The Anime Blu-ray Video Quality Thread

[Gorgon]

^^ Although I assuredly appreciate that folks wish for the very best transfer possible for any release, I sometimes think I'm blessed that I have less than optimal vision and in fact wear bifocals to function daily.
In this way, it takes far more to disturb my visual appreciation of a release and I am able to focus my attention on story content and character development rather than the nuances of the technical merits.
Again, by all means, please continue to provide the technical aspects of releases as it is I suspect VERY important to many viewers but please forgive me if I state they are frequently lost to me.

heh, I do read them though, as I find the info fascinating.

[cooperb21]

Is Aniplex's release of brotherhood much better? I have all funimation releases of Full metal alchemist 2003/2009 + ova's. I thought they looked very good watching them. Didn't see any obvious issues to me.

[cooperb21]

Originally Posted by Gorgon

^^ Although I assuredly appreciate that folks wish for the very best transfer possible for any release, I sometimes think I'm blessed that I have less than optimal vision and in fact wear bifocals to function daily.
In this way, it takes far more to disturb my visual appreciation of a release and I am able to focus my attention on story content and character development rather than the nuances of the technical merits.
Again, by all means, please continue to provide the technical aspects of releases as it is I suspect VERY important to many viewers but please forgive me if I state they are frequently lost to me.

heh, I do read them though, as I find the info fascinating.

You wouldn't notice unless comparing side by side. Funimation release of FMA/FMABH was actually good in my experience. I don't doubt Aniplex might look a bit better, but not enough to re-buy the series. We probably talking minor things less than 1-5% of people will notice.

[professorwho]

Originally Posted by cooperb21

Is Aniplex's release of brotherhood much better? I have all funimation releases of Full metal alchemist 2003/2009 + ova's. I thought they looked very good watching them. Didn't see any obvious issues to me.

Yes. They are massive improvement. FUNimation are complete idiots at encoding, and Brotherhood has a lot of banding and aliasing not on the Aniplex release.

Audio-wise, you could say that FUNi wins, as the audio is 24-Bit, and the dub is in 5.1 surround at a high Bitrate- but seeing as it’s stereo audio masters being matrixes into 6 channels, it’s not a huge benefit. So really, it’s a tie.

[professorwho]

Originally Posted by Gorgon

^^ Although I assuredly appreciate that folks wish for the very best transfer possible for any release, I sometimes think I'm blessed that I have less than optimal vision and in fact wear bifocals to function daily.
In this way, it takes far more to disturb my visual appreciation of a release and I am able to focus my attention on story content and character development rather than the nuances of the technical merits.
Again, by all means, please continue to provide the technical aspects of releases as it is I suspect VERY important to many viewers but please forgive me if I state they are frequently lost to me.

heh, I do read them though, as I find the info fascinating.

Oh sure. If I’ve never seen the show before, then I pay more attention to the series itself and less to the transfer. Only after a viewing do I really go in-depth. Sure, I can tell if it’s good or bad while watching it for the first time, but it’s not my main focus- just watching the show is.

So yeah, if I did that every time I watch a show for the first time, I’d be yelling here about everything (which I kind of already am, lol), but that’s a waste of my time.

The way I see it, if you show is good, you could watch it on VHS and still have a good time. Sure, it’ll look terrible, but it’s a good show. Here I focus on the technical elements. And sometimes it’s hard to do so on a show I like. But because I only mainly focus on one, it may give off false impressions.

[cooperb21]

Originally Posted by professorwho

Yes. They are massive improvement. FUNimation are complete idiots at encoding, and Brotherhood has a lot of banding and aliasing not on the Aniplex release.

Audio-wise, you could say that FUNi wins, as the audio is 24-Bit, and the dub is in 5.1 surround at a high Bitrate- but seeing as it’s stereo audio masters being matrixes into 6 channels, it’s not a huge benefit. So really, it’s a tie.

I didn't notice/see any of that when watching the series normally. I'm not saying it doesn't exist, but unless you have a sharp eye/equipment to test it you wouldn't notice. I guess depends on how anal you would be about transfers and you notice those things more easily.

[professorwho]

Originally Posted by cooperb21

Anyone know how good Funimation Mob Psycho 100 release was? It seemed to be a collaboration between Crunchyroll. With that deal ending, blu-rays probably won't be produced much longer. I think Crunchyroll has the rights after that.

On the topic of Mob Psycho, a JP BD Box was released a few days ago, and I think I'll be importing it sometime soon next year. (I'd rather get this- which is guarenteed to be well encoded, instead of risking it on Q-TEC's Kare Kano)

[LexInHD]

I'm slogging through Go Shogun. The video looks to be a straight HD telecine transfer, with no discernible alterations or clean-up. Lots of wobble, hairs, print speckles, etc. in the picture. The show is mind-bogglingly violent, on par with Zeta Gundam, and all the protagonists are constantly fighting with one another, often violently. Then there's the kid, who is basically shat on by everyone he's supposed to be protected by and even physically abused. I'm not sure what was going through the mind of whomever was running the show, but it's not as kid-friendly as one would think.

[NLScavenger]

Originally Posted by LexInHD

I'm slogging through Go Shogun. The video looks to be a straight HD telecine transfer, with no discernible alterations or clean-up. Lots of wobble, hairs, print speckles, etc. in the picture. The show is mind-bogglingly violent, on par with Zeta Gundam, and all the protagonists are constantly fighting with one another, often violently. Then there's the kid, who is basically shat on by everyone he's supposed to be protected by and even physically abused. I'm not sure what was going through the mind of whomever was running the show, but it's not as kid-friendly as one would think.

That sounds like a show right up my alley.

[SeaFox]

Anyone have any comments on Saekano's subtitles? Are they the same style I see on other AoA titles like The Irregular at Magic High School and SAO Alternative: Gun Gale Online (which are hardsubbed on Hulu)? Is there a decent effort to sub on-sign/screen text?

[professorwho]

Girls und Panzer: This is The Real Anzio Battle!
(Sentai Filmworks, USA)


Video:
1080p MPEG-4 AVC
23.976 fps
1.78:1 Aspect Ratio
17678 kbps AVG (17.68 mbps)
36256 kbps MAX (36.26 mbps)
4.81 GB

Audio:
Japanese DTS HD-MA 5.1 48kHz 24-Bit 3567 kbps (955 mb)
English DTS HD-MA 5.1 48kHz 24-Bit 3706 kbps (993 mb)

I'm disappointed. Not that it looks bad- it doesn't. It's fine. But, the bitrates are rather low. Sentai has many different compressionists, and the one here has achieved a good image at a low bitrate, but seeing as this 38 minute OVA is on its own BD-25, it's disappointing to see it not average at least 30 mbps. It would be much easier, too. Higher bitrates make it less taxing on the compressionist, so why not aim high when you have the space? The disc is only 8.88 GB.

[Naiera]

Lazy compressionists for the lose

[Robbl]

Originally Posted by professorwho

Higher bitrates make it less taxing on the compressionist, so why not aim high when you have the space? The disc is only 8.88 GB.

Not necessarily unless he has to go out of his way to achieve that.

[Lambadelta]

Slayers S1 JP BD

Oh boy this is a pretty lazy release, and I'm a tad gutted.

The release is a SD upscale of the footage from their previous DVD box release.

King Amusement Creatives put out the laziest release possible here with this set. This is mostly a pure cash in due to the renewed hype in Slayers due to the release of volume 16 of the main novels after 18 years.



First things first is the average bitrate, which honestly isn't that bad, but bitrate isn't everything in the world.

Picture Quality

If I had to sum it up in a word I'd say its pretty underwhelming. The image is fuzzy, and washed out.

JP BD vs UK DVD (Upscaled)
(Incase the screenshot comparsion gets removed (I couldn't use diff.pics) I'll put the images used in this spoiler)

[Show spoiler]
JP BD

UK DVD (Upscaled)

Here is the JP BD vs the Spanish BD

JP vs Spanish BD

(Incase the screenshot comparsion gets removed (I couldn't use diff.pics) I'll put the images used in this spoiler)

[Show spoiler]
JP BD

Spanish BD

(If your more curious about my opinions on the Spanish release check here)


The video source is 29.970fps, and is interlaced footage. This means its most likely a 1080i upscale, which is an odd choice for Slayers since it would have no content requiring 29.970fps, which makes me feel they used an old interlaced DVD souce, and decided to not mess with it in regards to deinterlacing the footage.

Video
ID                             : 1
Format                         : AVC
Format/Info                    : Advanced Video Codec
Format profile                 : High@L4.1
Format settings, CABAC         : Yes
Format settings, ReFrames      : 4 frames
Codec ID                       : V_MPEG4/ISO/AVC
Duration                       : 22mn 12s
Bit rate mode                  : Variable
Maximum bit rate               : 40.0 Mbps
Width                          : 1 920 pixels
Height                         : 1 080 pixels
Display aspect ratio           : 16:9
Frame rate mode                : Constant
Frame rate                     : 29.970 fps
Color space                    : YUV
Chroma subsampling             : 4:2:0
Bit depth                      : 8 bits
Scan type                      : MBAFF
Scan order                     : Top Field First

Audio

The audio for the set is clear, but not really much different to what is on other releases already out there bar the fact its using a different codec due to being on blu-ray.

Audio
ID                             : 2
Format                         : TrueHD
Codec ID                       : A_TRUEHD
Duration                       : 22mn 12s
Bit rate mode                  : Variable
Maximum bit rate               : 2 526 Kbps
Channel(s)                     : 2 channels
Channel positions              : Front: C
Sampling rate                  : 96.0 KHz
Compression mode               : Lossless
Title                          : Stereo
Language                       : Japanese

Honestly if you were wanting to buy Slayers on BD I'd say track down the Spanish release, and use that otherwise just stick with the DVDs. This set isn't much more than an extremely marginal improvement.

[Nostalgic Twilight]

Thank you so much for the review. That screenshot looks pretty gross. King Amusement Creative should be ashamed.

[Yuripa]

Not sure if anyone posted the full details for Bebop the movie form Funimation.

So I did :



Screengrabs : http://imgbox.com/g/w8tX6zi1P8

Full mediainfo :

[Show spoiler]

General
Unique ID : 261021501118504135229854028608877635338 (0xC45EE99A78CB0C889341FF04FF00270A)
Complete name : C:\Users\Iluvatar\Videos\Cowboy Bebop The Movie_t00.mkv
Format : Matroska
Format version : Version 2
File size : 29.6 GiB
Duration : 1h 55mn
Overall bit rate mode : Variable
Overall bit rate : 36.8 Mbps
Movie name : Cowboy Bebop The Movie
Encoded date : UTC 2018-12-23 15:30:42
Writing application : MakeMKV v1.14.1 win(x64-release)
Writing library : libmakemkv v1.14.1 (1.3.5/1.4.7) win(x64-release)

Video
ID : 1
Format : AVC
Format/Info : Advanced Video Codec
Format profile : High@L4.1
Format settings, CABAC : Yes
Format settings, ReFrames : 4 frames
Codec ID : V_MPEG4/ISO/AVC
Duration : 1h 55mn
Bit rate mode : Variable
Maximum bit rate : 37.0 Mbps
Width : 1 920 pixels
Height : 1 080 pixels
Display aspect ratio : 16:9
Frame rate mode : Constant
Frame rate : 23.976 fps
Color space : YUV
Chroma subsampling : 4:2:0
Bit depth : 8 bits
Scan type : Progressive
Language : English
Default : No
Forced : No
DURATION : 01:55:14.240666666
NUMBER_OF_FRAMES : 165776
NUMBER_OF_BYTES : 25884461395
SOURCE_ID : 001011
_STATISTICS_WRITING_APP : MakeMKV v1.14.1 win(x64-release)
_STATISTICS_WRITING_DATE_UTC : 2018-12-23 15:30:42
_STATISTICS_TAGS : BPS DURATION NUMBER_OF_FRAMES NUMBER_OF_BYTES SOURCE_ID

Audio #1
ID : 2
Format : TrueHD
Codec ID : A_TRUEHD
Duration : 1h 55mn
Bit rate mode : Variable
Maximum bit rate : 3 960 Kbps
Channel(s) : 6 channels
Channel positions : Front: L C R, Side: L R, LFE
Sampling rate : 48.0 KHz
Bit depth : 24 bits
Compression mode : Lossless
Title : Surround 5.1
Language : English
Default : Yes
Forced : No
DURATION : 01:55:14.240833333
NUMBER_OF_FRAMES : 8297089
NUMBER_OF_BYTES : 2268868216
SOURCE_ID : 001100
_STATISTICS_WRITING_APP : MakeMKV v1.14.1 win(x64-release)
_STATISTICS_WRITING_DATE_UTC : 2018-12-23 15:30:42
_STATISTICS_TAGS : BPS DURATION NUMBER_OF_FRAMES NUMBER_OF_BYTES SOURCE_ID

Audio #2
ID : 3
Format : AC-3
Format/Info : Audio Coding 3
Mode extension : CM (complete main)
Format settings, Endianness : Big
Codec ID : A_AC3
Duration : 1h 55mn
Bit rate mode : Constant
Bit rate : 448 Kbps
Channel(s) : 6 channels
Channel positions : Front: L C R, Side: L R, LFE
Sampling rate : 48.0 KHz
Bit depth : 16 bits
Compression mode : Lossy
Stream size : 369 MiB (1%)
Title : Surround 5.1
Language : English
Default : No
Forced : No
DURATION : 01:55:14.272000000
NUMBER_OF_FRAMES : 216071
NUMBER_OF_BYTES : 387199232
SOURCE_ID : 001100
_STATISTICS_WRITING_APP : MakeMKV v1.14.1 win(x64-release)
_STATISTICS_WRITING_DATE_UTC : 2018-12-23 15:30:42
_STATISTICS_TAGS : BPS DURATION NUMBER_OF_FRAMES NUMBER_OF_BYTES SOURCE_ID

Audio #3
ID : 4
Format : TrueHD
Codec ID : A_TRUEHD
Duration : 1h 55mn
Bit rate mode : Variable
Maximum bit rate : 4 137 Kbps
Channel(s) : 6 channels
Channel positions : Front: L C R, Side: L R, LFE
Sampling rate : 48.0 KHz
Bit depth : 24 bits
Compression mode : Lossless
Title : Surround 5.1
Language : Japanese
Default : No
Forced : No
DURATION : 01:55:14.240833333
NUMBER_OF_FRAMES : 8297089
NUMBER_OF_BYTES : 2184245930
SOURCE_ID : 001101
_STATISTICS_WRITING_APP : MakeMKV v1.14.1 win(x64-release)
_STATISTICS_WRITING_DATE_UTC : 2018-12-23 15:30:42
_STATISTICS_TAGS : BPS DURATION NUMBER_OF_FRAMES NUMBER_OF_BYTES SOURCE_ID

Audio #4
ID : 5
Format : AC-3
Format/Info : Audio Coding 3
Mode extension : CM (complete main)
Format settings, Endianness : Big
Codec ID : A_AC3
Duration : 1h 55mn
Bit rate mode : Constant
Bit rate : 448 Kbps
Channel(s) : 6 channels
Channel positions : Front: L C R, Side: L R, LFE
Sampling rate : 48.0 KHz
Bit depth : 16 bits
Compression mode : Lossy
Stream size : 369 MiB (1%)
Title : Surround 5.1
Language : Japanese
Default : No
Forced : No
DURATION : 01:55:14.272000000
NUMBER_OF_FRAMES : 216071
NUMBER_OF_BYTES : 387199232
SOURCE_ID : 001101
_STATISTICS_WRITING_APP : MakeMKV v1.14.1 win(x64-release)
_STATISTICS_WRITING_DATE_UTC : 2018-12-23 15:30:42
_STATISTICS_TAGS : BPS DURATION NUMBER_OF_FRAMES NUMBER_OF_BYTES SOURCE_ID

Audio #5
ID : 6
Format : AC-3
Format/Info : Audio Coding 3
Mode extension : CM (complete main)
Format settings, Endianness : Big
Codec ID : A_AC3
Duration : 1h 55mn
Bit rate mode : Constant
Bit rate : 640 Kbps
Channel(s) : 2 channels
Channel positions : Front: L R
Sampling rate : 48.0 KHz
Bit depth : 16 bits
Compression mode : Lossy
Stream size : 528 MiB (2%)
Title : Stéréo
Language : French
Default : No
Forced : No
DURATION : 01:55:14.272000000
NUMBER_OF_FRAMES : 216071
NUMBER_OF_BYTES : 553141760
SOURCE_ID : 001102
_STATISTICS_WRITING_APP : MakeMKV v1.14.1 win(x64-release)
_STATISTICS_WRITING_DATE_UTC : 2018-12-23 15:30:42
_STATISTICS_TAGS : BPS DURATION NUMBER_OF_FRAMES NUMBER_OF_BYTES SOURCE_ID

Text #1
ID : 7
Format : PGS
Codec ID : S_HDMV/PGS
Codec ID/Info : The same subtitle format used on BDs/HD-DVDs
Language : English
Default : No
Forced : No
DURATION : 01:53:58.352354166
NUMBER_OF_FRAMES : 2012
NUMBER_OF_BYTES : 20486762
SOURCE_ID : 001200
_STATISTICS_WRITING_APP : MakeMKV v1.14.1 win(x64-release)
_STATISTICS_WRITING_DATE_UTC : 2018-12-23 15:30:42
_STATISTICS_TAGS : BPS DURATION NUMBER_OF_FRAMES NUMBER_OF_BYTES SOURCE_ID

Text #2
ID : 9
Format : PGS
Codec ID : S_HDMV/PGS
Codec ID/Info : The same subtitle format used on BDs/HD-DVDs
Language : Spanish
Default : No
Forced : No
DURATION : 01:54:14.868854166
NUMBER_OF_FRAMES : 2011
NUMBER_OF_BYTES : 22278345
SOURCE_ID : 001201
_STATISTICS_WRITING_APP : MakeMKV v1.14.1 win(x64-release)
_STATISTICS_WRITING_DATE_UTC : 2018-12-23 15:30:42
_STATISTICS_TAGS : BPS DURATION NUMBER_OF_FRAMES NUMBER_OF_BYTES SOURCE_ID

Text #3
ID : 11
Format : PGS
Codec ID : S_HDMV/PGS
Codec ID/Info : The same subtitle format used on BDs/HD-DVDs
Language : French
Default : No
Forced : No
DURATION : 01:54:14.868854166
NUMBER_OF_FRAMES : 1999
NUMBER_OF_BYTES : 21679004
SOURCE_ID : 001202
_STATISTICS_WRITING_APP : MakeMKV v1.14.1 win(x64-release)
_STATISTICS_WRITING_DATE_UTC : 2018-12-23 15:30:42
_STATISTICS_TAGS : BPS DURATION NUMBER_OF_FRAMES NUMBER_OF_BYTES SOURCE_ID

Text #4
ID : 13
Format : PGS
Codec ID : S_HDMV/PGS
Codec ID/Info : The same subtitle format used on BDs/HD-DVDs
Language : Portuguese
Default : No
Forced : No
DURATION : 01:54:14.868854166
NUMBER_OF_FRAMES : 1995
NUMBER_OF_BYTES : 20627292
SOURCE_ID : 001203
_STATISTICS_WRITING_APP : MakeMKV v1.14.1 win(x64-release)
_STATISTICS_WRITING_DATE_UTC : 2018-12-23 15:30:42
_STATISTICS_TAGS : BPS DURATION NUMBER_OF_FRAMES NUMBER_OF_BYTES SOURCE_ID

Menu
00:00:00.000 : en:Chapter 01
00:07:00.420 : en:Chapter 02
00:12:19.864 : en:Chapter 03
00:20:07.664 : en:Chapter 04
00:27:55.423 : en:Chapter 05
00:38:58.669 : en:Chapter 06
00:47:20.712 : en:Chapter 07
00:53:18.528 : en:Chapter 08
01:00:59.656 : en:Chapter 09
01:09:16.152 : en:Chapter 10
01:17:04.953 : en:Chapter 11
01:24:49.292 : en:Chapter 12
01:32:15.613 : en:Chapter 13
01:40:12.131 : en:Chapter 14
01:47:11.967 : en:Chapter 15

I don't have the UK/AUS/old US BD's so I can't compare them, but from what I see It's not that good, especialy the artificial grain added after the DNR. (like the TV serie).

[NLScavenger]

I'm not seeing the DNR or the fake grain, but whatever grain was present has been rendered into a lumpy mush: https://images2.imgbox.com/71/e1/iFUM8DUA_o.png

[Dailyan]

Originally Posted by Yuripa

I don't have the UK/AUS/old US BD's so I can't compare them, but from what I see It's not that good, especialy the artificial grain added after the DNR. (like the TV serie).

Nah, that just seems to be poor compression than artificial grain. I'm sticking with the Image/Umbrella Blu.

[Yuripa]

Originally Posted by NLScavenger

I'm not seeing the DNR or the fake grain, but whatever grain was present has been rendered into a lumpy mush: https://images2.imgbox.com/71/e1/iFUM8DUA_o.png

Well I don't have the others BD to compare but from the old FR DVD I got my hands on, the grain was so much different that it seem's like the BD grain was completly new (so added artificially) but indeed it's probably not the case.
Anyway its not very good.
Would love to see a comparaison with the others BD.

[chronoclast]

I just re-bought the Image Bebop BD. I mistakenly sold it when Funi announced their license in hopes of 5.1 audio. Screw Funi and their inability to do good video encodes.