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[TheLion]

After certain feature requests continue to pop up I have to agree that JRiver is in "a very strange place" regarding its Blu-Ray support. On the one hand LAV (THANK YOU Hendrik) together with madVR (Mathias, you are my hero) enable us to get arguably the finest A/V quality possible in video playback today. And "Red October" made it approachable.

On the other hand JRiver still relies on "open source/enthusiast-developed software" to get there - which may strike as a very "resourceful" (as in cheap ;-) approach. IMHO JRiver 2014 may be mainstream and large a company enough to provide fully licensed Blu-Ray support - including buying (or developing - Hendrik, I am looking at you ;-) software libraries to enable very basic features that are lacking at the moment: 3D support, full menu/Java support, support for DTS-HD MA without the need of a band-aid (using a third party dll to unofficially enable this), no need for "tools" like AnyDVD.

This would certainly result in a significant investment (licensing fees, development time) and it can be argued that the net benefit (e.g. ROI due to higher sales, the most important thing - A/V quality doesn't improve) isn't worth it.

BUT if JRiver has the ambition to provide a fully featured and mainstream intuitive (how to explain that it won't show menus, 3D and he has to trick it into playing lossless DTS?) video functionality this is a necessary and overdue step in my opinion.
The other argument is that without "going official" I am very "afraid" about the situation when a disc based 4k standard is launched. It may take years until the community develops suitable filter/decoder/splitter in order to enable JRiver to make use of it ... (look at BD 3D support now - 3D is long dead until we will be able to play it with JRiver - which makes it almost an prophetic strategic decision not to support it ;-)

[Hendrik]

The last time we talked about this internally, it didn't look good. Both the resource and financial costs are very significant, and beyond what we can do without severely depriving all other areas of MC for a long time. Not to mention that plenty people (including me) are pretty happy with title-based playback as it is today, as menus are pretty annoying on many discs.

Some of the things would be an interesting technical challenge, but I wouldn't hold my breath really.

PS:
DTS-HD MA decoding is coming natively to LAV. Maybe this year if the developer of that feature hurries up a bit, otherwise soon after.

PPS:
Not that most people would even notice the difference, if they aren't told there is one.

[Awesome Donkey]

The last time we talked about this internally, it didn't look good. Both the resource and financial costs are very significant, and beyond what we can do without severely depriving all other areas of MC for a long time. Not to mention that plenty people (including me) are pretty happy with title-based playback as it is today, as menus are pretty annoying on many discs.

This *could* be a worthy Kickstarter idea.

[fitbrit]

Ideally, in my opinion, JRiver continues to invest in BD unofficially. That way, ridiculous technologies like Cinavia are not imposed on us, unlike with TMT and Cyberlink etc.
I have been watching a lot of 3d stuff lately and my friends and I love it with a decent projector. I would enthusiastically support JRiver tackling 3D bluray or at least mvc. There are lots of movies released in 3D now, and I hate having to fire up TMT - audio-video sync inevitably drifts all over the place with TMT 6. I badly miss using MC when watching 3D bluray, and I'd rather not convert stuff to HSBS or HOU and lose half the horizontal or vertical resolution.

However, Jim and JRiver have not remained in business for so long without making mostly the right decisions on average. I don't think JRiver can tackle full-on support of BD without fragmenting their product line. Audiophiles would not want to pay for BD playback features, and it would have to be an extra charge if JRiver were to licence, I imagine. Too much of a risk. On the other hand, those on the shelf may well commit to MC (at least I would like to think this!) if 3D playback were supported, somehow. I don't know how though, realistically from the discussions we've already had; it's not a priority, and that is understandable in the real world.

[6233638]

Being a licensed player means all sorts of restrictions on playback that I built the HTPC to get away from.
VLC now has working BD menu support and is open source. I wonder if that could be integrated.

[fitbrit]

Being a licensed player means all sorts of restrictions on playback that I built the HTPC to get away from.

+1

[TheLion]

Thanks, Hendrik. I fully understand the argument and reasoning behind this business decision (as mentioned in my post).

I too prefer title-based playback, although some don't (especially as it can be very annoying to e.g. blindfold search through special features).
I didn't buy into 3D just because JRiver doesn't support it and I wouldn't touch TMT/Cyberlink ;-)
But I am aware that you look into supporting these two features (unofficially) anyway - maybe some day.

I guess my main concern is about JRiver having a "battle plan" regarding an upcoming 4k disc format.

Thanks about the DTS-HD MA news - that's great!

The last time we talked about this internally, it didn't look good. Both the resource and financial costs are very significant, and beyond what we can do without severely depriving all other areas of MC for a long time. Not to mention that plenty people (including me) are pretty happy with title-based playback as it is today, as menus are pretty annoying on many discs.

Some of the things would be an interesting technical challenge, but I wouldn't hold my breath really.

PS:
DTS-HD MA decoding is coming natively to LAV. Maybe this year if the developer of that feature hurries up a bit, otherwise soon after.

PPS:
Not that J6P would even notice the difference, if he isn't told there is one.

[TheLion]

Being a licensed player means all sorts of restrictions on playback that I built the HTPC to get away from.
VLC now has working BD menu support and is open source. I wonder if that could be integrated.

Amen to that. I didn't think about not being able to provide the status quo as "licensed player" anymore. But I guess unofficially continuing to support the current unofficial playback approach along side a full featured J6P BD playback would be possible (unofficially) ;-)   

[Hendrik]

Any upcoming 4k format is likely to be built with existing technologies, like either the H.264 or H.265 video codecs, which are already supported just fine. I don't see a big road block up ahead on that front honestly.

[thorsten]

Hi,

The Lack of 3D is IMHO the only 'drawback' of MC. I Personally don't watch 3D, but I Know some Friends WHO warnt this. Ok, up to now they use their Oppos so they don't get rusty   

But, I don't want Full BD support. I'm very pleased that a Film just Starts......

I also Love the Product Strategy with Constant improvement and Easy Updates to the next versions every Year for a bargain!

(Sorry for the capitals, but my German iPad doesn't really understand english writing and Love to Auto-correct....)

[ferday]

I don't think JRiver can tackle full-on support of BD without fragmenting their product line. Audiophiles would not want to pay for BD playback features, and it would have to be an extra charge if JRiver were to licence, I imagine. Too much of a risk. On the other hand, those on the shelf may well commit to MC (at least I would like to think this!) if 3D playback were supported, somehow. I don't know how though, realistically from the discussions we've already had; it's not a priority, and that is understandable in the real world.

as someone who rips BD immediately (into .mkv) and then sells or re-gifts the disc, i could care less about titles/menus.  i also don't care about 3d.  i do totally understand why people do, but i'm one of those who would be unwilling to pay extra to attain these features.

well...maybe not unwilling, as MC has become an integrated part of my life, so i wouldn't ditch it with a moderate price increase...but i certainly would much prefer that this kind of stuff is in a separate package or plugin.

6233638 said it right....i built an HTPC for a reason, and right now MC is fulfilling the requirements pretty well.

[apgood]

BD 3D playback would be great, and menus would be nice if it didn't require licensing since with licensing come all sorts of restrictions

[Hilton]

I don't wont full official bluray support either.

What I would like in order of priority though is:

Native 3D decoding and rendering.
Native DTS-HD MA - its coming..... hmmm ok. Not a biggie for me though as the work around isn't too bad, but I can see how having native would "look good" on the specs.

The real problem for JRiver is that hardware players and streamers are getting cheaper and cheaper and much better with more and more overlap of the capabilities of JRiver.
There are several cheap rendering devices out there now that do a great job of handling almost any format you can throw at them. (including 3D MVC MKV, 2D and 3D ISO, M2TS 3D, DTS-HD-MA etc)

Over time, that makes JRiver even more of a niche product than it already is.  

Don't get me wrong, I love the product, but I'm a tinkerer.

But, even for an advanced user like me, I still have kids and WAF to worry about, and that can get tedious when having to trouble shoot ISO mount issues, 3D, audio sync and subtitles issues.

How do I explain to my 4 year old, hang on honey daddy's got to fix the ISO mount script.

[Ste7enPK]

When a disc is authored with seamless branching Is there a way to select which version of a move plays in MC? This and native 3D support is what has prevented me from completely abandoning my Oppo.

[Hilton]

When a disc is authored with seamless branching Is there a way to select which version of a move plays in MC? This and native 3D support is what has prevented me from completely abandoning my Oppo.

I think the titles menu will work for that but I haven't tried any seamless branching ISOs or folder rips to confirm.
You could always rip it to an MKV with any number of tools. DVDfab and MakeMKV are what I currently use.

[MrGlasspoole]

Maybe stupid question. Whats the thing with 3D in MC?
I'm not really into 3D and have just a view 3D mkv's cause my exgirlfriend had
a 3D TV and i wanted to test it.
I'm pretty sure all i did was drag and drop the movie into MPC-HC.

[fitbrit]

There are multiple formats of 3D. Side by side and over/under are two modes that work with MC, but you lose half of the horizontal or vertical resolution respectively. The display device can either recognise or be told to assume these modes when they're played. Therefore these files are just drag and drop or click to play in MC. This is likely what you saw.
We're talking about actual 3d Bluray formats, as in unadulterated disk or iso image formats. These are usually frame-packed video files and neither of the video renderers provided in Red October can handle these, as well as other technical challenges that prevent MC from viewing these files in 3D. They play back flawlessly as 2D though.

[Hilton]

The other option to consider is splitting the product strategy.

Many other software companies offer different levels of software with different features for a different fee, all built on a core program.

Perhaps this creates the opportunity for JRiver to go toe to toe with TMT and PowerDVD with a premium full bluray support version and continue with the underlying core with the current pricing.
That way you please both crowds, get more revenue to pay for the bluray membership and development.

I for one would be happy to pay almost double what I pay for JRiver to get everything I need in 1 piece of software, Id probably still buy the core current product too so I can use direct play MKV when I don't want menus or 3D.

You guys shouldn't sell your selves short with what you've achieved with JRiver.




Membership Levels

Membership in the Blu-ray Disc Association (BDA) is divided into three membership levels. (this is just to provide input into standards, this doesn't give use rights, see licensing below)

Board of Directors
Companies participating in the Board of Directors are active participants of the format creation and key BDA activities. They are selected from the Contributors by election. The board sets an overall strategy and approves key issues. A board member can participate in all activities and attend all meetings. The Blu-ray Disc Founder companies will make up the initial Board of Directors.
 Annual fee: $ 50,000

Contributor
Contributors are active participants of the format creation and other key BDA activities. They can be elected to become a member of the Board of Directors. A contributor can attend general meetings and seminars, and can participate in Technical Expert Groups (TEGs), regional Promotion Team activities, and most of the Compliance Committee (CC) activities. Membership requires execution of Contribution Agreement and must be approved by the Board of Directors.
 Annual fee: $ 20,000

General member
General membership provides access to specific information from Committee discussions. A general member can attend general meetings and seminars. They can participate in specific Regional Promotion Team activities and specific CC activities.
 Annual fee: $3,000

Please note: BDA membership is for those who want to actively participate in format development and to have early access to information on BD acvitities. BDA membership does not automatically give you access to published version of BD format specifications. If you become a Contributor member, you will have access to BD format specifications under development for the sole purpose of participating in the format development discussions. If your primary interest is to obtain BD format specifications or to license BD logo and format specifications for your product development, please contact License Agency (http://www.blu-raydisc.info). The licensing of the BD logo and format specifications does not require that you become a BDA member.

------------

Licensing

There are also a couple levels of licensing available.
The lowest is effectively the R&D licensing to evaluate suitability of the standards for product development. (not too bad IMHO to determine whether its something you really want to take on)

IA
Term: 1 year
Fees:
•US$ 2,500- for 1st Book (in every format)

•US$ 1,500- for 2nd Book (in every format)

•US$ 1,000- for 3rd and onward book (in every format)

-----------
And then there's full membership and certification under the FLAA - This ones definitely a lot steeper to take on.
You could as someone has suggested above, workout the feasibility with a kickstart type campaign if you really want to see what uptake and return you might get.

FLAA licencing and membership
•Term: 5 years

•Fee: The fee for RE2, RE3, RE4, R1, R2, R3, and AVCREC FLLA is $15,000 for one business category and $30,000 for the multiple business categories per Format Licenses. The fee for ROM2.0 and ROM3.0 FLLA is $30,000 one business category and $60,000 for the multiple business categories. There is also a Format Maintenance & Development Fee of $50,000 for BD-ROM3. This is a onetime fee that is due when the very first 3D BD product Test Verification is completed at the BD Testing Center. The fee for ROM2.0 and ROM3.0 FLLA Commercial Audiovisual Content is $4,000.




  

[RoderickGI]

I would hope that JRiver Media Center will someday (soon) be a complete Media Center. That is, it plays all media content, including DVD with menus, 2D and 3D Blu-rays with menus, and does FTA TV, IP TV, and streaming sources, a whole lot better than it does today.

There are a whole lot of Windows Media Centre users out there that are going to be very disappointed in the future, probably the near future, when WMC is no longer available, or important new functionality is not added.

Specifically on the 3D Blu-ray issue though, I would really like to get rid of PowerDVD 10, which came with my Blu-ray drive and I use for 3D movies. It is a pain. Needs an update for nearly every new 3D movie, and the update process doesn't work well, if at all. I don't much like 3D at the movies, but on the TV at home it can be great because it uses active glasses.

Maybe just better integration to a third party player would be a viable solution. I know, working with third parties never works well, but if it was the third party that developed a version of their player that worked as a plugins to MC, and they paid all the licencing and did all maintenance, it may work.

For example, DVDfab have released a Media Player that claims to do it all. Not only that, I saw an interesting quote on their web page; "NOTE: DVDFab Media Player is powered by XBMC." I suspect it is just the peripheral media capabilities that are handled by XMBC (or whatever it is called these days) components, and that the DVDfab player itself is a very light weight, callable component. Could MC call that, instead of calling crippled software like TMT or Cyberlink? Of course I want to bypass the three minute FBI warning, and the new two minute "thanks for buying the disc" movie, but DVDfab can do that. MC just needs to handle the sound, and if possible improve the video quality the player produces. O even just play the disc correctly from within the MC environment.

Please think outside the box as to how MC can provide the full Media Center experience, legally, without the licencing fees, risk, or massive resources. Perhaps by having the user install a plugin that someone else has developed based on their core technologies. Oh, but don't end up like other software and is made up of all sorts of bits, that a user needs to spend three years studying to assemble.

[6233638]

Native 3D decoding and rendering.

Madshi has said that he would like to implement 3D rendering in madVR, but the problem is that he wants to support legacy systems on all three GPU vendors, which is a lot of work.
As I understand it, Windows 8 introduced a standardized 3D API which would have made implementation a lot easier.

But, even for an advanced user like me, I still have kids and WAF to worry about, and that can get tedious when having to trouble shoot ISO mount issues, 3D, audio sync and subtitles issues.

How do I explain to my 4 year old, hang on honey daddy's got to fix the ISO mount script.

How are you playing back ISO files in Media Center? I have Virtual CloneDrive installed, and selecting an ISO file in Media Center automatically mounts and plays the disc. No scripts required.
 
Audio Sync should be a "set and forget" thing.
If you are finding that it changes depending on the audio format being played, you might want to upsample everything to a single fixed sample rate. I play back all video at 192kHz to prevent any timing variance.
Make sure that you are not bitstreaming, and have Video Clock enabled.
 
I do think that allowing people to use XySubFilter instead of Media Center's default renderer would fix most of the complaints about subtitles.
Even if it is not supported in an official capacity (which would be nice) allowing the use of alternative renderers would at least let people use it if they wanted to.

When a disc is authored with seamless branching Is there a way to select which version of a move plays in MC? This and native 3D support is what has prevented me from completely abandoning my Oppo.

You should be able to select it from the titles menu. The difficulty is knowing which title corresponds to which version - especially with discs now using playlist obfuscation.
I'm not certain, but I think AnyDVD only marks the main title as "good" and not the alternate titles. It's also frustrating when you get a before it has been added to their database yet.

[Hilton]

How are you playing back ISO files in Media Center? I have Virtual CloneDrive installed, and selecting an ISO file in Media Center automatically mounts and plays the disc. No scripts required.
 

I need to distinguish between 2D and 3D ISO so that only 3D ISO will playback with the external player.
The script also sets the correct 3DPlay mode and resolution for NVIDIA 3D playback, stops MC from playing, and closes TMT when stop or back is pressed to return to MC.
It also resets the resolution on return to MC too.

Unfortunately if you leave Nvidia 3DPlay active it will try to play all 24p material in 3D so you need the script to turn 3DPlay on and off.
I also have a custom resolution with custom timings for 24p so that it plays back at the exact 23.976 as the default 24p settings are out a little in the Nvidia driver.

Using standard 2D BD ISO in MC isn't the issue, all this work around stuff is currently needed to enjoy full framepacked 3D from an ISO and then return to MC so that it has a high WAF.

[Arindelle]

I need to distinguish between 2D and 3D ISO so that only 3D ISO will playback with the external player.
The script also sets the correct 3DPlay mode and resolution for NVIDIA 3D playback, stops MC from playing, and closes TMT when stop or back is pressed to return to MC.
It also resets the resolution on return to MC too.

Unfortunately if you leave Nvidia 3DPlay active it will try to play all 24p material in 3D so you need the script to turn 3DPlay on and off.
I also have a custom resolution with custom timings for 24p so that it plays back at the exact 23.976 as the default 24p settings are out a little in the Nvidia driver.

Using standard 2D BD ISO in MC isn't the issue, all this work around stuff is currently needed to enjoy full framepacked 3D from an ISO and then return to MC so that it has a high WAF.

I use clone drive too it just works. But question from a real video noob here, why rip to iso in the first place, and not mkv? thanks and sorry for the slight deviation.

[Hilton]

I use clone drive too it just works. But question from a real video noob here, why rip to iso in the first place, and not mkv? thasnk and sorry for the slight deviation

Because no software players apart from stereoscopic player can play proper full HD framepacked 3D from a MVC MKV file.
We are talking 3D specifically here. 2D ISO is perfect in JRiver.
All the commercial players need to have a full original ISO to play 3D with full resolution framepacking. Sure you can convert to 3D SBS or OAU but then you loose half your resolution best case and in some cases you end up with only 1/4 resolution on passive displays.

JRiver can play the 2D from a ISO fine but it cant play 3D at all from an ISO, it can only play SBS/OAU half res 3D in a MKV.

[Arindelle]

@Hiltonk -- thanks for the explanation sorry for the OT again

[JimH]

The other option to consider is splitting the product strategy.
...
FLAA licencing and membership
•Term: 5 years

•Fee: The fee for RE2, RE3, RE4, R1, R2, R3, and AVCREC FLLA is $15,000 for one business category and $30,000 for the multiple business categories per Format Licenses. The fee for ROM2.0 and ROM3.0 FLLA is $30,000 one business category and $60,000 for the multiple business categories. There is also a Format Maintenance & Development Fee of $50,000 for BD-ROM3. This is a onetime fee that is due when the very first 3D BD product Test Verification is completed at the BD Testing Center. The fee for ROM2.0 and ROM3.0 FLLA Commercial Audiovisual Content is $4,000.

Looks like a menu at an expensive restaurant.  I just see dollars with wings.

I'll watch this for a while before I pour any more cold water on it, but I have trouble imagining how it would work financially.

[Hendrik]

Don't forget the patent fees that come on top of the licensing as well, the world is evil enough to make this two separate things. 

[leezer3]

Looks like a menu at an expensive restaurant.  I just see dollars with wings.

I'll watch this for a while before I pour any more cold water on it, but I have trouble imagining how it would work financially.

Completely agree

Most of this stuff is parasitical on developers, artists and end users for the benefits of the big corporations and nobody else.

It's just like the barriers thrown around Netflix et al to artificially restrict consumers in one location from buying what is available elsewhere.

FWIW, I believe the DVD-Fab media player they're selling is simply a decryption layer slapped on top of an XBMC build, so in pure playback terms nothing more interesting than what's available currently.

Veering off topic a little:
As a personal opinion, 3D is not worth much.
Sure it's got a few neat little tricks, but just like the Wii, these little tricks get old very fast, and they're no reason to invest in the format.

-Leezer-

[RoderickGI]

FWIW, I believe the DVD-Fab media player they're selling is simply a decryption layer slapped on top of an XBMC build, so in pure playback terms nothing more interesting than what's available currently.

Except that it plays 3D Blu-rays, or at least the paid version does.

FWIW I don't agree with splitting the product strategy either. But in not supporting all major disc formats within the product, JRiver is providing an incomplete product that requires a somewhat tech savvy user to complete. I wouldn't mind that, but the solutions (TMT, Cyberlink) are a pain in the ...  Not only that, they don't use the MC audio and video processing, and have different controls and interfaces. So the user has to know be aware that the Blu-ray they are about to watch is 3D, stop MC from playing it (as I play other BDs in MC, it starts playing automatically), then start Cyberlink (in my case) and play the BD in that. Not good for the WAF. Especially when Cyberlink seems to lose audio sync on nearly all Blu-ray movies.

If MC could detect that a BD inserted is a 3D Blu-ray, and call Cyberlink to play it, that would be a significant improvement. But at this time I don't believe MC can differentiate between a 2D and 3D Blu-ray disc.

BTW, I don't mean to criticise. It is just that I was hoping for a one stop shop solution that provided the best sound and video, and wouldn't require constant attention to keep working. If not now, then at least over time.

[Hilton]

Except that it plays 3D Blu-rays, or at least the paid version does.

FWIW I don't agree with splitting the product strategy either. But in not supporting all major disc formats within the product, JRiver is providing an incomplete product that requires a somewhat tech savvy user to complete. I wouldn't mind that, but the solutions (TMT, Cyberlink) are a pain in the ...  Not only that, they don't use the MC audio and video processing, and have different controls and interfaces. So the user has to know be aware that the Blu-ray they are about to watch is 3D, stop MC from playing it (as I play other BDs in MC, it starts playing automatically), then start Cyberlink (in my case) and play the BD in that. Not good for the WAF. Especially when Cyberlink seems to lose audio sync on nearly all Blu-ray movies.

If MC could detect that a BD inserted is a 3D Blu-ray, and call Cyberlink to play it, that would be a significant improvement. But at this time I don't believe MC can differentiate between a 2D and 3D Blu-ray disc.

BTW, I don't mean to criticise. It is just that I was hoping for a one stop shop solution that provided the best sound and video, and wouldn't require constant attention to keep working. If not now, then at least over time.

Matt's just putting this feature into the next beta build of MC20. Jmone and I have been using a script for this but now its pretty much redundant.
This avoids the user intervention you mentioned above as MC20 will detect the 3D disc now and automatically launch an external player. While 2D will continue to play in MC20.

4. Changed: 3d blu-rays are categorized differently (use Update Library (from tags)) so that it's possible to configure external playback on the type bdmv3d.

[RoderickGI]

Brilliant! Well, a good start anyway.

[Hilton]

Brilliant! Well, a good start anyway.

It's actually quite a big change for such a small feature!  You should thank Jmone, he proposed this change in beginning of last year I think and with all the recent discussion about 3D and menus it resurfaced. (I got on my hobby horse for better 3D support too)

I'll do a video guide and post after the release of MC20 on how to get 3D movie only ISO's launched from MC20 with TMT6.7 and PowerDVD 14 for both Nvidia and Intel GPUs.

I worked out how to reauthor a 3D BD to a movie only ISO with one extra step in the ripping process.

It speeds up the mount and launch of the movie in the external player significantly.

[fitbrit]

Thanks, Hiltonk. That video would be awesome!
Can we take previously ripped 3D BluRays iso files and re-jig them to be movie only too, or is it just easier to re-rip them?

[RoderickGI]

I look forward to MC20 and the video Hiltonk. I may even look at using it to work out how to use DVDfab Media Player to do the same. Always worth trying options.

[Bizarroterl]

If JRiver went full BR licensed I would leave the room.  As others have stated before, the reason they went with a HTPC is to get away from forced menus.  I'm in the same boat.    Without a HTPC I'd have another hobby, as forced menus drove me nuts.

If full menu/3D support is important to enough users my suggestion to JRiver is to get into an agreement with TMT/Cyberlink/??  for them to provide the player portion for a full BR menu/etc support version.  I suspect the potential user list would shrink when it is determined how much JRiver would have to charge.

[Hilton]

Thanks, Hiltonk. That video would be awesome!
Can we take previously ripped 3D BluRays iso files and re-jig them to be movie only too, or is it just easier to re-rip them?

Existing ISOs will just convert faster, there's no need to rerip them to reauthor them.

[RoderickGI]

If JRiver went full BR licensed I would leave the room.

What I am asking for is the ability to play 3D movies. I don't want to be forced to watch the FBI warnings, or wait for over produced menus either. Although sometimes I would like the option of seeing the menus, and hence viewing the additional material as it was designed to be presented. But that would be a rare requirement.

If full menu/3D support is important to enough users my suggestion to JRiver is to get into an agreement with TMT/Cyberlink/??

Add to that list the DVDfab media player, which no doubt has no respect for DRM and forced videos and menus, then I think that would be a good idea.

Ideally though, any such deal would involve the player using MC video and audio functionality.

[glynor]

What I am asking for is the ability to play 3D movies. I don't want to be forced to watch the FBI warnings, or wait for over produced menus either.

If you go "official"... You can't have one without the o-ther.

[Ekpen]

Looks like a menu at an expensive restaurant.  I just see dollars with wings.

I'll watch this for a while before I pour any more cold water on it, but I have trouble imagining how it would work financially.

Jim,
Please do not under estimate your customer base. I and most of your customers will rise to the occassion. I have no problem paying double or tripple or even $75.00 for a  yearly upgrade.
You  know best.
Give us the best, without limitations.

In my short stint with ISO, using Samsung Galaxy note 1st generation, I was not able to play or display ISO files under Gizmo, same with Directv stbs, that was what made me go MKV route.
Now I have Note3, MKV plays fine, and Directv stbs also work with Mkv.

Thanks.
George.

[thorsten]

Jim,
Please do not under estimate your customer base. I and most of your customers will rise to the occassion. I have no problem paying double or tripple or even $75.00 for a  yearly upgrade.
You  know best.

Just for 3D and menues? No.
I think you overestimate the number of 3D-aholics.

[glynor]

Just for 3D and menues? No.
I think you overestimate the number of 3D-aholics.

+1

I'm decidedly meh on the whole thing.

[mwillems]

FWIW I'm pretty indifferent to menus and 3d, but I would pay significantly more for a licensed Blu-Ray playback module in MC, provided such a module could still make use of JRiver's DSP stack.  

But it seems like the licensing process could wind up effectively forcing MC to bitstream audio from Blu-Rays, which would put me in the "meh" camp.  It seems like it could potentially be a lot of cash and effort for a solution that (due to mandatory DRM) winds up not being any better than the current external solutions (i.e. using MC to launch a licensed player like powerdvd, which typically ships free with Blu-Ray drives).

[glynor]

But it seems like the licensing process could wind up effectively forcing MC to bitstream audio from Blu-Rays, which would put me in the "meh" camp.  It seems like it could potentially be a lot of cash and effort for a solution that (due to mandatory DRM) winds up not being any better than the current external solutions (i.e. using MC to launch a licensed player like powerdvd, which typically ships free with Blu-Ray drives).

I don't know about the forcing to bitstream requirement, but that might be part of the draconian DRM requirements that would be included.  There would be other impacts too.  JRiver would likely have to remove the current DVD Ripping functionality it already has (or, at least, "do more" to prevent it from working well with AnyDVD and similar applications), and probably much of the video conversion functionality it has, before it would be licensed by the BluRay consortium.

The massive payola required is only part of the cost.  They'd also require the ability to review MC for compliance.  This would grant them, essentially, "right of first denial" for any new feature JRiver wanted to add that could possibly be used to run afoul of their (ever shifting, politically driven) anti-piracy crusade.  That would be essentially death to the JRiver business model and system for developing.

In short: It would "infect" the rest of the application and they'd have to remove features that already exist, and avoid others in the future.

Boo on that noise.

And, I should add, comparisons to things available in DVD Fab, when discussing "official, licensed" players, isn't particularly helpful.  Since DVD Fab, of course, is famously not "legit".

[mwillems]

And, I should add, comparisons to things available in DVD Fab, when discussing "official, licensed" players, isn't particularly helpful.  Since DVD Fab, of course, is famously not "legit".

Yeah, I was obviously not thinking of DVDFab and AnyDVD in my reference to "licensed players";  they both look feature rich, but...

Legitimacy and convenience are the main reasons I'd be happy to pay for integrated, licensed playback even if it added no features, because launching powerDVD/TMT for legit playback and looping back/syncing their audio is kind of a drag.  

But I agree it's not worth doing integration if that means crippling the software; there are readily available legit blu-ray players that are feature-poor/DRM-rich already  

[phusis]

I don't know about the forcing to bitstream requirement, but that might be part of the draconian DRM requirements that would be included.  There would be other impacts too.  JRiver would likely have to remove the current DVD Ripping functionality it already has (or, at least, "do more" to prevent it from working well with AnyDVD and similar applications), and probably much of the video conversion functionality it has, before it would be licensed by the BluRay consortium.

The massive payola required is only part of the cost.  They'd also require the ability to review MC for compliance.  This would grant them, essentially, "right of first denial" for any new feature JRiver wanted to add that could possibly be used to run afoul of their (ever shifting, politically driven) anti-piracy crusade.  That would be essentially death to the JRiver business model and system for developing.

In short: It would "infect" the rest of the application and they'd have to remove features that already exist, and avoid others in the future.

Boo on that noise.

And, I should add, comparisons to things available in DVD Fab, when discussing "official, licensed" players, isn't particularly helpful.  Since DVD Fab, of course, is famously not "legit".

+1

Excuse me for putting this bluntly, but going by the above I'd rather scramble, post-haste and screaming, the hell away from the opportunity of a "full featured, official Blu-Ray support" and maintain (or even enhance) the excellent quality, relative developement freedom and fair price of the JRiver package as a whole as is.

[syndromeofadown]

In short:
Better integration of 3D rips for external players is a great idea that should keep the 3D users happy.

If particles were further developed into awesomeness, they could be even better than menus.
MC could even do its own custom menus that show particles of a particular rip.


In long:
It would seam silly to officially support a dead format.
Im not sure it was ever alive.

Sony is having losses with its physical formats. Maybe it has something to do with its high price for ridiculous DRM constraints.
Blu-ray took the same path as failed DVD-Audio and SACD. No one wanted expensive discs they couldn't even rip or play in car.
Blu-ray + DVD + Digital Copy + UltraViolet combo packs are bizarre. I can imagine my grandma trying to figure out what she's suppose to do with all that junk.

When commenting on 3D for MC17, Jim correctly stated

I think it will die.  It was fun as a novelty

3D seams quite dead. It was used for marketing new TVs but 4k has since replaced it as the new must have feature.
Throw your 3D TV in the garbage, it's a piece of crap.
Maybe the required 3D TV, 3D Blu-ray player, 3D HDMI cable, 3D compatable reciever,
3D glasses for each family member, and 3D media had something to do with it.
All being marketed to people that already own perfectly fine TVs, dvd players, DVDs, etc.

I do think sales of Blu-ray will increase in the upcoming years.
It will happen when 6TB dives are in the 100 dollar price range and the 2 dollar bin at Walmart is full of Blu-rays.
The sales increase will have nothing to do with a good business model but will instead be from dumping whats remaining of failed one.

[RoderickGI]

If you go "official"... You can't have one without the o-ther.

I wouldn't want MC to go official, or do anything that wasn't completely legitimate, for all of the reasons listed in this thread. That would defeat the purpose of this request, and be foolish.

But we all know that there is a working solution for playing Blu-ray discs in MC right now. All I would like to see is that option extended to 3D Blu-rays, so that I can watch them in the same manner that I watch all my normal Blu-ray discs. Currently, MC plays a 3D Blu-ray in 2D using the method we all know.

Animated 3D movies are a lot of fun, and have lots of re-watch appeal. I believe that will continue to be the case until better technology comes along.

I would be happy to buy a stripped down, custom and fully integrated version of either TMT or PowerDVD, as long as I didn't have to sit through all the dire warnings, ads, and over-blown menus. I feel punished every time I put a new, legitimate, paid for Blu-ray in the drive to watch, and I'm doing the right and legal thing! I know. Grumble grumble. But it is very frustrating.

[Hendrik]

Playing 3D content natively is not tied to Blu-ray support. It might happen eventually, as priorities shift and other tasks are completed.

[Hilton]

When commenting on 3D for MC17, Jim correctly stated
3D seams quite dead. It was used for marketing new TVs but 4k has since replaced it as the new must have feature.
Throw your 3D TV in the garbage, it's a piece of crap.
Maybe the required 3D TV, 3D Blu-ray player, 3D HDMI cable, 3D compatable reciever,
3D glasses for each family member, and 3D media had something to do with it.
All being marketed to people that already own perfectly fine TVs, dvd players, DVDs, etc.

I think that's more personal opinion than fact.
I also think its a bit of an over statement, I have over 40 3D discs.
Most AAA titles and even some of the B grades are coming out in 3D.
Also 8 of the top 10 grossing indie films are 3D.

Sales of 3D titles are still strong especially outside the US.
4K sales are not.  
The US market is also very different from other global markets like Europe and Asia at the moment, with some top films like Maleficent and Frozen not even getting a 3D release in the US, while Europe and Asia do.

http://www.etcentric.org/analysts-credit-gravity-with-bringing-3d-back-to-the-spotlight/
"“Gravity” brought in 80 percent of its debut haul from 3D engagement, leading analysts to credit the film for bringing the format back into the spotlight. For studios and exhibitors, this is a plus because 3D tickets carry a large surcharge, potentially bringing in million of dollars. The recent increase in 3D interest can be partially attributed to the directors, including Gareth Edwards (“Godzilla”) and Marc Webb (“The Amazing Spider-Man 2″), who have been encouraging fans to see their films in 3D.

“We all took 3D for granted,” said Cinemark CEO Tim Warner. “The studios made them in 3D, but they didn’t sell them in 3D. The exhibitors just said, ‘If people want to see them in 3D, fine. If they don’t, fine.’ So we didn’t market them either. We all saw that ‘Hey, here’s something that has really become about 20 percent of our box office, and if it goes away, none of us really has an idea to replace it.’”

Last summer, most audiences opted not to see movies in 3D, but this season researchers are seeing a sharp increase."


https://technology.ihs.com/418475/global-3-d-market-flourishes-across-cinema-home-video-and-tv-vod-platforms

http://bsandrew.blogspot.com.au/2014/03/the-coming-renaissance-of-indie.html

And an older one
http://www.tmcnet.com/topics/articles/2013/03/18/330805-with-strong-dvd-blu-ray-sales-3d-home.htm

[Hilton]

BTW with the new bdmv3d option in MC20 I can now play my whole 40 3D titles without a hitch launching an external player.

I created some new batch files which might need to be tweaked depending on your system and ISO mount tool.

There also a visual basic script that kicks it all off and makes it happen invisibly.

Copy this text into notepad and save it as invisible.vbs

Set JRiver to run this as a custom external program for bdmv3d with the argument [filename]

I renamed all my ISO's to remove spaces (replaced with underscore) in the filenames as scripts sometimes don't like being passed the quotes you need around filenames with spaces in them.

You may need to adjust the path for the 3Dmount.bat and of course your ISO mount program and 3D switch for your video driver if you need it.

invisible.vbs

Code: [Select]

Set WshShell = CreateObject("WScript.Shell")
For Each a In WScript.Arguments
  arg = arg & " " & a
Next 'a
WshShell.Run "C:\3Dmount.bat" & arg, 0
Set WshShell = Nothing

And some tweaks to the 3Dmount.bat that the wscript calls

3Dmount.bat

Code: [Select]

SET INPUT1=%1
SET ISOFileNamePath=%INPUT1%

SET ISOmount="C:\Program Files\DVDFab Virtual Drive\vdrive.exe"

%ISOmount% /M:0 %ISOFileNamePath%

timeout 1

mc20.exe /stop

timeout 1

REM mc20.exe /stop

REM timeout 1

call C:\TMTstart.bat

"C:\Program Files (x86)\NVIDIA Corporation\3D Vision\nvstlink.exe" /disable

%ISOmount% /U:0Don't forget to scroll down and also copy these 2 lines in the code above!
"C:\Program Files (x86)\NVIDIA Corporation\3D Vision\nvstlink.exe" /disable

%ISOmount% /U:0

And finally some tweaks to the TMTstart.bat which starts TMT (from the call in 3Dmount.bat), to make sure MC doesn't start playing the ISO.
TMTstart.bat

Code: [Select]

"C:\Program Files (x86)\NVIDIA Corporation\3D Vision\nvstlink.exe" /enable

timeout 1

mc20.exe /stop

timeout 1

start /w "" "C:\Program Files (x86)\ArcSoft\TotalMedia Theatre 6\uMCEPlayer6.exe"
Someone else with better programming skills than me could probably do this all in vbscript but I cant be bothered.

Now I can run all my 3D blurays from theatre view with just a remote and with minimal screen flickering between the app switch to TMT and back.

I just have to reauthor all my discs now down to just movie and subs only to speed the movie start up a bit by bypassing the menus etc.

PS. for testing purposed just load the 3Dmount.bat from MC instead of invisible.vbs .
If everything is working, just change MC to load the invisible.vbs and your all set!

I'll post instructions shortly on how to reauthor your 3D ISO discs to movie only ISOs in one quick step that only adds about 3mins to the ripping process.

[Hilton]

Ripping your 3D movie to movie only ISO that launches without menus straight to the movie. (and you can automate the launch with my new scripts above and the change to the bdmv3d settings in MC20.)

Step 1: Rip with MakeMKV to a MVC MKV.





Step 2: Re-Author to an ISO with tsmuxergui
Load the 3D MVC MKV from MakeMKV and set your output destination and filename.(if your using my scripts above to launch the ISO I suggest using underscores instead of spaces)
Set file type to Bluray ISO
Give it a volume label (name of movie)


On this disc I trimmed the 30sec of blank time at the beginning of the disc to start straight to the main feature.
Then go back to the main tab and click start muxing.
Simple as that and it only takes about another 3mins. 
All up about 20mins to rip and reauthor my 3D disk to a movie only ISO with my preferred audio and subs.



With my new automount script enjoy your 3D movie with no annoying menus with full automation within MC20 so you can use theatreview with a remote control to simply open your 3D movie and switch to your external player.
When you press stop the external player closes and your returned to MC20 theatre view.

I added a 3D menu to Theatreview.




When I have some more time I'll take a video of it in action. (when I watch a movie this evening)

Enjoy!