Tony Dugan can still recall the joy of watching his first DVD a decade ago.

A self-described “child of the ’80s,” Dugan is the store manager of Family Video, 3407 Lincoln Way, and spends his days making room on the shelves for Blu-ray discs — the next generation of movie-watching technology. Family Video began slowly introducing Blu-rays to central Iowa stores about a year ago, Dugan said.

“I’d say we definitely walk before we run,” he said.

Because of the demographic and the large number of students who own a Sony PlayStation 3, which supports the Blu-ray format, the Ames location received more Blu-rays over the past year as the discs continued to rise in popularity.

“For ‘The Hangover,’ we had 120 copies on DVD and seven on Blu-ray,” Dugan said, adding that all were checked out within 24 hours.

Family Video rents DVD new releases at $2.59 per night with Blu-rays priced at $3.85.

At Family Video, the ratio of Blu-rays rented to DVDs remains proportional. If it has 50 copies of a new title on DVD and five on Blu-ray, and 10 or 20 titles were checked out on DVD, one could expect one or two Blu-rays to go out as well.

This ratio is expected to change, though, once Blu-ray players begin to penetrate the market.

During the 2009 Christmas shopping season, Blu-ray stand-alone players began to dip below $80, and the cost of 42” 1080p high-definition televisions could be found near $500 to $600 per set.

The NPD Group’s market research analysts found Blu-ray players jumping 53 percent in total sales on Black Friday 2009 compared to the same day a year prior.

Sony dropped the price of its PlayStation 3 to below $300. That price drop helped allow Mike Holowinski, junior in pre-business, purchase his first PS3 in early January.

“The quality of picture is way better … there’s a lot more special features DVDs don’t offer,” Holowinski said of watching the first Blu-ray movie he bought, “The Hangover.”

Holowinski describes himself as the type of person who waits until new technology becomes more affordable, though he’s around it all the time working in the electronics section of Target, 320 S. Duff Ave. So far, the selection of movies available hasn’t been an issue to him either buying or renting, as he admits to renting movies around three times a week.

“All the new movies come out on Blu-ray, too,” his girlfriend Katie Andrew, junior in communication studies, points out.

Andrew wasn’t as quickly sold on the picture, but admits it didn’t take her long to notice an improvement.

“After about two or three minutes I could see some difference,” Andrew said. “I noticed highlights in the distressed bride’s hair that I hadn’t seen before, and every scrape and piece of dirt was more noticeable on Phil during his infamous phone call to Tracy.”

The video rental kiosk company, Redbox, rented a record two million DVDs on New Year’s Eve. With 19,000 locations and growing, Redbox surpassed 350 million rentals in 2009 nationwide, despite difficulties getting studios to embrace the kiosks.

“Redbox is currently testing Blu-ray at select locations in a limited number of markets,” said Christopher Goodrich, a public relations representative for Redbox.

Blu-ray rentals at Redbox remain at the same price as regular DVDs. “The price is $1 per night, but as with all tests, this could change,” Goodrich added.

Dugan reports few complaints about the current selection of Blu-ray titles at Family Video and said if anything it’s customers requesting older titles that may or may not be available yet.

But Dugan doesn’t see regulars DVDs being pushed out as fast as VHS vacated when DVDs appeared, attributing that to the backward compatibility Blu-ray players offer.

“DVDs still look a lot better,” Dugan explains. “And from what I’ve read, the industry doesn’t foresee DVDs leaving so quickly either.”

“It’s going to take a while to go back and remaster older films,” Holowinski says of the selection of Blu-rays while adding that it would only “get better.”

But despite the admiration Dugan holds for Blu-rays, he still says, “Nothing beats a movie theater.”