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Robert Meyer Burnett, the producer and editor of the bonus features found on the Star Trek: The Next Generation and Star Trek: Enterprise Blu-ray sets and long time Star Trek fan, explains why Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and Star Trek: Voyager are not available in HD or 4K Ultra HD and may never be in a lengthy interview.
Unfortunately, this meant, unlike TOS and The Animated Series, there would be no 35mm finished negative of TNG... and the series would only ever exist on videotape at NTSC resolution. The same would hold true of DS9 and Voyager. Enterprise though, shot in 2001, would be future-proofed, shot on 35MM and finished in HD, with the VFX created in CG at 720p, until the fourth season, which abandoned film altogether.
[...] TNG, DS9 and Voyager could not be rescanned and released in Full HD, as the original edited programs only existed on tape at NTSC resolution. With worldwide markets rapidly converting to HD, modern Trek, with the exception of Enterprise, would simply no longer be shown anywhere. With TNG still the most successful Trek series by a wide margin, Paramount and CBS desperately wanted to figure out a way to not let their crown jewel get thrown onto the scrapheap of history. Something had to be done.
So a radical notion was proposed...why not go back to the original negative and REBUILD the entire show, from the ground up, in High Definition? In the history of television, this had never been done before. Essentially, all 178 episodes of TNG (176 if you're watching the original versions of "Encounter at Farpoint" and "All Good Things") would have to go through the entire post-production process AGAIN. The original edits would be adhered to exactly, but all the original negative would have to be rescanned, the VFX re-composed, the footage re-color-timed, certain VFX, such as phaser blasts and energy fields, recreated in CG, and the entire soundtrack, originally only finished in 2 channel stereo, would be remastered into thunderous, 7.1 DTS.
[...] From 2012 through 2014, the seven seasons of TNG, along with 5 single discs (two-part episodes cut into feature presentations) were released on Blu-Ray, with over 50 hours of newly-produced special features. The restoration remains an absolutely astonishing achievement in the annals of television and anyone watching the new versions of the episodes, can only marvel at the vast difference from the originals. Everyone involved at CBS Digital and the various other Post Houses who participated in the project deserve a hearty round of applause from fans the world over. At least the fans who appreciate and understand just how much work was done.
Unfortunately, during this same time, the popularity of streaming services skyrocketed, and popularity of physical media began to diminish. Sales of physical discs dropped 10% a year across the board, the younger generation thought putting discs in machines was too 20th Century and even the loyal Trek fan base asked themselves, "why do I have to buy TNG YET AGAIN?" I bought the VHS tapes, the Laserdiscs and the DVDs, so do I really need the Blu-rays...? I don't even have a Blu-ray player. Won't it all be on Netflix anyway?" The absolutely justified high price-point of the initial Blu-ray seasons also didn't help sales.
Ultimately, the final result of all the effort put into the restoration itself and the newly-created special features were ultimately disappointing. The disc sales didn't match projections and continued to suffer as more and more people turned to streaming, where Star Trek was already widely available. Sure, the newly-remastered episodes of TNG have quietly replaced the original versions, but nowadays, very few people even notice, as they expect HD to look great.
Both Deep Space Nine and Voyager would require at least the same amount of time, manpower and money, but neither show was ever as popular as TNG or TOS. So, how can CBS be expected to shell out probably 20-million dollars per series to remaster them into HD?
It's a lengthy but good read that applies to all pre-HD television shows from the '80s and '90s. It also sadly explains why we'll likely never see Babylon 5 in HD or 4K Ultra HD.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 03 2017, @10:40PM
As someone who mostly only watches over the air on my 42" relatively new Samsung TV, while I like and appreciate the HD local channel broadcasts (yeah, they pop), I'm not really put off by watching shows on MeTV, etc., that are at best only in standard res, NTSC, even if they did come from a crappy film-to-tape conversion.
It helps if I care about the show I'm watching.
I like the eye-tease of the 4K TVs in the stores, but, like 3D movies, etc., my brain really doesn't care too much after the first few minutes.
And, yes, I notice it in short bites, but caring about it goes away quickly.
Unlike OTH broadcasts, though, I do notice and it does annoy me the compression artifacts from Cable and DBS feeds that are just there in their shows. Sure, some more than others. But it's there. And, yes, I notice the resolution artifacts in Netflix streaming, too. But I just don't care about that, either. Beats buffering.
TBH, I'm impressed by some of the actual detail capture by some of the old black-and-white TV shows that MeTV et al show now, but suspect some of them may have been remastered at some point along the way ("Perry Mason" vs "Judy Garland Show"). It's interesting also seeing the output from how TV camera tech progressed in the 50's and 60's too.
But I bought my TV to have a TV (and to stop moving around a 250 lb 32" CRT), not to impress myself or others socially with my humble-brags of the new TV I bought.
I don't really care that I spent "$$$" (but wouldn't buy a Vizio, Insignia, etc. TV, either), nor do I perceive that I'm somehow "wasting" my TV or my "investment" by showing such below-plebian claptrap on it. Again, after 5 or 10 minutes, my eyes and brain really don't care if it's DVD or Blu-Ray or black-barred SDTV 480p. And, I'm guessing yours doesn't either. You've just convinced yourself that it matters.
So, yeah. I'm a strong vote for the "WTF is this first-world problem complaining about? Get over yourself already."
But Samsung's remote controls? Almost as bad as Comcast's, DirectTV's, etc.