Home Media Magazine - June 15, 2008 - (Page 12)

HIGH-DEF www.homemediamagazine.com ‘Sleeping Beauty’ to Alert Viewers to BD Live By Stephanie Prange alt Disney Studios Home Entertainment is launching Web-connected BD Live on all of its upcoming Blu-ray Disc releases beginning in the fourth quarter. The studio plans to “reinvent the experience of watching movies in the home … by laying in a level of interactivity and connectivity that has never before been attempted in any format,” Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment president Bob Chapek said during a presentation last week introducing the studio’s first BD Live title, a remastered 50th anniversary edition of Sleeping Beauty, due Oct. 7. To show consumers the advantages of Blu-ray, Disney is including a standard DVD with the release to make it easy for them to see the difference between the two formats. The release also inaugurates a live, onscreen chat function with an instant messenger-like window that lets viewers converse with fellow viewers watching the Blu-ray Disc at the same time. Viewers use their Blackberries or other PDAs to type in their end of the conversation, which then appears on the screen, as the movie rolls. “The idea of my little girl being able to experience the movie and chat in real time with her grandparents across the country is very exciting to me,” Chapek said. “We are introducing this important feature on Singulus: BD Adoption Is Faster Than DVD By Erik Gruenwedel erman disc replication device manufacturer Singulus Technologies said consumer adoption of Blu-ray Disc is proceeding faster than standard DVD 11 years ago. The Frankfurt-based manufacturer cited an internal order for 21 Blu-ray dual-layer replication units in the first quarter for the outlook, with another nine units on order this year. W G The industry gathered last week in Los Angeles for Disney’s Sleeping Beauty event. At left: (L-R) HM’s Thomas K. Arnold, Marty Gordon of Philips and Andy Siditsky of WDSHE. Right: (L-R) HM’s Arnold and Stephanie Prange with Bob Chapek of WDSHE. The orders included one from a prominent U.S. replication company. “This means that the orders for Blu-ray in the first year of the dual-layer technology already by far exceeded the volume at the start of DVD 11 years ago with 17 machines,” CFO Stefan Baustert said in a statement. Singulus projects an optimistic 65% market share for Blu-ray by the end of the year. Sleeping Beauty, but imagine the possibilities of extending this to other titles such as High School Musical or, eventually, ABC’s hit show ‘Lost.’” Through video messaging, or “Disney Movie Mail,” a video message can be inserted into a movie, at any point, at the viewer’s discretion, and then sent to another viewer, for playback the next time the movie is watched. “It takes a greeting card and puts it on steroids,” Chapek said. Through BD Live functions, Chapek said, viewers also can earn “reward points” and tap into a newly created Disney BD Live Network. “Here, Blu-ray owners will be able to acquire studio updates, download new trailers, and use their accumulated reward points to obtain wallpapers, ringtones, avatars and many other new exciting possibilities,” he said. Summit, Concert Hot Spot Team for Concert Blu-rays By Chris Tribbey ummit Home Entertainment has teamed with Concert Hot Spot to release music-related titles and concerts on Blu-ray Disc. Starting in July, Summit will release high-definition concerts of Mötley Crüe, Bonnie Raitt, Keith Richards and others, as well as music events such as the Ozzfest 10th anniversary festival. “Summit’s commitment to bringing our customers the most dynamic content coupled with the highestquality presentation is exemplified by our agreement with Concert Hot Spot,” said Summit Home Entertainment president Steve Nickerson. “Blu-ray enables the joining of high-definition video and multi- S BRIEFS I DIGITAL PLAYGROUND TO GO SAME-DAY WITH DVD, BD Digital Playground said it is releasing all its DVD titles simultaneously on Blu-ray Disc. The adult video distributor said it also will convert one catalog title weekly to Blu-ray. “DP has become the ﬁrst adult studio to make all their Blu-ray releases day and date with standard DVD,” said CEO Samantha Lewis. “This is something no mainstream studio has done yet, so it’s quite noteworthy for the future of the Blu-ray format.” – Erik Gruenwedel channel audio at performance levels unsurpassed by any other home entertainment format.” Concert Hot Spot previously has released Nature’s Colors with the World’s Greatest Music and A View From Space with Heavenly Music on Blu-ray. “Steve Nickerson has assembled an extremely high-quality team of sales and marketing professionals who will help tremendously in bringing our Blu-ray music-related releases to the marketplace,” said Concert Hot Spot CEO Steve Devick. “We are excited about our alliance with Summit and expect the home entertainment consumer to embrace the dramatic audio and video quality improvements of Blu-ray Disc as compared to standard-definition DVDs.” TOP 20 HIGH-DEF BLU-R AY D ISC Week ended June 8, 2008 LABEL INDEX TOP 20 HIGH-DEF B D M A R K E T S HA R E Percentage of Sales Per Title vs DVD Week ended June 8, 2008 LABEL PERCENT TITLE TITLE B LU-R AY D I S C CO M I NG U P STREETING Be Kind Rewind New Line Street Date: 6/17 Fool’s Gold Warner Street Date: 6/17 Men in Black Sony Pictures Street Date: 6/17 So I Married an Axe Murderer Sony Pictures Street Date: 6/17 10,000 B.C. Warner Street Date: 6/24 PREBOOKING Shutter Fox 21 Sony Pictures Pre: 6/18, Street: 7/15 Pre: 6/19, Street: 7/22 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 Semi-Pro Rambo National Treasure: Book of Secrets Cloverfield There Will Be Blood The Eye Dirty Harry: Ultimate Collector’s Edition Meet the Spartans Weeds: Season Three Blade Runner: Complete Collector’s Edition Planet Earth: The Complete Series Patton Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest I Am Legend 300 Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of … The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the … National Treasure Over America Rambo Trilogy Warner Lionsgate Disney Paramount Paramount Lionsgate Warner Fox Lionsgate Warner BBC Video Fox Disney Warner Warner Disney Disney Disney Topics Lionsgate 100.00 97.43 81.39 79.90 57.23 46.74 32.03 30.83 27.82 25.76 24.92 24.61 23.74 22.30 21.78 20.48 20.04 18.94 16.66 15.96 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 Over America* Patton Blade Runner: Complete Collector’s Edition There Will Be Blood Cloverfield Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the … Planet Earth: The Complete Series 300 Dirty Harry: Ultimate Collector’s Edition The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the … Rambo Trilogy I Am Legend National Treasure Rambo National Treasure: Book of Secrets Semi-Pro Weeds: Season Three The Eye Meet the Spartans Topics Fox Warner Paramount Paramount Disney Disney BBC Video Warner Warner Disney Lionsgate Warner Disney Lionsgate Disney Warner Lionsgate Lionsgate Fox 100.00% 71.61% 63.61% 51.36% 48.51% 46.56% 46.07% 30.94% 26.73% 20.51% 20.18% 20.06% 15.81% 14.05% 12.22% 7.66% 7.10% 7.00% 6.43% 4.34% Source: Nielsen VideoScan First Alert data *Exclusively available on Blu-ray Source: Nielsen VideoScan First Alert data 12 Home Media Magazine June 15–21, 2008 http://www.homemediamagazine.com

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Home Media Magazine - June 15, 2008 Contents News News High-Def News Electronic Delivery News Commentary Asian/Anime Reviews Research Top 20 DVD Sellers Top 20 Rentals and Top 10 Charts Just Announced

Home Media Magazine - June 15, 2008

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