🌊

recently i finally made the jump beyond 1080p when some 1440p IPS monitors came on sale. watching a 720p tv show on them, i started to notice how blurry that felt. 1080p source files look noticeably better. 1440p vids better yet.

Star Wars: Andor is among the first media i've downloaded in 2160p ("4K") and i'm glad i did: the increased clarity was put to good use on this show, which is full of detailed panoramas and interesting set dressings. successful experiment.

so for one thing, i'm probably going to refrain from downloading 720p going forward (a majority of the movies i have are in 1080p, but TV shows/anime are often lower).

that in mind i went to look for a 4K copy of Avatar (2009), since that franchise is in the air again. i was rather surprised to learn it hasn't been officially released above 1080p yet! i kinda thought the graphics were half the point, so huh. Search revealed a 4K blu-ray is announced, but no launch date yet. someone on reddit speculated that Cameron wouldn't want a great-looking A1 print distracting from A2. who can say. anyway, a bit annoying, since i actually see the point of such high res for certain material now.

oh yeah, i also grabbed a 25GB 4K encode of Lawrence of Arabia, as i'm well due for a rewatch. humorously, now i feel like my mediocre 2014ish 1080p HDTV is not up to that viewing challenge. maybe i should enlist a friend with a modern 4K OLED.