Dragon Ball Z on Blu-ray

[The Dark Uniter]

You'll never know. Hopefully, the quality is more clear in a higher quality video but it definitely looks like Dragon Box footage to me, which is a good thing.

[rollinwith26s]

That restoration actually looks pretty damn good. I thought I was looking at Dragon Ball Kai footage for a moment! I don't think it is exactly like the Dragon Box but pretty damn close! I know during the fight with Vegeta the sky is more of an azure colour on the Dragon Box. In this footage it looks more like the blue we are used to seeing in Funimation restorations. I might be buying this once they release more than 17 episodes....

I guess Funimation realized fans of the original American Version hate the Funimation Dragon Ball Kai. Which is quite baffling considering they gave their fans a better product than what they did originally. Hence...DBZ on Blu! I feel like I have wasted my money on the Dragon Boxes now. I don't feel like I wasted my money on Kai though. I like having the option to watch filler free depending on my mood.

AND THAT FOOTAGE IS MOST DEFINETLY NOT CROPPED TO 16:9! This eliminates that fear.

[The Dark Uniter]

I can't say most people hate Kai. Me along with other people enjoy it for its accurate dub and faster pacing however I like the original DBZ as well. Also, the prices for the sets are $24.49 each: http://www.amazon.com/Dragonball-Z-L...2475224&sr=8-1

Sounds very tempting, I really hope Walmart will create a bundle pack like they did with Kai. Also, Funimation is NOT working with ANDTransfer on this release: http://hardware.broadcastnewsroom.co...hoenix-1617172

[Hdde]

I might hope it is region free, although the specs on Amazon tell me it is region 1!

[ps3bd_owner]

Originally Posted by The Dark Uniter

I can't say most people hate Kai. Me along with other people enjoy it for its accurate dub and faster pacing however I like the original DBZ as well. Also, the prices for the sets are $24.49 each: http://www.amazon.com/Dragonball-Z-L...2475224&sr=8-1

Sounds very tempting, I really hope Walmart will create a bundle pack like they did with Kai. Also, Funimation is NOT working with ANDTransfer on this release: http://hardware.broadcastnewsroom.co...hoenix-1617172

17 eps for $24,49 quite a big rip off, considering Dragon Box 6 costed $23,99 and was 40 episodes.

This may actually be the first time FUNimation makes a good decent remaster for the first time ever.

[The Dark Uniter]

Well, I can't say its really a rip-off. Before, I remember sets that only had 3 episodes and Kai only has 13 episodes per sets, so we're getting more episodes than the Kai releases. Again, we might see Walmart editions of the sets.

I might hope it is region free, although the specs on Amazon tell me it is region 1!

All of Funimation releases are regions 1 and 4 for DVDs and Regions A and B for Blu-rays.

[madridista8700]

Originally Posted by The Dark Uniter

All of Funimation releases are regions 1 and 4 for DVDs and Regions A and B for Blu-rays.

Not true. Their Blu-ray line of the DBZ movies are locked to Region A, except their test Blu-ray of a Broly double feature.

People complaining over the pricing of this set needs to stop that right away. Back when DBZ was released on dvd with only THREE episodes a disc, they went for $25. These Blu-ray sets will cost the same, but with 14 more episodes and then in HD!

On the note of the remastering process.. the orange bricks were remastered to 2K. People seem to make the mistake of thinking that these new sets will use the same tranfer as the ones created in 2006 - that's not the case. They've actually gone back and remastered it another time, and learned from the past mistake and this time around will do the footage in 4:3 as it was supposed to be. The real treat here is for the fans on both dub fans and sub fans. The audio will be in three different versions: One original Japanese spoken audio with Japanese music (subbed), one English spoken audio with Japanese music and the English spoken audio with US broadcast music.

If someone feels ripped off by Funi for releasing the series for the millionth time.. well, no-one's forcing anyone to buy these sets. I will though - can't get enough DBZ, right?

[EddieLarkin]

Can anyone tell me how the image quality of the blue-brick Dragon Ball DVDs was? I know they are in 4:3 but was wondering if they suffered the same "restoration" as the orange-brick DBZ sets? And if they are similar, what are the chances of Funi doing a Dragon Box re-release?

[madridista8700]

They are in fact in 4:3 and is NOT remastered in the same process as the DBZ series.

While they haven't used the Dragon Box footage for these, they come pretty close. I don't think they'll release a Dragon Box of it - not anytime soon.

[ps3bd_owner]

Originally Posted by EddieLarkin

Can anyone tell me how the image quality of the blue-brick Dragon Ball DVDs was? I know they are in 4:3 but was wondering if they suffered the same "restoration" as the orange-brick DBZ sets? And if they are similar, what are the chances of Funi doing a Dragon Box re-release?

The blue bricks were in 4:3, but still, FUNimation cropped and zoomed in the image so you didn't see all of it.

FUNi's cash cow is DBZ to them, so unfortunately it might take some time or even some years.

[EddieLarkin]

Hmm, so are they worth getting or not? Do you have any image examples of the cropping and zooming? Why in god's name would Funi crop and zoom anything if they were sticking with the OAR?! What a bunch of idiots

[ps3bd_owner]

Originally Posted by EddieLarkin

Hmm, so are they worth getting or not? Do you have any image examples of the cropping and zooming? Why in god's name would Funi crop and zoom anything if they were sticking with the OAR?! What a bunch of idiots

The blue bricks are better than the crappy widescreen DBZ sets but still, inferior to the original Dragon Boxes.

Okay then, this is a screen shot comparison from someone who uploaded at Amazon:

Also, the blue bricks don't have the NEP's (Next Episode Preview) and the cards/text was translated to English, rather than having them in its original Japanese.

I wonder how many years will take till FUNi releases their own Dragon Boxes of Dragon Ball, because I'm not buying these "digitally remastered" blue bricks.

If you want to customize the colours, your HDTV can do that.

So, if you don't mind the zooming and cropping, plus no NEPs neither original text, then it may be worth it.

[madridista8700]

Funimation have not acquired Dragon Box footage for these, and I doubt they'll get it.

For some reason, DBZ has been Funi's biggest vehicle in the US, but the original series hasn't nearly been as big as DBZ, neither has DBGT.
The Dragon Box footage cost them alot of money and are considered for fans only, hence the limited supply of the domestic Dragon Boxes. If they don't do that well in sales, they obviously won't release DB and DBGT as Dragon Boxes.

They have acquired Dragon Box footage of the 13 DBZ movies, but not the two specials. They are still debating whether to release them or not.

I have no desire to get the Dragon Boxes of the movies anyway. The BDs they released have pretty good PQ for movies produced on cheap cels. Also, I don't think that they will release the movies again on BD along with their new remastering of the series. They've remastered them the right way by cropping them to 16:9 as they were meant to be seen that way in the theater (even though they were produced in 4:3, but that's another story).

[madridista8700]

Originally Posted by EddieLarkin

Hmm, so are they worth getting or not? Do you have any image examples of the cropping and zooming? Why in god's name would Funi crop and zoom anything if they were sticking with the OAR?! What a bunch of idiots

They are worth getting.

1. They will certainly not remaster it once again and spit it out on BD, since it's not as big as DBZ.

2. They haven't got Dragon Box masters, because they are too expensive, and they learned from their DBZ mistake, and didn't crop it to 16:9.

3. Not sure, but they probably did the small bit of zooming because of print damage.

4. The blue bricks are way cheaper than what a - if released - Dragon Box would cost.

[EddieLarkin]

Hmm, I may just get the blue-bricks then if it's unlikely a DBBox will ever be released. Do you know if like the orange-bricks, the blue-bricks have an angle option to change the English text opening to the original Japanese?

[madridista8700]

Originally Posted by EddieLarkin

Hmm, I may just get the blue-bricks then if it's unlikely a DBBox will ever be released. Do you know if like the orange-bricks, the blue-bricks have an angle option to change the English text opening to the original Japanese?

I can't give you an accurate answer whether it has angle option or not. What I can tell you is that the blue bricks have one less audio option than the orange bricks.

Orange brick:
1. English dub with American-produced score
2. English dub with original Japanese score
3. Japanese with original score

Blue brick:
1. English dub with original Japanese score
2. Japanese with original score

They skipped the American-produced score for this release. I don't know if that allowed the PQ to be better or not.

And should a Dragon Box come with the original series, the footage wouldn't be that much better. I mean, with the DBZ series, you missed over 20% of the picture in the season sets, which the Dragon Box restored. The blue bricks are slightly zoomed as you can see in the above comparisons, and obviously has the better color in my opinion.

[ps3bd_owner]

Originally Posted by madridista8700

4. The blue bricks are way cheaper than what a - if released - Dragon Box would cost.

Amazon's pre-order prices for Dragon Box Z volumes have been considerably low, between $23,99 and $30,99 not really expensive at all, so the Dragon Box Dragon Ball would cost around the same thing.

[madridista8700]

The first couple of boxes were in the $60-70 range (MRSP $90) and had to adjust the price to sell more copies since they already had purchased the entire series and didn't want it to bomb.

Yes, the additional boxes had lower and lower prices, but as of writing, the blue bricks cost between $15 and $18 while the Dragon Boxes of DBZ cost between $30 and $60. That's rougly $0.50-0.60 for an episode of DB while it's $0.75-1.50 for the DBZ episodes.

And of course they have good deals on pre-orders (I bought mine for $32.59 each), but so did the blue bricks...

This is all just a pointless discussion since a possible future release of DB in Dragon Box will be just that... in the future. And if you're gonna wait, you might wait for nothing...

[ps3bd_owner]

Dragon Box: The Movies by FUNimation won't be happening.

They'll be re-releasing the DBZ films from the steelbooks on packs/collections for $22 (each'll contain 5 films).

Check Daizenshuu for more news about it.

This really annoyed me because I was waiting patiently for FUNimation to release their Dragon Box of the films, a replica of the original Japanese.

[Pokewhiz7]

Originally Posted by ps3bd_owner

Dragon Box: The Movies by FUNimation won't be happening.

They'll be re-releasing the DBZ films from the steelbooks on packs/collections for $22 (each'll contain 5 films).

Check Daizenshuu for more news about it.

This really annoyed me because I was waiting patiently for FUNimation to release their Dragon Box of the films, a replica of the original Japanese.

You don't know that yet. These box sets could be just one more quick cash grab before the "definitive" release that is the Dragon Box. They said in their initial announcement that they had acquired the Dragon Box masters for Dragon Ball Z and its 13 movies. I doubt they would just sit on it.