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Published on August 8, 2007

In fact, 24fps is the latest video standard. It is designed to reduce video-conversion errors when watching movies shot at 24 frames per second. In the film industry, movies are filmed at a rate of 24fps.

But to convert from 24fps onto a home video, engineers must add many extra frames to make it look smooth on your television set. These extra frames are most noticeable when watching slow picture motion.

Regular PAL broadcasting and DVDs have always played these images back at 25fps (NTSC = 30fps). This slight speed increase (4.17 per cent) has the effect of speeding up images and raising the pitch of sounds and voices, also known as "judder". A typical transfer of a DVD or broadcast will thus not be exactly like the original.

To cope with this problem, the 24fps pictures are displayed with a 3:2 pull-down, resulting in each picture being shown twice, This in turn results in a distortion of the timeline, which causes the visual system to judder unnaturally. But the new-high definition discs - ie, Blu-ray discs - offer accessibility to a digital "true to the original" copy of the theatrical film content.

Pioneer, among the first to do so, has unveiled a Blu-ray disc player: the BDP-LX70. With a direct output of 1080p/24fps, the BDP-LX70 is truly the leader in next-generation high-definition (HD) movie viewing. This means Pioneer's BDP-LX70 is capable of playing back movies at 24fps in 1080p, the same speed as the film was originally shot.

Pioneer is also putting this 1080p/24 feature into its new-generation plasma television sets. This ensures that the ability to play content at 24fps is present from the player right through to the display. This is the unparalleled level of film quality that home-theatre enthusiasts have been waiting for, delivering HD video details that were previously impossible with DVD.

With up to 50 gigabytes of storage space, Blu-ray discs have more than double the space capacity than do ordinary DVDs, making it possible to store video information at a rate of 1920-x-1080p output, the highest pinnacle of HD signals. Coupled with the Dolby True HD and DTS HD, the new-generation disc is capable of delivering "lossless" audio capability, such as studio master-quality sound.

In short, Pioneer's new Blu-ray disc player delivers audio and video exactly as the film-maker intended, due to its capability of scanning video at 24fps, the same frame speed as filmed material.

By Wijit Boonchoo

Ultimate in Luxury

The Luxury LS 460 is a wonderfully comfaortable car fitted with all mod cons, althoough not necessarily the most fun vehicle to drive.