[geeks] Recommendations or warnings for a new DVD player

David Cantrell geeks at sunhelp.org
Tue Nov 27 09:14:21 CST 2001


On Tue, Nov 27, 2001 at 07:03:42AM -0800, Fogg, James wrote:
> Actually, composite video has several flavors. North American standard NTSC
> sucks the most, but PAL (european) is an improvement. SECAM (more european
> in consumer goods, but used in North America for broadcast video) is
> actually pretty damn good.

SECAM is French, also used in parts of the former eastern-bloc - although
their version is subtlely different.  It's colour reproduction is superb.
Unfortunately, it's a swine to edit - certain types of fades, dissolves etc
are NOT POSSIBLE to produce on SECAM equipment cos the clever colour
correction bollockses it up.  For professionals this doesn't matter cos they
wouldn't edit on a SECAM system (or PAL, or NTSC) anyway.

Why did the French invent SECAM?  Cos they didn't want to use a British or
American system.

-- 
David Cantrell | david at cantrell.org.uk | http://www.cantrell.org.uk/david

  attractivating: inducing the quality of being attractive,
     especially to members of the appropriate sex.  -- Henrik Levkowetz



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