The Anime Blu-ray Video Quality Thread

[SpaceDandy]

Originally Posted by professorwho

Maybe it’s the same SD masters Geneon had and produced (with English OP/ED) being upscaled and not the DVDs? That said, if the DVD was good to begin with, and the person/program doing the upscale knows what they’re doing, it can still look better than said DVD even with it as said source.

I find it hard to believe anyone would have kept the master files for a ~15 y.o. anime release from a company that went bankrupt more than 10 years ago but fine I'll believe it. And no, if you start from the DVD, you're carrying over the MPEG-2 artefacts. Sure you can do some clean-up on the blocky chroma and the likes but that's about it. And it'll just stand next to Oedo 808 in terms of BD PQ…

[jsevakis]

Ippo is upscaled from the Geneon masters. The Japanese masters were marginal interlaced upscales that we couldn’t IVTC. Luckily the Geneon masters that the licensor sent us for the English/Spanish dubs were pristine quality so we used those instead.

We never upscale from DVD rip. Only time that ever happened was with Cyber City Oedo, since there was nothing else. And y’all made it ABUNDANTLY clear how happy you were with that one. ��

[professorwho]

I was gonna get Ippo anyways, but that seals the deal.

[Dailyan]

Originally Posted by SpaceDandy

I find it hard to believe anyone would have kept the master files for a ~15 y.o. anime release from a company that went bankrupt more than 10 years ago but fine I'll believe it. And no, if you start from the DVD, you're carrying over the MPEG-2 artefacts. Sure you can do some clean-up on the blocky chroma and the likes but that's about it. And it'll just stand next to Oedo 808 in terms of BD PQ…

Plenty of distributors/studios have home video masters that are decades old at this point.

[The Collector FX]

Originally Posted by jsevakis

Ippo is upscaled from the Geneon masters. The Japanese masters were marginal interlaced upscales that we couldn’t IVTC. Luckily the Geneon masters that the licensor sent us for the English/Spanish dubs were pristine quality so we used those instead.

I'm just glad an HD/re-release happened at all. It's a great show and it deserves to be recognized. I'm not sure if any of you know who Egoraptor is - but in a few of his old YouTube videos you'll see him wearing a Hajime No Ippo shirt. Made me happy knowing there are still people out there who enjoy that show.

Discotek rescuing Hajime No Ippo is a slam dunk for old school anime fans.

[sagadego]

Originally Posted by jsevakis

Ippo is upscaled from the Geneon masters. The Japanese masters were marginal interlaced upscales that we couldn’t IVTC. Luckily the Geneon masters that the licensor sent us for the English/Spanish dubs were pristine quality so we used those instead.

We never upscale from DVD rip. Only time that ever happened was with Cyber City Oedo, since there was nothing else. And y’all made it ABUNDANTLY clear how happy you were with that one. ��

oh i am happy how cyber looks it's even that or the ratty CPM dvds

[xXx$uicide_Ma$terxXx]

Originally Posted by sagadego

oh i am happy how cyber looks it's even that or the ratty CPM dvds

Or the DVDs that look better than the BD lol.

[HunterKIller]

NLScavenger, do you know if the UK and USA Tokyo Godfathers editions have the same image quality? I prefer the UK releases, but if it's better here, I might be tempted. I am also curious if the mentioned "Satoshi Kon Ani * Kuri15 short Ohayo" is available in the UK edition.

[NLScavenger]

Originally Posted by HunterKIller

NLScavenger, do you know if the UK and USA Tokyo Godfathers editions have the same image quality? I prefer the UK releases, but if it's better here, I might be tempted. I am also curious if the mentioned "Satoshi Kon Ani * Kuri15 short Ohayo" is available in the UK edition.

US BD is superior because it's a new remaster from 4K scan. Ohayo is not included with the UK BD.

[Tylerfan]

Demon Slayer Part 1 (FUNi's release not Aniplex's) just got reviewed
https://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Demon...270428/#Review

[Zhou]

I started watching the first Hajime no Ippo set last night, and while I was disappointed to see Geneon's (mis)translated credits in the opening and ending sequences, I'm pleasantly surprised by how good the upscale looks. Other than some aliasing there and there, I'd say it looks about as good as the first season of The Big O on Blu-ray, in the sense that I occasionally forgot I wasn't watching an HD remaster from the original film elements.

[Footlong Shoe]

This isn't exactly video quality but I got around to watching the Funimation Blu-ray release of Love Live Sunshine: Over the Rainbow and it uses the same translation as the Japanese release, though this time most of the songs are finally subtitled. One song is left untranslated, but I believe it could have been due to licensing issues since the song in question was first released on the bonus CD included with the final Blu-ray volume of the series. It's also used as background music for its scene, so it doesn't really disrupt the experience.

What irks me more is that this means one of the final lines of the movie is still terribly mistranslated.

[Show spoiler]In a post credits scene, you see a shot of the beach as some girls off screen talk about starting their own idol group. The Bandai translation incorrectly translates one line as "Didn't you see us live in Numazu?", which doesn't make any sense, and implies the girls speaking are the main characters (which also doesn't make sense given any of the other dialogue in the scene). I checked the dub and, despite being remarkably close to the subtitles, it corrects the mistake and says "Didn't you see the live in Numazu?", which clears up the confusion

. There are also some jokes that get translated poorly but they don't cause nearly as much confusion. I would've much preferred it if Funi translated this from scratch and made it more consistent with their translation of the series.

[Tylerfan]

Violet Evergarden review:
https://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Viole...lu-ray/277409/

[professorwho]

The audio is in LPCM and not Dolby TrueHD, and the series uses the broadcast versions and not the updated Blu-ray versions with the extended Episode 13. Just pointing it out because it's not mentioned in the review.

[Tylerfan]

If what you say about the LPCM audio is true, then how come the back cover mentions DTS audio?

[Tylerfan]

Oh yeah, here's the V.E. movie review:
https://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Viole...277379/#Review

[professorwho]

Originally Posted by Tylerfan

If what you say about the LPCM audio is true, then how come the back cover mentions DTS audio?

FUNimation ported over the Australian Madman Blu-ray with only slight modifications in the authoring stage (Region A locked as opposed to B, stuff like that), while the encodes are the same... they also appear to have ported over that error, as Madman's BD also lists DTS audio on the back, yet the discs have it in PCM (I can't find pictures of the back side of the case easily, but it's the same mistake).

[Raye]

Anyone know if the subsequent complete releases of Akame ga Kill after the two "half" sets had any improved PQ? I'm guessing it's most likely no since the two sets spanned four discs while the complete sets only have three?

[BigOnAnime]

Originally Posted by Tylerfan

Violet Evergarden review:
https://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Viole...lu-ray/277409/

Fans of the series are strongly encouraged to pick up Violet Evergarden.

Yeah uh, the broadcast version and the bad Netflix subtitle translation has been a deal-breaker for many people, so...

Unless FUNimation eventually provides the home video version with more accurate subtitles, my set is sadly sitting unwatched. I'm still very much crushed by the news (I pre-ordered well before the news hit). My only hope is if Anime Limited actually fixed the mistakes with their release that shouldn't have happened in the first place.

[professorwho]

Originally Posted by Raye

Anyone know if the subsequent complete releases of Akame ga Kill after the two "half" sets had any improved PQ? I'm guessing it's most likely no since the two sets spanned four discs while the complete sets only have three?

Those two halves each were the standard 9-4 split (or something along those lines), aka 1 BD-50 and 1 BD-25. The video could be identical, or it could be a new encode. With Sentai, it's hard to tell (though the only difference might be newly re-done subtitles).