Thoughts on Collecting DVDs and Videos

Growing up in the 1960's and 1970's I loved movies and televison shows very much. There were only a few major television networks and everyone who grew up in those decades can remember how certain movies were replayed at only certain times of the year. For example "The Ten Commandments" seemed to only be played around the Easter holiday. It became a family treat to gather together to watch programs like the Charlie Brown Halloween Special or "The Wizard Of Oz" on the one and only time it played during the year. Sure, we would have watched our favorite programs more than once a year if we'd had a way to do so. It wasn't until the invention of the video cassette recorder or VCR that we were able to do so.

Consumers took to the VCR like a duck takes to water. They began taping all of their favorites programs for repeated viewing whenever they liked. They purchased their favorite films and episodes of their favorite television programs on pre-recorded videotapes and watched them at their convenience. Film studios, knowing a good thing when they see it, began mass producing videotapes of anything and everything in their product catalogs that they thought might sell. Consumers could purchase products that were high in quality and designed for repeated playing or products that were thrown together on low quality tape and sold inexpensively. Many early films and televisions shows had fallen into the public domain. For whatever reason the copyrights were not properly recorded or renewed as required by law. As a result any company could release a videotape containing one of these public domain programs. These types of programs were usually only released on the cheaply produced videos. Videotapes were sold in such massive quantities that soon prices began to fall. Videos that once had retailed for fifty dollars or more when the format was new were now selling for ten dollars or less. Changes had to be made.

The music industry had experienced great success by slowly replacing the fairly inexpensive vinyl record album with the compact disc. Although many audiophiles said that the compact disc format was not superior to a high quality vinyl disc recording, the majority of consumers did not agree with them. The compact disc became the new standard for buying pre-recorded music. The movie studios have followed the example of the music industry with the introduction of the DVD. The DVD, much like the compact disc, is less expensive to produce so the movie studios can make a greater profit on each sale. In many cases they were able to sell the same product once again to the same consumer just as the music industry had done when consumers had replaced their aging vinyl record albums with shiny new compact discs. People began to replace their videotapes with newly manufactured DVDs. The fact that you could fit two DVDs in the same amount of shelf space as one videotape was an extra incentive to add more DVDs to your collection.

The DVD format enabled the studios to add much more than the movie onto a disc. Thus special features was born. Now consumers often had choices of buying DVDs that were "bare bones" containing just the movie and perhaps a film trailer or buying a more expensive version that contained the film plus several special features. The special features were things like making of the movie documentaries, cast interviews, deleted scenes or bloopers, interactive games or just about anything you could think of. One of the most interesting special features some DVDs contained were commentaries by the film's director or cast members. This was a special version of the film where the film's director or cast members would give a running commentary on the film while it was being shown. The soundtrack of the film was lowered so that the discussion of the commentary was easily heard. It was very much like watching the film with the director or cast members in your own home and listening to them describe the making of the film.

Consumers of pre-recorded movies and televison programs seem to fall into two camps. One camp really just wants to watch the program and cares very little for the special features I've mentioned above. They enjoy watching a good movie but in most cases don't really care to own it. The folks in this camp are the ones who have made stores like Blockbuster and Movie Gallery such a great success. They can go in and rent the film for a night or two, watch it and return it for someone else to rent.

On the opposite end of the spectrum are the videophiles who love films with such a passion that they want to build a library of their favorite films. These folks love the special features and look for DVDs that contain them. They may only watch a certain film once or twice over several years time but they like the convenience of having it easily available when they want to watch it. There are, of course, exceptions to the rule where the videophile may not want to own certain films or a person who seldom buys films will purchase a favorite film on DVD because they believe they will rewatch it often.

Things I've Learned About Collecting DVDs

Much like videotapes and compact discs, DVDs go out of print on a regular basis. Just because a film is available on DVD today doesn't mean that it always will be easily available for purchase. When a DVD is discontinued by its manufacturer it doesn't mean that that copies are no longer available. There will still be copies available for a limited time in stores and offered for sale on-line. As those copies are sold, the remaining unsold copies often become more expensive as the demand exceeds the supply. This result is most noticeable on Walt Disney titles that have been pulled from the sales market after a limited time.

Major studios often discontinue producing titles and then re-release them shortly afterwards with new covers or different special features. Sometimes they do this because they have a better transfer of the film they want to put on the market. Often they do this in the hopes of getting the consumer to "double dip" or repurchase a product that they've already purchased in the past. Another common occurrence is where a studio will still continue to produce a certain DVD title but will drop one of the special features on the DVD. This happens most often with so-called "flipper" discs. These are DVDs that have a full screen version of the film on one side of the disc and a widescreen version of the film on the other. In most cases the later pressings of the DVD will only contain the full screen version of the film, dropping the widescreen version completely. The earlier pressing of these titles become increasingly hard to find as the widescreen version is more desirable to most videophiles.

Films that are in the public domain rarely ever go completely out of print. One manufacturer may discontinue producing a certain title as sales decline but another manufacturer is just as likely to start producing the same title. Since the films are in the public domain and any company can produce DVDs of these titles you will often see the same title marketed by several different companies at the same time.These DVDs vary in quality as different companies use different prints of the film to manufacture their particular title on DVD.

A DVD containing a public domain film does not automatically mean that the product is inferior. Many classic films starring top Hollywood actors have fallen into the public domain. It's true that many of the public domain DVDs contain inferior quality transfers but many are also of fairly high quality considering the age of the film and other factors. While it's true that the majority of DVDs containing public domain films have little to no special features on the disc, some do. It depends on the resources of the company who manufactured the disc and on how much money they want to invest in creating a certain title. Many of these manufacturers do little more than transfer the film from video to DVD and add a menu that will allow the watcher to access certain scenes in the film.

The more obscure a DVD title is, the more likely it seems to be to go out of print. Major Hollywood blockbusters will, for the most part, always be available in one form or another. The companies may change the cover art or some of the special features but it will stay in print continuously. A more obscure film such as a film made by an independent film studio may only get one release on DVD. Titles such as documentaries, low budget films, sports and exercise programs, music video compilations and concert DVDs fall into the same category. If you would like to own a particular title on DVD from a category like this, it's better to purchase it as soon as you can as it may be hard to find a year or two down the road.

Many titles were never released on videocassette. Many of the ones that were released on video will never be released on DVD. Sometimes the film studios who own these programs feel that the demand for the title is not high enough to warrant a DVD release. In other cases the title may be tied up in some kind of legal wrangle where two or more companies feel they have legal rights to the film. Programs or movies that contained a lot of popular music may not get released on DVD because paying for the rights to use the music is felt to be prohibitive by the film studios. Sometimes these films are released with different music replacing the more fondly remembered music that was in the film originally. Many videophiles frown on this practice and will not purchase a DVD they know to contain replacement music.