4K.

Re: What am I watching? (BBC Red Button HDR)

NigelB72 — Mon, 17 Jun 2024 20:11:36 GMT

@naylor2006 ahh gotcha. I'd only heard of it when Amazon showed Star Trek Discovery in 1080p HDR... Didn't realise it was a thing before then