Mediabook What is a Digibook/ Mediabook/ Digipack thread?

[Sigill]

We often have a lot of confusion on the forum about what qualifies as a Digibook/ Mediabook and what is a a Digipack. This thread will hopefully help members distinguish the differences between these different editions. I will put a few basic examples of how we classify them on the forum, if you want to chime in feel free to post in this thread and voice your opinion!

Digibooks: A Digibook usually has a hard book like cover with a spine. Anything that contains pages bounded inside can be classed as a digibook. A lot of confusion lies with the Men In Black and Indiana Jones editions because they only have 3 or 4 pages with discs in them but I believe these should still be classed as Digibooks.


Variations:
This edition looks different but still has a book style packaging and contains bound pages so should be classed as a Digibook.


Mediabook:
Mediabooks are essentially the same as digibooks but are usually taller (DVD sized) and released in Austria, Germany and sometimes Spain.


Digipack:
A Digipack may have a book style packaging but does not contain any bound pages. It can be difficult to determine certain releases as some digipacks do come with pages/ booklets. As a general rule if the book isn't bound or attached to the cover then it is classed as a digipack.


Book like and bound editions:
This edition has a book style packaging but as the booklet isn't attached it should be classed as a Book edition and would go in the book and bound edition section.


This is how we currently classify these editions on the forum to try and keep some consistency. Feel free to chat and post any questions/ opinions!

 

[Sigill]

A standard Digibook:

Variations:

Mediabook:

A standard Digipack:

Book like and bound editions:

 

[dirtyoak]

I think this thread is a good idea. The first 3 examples I completely agree with but the fourth one that shows TWD digipak I'd like a clarification on.

Digipack:
A Digipack may have a book style packaging but does not contain any bound pages. It can be difficult to determine certain releases as some digipacks do come with pages/ booklets. As a general rule if the book isn't bound or attached to the cover then it is classed as a digipack.

When you say book style packaging are you refering to hard covers like a book has or are you intentionally being vague on what that means?

The Mulholland Drive edition from Studio Canal is hard to properly classify but to me it looks like a book and has a booklet and would be more of a digibook than a digipak but like I said it's hard to classify it exactly. It has a bound spine and hard covers and comes with a booklet that from what I've read on another forum comes glued to the front cover on some editions.

I would personally cathegorize them as digibook's but you won't get much arguing from me if you cathergorize them as digioak's.

 

[Sigill]

I think this thread is a good idea. The first 3 examples I completely agree with but the fourth one that shows TWD digipak I'd like a clarification on.



When you say book style packaging are you refering to hard covers like a book has or are you intentionally being vague on what that means?

The Mulholland Drive edition from Studio Canal is hard to properly classify but to me it looks like a book and has a booklet and would be more of a digibook than a digipak but like I said it's hard to classify it exactly. It has a bound spine and hard covers and comes with a booklet that from what I've read on another forum comes glued to the front cover on some editions.

Spoiler

View attachment 58138

I would personally cathegorize them as digibook's but you won't get much arguing from me if you cathergorize them as digioak's.

Hi Dirtyoak, yes I am referring to hard covers mainly as I believe if a release was made out of thin card for example and had a booklet it then it wouldn't fully fit the criteria of a Digibook. It's a difficult one and it's can be a matter of interpretation depending how you look at it.

The Studio Canal releases I would classify as Digipacks IMO, the booklets on the ones I have seen are loose and not attached so I believe this is correct. I didn't know there were any releases that were actually glued, if it was glued inside like your picture shows then it would have to be reclassified as a Digibook IMO.

 

[Jason Bourne]

I agree with everything the original post about categorizing what-where. Its pretty spot on accurate.

 

[dirtyoak]

Hi Dirtyoak, yes I am referring to hard covers mainly as I believe if a release was made out of thin card for example and had a booklet it then it wouldn't fully fit the criteria of a Digibook. It's a difficult one and it's can be a matter of interpretation depending how you look at it.

The Studio Canal releases I would classify as Digipacks IMO, the booklets on the ones I have seen are loose and not attached so I believe this is correct. I didn't know there were any releases that were actually glued, if it was glued inside like your picture shows then it would have to be reclassified as a Digibook IMO.

Everywhere I've seen the Studio Canal releases talked about they've been refered to as digibook's except for here on HDN. That's of course not reason enough to call them dgibook's but it shows what most people refer to them as.

To me it ticks 2 of 3 possible boxes that make are used to determine wether a release is a digibook.
It has the hard cover's just like a book. It's got the bound spine just like a book.
It even has a booklet that in some cases are glued to front page.

Here's a pic of the french release of Plein Soleil:

But even if none of them had the booklet glued to the front page these releases looks exactly like a book until you open them. No digipak looks like a book before you open it.
To me that makes the Studio Canal releases digibook's.

Btw here's some pics of a korean release for the movie The Hunter that has hard covers, no bound spine and no booklet. I only post it to show an example of a digipak that hard covers and doesn't fold out like the example I referd to in the Hunger Games digipak thread where this discussion started.

Only my 2 cents though.

 

[Sigill]

Everywhere I've seen the Studio Canal releases talked about they've been refered to as digibook's except for here on HDN. That's of course not reason enough to call them dgibook's but it shows what most people refer to them as.

To me it ticks 2 of 3 possible boxes that make are used to determine wether a release is a digibook.
It has the hard cover's just like a book. It's got the bound spine just like a book.
It even has a booklet that in some cases are glued to front page.

Here's a pic of the french release of Plein Soleil:

Spoiler

View attachment 58178

But even if none of them had the booklet glued to the front page these releases looks exactly like a book until you open them. No digipak looks like a book before you open it.
To me that makes the Studio Canal releases digibook's.

Btw here's some pics of a korean release for the movie The Hunter that has hard covers, no bound spine and no booklet. I only post it to show an example of a digipak that hard covers and doesn't fold out like the example I referd to in the Hunger Games digipak thread where this discussion started.

Spoiler

Only my 2 cents though.

Hi Dirtyoak, Your input is appreciated. Like you said the studio Canal releases do tick 2 of the 3 boxes. I do believe they should be all of the things to qualify as a Digibook. I didn't know that other places referred to them as Digibooks, Ive always been of the opinion that a book needs to have pages. All the UK releases I have seen have always had the booklets seperate so I don't believe they are digibook. As you said it may have a bound spine but it needs to have pages attached to it in some way either via the spine or stuck to the cover. The French version you show is stuck so yes I would class that as a digibook. It's quite difficult to class these Studio Canal editions as one or the other if some booklets are loose and others attached.

I don't believe classing digipacks with no booklets as Digibooks would work. If there is no booklet I can't see how it can be referred to as a book as one of the most important features of a book is surely the pages inside. I take your point about it being styled like a book but I don't think that's enough to class it as a Digibook. Again this is all down to individual interpretation but we need to have a standard format on the forum to make it easier for people to know what to class an edition as. This is one of those areas where not everyone will agree, people will always have differing opinions on the subject.

 

[softandy]

This thread is so great, now, much more clear.

 

[dirtyoak]

Hi Dirtyoak, Your input is appreciated. Like you said the studio Canal releases do tick 2 of the 3 boxes. I do believe they should be all of the things to qualify as a Digibook. I didn't know that other places referred to them as Digibooks, Ive always been of the opinion that a book needs to have pages. All the UK releases I have seen have always had the booklets seperate so I don't believe they are digibook. As you said it may have a bound spine but it needs to have pages attached to it in some way either via the spine or stuck to the cover. The French version you show is stuck so yes I would class that as a digibook. It's quite difficult to class these Studio Canal editions as one or the other if some booklets are loose and others attached.

I don't believe classing digipacks with no booklets as Digibooks would work. If there is no booklet I can't see how it can be referred to as a book as one of the most important features of a book is surely the pages inside. I take your point about it being styled like a book but I don't think that's enough to class it as a Digibook. Again this is all down to individual interpretation but we need to have a standard format on the forum to make it easier for people to know what to class an edition as. This is one of those areas where not everyone will agree, people will always have differing opinions on the subject.

The way I see it digipak were the first to come out and as such is the standard when it comes to this kind of packaging.
From what I know digipak's never had the bound spines and when you combine digipak's with a bound spine it looks exactly like a book. Even if there's no pages in it it looks like a book and not a pak (whatever that is ).
And if there's a collection that all look like book's and some of them even have pages glued to the back of the front page, then they should be regarded as a collection of digibook's and not a collection that contains both digipak's and digibook's.
The only difference between them is some glue.

To use another example that also has hard cover's and a bound spine's there's the korean wave of releases that are cathegorized as digipak's here on HDN but on kimchidvd they were called coffee book's.
Here's two examples from that wave:

House Of Flying Daggers
Billy Elliot
If you want more examples here's link to a search I did on kimchidvd: Click me

Those releases doesn't have a booklet but look unmistakably like book's. Let's call a spade a spade. It clearly emulates a book so why shouldn't it be cathegorized as one?
Perhaps we can call them Coffee book's seeing as they're afaik the only one's of their kind. Imo they should still be under the digibook section but at least if they have they're own distinct cathegorization we would know what they are.

 

[pmartin252]

Great to see this thread here. Gives us a chance to clarify our definitions for digibooks.

I knew that Studio Canal had begun glueing the booklets inside the front cover of their releases, initially they were adding them back-to-front, with the openings of the pages toward the spine, but recently they are affixing them with the staples aligned with the spine - thereby making them into "digiboks"!

I propose that if we know of any Studio Canal titles with this "correct" method of manufacture, we should include them as digibooks. Any of the other permutations- loose booklet, booklet fixed back-to-font, we leave as digipacks.

With regard to the Korean "Coffee Books" in my experience, there have been 1 or 2 which are actually digibooks eg. A single Man and the majority of which are simply a hard, bound cover with no pages - definitely not digibooks.

 

[dirtyoak]

Great to see this thread here. Gives us a chance to clarify our definitions for digibooks.

I knew that Studio Canal had begun glueing the booklets inside the front cover of their releases, initially they were adding them back-to-front, with the openings of the pages toward the spine, but recently they are affixing them with the staples aligned with the spine - thereby making them into "digiboks"!

I propose that if we know of any Studio Canal titles with this "correct" method of manufacture, we should include them as digibooks. Any of the other permutations- loose booklet, booklet fixed back-to-font, we leave as digipacks.

Do you really think that we should make it that hard to distinguish between the Studio Canal collection? Some are digipak's and some are digibook's?
And even distinguishing between the ones that have the booklet glued front to back and the ones that have it glued back to front?
Talk about making it hard just for the hell of it...

With regard to the Korean "Coffee Books" in my experience, there have been 1 or 2 which are actually digibooks eg. A single Man and the majority of which are simply a hard, bound cover with no pages - definitely not digibooks.

May I ask what comes to mind when you look at these coffee book releases and the Studio Canal (without the slipcover) releases? Do they remind you of a bag of chips? A Coffin? A lamp? Or do you like me see something that looks very much like a book?
I say if it looks like a book let's call it a book!
Those releases look way more like books than steelbook's do.

I'm pretty sure you're a much bigger fan of digibook's than digipak's. In the past I've gotten the impression that you don't like digipak's that much and at the time didn't know much about them. That might be wrong and/or has changed.
But to me it seems like you don't want these lumped in with digibook's just like I don't want them lumped in with digipak's which is my favorite packaging.
And I know that these day's digibook's are more popular but digipak's afaik, were made long before digibook's and shouldn't get the short end of the stick just because digibook's are the flavour of the month.
My theory is that digibook's are your priority and instead of figuring out what a digipak is you figure out what you like about digibook's and make everything else digipak's.
Digipak's came before digibook's so instead of looking at a digibook and finding out what makes it a digibook why not look at it from the other point of view which is what makes something a digipak.
And looking like a book isn't on that list imo.

If it look's like a duck, talks like a duck, it just might be a duck.

Look's like a book:

Doesn't look like a book:

Unless something else comes up I'll rest my case now. I hope that you will change your minds but I will respect it if you don't. Won't agree with you though but we don't have to agree on everything so who cares.

But please answer my question of what you see when you look at the Studio Canal releases and thje coffee book's from South Korea.

 

[pmartin252]

May I ask what comes to mind when you look at these coffee book releases and the Studio Canal (without the slipcover) releases? Do they remind you of a bag of chips? A Coffin? A lamp? Or do you like me see something that looks very much like a book?
I say if it looks like a book let's call it a book!

Looking at the thing when it is on the shelf, any of these formats could be mistaken for a digibook- What we are trying to establish and make clear to fellow collectors, is what they can expect when they purchase the release and have it in their hand. Hardened collectors of digipacks may be very disappointed that their longed for tri-fold release with extra postcards of Amazon Women on the Moon with keyring is only a 36 glossy paged lenticular digibook. In the great scheme of thinhg, ss you say it really doesn´t matter what we call it. We have seperate sections for the different types of release and have to decide where to put them.

I'm pretty sure you're a much bigger fan of digibook's than digipak's. In the past I've gotten the impression that you don't like digipak's that much and at the time didn't know much about them. That might be wrong and/or has changed.
But to me it seems like you don't want these lumped in with digibook's just like I don't want them lumped in with digipak's which is my favorite packaging.
And I know that these day's digibook's are more popular but digipak's afaik, were made long before digibook's and shouldn't get the short end of the stick just because digibook's are the flavour of the month.
My theory is that digibook's are your priority and instead of figuring out what a digipak is you figure out what you like about digibook's and make everything else digipak's.
Digipak's came before digibook's so instead of looking at a digibook and finding out what makes it a digibook why not look at it from the other point of view which is what makes something a digipak.
And looking like a book isn't on that list imo.

You are quite right here when you say that you could be wrong! I have nothing against digipacks, in fact I have several in my collection. Here is an extract from a PM between myself and Andy about the Hunger Games from a few days ago, which I hope he won´t mind me quoting.

I said...

About the Hunger Games, do you think it would lose impact if it was in the digipack thread? Digipacks are pretty popular, is there any way we can bring it forward to qive it equal emphasis to digibooks? in the thread hierarchy?

 

[dirtyoak]

Looking at the thing when it is on the shelf, any of these formats could be mistaken for a digibook- What we are trying to establish and make clear to fellow collectors, is what they can expect when they purchase the release and have it in their hand. Hardened collectors of digipacks may be very disappointed that their longed for tri-fold release with extra postcards of Amazon Women on the Moon with keyring is only a 36 glossy paged lenticular digibook. In the great scheme of thinhg, ss you say it really doesn´t matter what we call it. We have seperate sections for the different types of release and have to decide where to put them.

If I bought any of the Studio Canal or coffee book's releases after reading here on HDN that they are digipak's, I wouldn't be very happy with what I received.
Of course if a digibook collector bought them he or she would be disappointed too.
One thing you could do was write "digibook w/ booklet" on the Studio Canal releases and call the korean releases coffee book's like I've suggested earlier. After all that's what they are listed as on kimchidvd...
Those two things paired with this thread that informs everyone on what they can generally expect when they buy a specific release would help educate consumers.

You are quite right here when you say that you could be wrong! I have nothing against digipacks, in fact I have several in my collection. Here is an extract from a PM between myself and Andy about the Hunger Games from a few days ago, which I hope he won´t mind me quoting.

I said...

About the Hunger Games, do you think it would lose impact if it was in the digipack thread? Digipacks are pretty popular, is there any way we can bring it forward to qive it equal emphasis to digibooks? in the thread hierarchy?

How about not making digipak's out to be digibook's disliked little brother by giving it it's own cathegory icon and change the digibook icon to something like this:

When searching for a picture of a digibook I googled the word digibook and this link showed up and I just couldn't help myself:
http://www.zavvi.com/blu-ray/mulholland-drive-limited-digibook-studio-canal-collection/10225351.html

 

[dirtyoak]

The first post of this thread should be stickied in the digipak forum as well. If not it seems like only the digibook forum readers get's to know the difference between the formats.

 

[Sigill]

If I bought any of the Studio Canal or coffee book's releases after reading here on HDN that they are digipak's, I wouldn't be very happy with what I received.
Of course if a digibook collector bought them he or she would be disappointed too.
One thing you could do was write "digibook w/ booklet" on the Studio Canal releases and call the korean releases coffee book's like I've suggested earlier. After all that's what they are listed as on kimchidvd...
Those two things paired with this thread that informs everyone on what they can generally expect when they buy a specific release would help educate consumers.

The problem with labeling these Korean releases as Coffee books is that no one understands the term. I didn't know what a Coffee book was until I saw them on Kimchi. This will inevitably lead to more confusion as we are adding another category to classify something and we don't know what a Coffee book is exactly.

How about not making digipak's out to be digibook's disliked little brother by giving it it's own cathegory icon and change the digibook icon to something like this:
View attachment 58308

When searching for a picture of a digibook I googled the word digibook and this link showed up and I just couldn't help myself:
http://www.zavvi.com/blu-ray/mulholland-drive-limited-digibook-studio-canal-collection/10225351.html

No one is making out that Digipacks are disliked. They may not have as much interest as Digibooks but there are still many Collectors out there. A lot of people who collect Digibooks also collect Digipacks too. We have to look at the activity in the thread to see how much interest there is though and at the moment it fits in nicely within the Digibook section. Again if enough people would like to see this changed we can look into the idea. As for that listing I wouldn't take too much notice of that, it seems to vary from place to place. Some retailers list Digibooks as Digipacks and Vice versa.

 

[dirtyoak]

The problem with labeling these Korean releases as Coffee books is that no one understands the term. I didn't know what a Coffee book was until I saw them on Kimchi. This will inevitably lead to more confusion as we are adding another category to classify something and we don't know what a Coffee book is exactly.

My argument to that would be that at one point no one knew what a steelbook was either but through threads such as this one informing them now we all know what a steelbook is.
It has to start somewhere. HDN want's to be seen as the best and most diverse movie forum that leads the way for other's and to be that it has to make decisions that other's can follow.

A coffee book is a digibook without any pages. Add a few photo's and consider people informed.

 

[Sigill]

My argument to that would be that at one point no one knew what a steelbook was either but through threads such as this one informing them now we all know what a steelbook is.
It has to start somewhere. HDN want's to be seen as the best and most diverse movie forum that leads the way for other's and to be that it has to make decisions that other's can follow.

A coffee book is a digibook without any pages. Add a few photo's and consider people informed.

The problem with that is what exactly is a Coffee Book. We can't just decide that a Digipack without pages is a Coffee Book. So far I have only seen this term used for the Korean editions. What happens when a similar edition comes out from somewhere else, does that become a Coffee Book aswell? We don't want to start mis-informing people by creating a whole new name.
I think this is one of those things where it's impossible to please everyone. We need to see what other members viewpoint is on this. I believe it's fine the way it is but we are always open to feedback.

 

[dirtyoak]

No one is making out that Digipacks are disliked. They may not have as much interest as Digibooks but there are still many Collectors out there. A lot of people who collect Digibooks also collect Digipacks too. We have to look at the activity in the thread to see how much interest there is though and at the moment it fits in nicely within the Digibook section. Again if enough people would like to see this changed we can look into the idea. As for that listing I wouldn't take too much notice of that, it seems to vary from place to place. Some retailers list Digibooks as Digipacks and Vice versa.

I know that you guys aren't calling digipak's disliked but they don't have their very own cathegory. They're listed underneath digibook's even though digibook's actually are the little brother so to speak.

How would you actually find out that people would like to see this change? One way is to ask them and see what suggestions they propose. A poll.
Or just sit and wait for them to tell you.

Some retailer's do list things wrongly but not too many that actually deal with movies as their main product. But a quick search on zavvi for digibook's gave me no digipak's. And many Studio Canal releases.
They're also refered to as digibook's on BR.com and see-nema forum.

 

[Sigill]

I know that you guys aren't calling digipak's disliked but they don't have their very own cathegory. They're listed underneath digibook's even though digibook's actually are the little brother so to speak.

How would you actually find out that people would like to see this change? One way is to ask them and see what suggestions they propose. A poll.
Or just sit and wait for them to tell you.

Some retailer's do list things wrongly but not too many that actually deal with movies as their main product. But a quick search on zavvi for digibook's gave me no digipak's. And many Studio Canal releases.
They're also refered to as digibook's on BR.com and see-nema forum.

Well that's firstly what this thread is for, to hopefully help inform people and for them to give their feedback/ opinions. If you would like to start a poll to see what people think about the subject you are free to do that. The reason Digibooks have there own section is again down to the amount of interest they generate. We try to cater to all collectors but we have to see what people want and try to cater to that. The Digibook section gets more interest than the Digipack one hence why it has it's own section. That doesn't mean we wouldn't look at changing it as some point if there was enough interest shown though.

 

[dirtyoak]

The problem with that is what exactly is a Coffee Book. We can't just decide that a Digipack without pages is a Coffee Book. So far I have only seen this term used for the Korean editions. What happens when a similar edition comes out from somewhere else, does that become a Coffee Book aswell? We don't want to start mis-informing people by creating a whole new name.
I think this is one of those things where it's impossible to please everyone. We need to see what other members viewpoint is on this. I believe it's fine the way it is but we are always open to feedback.

Like I wrote in the reply that you quoted, a coffee book is a digibook without pages. A digibook has hard cover's, bound spine and pages.
Add pics and the jobs done.

A digipak without pages isn't a coffee book. A digipak is a digipak. A digipak doesn't have a bound spine like a book does.

I'm not sure why it's so hard to see that something that look's like a book should be classified as such.