Hi all, I recently bought my wife a box set of catherine cookson dvds and the picture quality is awful, I know that this was filmed many years ago but I would have thought they would have been digitally remastered, some have a 3cm line down the right and some down the left they look like old worn out vhs tapes. now got to pay to return them. chris.

A great many titles are thrown out onto dvd by using tatty old prints that are worn out.
I suspect the potential market for such titles is what is the deciding factor on whether money is spent on new prints.

If these are the ITV films of some years back then they were made on 16mm film and will look pretty rubbish anyway .

35mm should look pretty good unless the print is exceptionally worn.

You could also look out for US imports of the titles where the larger market may mean the prints used for the masters would be better - not guaranteed though.

I doubt her audience is big enough to justify very expensive and time consuming restoration work. The numbers have to add up for them to invest that kind of money for cleanup.

She is virtually unknown in the US so I wouldn't hold out hope for a different trasnfer there.