R5

R5 relates to a Region 5 DVD format created by the movie industry to help combat pirates, as well as tags used by movie pirates for distribution on the Internet. The movie industry created this format in efforts to help prevent piracy by producing higher quality Telecine transferred movies than pirates can offer on the Internet. This higher quality is achieved by the use of professional grade film transfer devices as opposed to lesser quality equipment obtainable by movie pirates. Groups releasing movies in this format can be identified with a tag resembling Moviename.R5.encodeformat.group.

R5 feeds in the form of pirated copies, have little to no remastering done to clean up the quality and usually never contain any special features. What this format allows potential bootleggers to do is release a DVD copy of a movie right around the time when a Screener is available on the Internet. Additionally, if an R5 DVD is released without an English audio Track, the direct line audio from the original film can be inserted and often tagged with .LINE in the finished filename.

There is currently no standard in the bootleg scene as to how R5 movies are labelled, therefore often files may be tagged as something familiar so as not to sway peers from downloading a specific group's offering. Names such as Telecines, DVD Screeners, or even DVD rips can be seen in place of the R5 tag that should be used on movies in this format. Several release groups have started using the R5 or R5 line tags to distinguish these files and urge other release groups to do the same to gain some standardization in the scene.

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Comment this glossary entry!
someguy9 29 April, 2007 17:12
great info!
smd9 18 July, 2007 12:00
It doesn't make sense how R5 DVDs combat pirates. The pirates just get ahold of a copy of an R5 DVD and release it on the internet with better video quality than they, save for a DVD Screener, could obtain otherwise through Telecine or Telesync or whatever. It seems more like it's helping the pirates rather than combatting them.
WillKatt 21 December, 2008 13:25
I can't make sense of this entry. It is utterly confusing. Starting by the Region 5 (or any other) NOT being a DVD format, but a region coding, DVD format as such remains unchanged for many years. Going through why would movie industry release HA TeleCine copies at all. And finally by the fact that Region 5 is the official region for Russia and former USSR countries. Of course only official releases get a region coding. This region coding is as simple to remove as any other Region, R1 or R2. Being official releases, they may differ from R1 releases. And seems that lately they may come just earlier than R1 (USA) releases, like Children of Huang Shi being already officially out in Russia 2 or 3 months before the R1 release in USA. So R5 DVD is already out. And it has the length of the officially announced R1 DVD and not that of a screener production out in Internet which is some 15 minutes shorter. A release group may remove Russian audio leaving only the original and thus just mark the source of the DVD, don't you think? I don't know what release groups think but counting that R5 officially means something else, the entire above explanation bring suspicion of misinformed fantasy, so I think it needs reviewing. Preferably by a member of those who mark their releases R5, just to be sure who's right.
WillKatt 21 December, 2008 13:39
A few things to add if R5 rather means what I think and what could be the source of confusion. Counting that in Region 5 (Russia & ex-USSR) piracy is like a plague due to social and cultural issues, Russian pirates often come up very early with some really good TeleCine / Telesynch copies sold on DVDs, those certainly usually do not have English audio or any extras. However those should not be properly counted as R5 releases. Official R5 releases mostly have both Russian and original audio (so strip out the original and you get an English DVD), Russian menus with all the fancy of original DVD craft, extras may vary but are usually present, however not totally translated, just having Russian subtitles. Tracks with director's comments or such without translation but may be with Russian subtitles also may be present if available on the original (planned) release.
WillKatt 21 December, 2008 13:44
AND the official R5 releases are usually PAL (25 fps) like for the rest of Europe, hence running time is naturally shorter due to speed alteration, although some competing licensed companies issue alternate translations (usually voice-over as opposed to official releases shown in theaters which are mostly dubbed) on NTSC DVDs, usually an exact R1 (USA release) copy, at least in the sense of the main video feature.

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