The Anime Blu-ray Video Quality Thread

[BigOnAnime]

It's been sold out on Amazon Japan for well over a year actually. I got mine from CDJapan only a few months after release as it was sold out at Amazon Japan less than a month after release.

This has been happening to plenty of Aniplex Japan releases actually, even huge sellers like the Monogatari series. Aniplex is basically letting things go OOP rather fast as they don't find it worth it to keep selling when they'll be selling less than 100 copies a week after the first few weeks.

As for the video quality being the same, that's unsurprising because Aniplex USA's BD's are authored in Japan by Aniplex Japan (Which is also why they're region-free like most JP anime BD's). DVD's though will look different from the JP DVD's as they're authored by Bang Zoom, so they'll have the color/brightness issue due to them not being authored in Japan (For some reason doing it here no matter what causes that issue, even for simulcast streams).

BTW, it's worth noting Ponycan USA's subbed-only releases will also have the same video quality as they do the same kind of thing, Pony Canyon in Japan authors their subbed BD's. Justin Sevakis though does their dubbed releases, so you will get the color/brightness issue due to non-Japanese equipment doing something strange to the video. Seriously, just what?
http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/103314
http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/103312

Also how much smaller is our booklet? Shame that like usual AoA likes gimping us... By far one of the biggest gripes I have with them, good thing for me then that I hardly like any of the shows they get these days. Sometimes I think it's just to get the hardcore collectors to import from Japan instead so Aniplex gets even more money that way.

[Z-95]

Originally Posted by BigOnAnime

Also how much smaller is our booklet? Shame that like usual AoA likes gimping us... By far one of the biggest gripes I have with them, good thing for me then that I hardly like any of the shows they get these days. Sometimes I think it's just to get the hardcore collectors to import from Japan instead so Aniplex gets even more money that way.

AoA release is 24 pages, JP release is 36 (and is actually bound not a fold with staples). JP release also includes another fold out 8 page pamphlet for the soundtrack and drama CD.

[Naiera]

I'm really not that into physical extras. I'd prefer to just save a little space on my shelves

[Mangaranga]

Originally Posted by Z-95

Since I recently got the JP release of KnK Recalled Out Summer I compared it with the AoA release and found that the video and audio are THE SAME (the raw video data was within kilobytes when extracted from the m2ts streams for RoS and EC).

This has always been the case with AoA releases. The only exception to this was Volume 5 of Kill La Kill since the video was done at a slightly lower bitrate to fit everything on one BD50.

Originally Posted by BigOnAnime

BTW, it's worth noting Ponycan USA's subbed-only releases will also have the same video quality as they do the same kind of thing, Pony Canyon in Japan authors their subbed BD's. Justin Sevakis though does their dubbed releases, so you will get the color/brightness issue due to non-Japanese equipment doing something strange to the video. Seriously, just what?
http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/103314
http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/103312

I don't know whether it's true or not, but according to one of the UK distributors I've spoken to in the past Justin also authors some of Aniplex's titles. That said, whilst I haven't seen any Pony Canyon BDs myself, the numbers for Yuki Yuna didn't look like a Japanese quality release.

[mp3dom]

Originally Posted by BigOnAnime

so they'll have the color/brightness issue due to them not being authored in Japan (For some reason doing it here no matter what causes that issue, even for simulcast streams).

Not because it's not authored in Japan... but because it's just authored in the wrong way. In the US screenshot, the image gets its range expanded from "TV Levels" to "PC Levels". Take the JP screenshot, convert it from TV Levels to PC Levels, and the result will be the same.
Check yourself: http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/136005

[BigOnAnime]

Originally Posted by mp3dom

Not because it's not authored in Japan... but because it's just authored in the wrong way. In the US screenshot, the image gets its range expanded from "TV Levels" to "PC Levels". Take the JP screenshot, convert it from TV Levels to PC Levels, and the result will be the same.
Check yourself: http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/136005

Alright, then what happened here?
http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/103314
http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/103312

Or here (Decided not to link the tweet I saw it from)? Keep in mind Twitter is known for heavily compressing images if you upload to them directly.
1
2
I'm guessing the same issue that hit Yuki-chan?

Or here? Even Justin is baffled (Look at his responses).
https://twitter.com/ultimatemegax/st...11083420364800

Only thing he could think of was colorspace conversion.
https://twitter.com/worldofcrap/stat...14574893158400

[mp3dom]

Originally Posted by BigOnAnime

Alright, then what happened here?
http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/103314
http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/103312

Here the range is right, but the color primitives used are wrong!

Or here (Decided not to link the tweet I saw it from)? Keep in mind Twitter is known for heavily compressing images if you upload to them directly.
1
2
I'm guessing the same issue that hit Yuki-chan?

Yeah, exactly like Yuki-chan, range expanded.

Or here? Even Justin is baffled (Look at his responses).
https://twitter.com/ultimatemegax/st...11083420364800
Only thing he could think of was colorspace conversion.
https://twitter.com/worldofcrap/stat...14574893158400

Justin is the one who authored it? And he didn't "detect" the problem? Anyway, even here the color primitives used are wrong (exactly like the screenshots of Hanasaku Iroha).

This is what you have now:
http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/136100

And this is the US edition with the right color primitives (same screenshot):
http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/136101

As you can see... with the right color primitives, the final result is the same (as it should).

[BigOnAnime]

Originally Posted by mp3dom

Justin is the one who authored it? And he didn't "detect" the problem?

Justin Sevakis authors all of NISA's BD's.

[Naiera]

The second Haikyu!! collection is on one disc, unlike the first.

Stay mediocre, Sentai

[Sylontack]

Do we know an awful lot about the UK/AUS Persona 4 release? It's on clearance at the moment and seems to be dub and sub spread across 3 BD50s so I thought I'd pick it up as a blind buy. I know there was a lot of licencor restriction hullabaloo over the US release so I was curious about how the Region B release fares.

[Naiera]

It definitely has Japanese audio. I can throw a volume in my BD drive later. It's Kaze, though, so don't expect much.

[Z-95]

Fate/Stay Night - Unlimited Blade Works (2010)

Comparing the US Sentai release to the JP Geneon LE release.

Video:
JP: AVC 34546213 bps
US: AVC 19998686 bps

Audio:
JP:
Japanese TrueHD 5.1 1662548 bps
US:
Japanese DTS-HD MA 5.1 3960319 bps
English DTS-HD MA 5.1 3952332 bps

Subtitles:
JP: None
US: English, English Titles

Extras:
JP: Trailers and Commercials
US: None

Almost double the video bitrate for the JP release! I haven't yet sampled the audio to know whether the doubled DTS bitrate makes a difference on the US release.

[BigOnAnime]

I wonder how it compares to the Geneon DVD's (Not Sentai's as those are probably as problematic as the BD's).

[Clark Kent]

Originally Posted by Naiera

The second Haikyu!! collection is on one disc, unlike the first.

Stay mediocre, Sentai

I believe sales estimates are deciding whether a show receives one disc or two for Sentai's Blu-rays. In all honesty, I will accept a one-disc release when the other alternative is a show not getting released at all.

[Naiera]

Yup.

[BigOnAnime]

Same... Though I would more okay with it if they got advice from say VAP on how to do these. They did single disc re-releases for Gatchaman Crowds and GJ-BU in Japan.

[Naiera]

Originally Posted by Sylontack

Do we know an awful lot about the UK/AUS Persona 4 release? It's on clearance at the moment and seems to be dub and sub spread across 3 BD50s so I thought I'd pick it up as a blind buy. I know there was a lot of licencor restriction hullabaloo over the US release so I was curious about how the Region B release fares.

Although the first disc has nine episodes on it, there seems to be the equivalent of ten, spread out across a whopping 35GB

[Sylontack]

Originally Posted by Naiera

Although the first disc has nine episodes on it, there seems to be the equivalent of ten, spread out across a whopping 35GB

Okay that's just embarrassing. I might just go with the DVD release or stream it legally if that's the case.

[Naiera]

It still looks miles better than any dvd, of course.

[Mangaranga]

Originally Posted by Naiera

Although the first disc has nine episodes on it, there seems to be the equivalent of ten, spread out across a whopping 35GB

BDinfo scan of the first episode shows dual 24bit PCM Audio streams and a 12mbps bitrate for the video of episode 1. This varies slightly between episodes with the lowest being 9mbps for an episode on Disc 3. To be fair to Khazi (and this is coming from the guy who has boycotted the company due to shit releases) it doesn't seem too bad. From flicking through the first episode, It doesn't seem to suffer from the excessive noise/banding that I'd expected it to. It's nothing amazing (and not what I'd expect from a retail BD), but then again the show doesn't look amazing either. I do have to wonder how Sentai's encode will be in comparison.

If anyone is interested in the subs, they are small and white, however OP/ED subs are not included at all. (well technically not true since hardsubbed creditless OP/ED1 exists on Disc 1 albeit with PAL speedup for whatever reason.) OP/ED sequences have the original japanese credits with Sentai's English credit roll after each ep.