tour de france - poor quality

I don't know wether it's ITV4 all the time, or wether the Tour
was being "cut down" for some reason, or wether the
almost continuous panning backgrounds give low compression,
but the MPEG artefacting on these programs was
absolutely nightmarish. More like YouTube than
professional broadcast.

Anyone know more?

BugBear

"bugbear" wrote in message
et...
I don't know wether it's ITV4 all the time, or wether the Tour
was being "cut down" for some reason, or wether the
almost continuous panning backgrounds give low compression,
but the MPEG artefacting on these programs was
absolutely nightmarish. More like YouTube than
professional broadcast.

This is because it's on ITV4. It's transmitted with less bits than the main
channels

tim

"tim....." wrote in message
...

"bugbear" wrote in message
et...
I don't know wether it's ITV4 all the time, or wether the Tour
was being "cut down" for some reason, or wether the
almost continuous panning backgrounds give low compression,
but the MPEG artefacting on these programs was
absolutely nightmarish. More like YouTube than
professional broadcast.

This is because it's on ITV4. It's transmitted with less bits than the
main channels


Which is profoundly sad, because it's parent channel (ITV1) is not
over-endowed with bits either.
--
JohnT

On Mon, 28 Jul 2008 19:39:41 +0100, "JohnT"
wrote:

"tim....." wrote in message
...

"bugbear" wrote in message
et...
I don't know wether it's ITV4 all the time, or wether the Tour
was being "cut down" for some reason, or wether the
almost continuous panning backgrounds give low compression,
but the MPEG artefacting on these programs was
absolutely nightmarish. More like YouTube than
professional broadcast.

This is because it's on ITV4. It's transmitted with less bits than the
main channels


Which is profoundly sad, because it's parent channel (ITV1) is not
over-endowed with bits either.

It was pretty crappy on Eurosport/Virgin also, I don't think the link
via motorbike and helicopter through the trees helps.

bugbear wrote:

I don't know wether it's ITV4 all the time, or wether the Tour
was being "cut down" for some reason, or wether the
almost continuous panning backgrounds give low compression,
but the MPEG artefacting on these programs was
absolutely nightmarish. More like YouTube than
professional broadcast.

Anyone know more?

BugBear

I'm glad I'm not the only one that noticed this. I even emailed ITV before
the Tour started to tell how crap last years was (due to low bit rate). I
asked if this year's Tour would be just as crap. They said they would "send
my comments to the appropriate dept". i.e /dev/null - the bin.

I was lucky in that our Irish language broadcaster TG4 also showed it, with
a significant improvement in picture quality. Thing is, the commentary was
rubbish Can't win I suppose.

zumoz wrote:

: It was pretty crappy on Eurosport/Virgin also, I don't think the link
: via motorbike and helicopter through the trees helps.

Not the cause of the crappy pictures!!!!

Sky now has Eurosport-HD and the TDF was postively *stunning* on it! Some of
the best live HD shots of glorious scenery (and the cyclists I suppose!)
I have seen for ages. The motorcycle/helicopter links did cause a little
breakup from time to time but all the cameras used seemed to be HD.

Once Eurosport-HD arrived TDF was just painful to watch on both British
Eurosport and ITV4!!

Brian McIlwrath wrote:

Sky now has Eurosport-HD and the TDF was postively *stunning* on it! Some
of the best live HD shots of glorious scenery (and the cyclists I
suppose!) I have seen for ages. The motorcycle/helicopter links did cause
a little breakup from time to time but all the cameras used seemed to be
HD.

Once Eurosport-HD arrived TDF was just painful to watch on both British
Eurosport and ITV4!!

Does Phil & Paul do the Sky commentary? They are probably the best out there
IMO.

Also, excuse my ignorance being a non-Sky user, is that a free channel or a
premium one?

On Tue, 29 Jul 2008 10:24:34 +0000 (UTC), Brian McIlwrath
wrote:

zumoz wrote:

: It was pretty crappy on Eurosport/Virgin also, I don't think the link
: via motorbike and helicopter through the trees helps.

Not the cause of the crappy pictures!!!!

Sky now has Eurosport-HD and the TDF was postively *stunning* on it! Some of
the best live HD shots of glorious scenery (and the cyclists I suppose!)
I have seen for ages. The motorcycle/helicopter links did cause a little
breakup from time to time but all the cameras used seemed to be HD.

Once Eurosport-HD arrived TDF was just painful to watch on both British
Eurosport and ITV4!!

Actually the scenery was pretty good even on SD but there was a lot of
break-up on the close-ups.

On Mon, 28 Jul 2008 23:15:34 +0100, John Watson
wrote:

bugbear wrote:

I don't know wether it's ITV4 all the time, or wether the Tour
was being "cut down" for some reason, or wether the
almost continuous panning backgrounds give low compression,
but the MPEG artefacting on these programs was
absolutely nightmarish. More like YouTube than
professional broadcast.

Anyone know more?

BugBear

I'm glad I'm not the only one that noticed this. I even emailed ITV before
the Tour started to tell how crap last years was (due to low bit rate). I
asked if this year's Tour would be just as crap. They said they would "send
my comments to the appropriate dept". i.e /dev/null - the bin.

I was lucky in that our Irish language broadcaster TG4 also showed it, with
a significant improvement in picture quality. Thing is, the commentary was
rubbish Can't win I suppose.

Well if you are Irish you would be able to follow the Eurosport
commentary from Sean Kelly and comments by Stephen Roche!

I used to like David Duffield who would talk about anything at all
during the long stages, he once spent the entire afternoon talking
about French cheeses.

zumoz wrote:

Well if you are Irish you would be able to follow the Eurosport
commentary from Sean Kelly and comments by Stephen Roche!

I don't have Sky. Or more specifically, I don't receive Eurosport.