Page 1 of Picture grain???????

Basically, virtually EVERY dvd I own has some sort of picture noise on it, either:

- the appearance of what appears as 000`s of tiny pin-pricks moving on-screen. When you pause the picture, these "termites" all stop wriggling.
Noticable on Vanilla Sky, The Matrix. To the casual viewer, the picture is fine
but to me, once I`ve noticed it, it REALLY grates on me. It can be vaguely seen from a distance - get closer to the set and you notice it big time.

OR

- some sort of picture noise that can only be described as if the picture is projected not onto a smooth screen but a 28" widescreen brillo pad - the picture is fine, but certain areas of the screen seem "scratchy" somehow, particularly on large areas of one colour, like a sky background. Even appears on recent movies like Charlies Angels
and Sum of All Fears.

These faults dont ruin the picture totally, in fact they are only vaguely noticeable..but once noticed, it really starts bugging you.
My discs arent scratched - they are clean, the connections from the tv - dvd are firmly in place. I`ve tried expensive gold plated Scart cables by QED - nothing gets rid of this.
Even when played on different friends players and tv`s its still seen. My mates discs all show this as well on their sets....and since I`ve pointed this out to them, they now feel as I do......DVD picture-wise aint as perfect as its cracked up to be.

Any thoughts?????? Is this the much read about "grain"?

This item was edited on Wednesday, 23rd July 2003, 21:12

Grain is an integral part of the image on motion picture film.

Without the grain, you don`t have a picture. Every particle you see is the dye-image of a grain of silver deposited by processing the film.

Some films have more noticeable grain, some have less.

A movie picture without any grain is overprocessed. You may be missing detail in your pin-sharp picture because grain has been smoothed out (to aid in the compression).

Compression doesn`t help matters, sometimes adding its own peculiarities to the mix. Maybe those are what you are seeing, and unfortunately like grain there`s nothing you can do.

While nothing is perfect, DVD gives the best possible picture quality at an affordable price. If you`re one of those people who freaks out at a single dead pixel on an LCD monitor, you`ll probably spot defects and they`ll drive you bananas.

Accept it. You`ll live longer :)

J Mark Oates

What player are you using?

This may have something to do with it!

Thanks for the explanation..I feel better knowing that this is normal and not due
to any defects with my system. Still bugs me, though.
By the way, my player is the Pioneer DV454 and the tv is a Sony Vega widescreen.

The picture quality in `Citizen Kane` is bad too...
It`s in black and white for f***s sake...

jc808

Can you try a couple of other DVD players. You have a good TV, I have the Toshiba 36" picture frame & this picks up most problems but I don`t have the problems you have. Just as a matter of interest could your lens need cleaning or adjusting.

Sky nearly always has grain as it`s so bright and usually out of focus as it`s in the background. As pointed out earlier in the thread it`s part and parcel of film, there`s no way of getting round it.

Go to the cinema and watch a film there, the grain on sky scenes is very noticable but you just get on with it.

It`s not something I`ve ever noticed. You say it`s on friends` players and tv`s so changing players won`t make any difference.
Mark, if this is well known, do you know any links etc. showing this phenomenon so I can see what I`m `missing`?

Ste

Put your player on its highest zoom factor and sit as close to the telly as possible. See that sort of broiling effect the image has - all shimmery? That`s grain. ;)

J Mark Oates

Oh for HD TV.. >:(