I think it’s NHK, or one of the Japanese broadcasters anyways, that has actually been pressing for 8K since the 1990s. They didn’t have content back then and I doubt they have much today, but that’s what they wanted HD to be.
Comment on Big Surprise—Nobody Wants 8K TVs
acosmichippo@lemmy.world 1 month ago
article took forever to get to the bottom line. content. 8k content essentially does not exist.
jqubed@lemmy.world 1 month ago
NuXCOM_90Percent@lemmy.zip 1 month ago
Not familiar with NHK specifically, but it really makes a lot of sense for news networks to push for 8k or even 16k at this point.
Because it is a chicken and egg thing. Nobody is going to buy an 8k TV if all the things they watch are 1440p. But, similarly, there aren’t going to be widespread 8k releases if everyone is watching on 1440p screens and so forth.
But what that ALSO means is that there is no reason to justify using 8k cameras if the best you can hope for is a premium 4k stream of a sporting event. And news outlets are fairly regularly the only source of video evidence of literally historic events.
From a much more banal perspective, it is why there is a gap in TV/film where you go from 1080p or even 4k re-releases to increasingly shady upscaling of 720 or even 480 content back to everything being natively 4k. Over simplifying, it is because we were using MUCH higher quality cameras than we really should have been for so long before switching to cheaper film and outright digital sensors because “there is no point”. Obviously this ALSO is dependent on saving the high resolution originals but… yeah.
acosmichippo@lemmy.world 1 month ago
it’s not exactly “there is no point”. It’s more like “the cost to film and broadcast in 8k is not economically feasible”.
Knock_Knock_Lemmy_In@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Filming in 8k does have advantages. You can crop without losing quality.
NuXCOM_90Percent@lemmy.zip 1 month ago
Which, for all intents and purposes, means there is no point. Because no news network is going to respond to “Hey boss, I want us to buy a bunch of really expensive cameras that our audience will never notice because it will make our tape library more valuable. Oh, not to sell, but to donate to museums.” with anything other than laughter and MAYBE firing your ass.
bobo1900@startrek.website 1 month ago
Not only the content doesn’t exist yet, it’s just not practical. Even now 4k broadcasting is rare and 4k streaming is a premium, imagine 8k that would roughly quadruple the amount of data required to transmit it (and transmit speee is not linear, 4x the speed would probably be at least 8x the cost).
Lucidlethargy@sh.itjust.works 1 month ago
TV manufacturers are idiots.
fartographer@lemmy.world 1 month ago
That’s usually the case
Broken@lemmy.ml 1 month ago
Not only does it not exist, it isn’t wanted. People are content watching videos on YouTube and Netflix. They don’t care for 4k. Even if they pay extra for Netflix 4k (which I highly doubt they do) I still question if they are watching 4k with their bandwidth and other limiting factors, which means they’re not watching 4k and are fine with it.
themeatbridge@lemmy.world 1 month ago
4k tvs existed before the content existed. I think the larger issue is that the difference between what is and what could be is not worth the additional expense, especially at a time when most people struggle to pay rent, food, and medicine. More people watch videos on their phones than watch broadcast television. 8k is a solution looking for a problem.
Fredselfish@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Hell I still don’t own a 4k tv and don’t plan to go out of my way to buy one unless the need arises. Which I don’t see why I need that when a normal flat-screen looks fine to me.
I actually have some tube tvs and be thinking of just hooking my vcr back up and watching old tapes. I don’t need fancy resolutions in my shows or movies.
Only time I even think of those things is with video games.
NauticalNoodle@lemmy.ml 1 month ago
4K hardly even makes sense unless your tv is over 70" and your watching it from less than 4 feet away. I do think VR could benefit from ultra-high resolution, though.
sp3ctr4l@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 month ago
www.rtings.com/…/size-to-distance-relationship
Extensive write up on this whole issue, even includes a calculator tool.
But, basically:
Image
Yeah, going by angular resolution, even leaving the 8K content drought aside…
8K might make sense for a computer monitor you sit about 2 feet / 0.6m away from, if the diagonal size is 35 inches / ~89cm, or greater.
Take your viewing distance up to 8 feet / 2.4m away?
Your screen diagonal now has to be about 125 inches / ~318cm, or larger, for you to be able to maybe notice a difference with a jump from 4K to 8K.
…
The largest 8K TV that I can see available for purchase anywhere near myself… that costs ~$5,000 USD… is 85 inches.
I see a single one of 98 inches that is listed for $35,000. That’s the largest one I can see.
So with a $5,000, 85 inch TV, that works out to…
You would have to be sitting closer than about 5 feet / ~1.5 meters to notice a difference.
And that’s assuming you have 20/20 vision.
…
So yeah, VR goggle displays… seem to me to be the only really possibly practical use case for 8K … other than basically being the kind of person who owns a home with a dedicated theater room.
WanderingThoughts@europe.pub 1 month ago
At 1.6 meter for the metric minded. If you really stretch out and can hit the tv with your toes it’s about the right distance.
5in1k@lemmy.zip 1 month ago
You’re describing my bedroom tv.
M137@lemmy.world 1 month ago
you’re*
It’s not hard, get it right.