Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)I've never had a fireplace DVD before, so my only reference base was a day long burning fire that's broadcast on a local cable channel on Christmas day. I guess I was spoiled by that, because the cable version was better than this DVD, but... I still like to play it.
I'll tell you my complaints first:
1. The sound takes some getting used to. The popping wood echos pretty loudly and gives you the impression the fire is burning in an empty room with hard surfaces (not exactly a cozy feeling).
2. The looping is jarring. There are four choices in the menu, a high fire, a medium fire, a low fire, and the full fire (from hi to low). Of the first three choices, the fire loops every ten minutes, but the loop is noticeable. The frame freezes for a few seconds, the sound stops, and then it starts over again. I've made smoother transitions in my amateur home videos, so not sure why they did it this way. Would be better if you didn't notice the loop at all. The fourth option, the full fire, is even worse. It plays for a full 30 minutes, but towards the end of the low fire the sound starts to skip a little. Then the screen goes to black for quite a few seconds (and is silent) before starting again with the high fire. Again, very jarring. I almost fell asleep, but this woke me up. Seems they could have made this less noticeable.
3. You feel the urge to stir! During the low fire part, a log (or a piece of a log) falls out of the firebox and no one puts it back! It really drives home the point this fire is not real because you're dying to jump up and put it back!! (this is another thing I liked so much about the cable version - a guy would come by every so often, stir the fire, add more wood, so it was tended to and you therefore didn't worry about that.
But... in spite of my complaints, I have to admit I still watch the thing and I do find it relaxing, once I got used to the idiosyncrasies. The colors are warm and glowing. The fire is kind of hypnotic to watch. Your brain even tricks you into thinking it's giving off heat! And it is framed just exactly right, so that it fills up your TV screen as though that were the firebox itself. No annoying music, just the sounds of popping wood and the updraft.
For ten bucks I guess it was a decent buy. If I had paid more I would probably be less accommodating. But if you simply want a basic, no frills fire to watch, this will do the job.
Click Here to see more reviews about: Fireplace DVD: Real Wood Burning Fire (Anamorphic - FullScreen Edition) (2008)
After being disappointed with many of the Fireplace DVDs out on the market that we tested, we were inspired to create a fireplace DVD that:1. Used a real wood burning fire (not gas). 2. Was lit properly so that the fire didn't overexpose the shot. 3. A fire that filled the entire screen of a wide screen television as well as a regularly formatted TV.4. Had no cheesy hearths to distract from the fire's magnificence.5. Allowed the viewer to control what stage of the fire they wanted to see.We believe that addressing these issues with a professional DVD has allowed us to create the best virtual fireplace available.There are two basic aspect ratios 16:9 (widescreen) and 4:3 (standard) so look for these while you are searching your DVD player's menu. We shot the DVD in Anamorphic, which will allow it to switch between 16:9 and 4:3 formats without any issues.If you are getting the black bars at the top and bottom of your TV screen, you will need to access your dvd player's menu (found on the remote). On your DVD player menu there should be an option to change the format (aspect ratio) so that the DVD displays properly on your screen without the black bars. This is how our DVDs are able to play on both widescreen and regularly formatted TVs.This DVD has been tested in a wide variety of widescreen and standard screen TVs and displays full screen on both TV formats.
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