The downside of HDTV

December 13, 2005

The HDTV-capable set I’ve had a couple months, but the receiver I only got a couple weeks ago (on eBay, a real bargain too compared to what these go for at Circuit City or Best Buy). Mostly so far it’s been football that I have watched in HDTV, and for that it’s just remarkable. Almost like you’re just looking thru a window at the playing field. But last night I watched a show that demonstrated one of the weaknesses to the digital transmission system behind HDTV.

The show in question was Elton John’s Red Piano, on NBC. I’ve seen the live version of the show in Las Vegas, and it’s pretty decent. Not great–I still think Celine Dion’s show is better in terms of being an experience and not just a concert.

Anyway, the problem is that the director for Red Piano was apparently schooled in the Michael Bay Academy of attention-deficit disorder. He couldn’t hold a shot more than maybe three seconds before cutting to another camera. And he had a lot of cameras at his disposal–I am guessing there were perhaps four or five camera angles of the stage itself, and at least that many pointed out at the audience.

The issue with digital transmission is that the compression can’t always keep up with rapid cuts. Immediately after a cut to a different angle, the image looks blocky and pixelated for a fraction of a second until the compression algorithm has a chance to catch up and lock on the image. With so many rapid-fire cuts it became very annoying to keep seeing that split-second pixelation.

Basically, don’t ever watch any Michael Bay-influenced shows on HDTV. If the rapid-fire cuts don’t give you a headache the pixelation will.