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Youtube Displays Media Technology

Ghost Towns Is the First 8K Video Posted To YouTube -- But Can You Watch It? 181

Posted by timothy from the not-for-me dept.
Iddo Genuth writes: 4K videos and movies are still far from common and now 8K seems to start making its appearance online. A few days ago, what might be the first 8K video entitled "Ghost Towns" was published on Youtube and you can now watch it for yourself in its full 7680 × 4320 pixel glory — that is if you happen to have access to a 8K display (or projector).

The video was created by cinematographer Luke Neumann who used a 6K EPIC DRAGON camera using some advanced and complex techniques such as shooting in portrait orientation and then stitched the video together in Adobe After Effects. Some shots simply scaled up by 125% from 6.1K to meet the 7.6K standard and handheld stuff was 6K scaled up by 125% and sharpened up.

Youtube is now offering an 8K option and according to Google: "8K video has been supported since 2010, but that labeling for 8K video (the 4320p/8K quality setting like pictured above) was added "earlier this year — but presumably there was noting to view — until now...
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Ghost Towns Is the First 8K Video Posted To YouTube -- But Can You Watch It? More

Ghost Towns Is the First 8K Video Posted To YouTube -- But Can You Watch It?

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  • Slashdotters (Score:5, Funny)

    by Chris Katko ( 2923353 ) on Tuesday June 09, 2015 @12:44PM (#49877231)
    I love that Slashdotters are all about VR, but "nobody can see 4K" and "there's no point in going above that."

    Meanwhile, their 1080p 5" phone has a dot pitch 10 times their 1080p TV and they don't go "man, I wish the screen was lower resolution."

    They sure have a fickle love of new technology.

    • Re:Slashdotters (Score:5, Informative)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 ) on Tuesday June 09, 2015 @01:53PM (#49877907) Homepage Journal

      It's worth noting that this video is only 8k resolution, but it's not what the eventual 8k broadcast standard will be. That requires a higher frame rate and higher colour depth as well. Same with 4k, it's more than just a resolution bump and most cheap 4k equipment is only HD with more resolution.

      • Re:Slashdotters (Score:4, Informative)

        by dotancohen ( 1015143 ) on Tuesday June 09, 2015 @02:17PM (#49878163) Homepage

        It's worth noting that this video is only 8k resolution, but it's not what the eventual 8k broadcast standard will be.

        And if you want to see the actual video, then here's the URL:
        https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]

        You can watch it while the linked article _about it_ times out after 30 seconds or so of trying to load.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by antdude ( 79039 )

          Just download it with youtube-dl [github.io] command:

          $ youtube-dl -f bestvideo+bestaudio https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]

      • Re:Slashdotters (Score:5, Informative)

        by David_Hart ( 1184661 ) on Tuesday June 09, 2015 @02:29PM (#49878291)

        It's worth noting that this video is only 8k resolution, but it's not what the eventual 8k broadcast standard will be. That requires a higher frame rate and higher colour depth as well. Same with 4k, it's more than just a resolution bump and most cheap 4k equipment is only HD with more resolution.

        Not only that, but the majority of the content is upscaled from 6K (whether using upscaling or stitching). It's cool and all that he spent the time and effort to do this, but, in my opinion, it's not true 8K until it's native video. Red has a 6K camera that can be upgraded with an 8K sensor.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Khyber ( 864651 )

        "That requires a higher frame rate and higher colour depth as well."

        Show me any LCD that is an actual 32-bit panel and capable of handling that kind of gamut.

        You won't. And RGB LED screens won't, either.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Bengie ( 1121981 )
          I don't care about current monitors, I only care that future monitor could take advantage of the higher color depth without a chicken-and-egg issue.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Khyber ( 864651 )

            Current monitors can't even take advantage of CURRENT color depth (old CRTs can!)

            Unless they make a monitor where each pixel is capable of emitting each wavelength in the visible spectrum and combining those wavelengths for perfect color reproduction, you won't ever see even 24-bit color depth.

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by Bengie ( 1121981 )
              Quantum dot displays can, but they're a bit further out. Too bad there are colors that have no wave length because they're an artifact of our perception caused by combining real colors. 3 color pixels with N combinations is good enough for now, until we find something better.

            • Old CRTs were great: I had one that did something like 2048x1536 with real 24-bit color 15 years ago! Sure, it took up my whole desk, weighed a ton and sucked power, but it had a better picture than most of the flat panel monitors I've had since (and way better than the average shitty monitor that comes with people's Dells!).

    • Yes, 8k VR headsets are going to be almost removing the 'V' from VR. As it is the GearVR 2650x1440 shows how much a little resolution goes compared to the DK2. The new Vive and CV1 should be similar with higher density pixels which will be awesome too.

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward

      If it increased the battery life, hell yes I'd take a lower resolution phone.

      Plus, yeah, the phone has 10x the dot pitch. But on the other hand, it's rarely more than 1.5-3 feet away from my face. My 50' TV is generally at least 12 feet away.

    • FYI cellphone resolution is at 1080p so you can hook your phone up to you 1080p television and keep it in it's native resolution. The reason there is no point in going above 4k is consumer electronics are not large enough to justify the huge files and large bandwidth usage. When 200" screens start becoming normal in homes 8k will have a place but that is not going to happen in the near future, most people don't have a place to put an eight foot by 14 foot TV in their homes.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Bengie ( 1121981 )
        Diagonal lines on 1080p still have "steps". The resolution is not high enough until those go away without anti-aliasing.

    • > I love that Slashdotters are all about VR,

      You don't speak for all of /. -- wake me up when they can run @ 120 Hz for _both_ eyes because there is a world of difference between crappy 30 Hz, OK 60 Hz, and silky smooth 120 Hz. Right now they are barely able to 72+ Hz which is still too low for everyone.

      The movie industry still doesn't have a clue between 24 fps and 60 fps

      * OWE my eyes @ 24 fps !
      http://red.cachefly.net/learn/... [cachefly.net]

      * Not bad @ 60 fps !
      http://red.cachefly.net/learn/... [cachefly.net]

    • Meanwhile, their 1080p 5" phone has a dot pitch 10 times their 1080p TV and they don't go "man, I wish the screen was lower resolution."

      That depends. Would having less resolution get me better battery life? If so, I'll take it!

  • I can only see the difference between 720p and 1080p if I squint... but I blame TV sizes for monitors for taking away my precious vertical resolution.

    • I'm much more excited about 4k 21-24" computer monitors than I am TV, but then I don't watch TV as much as I once did.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by JazzLad ( 935151 )
        This [amazon.com] changed my life (only slight exaggeration). Roughly 150DPI, it is amazing for Photoshop & Fallout NV never looked better (yeah, there's better games visually, but I'm a FO junkie - FO4 later this year, woot!). I don't even use anti-aliasing in games anymore (in part because when you quadruple the pixels, 16x AA takes a LOT of GPU), it's dense enough I don't feel like I need it.

      • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

        by gstoddart ( 321705 )

        Do you think a 4K 21-24" monitor will add much for you?

        Unless you set it for jumbo fonts, or have super vision, for many tasks it seems like that would be too small to add much benefit -- at least to me.

        I've currently got two 1080p displays on my desk (well, 3 if you count my laptop) ... and I'd not want my fonts or windows any smaller.

        Now, give me a 40" 4K monitor, and that would be cool. But it seems like a 21-24" 4K monitor is just going to have pixels way too damned small for many of the things I can i

        • For photography it has it's uses. Not enough to make most people bump up (the better gamut is more of a draw). My next monitors will be 4K, but I'm not tossing out my two year old screens just yet.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by dj245 ( 732906 )

          Unless you set it for jumbo fonts, or have super vision, for many tasks it seems like that would be too small to add much benefit -- at least to me.

          That's a side effect of operating systems which don't scale properly. [wikipedia.org] Windows doesn't do it properly and most other operating systems screw it up in various ways too.

          • Windows scales fairly well (especially Vista and up). Legacy programs that don't rely on pixels for element positioning do fine even in the compatibility high DPI mode. Programs that ignored resolution-independent guidelines that Microsoft had been providing for years, don't work well.

        • Re:Diminishing returns (Score:4, Informative)

          by EvilSS ( 557649 ) on Tuesday June 09, 2015 @04:07PM (#49879095)
          I have two 4K monitors on my desk right now, both 28", as well as a 15" 4K laptop. On thing it adds (besides amazingly smooth looking fonts and GUI elements) is screen real estate. Even with the DPI turned up so text and icons look "normal" size there is a ton more screen space than you have on a 1080p screen. After using these for about 6 months now I have no plans to ever go back to 1080p if I can help it.

        • Re:Diminishing returns (Score:4)

          by DanielRavenNest ( 107550 ) on Tuesday June 09, 2015 @04:48PM (#49879393)

          The human eye has a resolution of 1 arc-minute (1/60th of a degree), and so on a display that fills 90 degrees horizontally you can resolve 5400 pixels. The retina and brain do some fancy processing so that you can detect narrow linear features smaller than that. It's a kind of image sharpening, but it goes beyond the light sensing cells in the eye. For non-linear features like a checkerboard, 1 arc-minute is the limit.

          So unless we are talking surround-screen, there isn't much reason to go past 4K, and no reason to go past 8K. In fact, you only see a small part of your field of view at full resolution. Stare at some icon or symbol on this page, and try to read anything else without moving your eyes. You can't. Your eyes have variable resolution away from the fovea, and make up for it by moving around.

          • yeah, I've been wanting a "view-screen" sized 8K display since the 1980's. I did the math back then and it's never changed.

            When an 8K comes out in the 40-50" range I'm dropping an ass-ton of money on one. I've been behind the buying curve since the early 90's because I always knew it was just a step. Finally at 8K I'll be done upgrading, so the time will be "right away". Apparently I lived long enough to see it and my eyes are still good. Now as long as I keep eating leafy greens until a low-powered

        • Don't underestimate the value of jumbo fonts. Now, I've got the 5K imac, so even with "pixel-doubling", I'm not at a loss for vertical space. But everything looks clearer. What little antialiasing the mac uses can't be seen.

        • Ditto. I just bought a 42" 4K TV to use as a monitor ($300 at Brandsmart USA, by the way), and it's going to be great. (I use future tense because I'm still waiting on Newegg to deliver my new video card capable of driving it, so it's running at 1080p until Thursday... and even then, it'll temporarily be 30FPS until somebody comes out with a DisplayPort 1.2 -> HDMI 2.0 converter in a few months).

          Anyway, for those who don't understand why 4K is great, the key is not to think of it as a sharper "regular mo

      • I kind of settled and went with 3x27" HD res monitors. After going to 3 monitors I don't understand how I lived with tunnel vision for so long.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by eepok ( 545733 )
      Personally, I can't be bothered to see the difference. I'm serious. It may have been being raised in the golden age of CD-burnable movies (degrade a 2-hour movie sufficiently to burn it to a 700MB disc), but I don't see the point in 1080p let alone anything more than that. How much detail is required to convey that someone is crying, that the ball hit the ground before the receiver took possession, or that the explosion went BOOOOM? Certainly not 8k or 4k. And I doubt 1080p.

  • My razor has only four blades now I need eight.

  • Support since 2010 (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 09, 2015 @01:51PM (#49877887)

    8K video has been supported since 2010

    2010 was when I clicked on the play button. It's still buffering.

  • I predict ... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by gstoddart ( 321705 ) on Tuesday June 09, 2015 @01:51PM (#49877889) Homepage

    I predict zero consumer demand for this.

    HD was a moving target for years, and early adopters eventually got screwed as their gear no longer worked.

    The movie studios dickered over the HD replacement for DVD.

    If they think we're going to buy new TVs and the like every time someone makes it bigger, they're sorely mistaken.

    I'm sure it will be beautiful and wonderful, and people with lots of money will rush to run out and drop thousands of dollars on new gear so they can brag to their friends.

    And the overwhelming majority of household consumers will yawn, scratch their asses, and wonder what the hell is in it for them.

    I find myself with zero motivation to replace any of my TV/stereo stuff just because someone has said "fuck it, we're going to 8K".

    But suddenly it seems like every 2-3 years people believe we'll all swap out our existing stuff just because some filmmaker decided to use it.

    This will be mostly a non-existent technology for most people.

    • And the overwhelming majority of household consumers will yawn, scratch their asses, and wonder what the hell is in it for them.....This will be mostly a non-existent technology for most people.

      Honestly, I think that's fine. But there's been a bit of a screen size war and consumers do actually want bigger screens. And it's true,about half wouldn't even realize they were only getting 480p from the RCA cables on their cable box. The downside to larger screens is that 1080p isn't much when you are close to the screen and most movies (and some Netflix series) are already shot in 4K. Might as well make it available to the early adopters that want it. For everyone else, it's just something to consi

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by zlives ( 2009072 )

        "passive 4K 3D" if that is true then shouldn't passive 1080p 3d be available on 4K screens?

        • Yes. Unfortunately, a lot of manufacturers gave up on passive 3D too soon. I already have several dirt cheap passive glasses (from the theater), but I'm waiting on the right 4K TV with passive 3D. It might be a couple years yet, if it happens at all. Active just doesn't seem to block enough light compared to the polarizing filters of passive 3D and I don't like it.

          I'm only saying that there's a potential use case and content for 8K already in existence (4K for each eye), even if it isn't native 8K video

      • The downside to larger screens is that 1080p isn't much when you are close to the screen

        I'm not sure about that. My couch isn't all that far away from our 60" 1080p screen and don't notice individual pixels even in things like the on-screen channel guide. There's an enormous quality leap from 480 to 1080, but not as much of a visible difference after that. You'd hear a big difference between 22KHz audio and CD-quality 44.1KHz recordings, but few people except trained experts using special equipment could hear the difference between 44.1KHz and 96KHz. Well, same with video: the current standard

        • I'm sitting right around what I'd consider the Nyquist distance from my 42" TV now. The screen is about 2-3 feet in front of a couch (cheaper than buying a bigger screen and this isn't our living room). If I wanted a bigger screen, I'd prefer a little more - especially considering the resolution loss of passive 3D (which I prefer).

          Don't gauge it by not being able to see lines between each pixel (they're a hair's width compared to the width of a pixel), and don't gauge it by not seeing obvious stair-steppi

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by SpiceWare ( 3438 )

      early adopters eventually got screwed as their gear no longer worked.

      Not true, my gear from 2001 still works just fine. Sure it predates HDMI by a couple years, but that is easily solved with an HDMI->Component Video adaptor [atariage.com]

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Kjella ( 173770 )

      i just checked my local price guide and out of 631 TV models on sale there's exactly zero SD sets available and less than 10% are 720p. You can get a 58" UHD set today for less than I paid for my 60" 1080p TV about 4 years ago. Sure I'm not going to run out to get one, but in 10 years I expect 720p to be gone, 1080p the cheap option and 4K the norm. There's not really any downsides and the prices are coming down quickly, even 4K downscaled will look better because it's 4:4:4 @ 1080p. Better colors, HDR will

    • Sure, most people won't swap out their TVs for 4k or 8k just because it's available...but enough people will so that in 5 years when I do upgrade....I'll be getting 4k for less than I paid for my current 1080p TVs. So let's be happy about it all...

    • Not every consumer is a nerd who gets his news from sites like Slashdot or Arstechnica. A typical consumer is a stereotypical family guy, possibly with children, who wants to buy a 4k TV because he saw those beautiful screens at Sams Club or Costco, playing a stunning looking content (that was specially recorded to be demod at the stores).

      Still, I agree.. I can't see people tripping over their HDMI cable running to an electronics store to buy even a 4k TV. Realistically, buying a 4k TV would start making se

  • Can I even stream? (Score:3)

    by _xeno_ ( 155264 ) on Tuesday June 09, 2015 @02:00PM (#49877993) Homepage Journal

    No, of course I can't watch it, I don't own an 8K TV or let alone a 4K TV.

    But what I'm more curious is: can I even stream it? Because I'm stuck with Comcast, so I'm limited to something like 20Mbps download speed. ("Something like" because that's the maximum, not the guaranteed, which is 0Mbps. Yay monopolies!) 4K video on YouTube apparently requires more than that!

    So forget watching it, I can't even stream it in real time.

    And I live in an area where there "is" competition. I could also get the same 20Mbps speed from RCN, plus Verizon offers FiOS in the area! But not to me, despite it literally running down the street I live on.

    • Yay monopolies!

      And I live in an area where there "is" competition.

      Do you have some kind of split personality? You just typed two entirely conflicting statements. Either there is a monopoly, or there is competition. It is impossible to have both.

      I have FiOS. There are cable providers in my area as well, plus DSL, so I have 75/75Mbit. Yay competition.

  • So it was actually captured in 6k, and then was scaled to 8k. I don't think it should count unless it is captured in 8k. I mean, I could take a normal DVD and upscale it to 8k, but that doesn't mean much.

  • Such as "shooting in portrait"

    Well.. sorry to say this but this particular advanced and complex technique has been used by every idiot with a smartphone recording videos for years.

    Also... 6k video scaled up isn't 8k. it's 6k video with some random pixels thrown in for marketing reasons.

  • 4k downsampled to 1080p is AWESOME (Score:4, Informative)

    by BrookHarty ( 9119 ) on Tuesday June 09, 2015 @02:11PM (#49878119) Journal

    I was always wondering why a 4k video playing on a 1080p looks so awesome compared to same 1080P video. Well, the 4K and 1080P uses 4 pixels in a square with the same chroma. When you downsample the 4k on a 1080p, it goes to a 1/1 pixel matching, so no more 4 square pixels. You get a more detailed video with more vibrant colors and detail. Its crazy how better it looks. So the true visual quality is lost in the encoding on 1080p!

    We are being robbed of visual quality, so more pixels is a selling point. (mostly)

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by ndavis ( 1499237 )

      I was always wondering why a 4k video playing on a 1080p looks so awesome compared to same 1080P video. Well, the 4K and 1080P uses 4 pixels in a square with the same chroma. When you downsample the 4k on a 1080p, it goes to a 1/1 pixel matching, so no more 4 square pixels. You get a more detailed video with more vibrant colors and detail. Its crazy how better it looks. So the true visual quality is lost in the encoding on 1080p!

      We are being robbed of visual quality, so more pixels is a selling point. (mostly)

      I have been hearing this and just purchased a 4k video camera thinking that I can downsample it if necessary or I can keep it 4K for Youtube and in the future my kids/grandkids will be able to enjoy the high quality video I took.

    • You could get that with a higher bitrate, too. Chances are that their 4K scaled down to 1080p would be very close in visual quality to your average Blu-Ray encode.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by dwywit ( 1109409 )

        Yep. People overlook bitrate when talking about resolution, colour depth, etc.

        That's one reason why a blu-ray and a DCP look different, even though they're both 2K.

        • There's that reason, and also that the dot pitch of a DLP DCP is practically zero due to overlap. That makes a much smoother image.

          Also, most theaters have moved on to 4K.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by dwywit ( 1109409 )

            Maybe, but not mine. We've only had a 2K projector for 2 years....

            • Since we moved our couch up close to the TV, it's really only the fact that I don't have proper curtains yet that make us even want to go to the theater. Our theater's screens are too small for 4K to be enough difference, truthfully, and it's over an hour's drive for the "Mega Screen" (50' x 70') that guarantees that your field of view is covered pretty well and that you can even turn your head a bit and still see only screen.

              Once I get proper light-blocking, I won't really want to go to the theater very o

    • It's possible to turn off chroma subsampling in h264, avoiding the need to encode the video at twice the target resolution. But for a while that wasn't as well-supported.

      For youtube in particular, there is another issue that makes video encoded at high resolution look better when downsampled than something encoded for the target resolution. Youtube assumes that low-resolution videos are low quality, and hence can be compressed more aggressively. This is why things like TASVideos encode their console gamepla

  • I know I'm way behind the times when it comes to consumer electronics, but the last time I bought a TV I wanted a 1040p, and kind of assumed that 4k and 8k would have 4x and 8x the vertical density of that. Apparently not; Wikipedia sayeth that it switched from vertical to horizontal resolution.

    Now that I know this, it's not difficult to understand. But I'm curious as to why they'd change naming conventions. Is there any particular reason?

    • Re:Why the switch in nomenclature? (Score:5, Informative)

      by vux984 ( 928602 ) on Tuesday June 09, 2015 @02:55PM (#49878493)

      But I'm curious as to why they'd change naming conventions. Is there any particular reason?

      Short answer:

      Because people in marketing are catastrophic idiots.

      Longer answer:

      This is the graphic to look at:

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]

      4K UHD has nothing to do with horizontal resoution. 4K is because its exactly 4 x 1080p tiled 2 by 2. (see how the FHD fits exactly 4x into UHD).

      So 4K UHD is 4x1080p =~> 4K

      By sheer coincidence 4K UHD at 3840x2160 which is sort of close to 4k horizontally 3840 ~= 4000 so lots of people thought it meant horizontal resolution rather than 4 x 1080p. To further confuse the issue there actually is a DCI 4K resolution 4096x2160 which *IS* named 4K for the horizontal resolution, which is actually 4K (4096 is 4k in binary of course).

      Then when it came time to make the next standard, they did the samething as the did to make 4K. They just tiled a 4K screen 2x2. (Again see how 8K UHD is exaclty one quadrant of 8K... )... so 8K is 4 x 4K tiled 2x2 or 16 x 1080p tiled 4x4... but by then most people including the dipshits in marketing thought the 4K was the approximate horizontal resolution, so they called it 8K UHD. because 7860 is ~= 8000.

      There are some other resolution standards in the 8K family that are derived from the DCI 4K... so they actually have 8192 pixels horizontally... well most of them anyway. 8K "21:9" keeps the vertical fixed and expands the horizontal out to 10,240... because why not. (I mean, I get it... but then 16:10 should have just varied the vertical and kept the horitontal... but that's 8192x5120... which isn't really consistent with anything.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by jfengel ( 409917 )

        Oh, for the love of Pete... thanks for the headache. Now I know. (And wish I hadn't asked ;-)

      • I am not convinced this forest of confusing display size name standards [wikipedia.org] is better than simply writing down the dimensions explicitly. 1920x1080 is not that much longer than 1080p, and makes it explicit which dimension is how long.

      • 4K UHD has nothing to do with horizontal resoution. 4K is because its exactly 4 x 1080p tiled 2 by 2. (see how the FHD fits exactly 4x into UHD).

        That makes no sense whatsoever, and is also wrong. Following the first link in the wikipedia article you cited, we find this [wikipedia.org]: "4K resolution, also called 4K, refers to a display device or content having horizontal resolution on the order of 4,000 pixels."

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by vux984 ( 928602 )

          Following the first link in the wikipedia article you cited

          Lol, well if you read it wikipedia... :)

          Here's the thing, 4K as a professional term means that.
          4K as a consumer term originated from it being 4x1080p.

          A good link to read would actually be the one on 2K
          https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]

          Here you see the DCI 2K resolutions spelled out. 1080p in particular is not included and they even go on to say that it is officially not recognized as a 2K resolution by the DCI and in industry standards.

          The same is sort of true for 4K. The DCI 4K is 4096x2160.
          The consumer 4K

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Bo'Bob'O ( 95398 )

        "4K" was pretty widely used in the cinema world well before it really started to become something that came into the consumer market. So for once I don't really think this is some hidden marketing agenda

        Personally, I think it's close enough to 4000 for 4k (and 8k by extension) to be a perfectly acceptable short hand. I'll take having to say "4k" any day over something like "WQUXGA". Particularly since these goofy names don't give you a lot of other information that can be just as important (Color depth, chr

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by vux984 ( 928602 )

          "4K" was pretty widely used in the cinema world well before it really started to become something that came into the consumer market.

          Yes. DCI 4K.

          DCI 2K is also widely used in the cinema world. And 1080p is often conflated with 2K even though it is officially not recognized as a DCI 2K resolution; so its wrong to call 1080p 2K (even though the wikipedia page on 4K has it labelled as such... while the wikipedia page on 2K makes it explicit that its not considered 2K.)

          So when marketing named UHD "4K" it was justified as 4x1080p -- the DCI still didn't recognize it; but naming it 4K UHD served to permanently conflate the consumer 4K UHD wit

    • The last time I bought a display, I wanted to know both the horizontal and the vertical resolution. If you rely on lossy naming conventions that assume a typical ratio that may or may not be typical the next/last year, chances are you won't really care about the actual resolution.

    • Because 4K is a film term. Digital movie projection was always measured in vertical resolution. And for that matter, it was used in the analog TV days. Back in the CRT days, you would see the marketing say that a particular TV or camera has "500 lines of resolution"

    • In my experience, it's because digital cinema projectors [wikipedia.org] are measured in horizontal resolution; and a 2k projector is 2048x1080 pixels.

      In digital cinema, resolutions are represented by the horizontal pixel count, usually 2K (2048×1080 or 2.2 megapixels) or 4K (4096×2160 or 8.8 megapixels).

      Movies are shipped inside this frame; 1.85:1 is 1998x1080; 2.40:1 is 1920x800.

      4k is double the above heights and widths, 8k is quadruple.

      For general consumer TVs, they're always 16:9 so you get 1920x1080.

    • > But I'm curious as to why they'd change naming conventions. Is there any particular reason?

      Two words: Marketing shenanigans.

      They switched from using vertical for 720p, and 1080p, to horiztonal 4K (sic.) when it should be called 2K since it is 3840x2160.

  • Looks like it is time to re-render Big Buck Bunny.
    • You're joking but THEY ALREADY DID IT.... in 2013! High frame rate, stereo, and 4K editions. Talk about planning ahead!

  • When I hear 4K or 8K all I think of is a Spishak Mach 20.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]

    Even 4k at highest possible FOV in full VR is overkill with a working eye tracker and clever photon source. 15 degrees of arc is all cones of human eyes can see.. /w rest requiring an irrelevant number of pixels.

    There will be excuses like VR that will push legitimate uses of high density yet relatively low DPD (Dots-Per-Degree) displays for a number of years yet this is only a passing state of affairs.

  • That's nerd cred right there. Drop the mic and walk.

  • I mean, come on... just when the graphics performance starts to get good, people all want bigger displays which halves the performance and then want to go even BIGGER and halve it again.

    My perfectly good Sandybridge i7 can't drive this shit. Time to rotate in another workstation. Again.

    Grumble.

    -Matt

  • Wasn't that supposed to be the great next home entertainment technology??? That disappeared fast.

    Now we're talking 4k/8k resolutions, good luck trying to get Netflix to stream something like that through our existing crappy internet infrastructure.

    Comcast will throttle it no doubt, so what you'll end up with is choppy/low res pixelated crap.

    It's a great idea, but too bad that the USA is a third-world country as far as broadband is concerned. Every Asian country has bigger pipes than us. But we're the ones b

    • 100Mbps is all you need to stream UltraHD (much less actually). Plenty of households have access to this sort of bandwidth, but it's still rare.

      Realistically, 2-3 years down the road, there should be affordable gigabit broadband in every big city, and there will be more UltraHD content on Netflix and maybe Blueray discs. So then it will be a good time to start thinking about buying a 4k TV. Prices will hopefully come down by then.

  • Only 8k? (Score:5, Funny)

    by jimmydigital ( 267697 ) on Tuesday June 09, 2015 @03:30PM (#49878801) Homepage Journal

    Wake me up when it goes to 11k and the black levels can be none more black.

  • I tried watching this at 8K resolution on my quad core i7 laptop, and it turned into a slide show. It looks like Chrome was using maxing out 4 processor cores and was using 5 GB of memory at the time. Wow.

    Running the video at 4K worked fine, though.

  • ... But my old desktops couldn't play them in both Windows (MPC-HC and VLC) and Linux/Debian oldstable's (c too)VLC and Mplayer. :( VLC worked on my king ant's MacBook Pro (2012), but it was choppy. :(

  • A few days ago, what might be the first 8K video entitled "Ghost Towns" was published on Youtube and you can now watch it for yourself in its full 7680 × 4320 pixel glory.

    The video was created by cinematographer Luke Neumann who used a 6K EPIC DRAGON camera using some advanced and complex techniques such as shooting in portrait orientation and then stitched the video together in Adobe After Effects. Some shots simply scaled up by 125% from 6.1K to meet the 7.6K standard and handheld stuff was 6K scaled up by 125% and sharpened up.

    Why must you turn Slashdot into a house of LIES?!

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