Which brings us neatly back to what I said above - people will pay what they think it's worth and according to how badly they want the product. Don't think it's worth the money? Then don't buy. Simple! And as far as encoding goes, unless you have knowledge of the business, then you're probably just assuming that there are no additional costs involved for a niche-market, small company producer in Europe to have his DVD encoded as NTSC as opposed to the European PAL standard. Maybe there are, maybe there aren't - I don't know for sure one way or the other, although I would imagine that it's probably not as simple / economical as you might expect, given that having, say, a PAL video tape converted to NTSC can be very expensive. Numerous technical issues are involved, such as 480 scanlines per second for NTSC as opposed to 576 per second for PAL and a slightly faster display rate. Probably other complexities too, I don't know - I don't claim to be any sort of techno-bod. But in any case, MIG Prods no doubt have their reasons for taking the decision that they've taken - be they financial, technical or marketing-related. Either way, that's the state of play and it's no good bellyaching over it. Maybe Adam Wilder can explain the reasons, if he's around. - Steve

I think Steve cleared up the issue of the dual format pretty well, so I won't return to this. What I will mention is the F.A.Q. book. It wasn't published by Mig Productions - in fact it was published by Andrea Press. Mig Productions are making VERY little out of it. I don't want to go into the details of it, but it ended up being less complete than the author envisaged due to limitations imposed by the publisher. The publisher also put a 'premium' price on it which inevitably impacted on sales. As I said before, i'll be asking about plans for 'Dual Format' this week. With the success of the first, it's possible that demand is sufficient it MAY happen...

Although from a business stand point in getting your DVDs burned/encoded, no, I don't know the ins and outs from it. However I do know from personal experience burning my own DVDs at home, that the difference in encoding a DVD in NTSC or PAL is just a change in the software parameters before burning a DVD. Using my own home DVD burning software I can choose to encode my DVDs in any format I want with the change of a few boxes in the software. Takes no longer, and requires no more time or special disks or anything like that to do so, its just a change in the burning software(Literally 3 boxes that can be checked off...PAL, NTSC, or NONE). Now on a professional DVD makers company, I can't think that it would be a whole lot different, yeah, I am sure they aren't using some version of NERO, and yeah I am pretty sure they are pumping out 10-20 disks at a time as opposed to one at a time on a home PC, but the processes to get there would be the same....they set up a batch of DVDs to burn, somewhere in the software program they use to burn those DVDs there is a series of boxes that would say "Encode - PAL, NTSC, or NONE" Just a matter of checking the right box. As far as Mig Productions being a "small" business, 5 years ago I would agree with you, but with the line of pigments, washes, filters, oil paint, and his vast array of multiscale resin items all pretty much readily available worldwide, I wouldn't class Mig Productions as a "small" company. Seeing as I see much smaller companies releasing DVDs from Europe on modeling and they end up having their DVDs that are released to the NA market (which is far from being a niche market btw), in NTSC, as opposed to PAL, then why not the Mig DVDs. I don't know if they "missed the boat" on this, or just didn't anticipate the DVD being that much of a big hit in NA, either way it would be great to see the follow on DVDs be available both formats. There was a rumor (not sure how true it is) that some company in the US was going to enter into a partnership with Mig to produce the DVDs for the NA market in the US, encoded in NTSC. I would think that if this goes through it would reduce the cost of the DVD at the NA suppliers, as the shipping costs from Europe wouldn't be taken into account then. I never questioned whether the DVD was worth the price or not, personally if I was to buy one, I would buy it from Europe and have a friend of mine over there just buy it and ship it to me, considering it would be about 1/3rd the cost of buying it here. I never questioned the value of the DVD, I only asked, having not seen the DVD, how much difference there is in the information on the DVD, than what is in the FAQ book.

There you go then - you've just solved your own problem. Buy the DVD(s) and run off a personal NTSC-encoded copy on your burner (which as far as I understand it is perfectly legal and legit, provided it's for personal use only and you don't start disseminating or selling pirate copies). "Growing", for sure. But alongside the big players like Tamiya, DML, Revell et al - still relatively small and without the same resources and financial clout. I wasn't referring to North America as a niche market. The niche market I was referring to is our hobby as a whole - for the majority of companies, there simply aren't the economies of scale that exist for mass-producing DVDs on a global scale. It isn't Hollywood. Look how many modelling companies go under, especially the smaller "cottage" ones. And even Verlinden (a major player) seems to be struggling a bit now - at least from what I can gather. Same principle applies to the AM guys - relatively small market, hence their products are relatively expensive (no major economies of scale). But like I said earlier - MIG Prods would be the ones to take it up with. Only they know why they took the decison they took. All we can do is speculate back & forth about the whys and wherefores. In the meantime - it's out in PAL format. It isn't out in NTSC format. That's the status. So until and unless that changes - learn to live with it. - Steve

Well, I for one just received my copy (directly from Spain) and I'd give it a 10 out of 10. Not having ever bought the book I think it truly, for me, demostrated exactly how to use their pigment range (of which I have began to collect quite a bit). The 'film' went through pretty much all you can achieve with the pigments, the thinner and acrylic resin and, in the end, I am very satisfy. Looking forward to the next one! Rob

Hllo guys. I m sorry that I post really few messages, but each time I have less and less time. Fortunatly I was lucky to find and follow this tread. Please, let me explain some points: 1) The DVD FAQ is COMPLELY AND TOTALLY different and new contents than FAQ Book. The only same thing is the Tittle, because the techniques explanations is the same concept than in FAQ book. Is individual techniques and not a complete article. In fact, I needed to make new models and stuff for the DVD. 2) Mig Productions and Night Vision is a really small company. Even if you think that because we sell Pigments, Washes and many resin kits, this don't provide the enought money, and we are lucky if we pay our salaries and bills. As maybe some of you know....we re not rich company, but we are very happy because we work making models. But believe me please: Pigments, wahses and more don't give us enought benefit, because these products is extremly expensive, the main delaers get a 50% of the reatil price, and our final benefits is almost ridiculos. Unfortunatly I am not a good bussines man. Maybe we have good ideas for products, but I cannot acting like real bussinesman because I am not. The DVD is one good example: 10€ retail price is something stupid if you compare the prices of Compendium films with less ltechnology, less investiment, less quality but higher retail price (around 24 €) See the difference: 10 Mig DVD vs. 24€ Compendium DVD. Interesting, right? But my cost is higher because the editing cost is terrible, recording time is too long, and even we created 95% of the music content inside (except a fagment of a classic sound). Yes, I needed 1 year to learn how to work with the necesary programs plus almost 1 year learning about music creation. Even if we sell thousand of DVDs, never will pay 2 years of my work! The reason of why I choose Pigment subject is because each day I received tons of emails asking me how to paint with pigments, and I thought that this first DVD could be a good soluction and I decided to sell for the MINIMUN rice to cover the basic costs. 3) My cameras only allow me to record in PAL or NTSC. My Programs for editing have the same requeriments (PAL or NTSC) and also or factory can print n one of both., If I want to make it in NTSC at the same time, I must make the same work two times, and of course, I cannot afford that. 4) The 80 % of our sales in in PAL countries, so...this is why we must give service to our PAL customers. 5) All DVDs can be played in any computer.I thought that...because almost all modellers have the PC at the modelling room, it will be the best way to watch the movie. I don't know too much people with a TV and DVD player in the modelling room. But the most typical is a PC, because is where we search for info, forums....while the paint is drying! So, I cannot see a problem with formats. 6) For some of you the main problem is format, but....you never will want to hear about the docens of guys asking me for lenguages like French, German, Dutch, Russian, Ucranian, Chhinese, japanese, Greek, .....and...even SPANISH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I received many insults from some spanish guys and some dealers because I made only in ENglish! But one more time, my economy only allowed me make a english version. Each extra lenguage cost a lot ,not the traslation, because fortuntaly some foreing people can help me) but the editing, etc.... Now, with the first and small benefits from the first sales of DVD, I am investing all of this in multilenguage DVDs to fix this dramatic problem. So, as you can see, nothing is what seems. We worked hard during 2 years for this high quality DVD, trying to make it like a movie, but also with the same quality than a magazine article with movement step by step from the modeller point of view. Of course, I made many mistakes...and I am fixing now. I try improve it. But...the FORMAT issue is not a mistake, just a election, because I cannot make it in two formats. I am sorry for that. Well, I hope it can clarify some points. I wll be very happy to hear any feedback from any of you, because the next volumes is really complex about scrip, or concept. I would like to hear also what you need, or how you want it.Our goal is to give answers to all doubts about modelling techniques with the maximun image quality. Thank you so much Mig Jimenez

Thanks for the input and your detailed explanation, Mig. Hopefully that will silence the moaners here. Keep up the good work. - Steve

Definitely. It's also good to hear the reality of the situation directly from the manufacturer

Yay Mig! Can we now get back to the regular broadcasting?