Month: February 2008 (Page 1 of 3)

Warner Home Video announced today that Ocean’s 11 and Ocean’s 12 will be available separately for the first time on Blu-ray on April 29 and HD DVD on May 20. The films were previously exclusive to the Ocean’s Trilogy gift set.

Ocean’s 11 (2001)
Danny Ocean (George Clooney) likes taking chances. All he asks is that his handpicked squad of ten grifters and cons play the game like they have nothing to lose. If all goes right, the payoff will be a fat $150 million.

Ocean’s 12 (2004)
Danny Ocean and pals return in a sequel to the caper that saw them pull off a $150 million heist. But $150 million doesn’t go as far as it used to. Exciting locations include Amsterdam, Paris and Rome, the direction of Steven Soderbergh again and the original cast plus Catherine Zeta Jones and others.

Image Entertainment has announced that the 1985 Short Circuit will make its way to Blu-ray on May 20th, marking the first time the film has been presented in high-definition.

Extras will include an audio commentary with director John Badham and screenwriters S.S. Wilson and Brent Maddock, plus isolated music and effects.

The film will be presented in 1080p video with DTS-HD Lossless Master Audio 5.1 Surround audio.

Via High-Def Digest

Fox announced today that Patton, The Sand Pebbles and The Longest Day will all be released on Blu-ray Disc on June 3, 2008.

All three titles will be presented in 1080p/AVC MPEG-4 video with remastered English DTS-HD Lossless Master Audio 5.1 Surround audio along with English, French and Spanish Dolby Digital and subtitles.

Via High-Def Digest

Trading Markets reports that the Mitsubishi Kagaku Media Company is stepping up production of writable Blu-ray Discs, anticipating higher demand since Toshiba’s decision to exit the HD DVD business has left Blu-ray as the sole next-gen disc format.

At its Singapore plant, the firm will install a production line for recordable Blu-ray Discs which will go into service in July or August and is expected to produce 500,000 units a month.

The new line at the Singapore plant will raise monthly companywide production to 700,000 units. In addition, the firm will begin outsourcing some production to foreign manufacturers.

Netflix announced today that the company plans to quadruple its Blu-ray selection this year and hinted at a possible partnership with Microsoft. Perhaps the rumored “Netflix Streaming Movies on Xbox Live”.

Netflix reps confirmed that the company will add as many as 1,500 Blu-ray titles to its existing 400 titles this year. It is unknown at this time if the addition of Blu-ray inventory will lead to membership price increases.

Its nice to see the world’s number one online rental service is getting behind the Blu-ray format, meeting the increasing demand for high-definition content.

Via Video Business

Sony updated its Blu-ray Disc player line today with two new models that will be capable of accessing advanced interactive features such as BonusView and BD-Live.

The BDP-S350 and BDP-S550 models both support BonusView (Picture-in-Picture) featured on some of the new Blu-ray Disc theatrical releases. The BDP-S350 model is BD-Live ready featuring an Ethernet port for an easy firmware update and access to Internet-based interactive content features. The BSP-S550 is BonusView and BD-Live capable when it ships.

Both models also feature an external port for local storage, so users can add optional storage device. The BDP-S550 ships with a 1GB storage device.

The players feature 1080/60p and 24p True Cinema output. They are compatible with most standard DVDs and feature 1080p upscaling through an HDMI connection to capable HDTV sets, improving the picture performance of existing DVD libraries.

The models offer 7.1 channel Dolby TrueHD and Dolby(R) Digital Plus decoding and bit-stream output, as well as dts-HD High Resolution Audio and Master Audio bit-stream output. The BDP-S550 adds dts-HD High Resolution Audio and dts-HD Master Audio decoding as well as 7.1 channel analog audio output.

The players support AVCHD discs encoded with x.v.Color (xvYCC) technology, an international standard for wide color space reproduction. The standard expands the current data range of video by about 1.8 times, allowing the players to output more natural and vivid colors similar to what the human eye can actually see. The players also feature compatibility with an array of video formats, including BD-R/RE (BDMV and BDAV modes), DVD+R/+RW, DVD-R/-RW, CD, CD-R/RW (CD-DA format), and JPEG on DVD//CD recordable media.

The new BDP-S350 ships this summer for about $400 and BDP-S550 will be available this fall for about $500.

Goldmund introduced today the company’s first Blu-ray player, the Eidos 20 BD. With the announcement of the Eidos 20 BD, Goldmund becomes the first high-end audio/video manufacturer to issue a Blu-ray player.

Goldmund signature features found on the Eidos 20 BD include the “AC-Curator” power supply circuit which dramatically improves picture and sound stability and dynamics, and the “Mechanical Grounding” construction which removes from the player mechanism spurious vibrations blurring the video signal and increasing jitter. In addition, the new Eidos 20 BD uses the Goldmund “Magnetic Damper,” a device lowering the reading errors, a feature that previously was exclusive to Goldmund’s highest end devices.

Oh and it costs $16,900. Yea… sixteen thousand nine hundred dollars!

At its annual retail and publisher conference Destination PlayStation, Sony announced details of the upcoming Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots PLAYSTATION 3  bundle.

To coincide with the North American launch of Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots in late Q2 2008, Sony will introduce a PS3 bundle, which will include an 80GB PS3, the upcoming Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots and a DUALSHOCK 3 wireless controller for $499.

Why am I posting this news here on BlurayWire? Well because the PS3 is also a Blu-Ray player! For those wanting to make the leap from DVD to Blu-Ray, this new bundle is a great deal. You not only get a gaming console w/ one game — you also get a Blu-Ray player!