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New(?) blu-ray copy protection problem

TM2YC

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So far I've encountered two blu-rays that feature a new(?) clever form of copy-protection. Instead of the usual advanced methods of encrypting that always get bypassed, this one is pretty simple in concept. Instead of 1 playlist for the movie in the disc folder, it has about 1000, 1 plays the movie correctly from start to finish, the other 999 playlists play the scenes/shots in 249 different random orders. Only the play button in the blu-ray menu knows which is the correct one.

You could rip all 1000 versions of the movie and spend a year watching them all to find the one that makes sense I suppose. :D

IIRC you can copy the disc wholesale and the copy will play in a regular blu-ray player but of course that's not what I'm after, I want a file I can edit with. I can't seem to find a way round it.

Has anybody else encountered this? Can anybody think of a workaround?
 

DigModiFicaTion

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I know Disney movies can be difficult. Especially some Star Wars. Are there specific titles that you are referring to? Have you tried different programs?
 

lapis molari

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Sounds like the trick Sony used on DVD back in the day. They figured out how to overcome that in ripping software, so I expect in time they'll overcome the new trick as well. Of course that doesn't help you in the short run. :s
 

TM2YC

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DigModiFicaTion said:
Are there specific titles that you are referring to?

I gave up on this one last year:

An Actor's Revenge: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Actors-Revenge-DVD-Blu-ray/dp/B076M4B6D5/

I'm still trying with this one:

Cotton Club Encore: https://www.amazon.com/Cotton-Club-Encore-Blu-ray-Richard/dp/B07Y9BDWB4/

DigModiFicaTion said:
Have you tried different programs?

The usual suspects but they all have the same issue of allowing you to make a copy but not telling you which playlist is the one you want.
 

Captain Khajiit

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EDIT:  Rip the whole disc.

Use eac3to to identify the playlist(s).  Pick the one that has the correct running time.
Code:
eac3to /filepath/
 

TM2YC

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Captain Khajiit said:
EDIT:  Rip the whole disc.

Use eac3to to identify the playlist(s).  Pick the one that has the correct running time.
Code:
eac3to /filepath/

I might have had some success with the Cotton Club disc earlier today (so far it looks okay) by identifying the runtime in a different way. I played the disc in VLC with full menus, noted down the runtime and then ripped the one playlist that corresponded to that runtime. All the other playlists where a different but uniform runtime.

However, with the other disc I mentioned, one playlist has a different runtime to all the others but in that case it is not the right one. All the other hundreds of playlists are the correct runtime and all exactly the same runtime. So I guess it depends on how tricksy/devious the team encoding the disc are.

I forgot to mention that it's not just that the fake playlists jumble up the movie, the movie comes pre-jumbled. There isn't one big *.m2ts file in the STREAM folder as usual, there are lots of little *.m2ts files and the scenes within those files can play out of order. Only the correct playlist knows how to play all the parts in the right order. It occurred to me that it's like using the "seamless branching" technology (e.g. the Blade Runner blu-ray disc) but this time for evil! :D
 

Captain Khajiit

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For the other disc, how are you ascertaining that all the playlists have the same runtime?  Are you using VLC, as you did for Cotton Club, or another method?  It's worth giving eac3to a shot: it's quite good at finding the right playlist(s).  Give it a go, and let me know.

It's unusual for scenes to be out of order within an M2TS.  That's something that distinguishes the method used here from seamless branching, which does reassemble the M2TS files in a certain order but rarely features jumping around within them; that's something that only a playlist that makes use of something akin to chapter-stops can do.

EDIT:  When you talk about ripping a playlist, it sounds as if you are using MakeMKV to rip a specific playlist, rather than the whole disc.  Try the trial of AnyDVD, which should have been updated to handle this disc.  The BFI discs are known to be tricky when it comes to copy protection.
 

TM2YC

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Captain Khajiit said:
When you talk about ripping a playlist, it sounds as if you are using MakeMKV to rip a specific playlist, rather than the whole disc. Try the trial of AnyDVD, which should have been updated to handle this disc. The BFI discs are known to be tricky when it comes to copy protection.

I've got the full version of AnyDVD-HD (it's awesome) and I always use it to rip the whole disc before taking any further steps on a project. Having said that, I haven't installed the latest update yet. It removes all the usual copy protection just fine but the thing I'm talking about is baked into the disc structure, so I don't see what AnyDVD could do to help. I can rip the disc, burn the disc, rip that new disc and then burn it again, extracting something from it is the problem.

Captain Khajiit said:
For the other disc, how are you ascertaining that all the playlists have the same runtime?

I can look at them in VLC (minus the menu structure), in DVDFab and in Handbrake.

Captain Khajiit said:
It's worth giving eac3to a shot: it's quite good at finding the right playlist(s).  Give it a go, and let me know.

I haven't got that installed on my new PC yet (the old one died) but I'm not sure how it would find the right needle from this particular massive stack of hay identical needles.

Captain Khajiit said:
It's unusual for scenes to be out of order within an M2TS.  That's something that distinguishes the method used here from seamless branching, which does reassemble the M2TS files in a certain order but rarely features jumping around within them; that's something that only a playlist that makes use of something akin to chapter-stops can do.

I haven't verified that the Cotton Club M2TS files are mixed up or not yet (They are for the BFI blu-ray). It's akin to shuffling the deck, the Cotton Club disc has been shuffled by a regular joe, the BFI disc has been shuffled by a card sharp :D .

Captain Khajiit said:
EDIT:  When you talk about ripping a playlist, it sounds as if you are using MakeMKV to rip a specific playlist, rather than the whole disc. 

 I'm ripping the whole disc and then looking into extracting the correct version of the movie. I'm not using MakeMKV.
 

Captain Khajiit

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I've got the full version of AnyDVD-HD (it's awesome) and I always use it to rip the whole disc before taking any further steps on a project. Having said that, I haven't installed the latest update yet. It removes all the usual copy protection just fine but the thing I'm talking about is baked into the disc structure, so I don't see what AnyDVD could do to help. I can rip the disc, burn the disc, rip that new disc and then burn it again, extracting something from it is the problem.
I wasn't sure exactly what you were describing.  Now I know that you are talking about demuxing a given playlist and that you are already using AnyDVD (HD), it's clear.
TM2YC said:
I haven't got that installed on my new PC yet (the old one died) but I'm not sure how it would find the right needle from this particular massive stack of hay identical needles.
It's worth a try because it's a good tool for sorting out different playlists by listing their characteristics.  And the playlists might have the same runtime, but they can't be identical, because that would mean that it wouldn't matter which you demuxed.

Also, have you looked in the disc.inf file generated by AnyDVD?  It ought to list the correct playlist(s).
 

Captain Khajiit

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Right, so the disc in question is protected by Screen Pass.  AnyDVD HD should produce a disc.inf file containing the playlist information.  Failing that, you could try enabling Speedmenu in the settings, under Video Blu-ray, and ripping the disc that way.  If that doesn't work, there are a few other things we might try.  But I think that it will work.  Red Fox sorted this disc out a while ago, so recent versions of AnyDVD HD should be able to handle it.
 

TM2YC

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I could swear I posted a response to your last post, weird.

(Sorry if I wasn't using the correct terminology and making things needlessly confusing)

I looked into the disc.inf file generated by AnyDVD as you suggested and it listed the same playlist I already identified and demuxed for Cotton Club (830), which is encouraging. For the BFI blu-ray it listed three playlists (851, 778 & 472). The last two are hour-long bonus features, only 851 is the movie. I've already demuxed that one and need to give it a full watch to verify if it's okay but I've got a good feeling it is :) .

It looks like the genius of @"Captain Khajiit" has solved another conundrum (I will post when I've made sure). Thanks.
 

Captain Khajiit

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You are most welcome.  Fingers crossed that you now have your movie demuxed and are all set.  That disc.inf file is really handy, and as long as Red Fox has gotten round to looking at a particular disc, it can usually be relied upon to solve Screen Pass issues.

If it hadn't worked, I'd have helped you demux the disc manually.  It would have been a bit more hassle, but we'd have got there in the end.
 

TM2YC

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TM2YC said:
It looks like the genius of @"Captain Khajiit" has solved another conundrum (I will post when I've made sure). Thanks.

Genius confirmed. @"Captain Khajiit" 's method did work. Thanks again :) .
 

TM2YC

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Update: I found another blu-ray disc with this lo-fi encryption, one mastered in 2013/2014. Again @"Captain Khajiit" 's method of checking the disc.inf file for the playlist number worked, although this time I noticed Handbrake had auto-selected the same playlist from a selection of over 200.
 

lantern51

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I have a paid software that has been able to handle my Blu Ray encryptions. Its about $35 but no issues as of yet. It's call EaseFab Lossless Copy
 
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