Doctor Who: The Waters of Mars may be coming to ABC in a little over a week, but it will be coming in SD rather than HD.
ABC has opted not to buy a high definition copy of the special from the BBC, citing cost as part of its decision.
It will be upscaled on ABC HD but not to true high definition quality.
In a statement issued to TV Tonight, ABC’s Director Television Kim Dalton said, “Over the past few years ABC TV’s focus, resources and budget have been on our multi channel strategy.
“The development of our SD channels ABC2 and ABC3, along with iView have been our primary concern.
“However in 2010 we will be developing our HD strategy with the intention of moving towards a more distinctive HD offering.”
The special airs 7:30pm Sunday December 6th on ABC1…. and ABC HD….
Win HD has been rebuilt and back on air for the last week or so.
At least the ABC is showing it within a few weeks of it being aired in the UK. Much better than the months and months of delay that previous shows and seasons have had.
Still not as good as UKTV though with Children of the Earth. That is the way it should be.
If the ABC hadn’t said anything, I doubt anyone would have noticed. I have a rather large TV with an inbuilt HD tuner, and in recent times I have tried many times to spot the picture quality difference between ABC1 and ABC HD. The answer: ABC HD has a larger logo in the corner.
Now that ABC3 is taking another 10Mbps out of the pool, they may as well turn ABC HD off, or rename it “ABC Plus” and stop pretending.
As for the cost of HD as mentioned by effdee, if you’ve got a computer, odds are you have a HD-resolution screen and can put live HD TV on it for the cost of a $50 TV card. No matter what the size of the screen, sit close enough and you’re getting the best available picture.
@David S – it would be nice to watch the cricket in HD but unfortunately WIN is still rebuilding the HD service, even since GO! coma on line…
I’ve never seen HD, it’s too expensive for those of us on very low incomes, so I won’t notice any difference.
David S, they haven’t resisted – they weren’t allowed to.
Current price of US tape stock from pro-tape:
SONY BCT-D124L Digital Betacam Tape – US$54.90
SONY BCT-124HDL 124 Minute HDCam Tape – US$84.75
Yes, the BBC is asking too much to simply supply the ABC with a HD copy … or the ABC is too cheap.
It’s a terrible pity that just as sales of large screen HD and Full HD sets are booming like never before the networks are all downgrading their HD program offerings. After years of resisting the idea of multichannelling they suddenly discover it doesn’t kill their ratings at all, in fact it increases their overall audience (d’oh!) So just as the original justification for digital TV in Australia, HD, is finally reaching the mainstream audience they all rush off into new SD channels like sheep with no brains, and lower the quality of their increasingly rare HD offerings in the process. The audience feels cheated and can’t see why they spent so much money on new gear when all that’s on are old sixties sitcoms and Nine’s endless loop of Two and a Half Men, etc.
The networks would be better off using their HD channels as their multichannels, offering real honest HD content that can’t be appreciated in SD and forget the new SD multichannels, all they’re doing is stealing valuable bandwidth from the main SD and HD channels. Having 15 or 16 Freeview channels is pointless when there’s only 10 or 11 different content streams being broadcast. The question is are the networks smarter than a fifth grader? The answer is apparently no.
If anyone is in any doubt as to what a real native HD broadcast looks like just switch your HD set to the current cricket test on Nine HD, it’ll knock your socks off.
I look forward to David getting an answer to the “how much more does HD cost” question. Because I’m quite sure it’s a Big Fat Zero. Somebody forgot to ask the BBC for an HD copy and just kept receiving episodes in SD because the process from 2008, 2007, 2006 just kept ticking over.
I’m fed up to the back teeth about people complaining about HD not looking any different when they don’t own anything bigger than a microwave (and is it the same people who always get “new HD channels” confused with “new digital channels”?) It’s like when colour TV got introduced … did all the grannies with black & white say that they couldn’t understand what the fuss was about with colour TV?
Well, yes they did actually. My dad used to retail “CTVs” over the decades. In fact it was as recently as 1990 when a little old lady wrote in to BackChat on the ABC to complain that the election graph was using colours in its bar graphs and pie charts and “could they please make it suitable for viewing for the rest of us?”
Future News Bulletin.
Australian FTA networks broadcast a HD program in actual HD, within a few days of UK or US airing and in a pre-advertised fixture on their schedule.
Copyright Lawyers and ISP’s fear bankruptcy when piracy completely ceases overnight.
Network executives celebrate as FTA ratings skyrocket and TV sponsor revenues boom.
…as if.
I have HDTV okay the screen is not full HD and I can still see the quality difference between SD & HD, but I do agree it’s not as good as BluRay I’ve seen on a 1080 screen. Right now we get just 7HD and ONE HD, WIN HD is still re-building it’s HD service, ABC and SBS are not full HD.
So if you’re not into sports you’re down to one network broadcasting in full 1080 HD and even then it’s only a limited number of programs. But retailers are still out there selling the benefits on HD with very little real world content to use them with.
Maybe by the time people get around to their 2nd or 3rd HDTV we willhave the content to use them fully?
Wow, I’vwe never read so many stupid remarks about HD for a while. And always comes from people who don’t own HD TV set in the first place. Aussie HD TV programs stink in quality because our TV stations don’t have enough bandwidth to carry quality HD programs. Occasionally Ch 9 shows a movie in a good HD quality and that’s about it. With appearance of multi channels the TV stations will have to cut back on quality somewhere else, which means that in the enar future we’ll be left without genuine HD TV, only a bunch of SD channels and a HD channels with an average HD quality.
I dare people to compare any TV program they see with the movie watched and blu-ray and they will notice the difference.
HD TV is fantastic, which can’t be siad for our government (technologically clueless and TV stations too stingy to fork out money for proper equipment).
Laughing at Jimmy’s (8:48am) comment below!
And I’m with Greg (10:32am) in relation to Dalton’s line on ABC HD possibly having a “more distinctive” offering. I was thinking he meant more breakaway programming from ABC1 like NineHD, SevenHD & TenHD used to do. Very interesting…
@tasmanian devil – “…I don’t own an HD television…” Precisely why you don’t realise that the difference between SD and full HD is night and day. Unfortunately the attitude towards HD in this country from viewers is about as disappointing as their attitude towards quality shows.
@Tim, I agree. HD just seems overrated to me. I don’t own an HD television, but from what I’ve seen it really isn’t that much of a difference. And it’s not like the quality of SD is anywhere at all near like what one could expect from You Tube, so I don’t see why people make such a fuss about shows not being in HD.
I’m shocked it costs more to get the HD version. BTW “Waters of Mars” did look great in HD.
The BBC (which owns right to Dr Who) is becoming more and more keen to generate revenue from program sales and other means so not surprised at all to hear HD versions of their shows cost a lot more
So will it be 576p then ?
I notice whenever real hd content is on ABC HD the logo stretches out. Only 2 shows last night were in 720p hd
What happened in this country. There was more content available in HD a year ago, now none of the networks broadcast anything in HD. What’s going on?
Last night while watching the end of Graham Norton show ABC2,
which had David Tennant as guest, the voice over said talkning about
water of mars followed by end of time will be in the new year
David, do you know or have any idea what the premium is for a station to buy an HD rather than SD version?
Seven just despise HD altogether Paull. The Australian Open will probably be broadcast in 320×240 by Seven next year.
I think the more interesting part of this is this quote
“However in 2010 we will be developing our HD strategy with the intention of moving towards a more distinctive HD offering.”
So let the speculation begin … When will ABCHD be a totally separate channel?
Should it be news?
Crap. Can you find out how much this actually saves? I’ve noticed a lot of content on HD channels being less than HD.
Is this the same reason 7 has for not airing Flashforward in HD?
Heck we should be grateful we’re getting it before Xmas.
If it weren’t for the Interwebs and people d/l’ing it already, we’d probably see it at Easter.
I didnt realise that HD cost more than SD to buy the rights to, bloody TV content producers. Not that i care since i believe HD is highly overrated.
With having to share the lowly 21Mbps or so of bandwidth with ABC1, ABC2, ABC3, ABCHD, DiG Radio, and DiG Jazz, I don’t think ABC HD is going to look particularly good anyway…
There is no need for ABC3 with all the kids programming on ABC1 and ABC2
Let the whining begin…
Oh well, the blu ray’s out on Jan 11 in the UK!
Betting than nothing but still… Rudd should give them the money so we can see it in HD
Lets hope they are serious, as HD in this country is fast becoming a joke.
Excuses, excuses, Dalton. Bottom line is, it looked great in HD for me and many thousands of other fans.
I’d love to know exactly how great the cost difference is. Surely a time will come when masters are just supplied in HD by default.