The Anime Blu-ray Video Quality Thread

[NLScavenger]

Originally Posted by jd213

Got the Daitarn 3 box that was recently released in Japan. Image quality looks about the same as the Italian BD box, maybe a slight bit more DNR (but nowhere near as bad as the Zambot 3 box).

[Show spoiler]
A couple shots from the IT box:

The JP box's audio is much better however, the IT box's audio was probably taken from the optical audio of film prints or something, comparing the spectograms and it looks like everything over 18 kHz is nothing but noise on the JP track from the IT box.

Got the Dynit release in the mail today. Apart from the lower volume and the noise in the 18kHz+ range that nobody in the target audience will likely notice with their level of hearing, it sounds the same as the Japanese Blu-ray track to me.

An important piece of detail is that the ITA and JP BD tracks in spectograms above are from the track that is labeled as "Director Yoshiyuki Tomino version" (富野由悠季監修版) on the Japanese BD, which despite the director's name being attached offers nothing special apart from some noise reduction and EQ compared to the "Original Version" (オリジナル版) on the Japanese BD. Heck, the restoration work seems to be quite conservative, so while there are some audible differences, to my ears the restored track of episode 1 didn't sound a whole lot different from the original.

Spectogram of JP BD Original / JP BD Tomino / ITA BD: https://slow.pics/c/7AxOpXGq

BDInfo ITA Disc 1

Disc Label: MUTEKI KOJIN DAITARN 3 D1
Disc Size: 49,953,328,604 bytes
Protection: AACS
Playlist: 00004.MPLS
Size: 46,946,904,576 bytes
Length: 3:18:17.176
Total Bitrate: 31.57 Mbps
Video: MPEG-4 AVC Video / 24001 kbps / 1080p / 23.976 fps / 16:9 / High Profile 4.1
Audio: Italian / DTS-HD Master Audio / 5.1 / 48 kHz /  2472 kbps / 16-bit (DTS Core: 5.1 / 48 kHz /  1509 kbps / 16-bit)
Audio: Italian / DTS-HD Master Audio / 2.0 / 48 kHz /  1051 kbps / 16-bit (DTS Core: 2.0 / 48 kHz /   640 kbps / 16-bit)
Audio: Italian / DTS-HD Master Audio / 2.0 / 48 kHz /   998 kbps / 16-bit (DTS Core: 2.0 / 48 kHz /   640 kbps / 16-bit)
Audio: Japanese / DTS-HD Master Audio / 2.0 / 48 kHz /   994 kbps / 16-bit (DTS Core: 2.0 / 48 kHz /   640 kbps / 16-bit)
Subtitle: Italian / 28.685 kbps
Subtitle: Italian / 0.865 kbps

Episode 01 bitrate graph

[mp3dom]

Honestly I don't remember if the audio source was really 24bit or 16bit. If it was converted to 16bit, the "noise" above 18KHz could be explained with the dithering and noise shaping added for quantization. Target of the dither and noise shaping is to move noise in the less audible areas, so lows and very highs frequencies, leaving less noise in the mids (more audible)

[BigOnAnime]

Got Girl's High in directly from the Media Blasters Storefront last week (came in a plastic bubble mailer). Doing a quick check of the quality and the audio seems to sound muffled and echoey on the opening and ending themes. When I checked the clean versions of them in the extras, there wasn't any such problem, the audio sounded way cleaner. I don't have the DVDs to compare, but it seems they may have upscaled this from composite masters? No dot crawl or rainbows, but not a very good source. They also for whatever reason kept the "DVD Author" credit from the DVDs unlike Phoenix and Grenadier where they had a Blu-ray authoring credit (Blu-ray authoring by Justin Ramos). Also the "postcard" is printed on thin paper that is slightly too big to fit in the case because of the plastic tabs at the top and bottom, so it has slight wrinkles.

[Naiera]

WTF

[BigOnAnime]

Talking to a friend about it right now, seems the issue is they accidentally mixed in the M&E tracks.

[Edit]

Originally Posted by ChibiGoku

It seems that this is a result of the Music & Effects track getting doubled up on the Opening and Ending at least. Unclear if the main audio is impacted, as I'd have to hear it myself, but this was a problem on Episode 2 of Trigun on one of FUNimation's DVD releases for it. It impacted the episode, resulting in anything other than the voices to be "muffled/echoy" sounding. One of the streaming masters was affected by this as well, but I haven't checked to see if this was fixed at all.

I remember one thing is that when FUNimation updated the streaming masters for Yatterman Night to the home video release, the entire series was impacted by it and it made it unwatchable for me. It distracted me that enough to the point I didn't even want to risk getting the DVD subtitle only release.

That said, it's likely the result of them mixing the M&E and Language audio track together by accident and downmixing it as a stereo stream, resulting in how it sounds. I've seen this occasionally crop up on streaming masters, clips, and even on broadcast television at times.

https://fandompost.vbulletin.net/for...ers#post825976

[Member-571539]

Was their QC asleep at the wheel?

[BigOnAnime]

This is Media Blasters we're talking about, if there's one thing that's been consistent about them since the beginning 25 years ago, it's problems in their releases. It doesn't entirely shock me the release turned out the way it did.

[briwas101]

Originally Posted by gloomranger

Was their QC asleep at the wheel?

As a cost-cutting measure everyone is their own QC.

[Prince_7]

Demon Slayer - Kimetsu no Yaiba- The Movie: Mugen Train - Dynit BD



As expected, it looks fabulous, banding-less and without any compression macroblocks.
The japanese audio commentary is included and translated in italian.
Unlike the Heaven's Feel movies which did it in softsubs, the opening credits are not translated at all.

BDinfo:

                                                                                                                Total   Video                                             
Title                                                           Codec   Length  Movie Size      Disc Size       Bitrate Bitrate Main Audio Track                          Secondary Audio Track
-----                                                           ------  ------- --------------  --------------  ------- ------- ------------------                        ---------------------
00005.MPLS                                                      AVC     1:56:48 0               49,950,347,983  0.00    0.00    DTS-HD Master 5.1 (48kHz/24-bit)          


DISC INFO:

Disc Title:     Demon Slayer The Movie Mugen Train
Disc Label:     DEMON_SLAYER_MOVIE_MUGEN_TRAIN
Disc Size:      49,950,347,983 bytes
Protection:     AACS
Extras:         50Hz Content
BDInfo:         0.7.5.6

PLAYLIST REPORT:

Name:                   00005.MPLS
Length:                 1:56:48.001 (h:m:s.ms)
Size:                   0 bytes
Total Bitrate:          0.00 Mbps

(*) Indicates included stream hidden by this playlist.

VIDEO:

Codec                   Bitrate             Description     
-----                   -------             -----------     
MPEG-4 AVC Video        0 kbps              1080p / 23.976 fps / 16:9 / High Profile 4.1

AUDIO:

Codec                           Language        Bitrate         Description     
-----                           --------        -------         -----------     
* DTS-HD Master Audio           Italian         0 kbps          5.1 / 48 kHz / 24-bit (DTS Core: 5.1 / 48 kHz /  1509 kbps / 24-bit)
* DTS-HD Master Audio           Japanese        0 kbps          5.1 / 48 kHz / 24-bit (DTS Core: 5.1 / 48 kHz /  1509 kbps / 24-bit)
DTS-HD Master Audio             Japanese        0 kbps          2.0 / 48 kHz / 16-bit (DTS Core: 2.0 / 48 kHz /   640 kbps / 16-bit)

SUBTITLES:

Codec                           Language        Bitrate         Description     
-----                           --------        -------         -----------     
* Presentation Graphics         Italian         0.000 kbps                      
* Presentation Graphics         Italian         0.000 kbps                      
Presentation Graphics           Italian         0.000 kbps                      

FILES:

Name            Time In         Length          Size            Total Bitrate   
----            -------         ------          ----            -------------   
00006.M2TS      0:00:00.000     1:56:48.001     0               0               

CHAPTERS:

Number          Time In         Length          Avg Video Rate  Max 1-Sec Rate  Max 1-Sec Time  Max 5-Sec Rate  Max 5-Sec Time  Max 10Sec Rate  Max 10Sec Time  Avg Frame Size  Max Frame Size  Max Frame Time  
------          -------         ------          --------------  --------------  --------------  --------------  --------------  --------------  --------------  --------------  --------------  --------------  
1               0:00:00.000     0:05:28.828     0 kbps          0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 bytes         0 bytes         00:00:00.000    
2               0:05:28.828     0:10:41.849     0 kbps          0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 bytes         0 bytes         00:00:00.000    
3               0:16:10.678     0:06:51.911     0 kbps          0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 bytes         0 bytes         00:00:00.000    
4               0:23:02.589     0:11:58.134     0 kbps          0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 bytes         0 bytes         00:00:00.000    
5               0:35:00.723     0:09:44.959     0 kbps          0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 bytes         0 bytes         00:00:00.000    
6               0:44:45.683     0:05:34.250     0 kbps          0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 bytes         0 bytes         00:00:00.000    
7               0:50:19.933     0:10:38.637     0 kbps          0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 bytes         0 bytes         00:00:00.000    
8               1:00:58.571     0:05:13.688     0 kbps          0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 bytes         0 bytes         00:00:00.000    
9               1:06:12.259     0:13:10.831     0 kbps          0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 bytes         0 bytes         00:00:00.000    
10              1:19:23.091     0:11:41.659     0 kbps          0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 bytes         0 bytes         00:00:00.000    
11              1:31:04.750     0:16:06.465     0 kbps          0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 bytes         0 bytes         00:00:00.000    
12              1:47:11.216     0:04:44.659     0 kbps          0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 bytes         0 bytes         00:00:00.000    
13              1:51:55.875     0:04:52.125     0 kbps          0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 kbps          00:00:00.000    0 bytes         0 bytes         00:00:00.000    

STREAM DIAGNOSTICS:

File            PID             Type            Codec           Language                Seconds                 Bitrate                 Bytes           Packets         
----            ---             ----            -----           --------                --------------          --------------          -------------   -----           
00006.M2TS      4113 (0x1011)   0x1B            AVC                                     0.042                   0                       0               0               
00006.M2TS      4352 (0x1100)   0x86            DTS-HD MA       ita (Italian)           0.042                   0                       0               0               
00006.M2TS      4353 (0x1101)   0x86            DTS-HD MA       jpn (Japanese)          0.042                   0                       0               0               
00006.M2TS      4354 (0x1102)   0x86            DTS-HD MA       jpn (Japanese)          0.042                   0                       0               0               
00006.M2TS      4608 (0x1200)   0x90            PGS             ita (Italian)           0.042                   0                       0               0               
00006.M2TS      4609 (0x1201)   0x90            PGS             ita (Italian)           0.042                   0                       0               0               
00006.M2TS      4610 (0x1202)   0x90            PGS             ita (Italian)           0.042                   0                       0               0

[Prince_7]

Originally Posted by KaizerChef

Speaking of which, I recently got hold of their release of Roujin Z as it's the only one that is not OOP, will probably upload screenshots some time. But I can say now that the encode is different to the Kazé release since the average bitrate is a bit higher.
[/code]

Roujin Z - Selecta Visión BD vs Kazé BD

https://slow.pics/c/qz2zcwze

The Kazé blu-ray is quite different. Selecta seems to be filtered, or maybe it uses a different master.
Some white dots are not present on the selecta release, outlines can be a bit thinner and I don't even know what's going on in cap 4 around her hand.

Since we don't have a japanese HD release to compare (Even JP Amazon Prime only has it in SD), it's hard to tell which is supposed to be accurate color wise.

As for the encode, sometimes Kazé wins, sometimes Selecta does, cap 3 is a good example.

[Glorian]

So, I'm wondering about the Canaan BD re-release from Sentai this year. Is it likely to have better picture quality than the original release? I know the original release was of pretty iffy quality (1080i from a 720i source), but I'm wondering if this is like their Fate/Stay Night re-release, where the 1080p version was arguably worse because of the dropped frames. If it's likely an improvement, I'd like to get it, but there's not point if it's the same or worse. Anyone have insight on this release?

[Jackson_H]

Moribito was in a similar situation but someone who bought the Sentai re-release wrote mostly positive things about it compared to past releases.

It should also be noted that the complete collection of Fate/stay night having dropped frames in 1080p was authored by someone who is no longer in that position. If Sentai had it released again by their current Blu-ray authoring team I would like to believe the results would be better.

The newer release of Canaan being AVC instead of VC-1 is already an improvement and authored by a more experienced team than the guy who worked on the original 2010 release. Sentai rarely reuses discs and frequently updates discs for re-releases compared to other companies.

Optimism says the new release should be significantly better but if you have very high standards you will likely find some disappointment somewhere even over the smallest flaws.

[BigOnAnime]

David Williams pretty much authored every Sentai Blu-ray until late 2014 (lots of credits are missing though, especially sub-only shows), for a brief period Nick Lee was doing the authoring, then Joel McCray took over and Sentai had a big improvement in the quality. As of 2020 he was later joined by Ryan Anthony, but as of a few months ago, Joel McCray is no longer authoring Blu-rays, it's just Ryan Anthony by himself. Don't know if he's still at the company, he was credited for the theatrical release of the Revue Starlight movie (Sentai changes the credits between the theatrical release and home video release).

I'd expect the newer release to be better, but there were still some Sentai and Maiden Japan releases with frame issues after Joel McCray took over, namely the SDBDs (Votoms being one of the most notable examples) and Princess Tutu.

[NLScavenger]

Children of the Sea - US BD vs JP BD

Comparison (expires on October 20 2024)

Used AvsPmod for a change (FFMpegSource / Dither_srgb_display with chromak="spline36")

There's quite some banding in the US BD in darker colors. While noticeably less present, the JP BD isn't free from banding either. There's also a slight green tint in the US BD, which could be a sign of a rounding error.

US BD


JP BD


US BD BDInfo

Disc Title: Children of the Sea
Disc Label: CHILDREN_OF_THE_SEA
Disc Size: 47,894,230,374 bytes
Protection: AACS
Playlist: 00002.MPLS
Size: 33,526,812,672 bytes
Length: 1:51:40.902
Total Bitrate: 40.03 Mbps
Video: MPEG-4 AVC Video / 29961 kbps / 1080p / 23.976 fps / 16:9 / High Profile 4.1
Audio: English / DTS-HD Master Audio / 5.1 / 48 kHz /  3753 kbps / 24-bit (DTS Core: 5.1 / 48 kHz /  1509 kbps / 24-bit)
Audio: Japanese / DTS-HD Master Audio / 5.1 / 48 kHz /  4042 kbps / 24-bit (DTS Core: 5.1 / 48 kHz /  1509 kbps / 24-bit)
Subtitle: English / 19.751 kbps
Subtitle: English / 16.741 kbps
Subtitle: Spanish / 15.583 kbps
Subtitle: French / 16.152 kbps
Subtitle: English / 0.506 kbps

JP BD bitrate

[Misioon_Odisea]

Originally Posted by NLScavenger

Children of the Sea - US BD vs JP BD

Comparison (expires on October 20 2024)

Used AvsPmod for a change (FFMpegSource / Dither_srgb_display with chromak="spline36")

There's quite some banding in the US BD in darker colors. While noticeably less present, the JP BD isn't free from banding either. There's also a slight green tint in the US BD, which could be a sign of a rounding error.

US BD


JP BD

That one came out particularly concerning. Brian Orndorf, reviewing for the website, also complained about this problem.

Originally Posted by Brian Orndorf

Artifacting is persistent throughout "Children of the Sea," with banding a common sight.

It seems like this was another difficult film for Blu-ray encoders to deal with in general. Much like Belle, I would have really loved to see a 4K UHD disc for this one, even if just for the better compression and less banding/detail scrubbing, provided it's handled by competent encoders.

[Prince_7]

Originally Posted by NLScavenger

There's also a slight green tint in the US BD, which could be a sign of a rounding error.

That appears to be due to the dithering method used on the JPBD introducing a shift toward red.
Other releases around the world are similar to the USBD color wise based on my knowledge.
Same thing can be seen on stuff like the 24th Case Closed movie which was heavily dithered for the JP release and leans more toward red tones.

[NLScavenger]

Heart and Yummie Collection - Discotek Media BD

Heart and Yummie


The movie mainly uses colors of the paint-bucket variety, but banding tends to show up whenever gradients appear. Some shots are composited with static dither to smooth out the gradients (see #11).

The Adventures of Tyrano Boy


I've only checked the first few minutes. Banding seems to be less of an issue, but it's still there. This is apparently the only home video release that presents the film in its native framerate of 29.97fps (progressive-encoded video with fake-interlace flag btw).

Tatsuya Miyanishi Theatre: Heart and Yummie


Not much to say. Interlaced presentation with a mix of 29.97p and true 59.94i shots:

True 59.94i / BWDIF deinterlace to 59.94p in MPV


BDInfo Heart and Yummie

Disc Title: Heart and Yummie Collection
Disc Label: HEART AND YUMMIE COLLECTION
Disc Size: 46,108,289,065 bytes
Protection: AACS
Playlist: 00000.MPLS
Size: 15,405,206,976 bytes
Length: 1:29:49.384
Total Bitrate: 22.87 Mbps
Video: MPEG-4 AVC Video / 19299 kbps / 1080p / 23.976 fps / 16:9 / High Profile 4.1
Audio: Japanese / DTS-HD Master Audio / 5.1 / 48 kHz /  1555 kbps / 24-bit (DTS Core: 5.1 / 48 kHz /   768 kbps / 24-bit)
Audio: Japanese / DTS-HD Master Audio / 2.0 / 48 kHz /   719 kbps / 16-bit (DTS Core: 2.0 / 48 kHz /   256 kbps / 16-bit)
Subtitle: English / 22.268 kbps

BDInfo The Adventures of Tyrano Boy

Disc Title: Heart and Yummie Collection
Disc Label: HEART AND YUMMIE COLLECTION
Disc Size: 46,108,289,065 bytes
Protection: AACS
Playlist: 00002.MPLS
Size: 18,401,238,336 bytes
Length: 1:22:08.857
Total Bitrate: 29.87 Mbps
Video: MPEG-4 AVC Video / 24821 kbps / 1080i / 29.970 fps / 16:9 / High Profile 4.1
Audio: Japanese / DTS-HD Master Audio / 5.1 / 48 kHz /  2458 kbps / 24-bit (DTS Core: 5.1 / 48 kHz /  1509 kbps / 24-bit)
Audio: Japanese / DTS-HD Master Audio / 2.0 / 48 kHz /   921 kbps / 24-bit (DTS Core: 2.0 / 48 kHz /   256 kbps / 24-bit)
Subtitle: English / 19.140 kbps

BDInfo Tatsuya Miyanishi Theatre: Heart and Yummie

Disc Title: Heart and Yummie Collection
Disc Label: HEART AND YUMMIE COLLECTION
Disc Size: 46,108,289,065 bytes
Protection: AACS
Playlist: 00001.MPLS
Size: 10,407,168,384 bytes
Length: 0:56:37.727
Total Bitrate: 24.50 Mbps
Video: MPEG-4 AVC Video / 19846 kbps / 1080i / 29.970 fps / 16:9 / High Profile 4.1
Audio: Japanese / LPCM Audio / 2.0 / 48 kHz /  1536 kbps / 16-bit
Audio: Japanese / LPCM Audio / 2.0 / 48 kHz /  1536 kbps / 16-bit
Subtitle: English / 39.926 kbps

Bitrate episode 01

[Prince_7]

Ghost in the Shell - Bandai Namco JP UHD 4K BD

The JP UHD release of Ghost in the Shell is substancially different from the Lionsgate release.
First of all, only stereo adio tracks are included, both for the JP and EN dub.
So no 5.1 or Atmos remix, these (to my knowledge) were never included on any japanese release of the movie.
Living Inside the Shell does play as the credits song of the JP audio and One Minute Warning as the EN credit song, unlike the Lionsgate release which apparently messed that up and used One Minute Warning as the song on every track.

The color grading from on the Lionsgate release is completly different than the one found on this release.
Lionsgate seems to have increased the brightness levels of the HDR grade, perhaps in an effort to give it more "pop", but I really do not like it.
The Lionsgate disc also had Dolby Vision, the Bandai release doesn't.

As for the grade itself, I really love it quite a lot.
It's quite dim most of the time but there are many moments where it goes above 100 nits.

Mastering display luminance : min: 0.0050 cd/m2, max: 1000 cd/m2 
Maximum Content Light Level : 873 cd/m2 
Maximum Frame-Average Light Level : 271 cd/m2

Also, unlike most UHD releases of anime films which are often sourced from SDR material and remain within Rec.709 color range, this one doesn't.
The Rec.2020 color gamut is used to great extent, bringing richer colors without looking oversaturated, mostly thanks to remaining quite dim.
This results in a very organic looking picture with a lot of depth and nuance, I really love it.

No caps included as those can already be found on cap-a-holic and I'm feeling a bit lazy, but here are some waveforms and CIE Chromaticity graphs for you to look at.

Bear in mind the preview window for Davinci Resolve does not do tonemapping when reviewing HDR content, so it does not reflect what the actual grading look like and should only be used as reference for what the waveforms are indicating.





Yes, it's grain managed (to a certain extent), no there isn't a ton more detail on here than on the blu-ray, but this is still the best release of the movie out there.
The HDR grade is fantastic and the amount of DNR is low enough for it to remain quite filmic.
This is an all around a great disc, and it has english subs so go grab it now that its price has dropped down.

[NLScavenger]

The 2.0 tracks on JP UHD are not "stereo", but actually Dolby Surround tracks (matrix encoded Left-Center-Right-Surround).

The German distributor KSM Anime is aware of the One Minute Warning issue in the Lionsgate masters. Might get fixed for their upcoming release (or not). I don't think they're aware of the missing line in the Japanese 5.1/Atmos remix though.

[Prince_7]

Matrix decoding, the bane of my existence