The Anime Blu-ray Video Quality Thread - Page 333 - Blu-ray Forum

Ccharmanderk · 04-22-2022, 04:15 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BigOnAnime

He didn't do basic research again...

He watched only part of Negima. I've still not seen Negima and this is irritating to see. What is Negima!?, animated by Shaft?

Not to mention he claims the Scrapped Princess upscale is produced by Funimation; it's taken from the Japanese BD.

2/5 is also pretty harsh as a score on that one. It's at least a presentation that retains the original production aesthetics (namely the fake grain throughout the show) and the linework isn't smudged to hell. I don't think Scrapped Princess was ever gonna look amazing on Blu-ray, but for how the show was produced back in the day, the upscale is more than serviceable. Certainly an upgrade head-and-shoulders above the Bandai DVDs.

NLScavenger · 04-22-2022, 05:08 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Prince_7

Also yes the french BD is a bit blurrier, which is probably due to the x264 settings used and perhaps the use of the theatrical master, but you only really notice it when putting both side by side (unlike the difference in aspect ratio which is noticeable due to a thin line at the bottom which is brighter than the rest).

Maybe blurrier than JP BD because of a different 2K scope to 1080p rescale method.

Ajc228 · 04-22-2022, 06:51 PM

So I just picked up the Sentai release of VOTOMS the complete collection. I mainly wanted the side-story stuff because I already have the original series in HD. The HD stuff like Case Irvine looks okay but the SD original series looks pretty rough. Hopefully Sentai or another licensor down the line can get access to the new HD transfer because the current version isn’t ideal.

BigOnAnime · 04-22-2022, 07:16 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ccharmanderk

Not to mention he claims the Scrapped Princess upscale is produced by Funimation; it's taken from the Japanese BD.

2/5 is also pretty harsh as a score on that one. It's at least a presentation that retains the original production aesthetics (namely the fake grain throughout the show) and the linework isn't smudged to hell. I don't think Scrapped Princess was ever gonna look amazing on Blu-ray, but for how the show was produced back in the day, the upscale is more than serviceable. Certainly an upgrade head-and-shoulders above the Bandai DVDs.

At this point, I'm expecting him to review the complete collection release of Votoms, ignore the banner at the top, watch just a few episodes of the TV series, use only screenshots from the TV series, claim it was distributed by Sentai, claim the entire series is on SD Blu-ray and say how much they wish anime wasn't released that way not understanding why it happens, and call it a day.

Ajc228 · 04-23-2022, 12:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BigOnAnime

At this point, I'm expecting him to review the complete collection release of Votoms, ignore the banner at the top, watch just a few episodes of the TV series, use only screenshots from the TV series, claim it was distributed by Sentai, claim the entire series is on SD Blu-ray and say how much they wish anime wasn't released that way not understanding why it happens, and call it a day.

Is this directed at me ? Maiden Japan released VOTOMS (honest mistake.) My understanding is that the main series was sourced from SD material because either Sunrise didn’t have HD material available at the time or they did want to give it to a US distributor because the JP release was relatively recent/impending. Is this not accurate?

NLScavenger · 04-23-2022, 02:20 PM

Wicked City - UK BD vs JP/US BD

Comparison

UK BD footage and bitrate graph were provided by doud. The differences between the two encodes are quite subtle. It is worth mentioning that the UK BD is missing the UK dub that the US BD has.

UK BD

JP/US BD

BDInfo UK BD

Code:

Playlist: 00000.MPLS
Size: 26,835,207,936 bytes
Length: 1:22:15.347
Total Bitrate: 43.50 Mbps
Video: MPEG-4 AVC Video / 34682 kbps / 1080p / 23.976 fps / 16:9 / High Profile 4.1
Audio: English / LPCM Audio / 2.0 / 48 kHz / 2304 kbps / 24-bit
Audio: English / DTS-HD Master Audio / 5.1 / 48 kHz / 2057 kbps / 24-bit (DTS Core: 5.1 / 48 kHz / 768 kbps / 24-bit)
Audio: Japanese / LPCM Audio / 2.0 / 48 kHz / 2304 kbps / 24-bit
Subtitle: English / 23.868 kbps
Subtitle: English / 0.077 kbps

BDInfo JP BD

Code:

PLAYLIST REPORT:

Name:                   00001.MPLS
Length:                 1:22:15.639 (h:m:s.ms)
Size:                   19.679.391.744 bytes
Total Bitrate:          31.90 Mbps

VIDEO:

Codec                   Bitrate             Description     
-----                   -------             -----------     
MPEG-4 AVC Video        24321 kbps          1080p / 23.976 fps / 16:9 / High Profile 4.1

AUDIO:

Codec                           Language        Bitrate         Description     
-----                           --------        -------         -----------     
LPCM Audio                      Japanese        1536 kbps       2.0 / 48 kHz / 1536 kbps / 16-bit
LPCM Audio                      English         1536 kbps       2.0 / 48 kHz / 1536 kbps / 16-bit
DTS-HD Master Audio             English         2419 kbps       5.1 / 48 kHz / 2419 kbps / 16-bit (DTS Core: 5.1 / 48 kHz / 1509 kbps / 16-bit / DN -3dB)

sagadego · 04-23-2022, 03:10 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BigOnAnime

At this point, I'm expecting him to review the complete collection release of Votoms, ignore the banner at the top, watch just a few episodes of the TV series, use only screenshots from the TV series, claim it was distributed by Sentai, claim the entire series is on SD Blu-ray and say how much they wish anime wasn't released that way not understanding why it happens, and call it a day.

And then moan about a lack of 5.1 surround sound

BigOnAnime · 04-23-2022, 06:39 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ajc228

Is this directed at me ? Maiden Japan released VOTOMS (honest mistake.) My understanding is that the main series was sourced from SD material because either Sunrise didn’t have HD material available at the time or they did want to give it to a US distributor because the JP release was relatively recent/impending. Is this not accurate?

It was directed at Blu-ray.com reviewer Neil Lumbard who didn't do basic research on some titles. It's very important that when you review stuff, you include accurate information so people aren't misled or misinformed. Also seeing screenshots from only the beginning of a show is a problem. Some of the titles he reviewed had some of the content upscaled from SD masters while the rest was HD native, and yet none of the HD content has screenshots.
https://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread...2#post20042522
https://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread...5#post20042595
https://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread...8#post20045478
https://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread...1#post20046591

Why Votoms got SDBDs was because of the lack of HD masters (the Japanese Blu-ray with HD masters wasn't announced yet) and the fact that DVD sales have declined so much that DVD skus are no longer viable, with only two companies still actively supporting the format, that being Media Blasters and VIZ Media. In order to make SD content sell at this point, companies went down the SDBD route, though Sentai and Maiden Japan gave up after 2019, Media Blasters did only one (Strawberry Panic which wasn't advertised with a banner), Nozomi/RightStuf has done just a few, and it's been mainly Discotek at this point that still does them.

Glorian · 04-23-2022, 08:26 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BigOnAnime

In order to make SD content sell at this point, companies went down the SDBD route, though Sentai and Maiden Japan gave up after 2019, Media Blasters did only one (Strawberry Panic which wasn't advertised with a banner), Nozomi/RightStuf has done just a few, and it's been mainly Discotek at this point that still does them.

My impression, at least, is that most companies have decided they're better off upscaling SD materials for a release, at least for shorter (up to 26 episodes or so) titles. That's not a feasible approach for longer shows (especially niche ones), though, both from the time, effort, cost and the huge number of discs they'd require. So we only still see SD BDs from Discotek, since they're pretty much the only ones releasing really long older shows. Even then, only for the niche titles; they're doing upscales for major titles like Digimon.

CrashOveride95 · 04-24-2022, 02:49 AM

Lupin the 3rd Part I: The Classic Adventures - Discotek Media BD

BDInfo for Disc 1

[Show spoiler]

This is gonna be a long one, sorry

Video history:
So Part 1 has a complicated HD history.

Code:

			Raw HD Scan	____		
				|		        \
				|			 \
			        \/			  \
			"Netflix" Master                   \
				|			    \
				|		 Discotek's restoration
				\/
				JPBD

First, you have the raw HD scan which all HD masters of Part 1 are based off of.
I don't know when this scan was done, nor what year.
The scan was not done from the OCNs, but rather from 35mm prints (Excluding Episode 17B, which i'll get to later)

Next came the "Netflix" master, so called because the main source for it was Netflix. However, I have heard that it was originally created for use on WOWOW's HD service, and it has also seen use in recent years on other streaming services like Pluto TV.

The Netflix master has no color grading changes whatsoever from the raw scan, but does however do some of the same changes as the JPBD does, such as fixing an animation error in Episode 6, and some minor scratch/film damage removal

Finally there is the JPBD, which introduced the infamous "freezegrain" process, and bad color correction which blooms the image to hell

Luckily, Discotek was given access to the previously mentioned raw scans, and was able to do their own color correction + restoration process

The result is the best Part 1 has ever looked. Grain looks great, encoding is superb as always, and the new color correction looks very nice.

Episode 1 bitrate

Episode 1 Gallery

The Episode 17 Issue:

Since at least the 90s (possibly the 80s?) TMS has had to use a 16mm print for the B part of Episode 17. This 16mm print has not aged well, and is very grainy, faded, and blurry. Other releases such as the JPBDs attempted to hide it's age by subjecting it to filtering hell, scrubbing the image more than Mr. Clean

In the new restoration, colors have been slightly corrected to make the image fit in with the rest of the 35mm episode, and I think they did a good job for what they had to work with

Episode 17B Gallery

Audio:

Two audio tracks: Japanese mono, and the new English dub (Stereo?).

Episodes 3 and 23 have commentary tracks with Reed Nelson, Episodes 4 and 13 have commentary tracks with Mike Lepore and Ryan Gilbert.

Some notes about them:

The Japanese mono does not sound that good
It sounds like it came from some optical film source, probably the film prints used for the scan themselves.
It's not terrible, but it's really muffled in general
Every release I've seen has the same audio quality, so IMO it can be assumed without much doubt that the tape masters for the JP audio have been lost

However, the English dub, in terms of fidelity, sounds much better
It is immediately obvious that the backing M&E track is of significantly higher quality, and the music sounds better than you've ever heard it before.

Overall thoughts:

This is a great release in general, I really hope Discotek gets more opportunities down the line to be able to fix up bad remasters
With Part 1 done, the last part not released on BD in US is Part 2

that has its own set of problems

SpaceBlackKnight · 04-24-2022, 03:52 AM

TBH, the 16mm sections in 17B don't look that bad. At least it came from a decent film source and not some shitty SD upconvert or VHS insert.

NLScavenger · 04-24-2022, 06:24 AM

RIP freeze grain processing: https://slow.pics/c/Y6YWxW0m (also notice the silly error in the JP BD screenshot)

underworlderer · 04-24-2022, 07:14 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by CrashOveride95

Lupin the 3rd Part I: The Classic Adventures - Discotek Media BD

BDInfo for Disc 1

[Show spoiler]

This is gonna be a long one, sorry

Video history:
So Part 1 has a complicated HD history.

Code:

			Raw HD Scan	____		
				|		        \
				|			 \
			        \/			  \
			"Netflix" Master                   \
				|			    \
				|		 Discotek's restoration
				\/
				JPBD

First, you have the raw HD scan which all HD masters of Part 1 are based off of.
I don't know when this scan was done, nor what year.
The scan was not done from the OCNs, but rather from 35mm prints (Excluding Episode 17B, which i'll get to later)

Next came the "Netflix" master, so called because the main source for it was Netflix. However, I have heard that it was originally created for use on WOWOW's HD service, and it has also seen use in recent years on other streaming services like Pluto TV.

The Netflix master has no color grading changes whatsoever from the raw scan, but does however do some of the same changes as the JPBD does, such as fixing an animation error in Episode 6, and some minor scratch/film damage removal

Finally there is the JPBD, which introduced the infamous "freezegrain" process, and bad color correction which blooms the image to hell

Luckily, Discotek was given access to the previously mentioned raw scans, and was able to do their own color correction + restoration process

The result is the best Part 1 has ever looked. Grain looks great, encoding is superb as always, and the new color correction looks very nice.

Episode 1 bitrate

Episode 1 Gallery

The Episode 17 Issue:

Since at least the 90s (possibly the 80s?) TMS has had to use a 16mm print for the B part of Episode 17. This 16mm print has not aged well, and is very grainy, faded, and blurry. Other releases such as the JPBDs attempted to hide it's age by subjecting it to filtering hell, scrubbing the image more than Mr. Clean

In the new restoration, colors have been slightly corrected to make the image fit in with the rest of the 35mm episode, and I think they did a good job for what they had to work with

Episode 17B Gallery

Audio:

Two audio tracks: Japanese mono, and the new English dub (Stereo?).

Episodes 3 and 23 have commentary tracks with Reed Nelson, Episodes 4 and 13 have commentary tracks with Mike Lepore and Ryan Gilbert.

Some notes about them:

The Japanese mono does not sound that good
It sounds like it came from some optical film source, probably the film prints used for the scan themselves.
It's not terrible, but it's really muffled in general
Every release I've seen has the same audio quality, so IMO it can be assumed without much doubt that the tape masters for the JP audio have been lost

However, the English dub, in terms of fidelity, sounds much better
It is immediately obvious that the backing M&E track is of significantly higher quality, and the music sounds better than you've ever heard it before.

Overall thoughts:

This is a great release in general, I really hope Discotek gets more opportunities down the line to be able to fix up bad remasters
With Part 1 done, the last part not released on BD in US is Part 2

that has its own set of problems

no assumptions needed. Japanese people have a problem reconciling with grain and master audio tapes.

in other words, low standards. unfortunately

AreaFive · 04-24-2022, 09:59 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by CrashOveride95

Luckily, Discotek was given access to the previously mentioned raw scans, and was able to do their own color correction + restoration process

The result is the best Part 1 has ever looked. Grain looks great, encoding is superb as always, and the new color correction looks very nice.

Great to hear. Thank you for taking the time to make such an informative post.

NLScavenger · 04-24-2022, 03:38 PM

Patlabor on Television - US BD (Ultimate/Complete Collection) vs US BD (volumes) vs JP BD

Comparison

Redid the comparison to include PNG screenshots of old US BD and because hissatsu's JP BD screenshots were in wrong color.

US BD Ultimate/Complete Collection

US BD volumes

JP BD

Bitrate US BD Ultimate/Complete episode 01

Code:

Disc Label: PatLaborComp18 BD-1
Disc Size: 36,495,681,656 bytes
Protection: AACS
Playlist: 00009.MPLS
Size: 4,761,944,064 bytes
Length: 0:25:12.511
Total Bitrate: 25.19 Mbps
Video: MPEG-4 AVC Video / 21761 kbps / 1080p / 23.976 fps / 16:9 / High Profile 4.1
Audio: Japanese / DTS-HD Master Audio / 2.0 / 48 kHz /  2054 kbps / 24-bit (DTS Core: 2.0 / 48 kHz /  1509 kbps / 24-bit)
Subtitle: English / 34.811 kbps

Bitrate US BD vol. episode 01

MPEG-4 AVC 19999 kbps, DTS-HD MA 2.0 24-bit

Bitrate JP BD episode 01

MPEG-4 AVC 26654 kbps, LPCM 2.0 16-bit

CrashOveride95 · 04-24-2022, 03:41 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by NLScavenger

RIP freeze grain processing: https://slow.pics/c/Y6YWxW0m (also notice the silly error in the JP BD screenshot)

Do you have any other comparisons? I'm particularly interested in episode 17B, but anything helps

Naiera · 04-24-2022, 03:42 PM

There was something wrong with the complete collection of Patlabor, wasn’t there? Something-something black crush, or, you know, something?

NLScavenger · 04-24-2022, 03:58 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by CrashOveride95

Do you have any other comparisons? I'm particularly interested in episode 17B, but anything helps

I'll look into 17B tomorrow.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Naiera

There was something wrong with the complete collection of Patlabor, wasn’t there? Something-something black crush, or, you know, something?

Volumes have incorrect gamma whereas the complete collection's gamma is same as JP BD. All of the releases have their share of problems, but of all of them the volumes retain the most detail.

omarchafa · 04-24-2022, 04:53 PM

Wow on Lupin Part 1 US BD release. Now, I'm going to get it for sure. I'm glad Discotek got accessed to the raw material and release a superior product than the JP version.

CrashOveride95 · 04-24-2022, 05:04 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by underworlderer

no assumptions needed. Japanese people have a problem reconciling with grain and master audio tapes.

in other words, low standards. unfortunately

Well not really, most of TMS's old shows have good audio, just for Part 1 they lost a lot of assets, probably because the show failed when originally airing

Additionally many of TMS's other remasters don't do crappy DNR or other grain removal processes

04-24-2022, 02:49 AM	#6650
CrashOveride95 Active Member Member since:Oct 2021 4K collection:5 Blu-ray collection:49	Lupin the 3rd Part I: The Classic Adventures - Discotek Media BD BDInfo for Disc 1 [Show spoiler] This is gonna be a long one, sorry Video history: So Part 1 has a complicated HD history. Code: Raw HD Scan ____ \| \ \| \ \/ \ "Netflix" Master \ \| \ \| Discotek's restoration \/ JPBD First, you have the raw HD scan which all HD masters of Part 1 are based off of. I don't know when this scan was done, nor what year. The scan was not done from the OCNs, but rather from 35mm prints (Excluding Episode 17B, which i'll get to later) Next came the "Netflix" master, so called because the main source for it was Netflix. However, I have heard that it was originally created for use on WOWOW's HD service, and it has also seen use in recent years on other streaming services like Pluto TV. The Netflix master has no color grading changes whatsoever from the raw scan, but does however do some of the same changes as the JPBD does, such as fixing an animation error in Episode 6, and some minor scratch/film damage removal Finally there is the JPBD, which introduced the infamous "freezegrain" process, and bad color correction which blooms the image to hell Luckily, Discotek was given access to the previously mentioned raw scans, and was able to do their own color correction + restoration process The result is the best Part 1 has ever looked. Grain looks great, encoding is superb as always, and the new color correction looks very nice. Episode 1 bitrate Episode 1 Gallery The Episode 17 Issue: Since at least the 90s (possibly the 80s?) TMS has had to use a 16mm print for the B part of Episode 17. This 16mm print has not aged well, and is very grainy, faded, and blurry. Other releases such as the JPBDs attempted to hide it's age by subjecting it to filtering hell, scrubbing the image more than Mr. Clean In the new restoration, colors have been slightly corrected to make the image fit in with the rest of the 35mm episode, and I think they did a good job for what they had to work with Episode 17B Gallery Audio: Two audio tracks: Japanese mono, and the new English dub (Stereo?). Episodes 3 and 23 have commentary tracks with Reed Nelson, Episodes 4 and 13 have commentary tracks with Mike Lepore and Ryan Gilbert. Some notes about them: The Japanese mono does not sound that good It sounds like it came from some optical film source, probably the film prints used for the scan themselves. It's not terrible, but it's really muffled in general Every release I've seen has the same audio quality, so IMO it can be assumed without much doubt that the tape masters for the JP audio have been lost However, the English dub, in terms of fidelity, sounds much better It is immediately obvious that the backing M&E track is of significantly higher quality, and the music sounds better than you've ever heard it before. Overall thoughts: This is a great release in general, I really hope Discotek gets more opportunities down the line to be able to fix up bad remasters With Part 1 done, the last part not released on BD in US is Part 2 that has its own set of problems

04-24-2022, 03:38 PM	#6655
NLScavenger Blu-ray Ninja Top contributor Member since:Dec 2013 Location:Netherlands 4K collection:20 Blu-ray collection:831 Trading Score:9	Patlabor on Television - US BD (Ultimate/Complete Collection) vs US BD (volumes) vs JP BD Comparison Redid the comparison to include PNG screenshots of old US BD and because hissatsu's JP BD screenshots were in wrong color. US BD Ultimate/Complete Collection US BD volumes JP BD Bitrate US BD Ultimate/Complete episode 01 Code: Disc Label: PatLaborComp18 BD-1 Disc Size: 36,495,681,656 bytes Protection: AACS Playlist: 00009.MPLS Size: 4,761,944,064 bytes Length: 0:25:12.511 Total Bitrate: 25.19 Mbps Video: MPEG-4 AVC Video / 21761 kbps / 1080p / 23.976 fps / 16:9 / High Profile 4.1 Audio: Japanese / DTS-HD Master Audio / 2.0 / 48 kHz / 2054 kbps / 24-bit (DTS Core: 2.0 / 48 kHz / 1509 kbps / 24-bit) Subtitle: English / 34.811 kbps Bitrate US BD vol. episode 01 MPEG-4 AVC 19999 kbps, DTS-HD MA 2.0 24-bit Bitrate JP BD episode 01 MPEG-4 AVC 26654 kbps, LPCM 2.0 16-bit Last edited by NLScavenger; 04-24-2022 at 03:50 PM.

04-22-2022, 06:51 PM	#6643
Ajc228 Senior Member Member since:Mar 2017 Location:Mars	So I just picked up the Sentai release of VOTOMS the complete collection. I mainly wanted the side-story stuff because I already have the original series in HD. The HD stuff like Case Irvine looks okay but the SD original series looks pretty rough. Hopefully Sentai or another licensor down the line can get access to the new HD transfer because the current version isn’t ideal.

04-24-2022, 03:52 AM	#6651
SpaceBlackKnight Blu-ray Samurai Member since:Jul 2018 4K collection:25 Blu-ray collection:346 Digital collection:20	TBH, the 16mm sections in 17B don't look that bad. At least it came from a decent film source and not some shitty SD upconvert or VHS insert.

04-24-2022, 06:24 AM	#6652
NLScavenger Blu-ray Ninja Top contributor Member since:Dec 2013 Location:Netherlands 4K collection:20 Blu-ray collection:831 Trading Score:9	RIP freeze grain processing: https://slow.pics/c/Y6YWxW0m (also notice the silly error in the JP BD screenshot)

04-24-2022, 03:42 PM	#6657
Naiera Blu-ray Prince Top contributor Member since:Jun 2012 Location:Denmark Home Theater Gallery:2 Trading Score:25	There was something wrong with the complete collection of Patlabor, wasn’t there? Something-something black crush, or, you know, something?

04-24-2022, 04:53 PM	#6659
omarchafa Special Member Member since:Feb 2014	Wow on Lupin Part 1 US BD release. Now, I'm going to get it for sure. I'm glad Discotek got accessed to the raw material and release a superior product than the JP version.

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