Myth - "Funimation didn't acquire film masters of DBZ until 2008"

[SuperSaiyaManZ94]

Spoiler:

I'm gonna be really mad if they have film for all of Dragon Ball and arent using it At they very least the Blue Bricks should have been a film scan if thats the case.

What exactly are the “digitally remastered” blue bricks then? The same video transfer that FUNi apparently made 20 years ago from the film they had the whole time? I had until now assumed that Toei gave them OK tape masters and they were just working with those. Guess not.

"Digitally remastered", video-wise, is literally the exact same footage that was on the original DVD singles but zoomed in slightly and with a strong DNR filter. It's only "digitally remastered" in the same sense that those shitty "Remastered 4K 60fps DBZ opening HD [BEST QUALITY ON YOUTUBE]" videos are; that is, they're using existing sources but making them unspeakably shittier with some flashy filtering that they think might make it look appealing to the untrained eye.

The same is true for GT.

For the Blue Bricks it looks like they used actual film for the first 28 episodes but from 29 onward they just applied DNR to the digibeta tapes they already had and called it a day. GT was the same case - just DVNR to digibetas. In fact, wasn't Funi's GT footage digibetas of the Dragon Box source film?

The first ~28 episodes that they have film for, presumably the Blue Bricks are indeed a Funimation film transfer... However, I'm pretty sure it's not a new transfer; it's just the old DigiBeta transfer they did in the '90s, but with massive DNR on top. My observation is that the only film transfers Funimation has bothered with since about 2003 has been Z for the movies, and the Orange Bricks (as well as the Levels, whose scans were then fully cleaned up sometime around 2013-2014ish, and those cleanups were then used, with shitty filtering and such, to make the Season BDs and 30th sets, as well as the new steelbooks)... DB's home video has all just been based off the old DigiBetas Funi has had since the '90s/early '00s, and GT's home video is based off the Dragon Box masters Toei gave them in 2003 (with some caveats relating to the "Step Into The Grand Tour" OP, but we don't need to get into that -- basically, it boils down to the fact that they also had an earlier tape master that Toei had previously given to France, Latin America, and various other places, before the Dragon Box transfer became widespread).

I'm assuming so, there is no mention of any restorations in their booklets (like the Orange bricks). I think since Dragon Ball doesnt sell as well as Z they haven't taken the time to rescan the film. I just want a better release of Dragon ball.

TBH, the way for a "Better release of Dragon Ball" would be for Funi to just rerelease raw DVD represses of the DigiBeta masters they have; it would look better than the singles by virtue of better encoding, and better than the Blue Bricks by virtue of not being DNR'd to hell and back.

But either way, if they "remastered" DB from film, it would be just as shitty as their Orange Bricks, Season BDs, and 30th sets. Personally, I don't want that. Unless Funi can do things properly, and focus on the idea of restoring Dragon Ball from film, like on the Levels and the pre-filtering Season BDs/30th set masters, rather than "remastering" it like on the OBs/BDs/30th sets/steelbooks, then I don't want it, it'll just be shit.

That said, it is quite telling that, as proud as Funi are of their HD "Remastering", they haven't touched DB. They most certainly have film of the first 28, and may even have film of all 153 (and if not, they could have easily acquired it at the same time as they filled any Z gaps they had, assuming they had any gaps), so they could've done it at any time... But they chose not to. -_-

To be clear, I don't think Funi are an evil company who deliberately do anything malicious to the fans, but sometimes their ignorance baffles me. Do they think a "Complete, all 444 episodes" Blu-ray box set of DB+Z all transferred in genuine HD wouldn't sell?

Spoiler:

Here is a screencap from the saga sets from Episode 41


Compared to episode 13

FWIW, the gallery I linked in the OP shows that episodes as early as Z #2 don't look as filmic as Z 1 and early DB, so DB 41 looking not-so-nice on the singles could easily be blamed on Funi using cheaper transfer equipment and/or using analogue intermediaries.
Certainly, while #41 looks no-where near as good as #14 there, there's a lot of grain still present, and overall it does bear a strong similarity to the less-filmic early Z episodes...

As I note in the OP, one could assume the DigiBetas Funi used after DB 28 & Z 67 are the Latin American transfers of the film that distributor was sent by Toei, but it's also possible that Funi just got film from Latin America, transferred it themselves in Dallas using yet-cheaper equipment than the later Saban run of Z, and thus they just always had film all along (except for GT, which they only ever had D2 and DBox masters of).

I'm pretty sure in terms of the Blue Bricks it's only the first thirteen episodes that have a different source, while the other 140 are basically just taken from the same set of digibeta tape masters as the old Saga releases minus of course the DNR filtering. On that point, in terms of OG DB they did get much more sane and competent with the application by that point especially compared to the first few Orange Bricks where it was clear they overdid the process especially the Season Two set. Not saying that i completely 100% approve no questions asked but at least the results weren't absolutely horrible to the extent that the former had been and GT to a lesser degree.

Also, there's the thing with it being the only way to get the first arc uncut and with the Japanese audio here in the States as a result of the long period of distribution legal red tape that Lionsgate (Kidmark and Trimark prior to that) had over them and DB movie 1 in their 1995 edited dub only forms which didn't revert back to FUNimation until sometime in early 2009 or so.

[Robo4900]

Speaking of the change in video quality in the original DB, my guess is that the early episodes were transferred when the BLT dub was produced, and the rest was done later, maybe in a cheaper way.

Indeed. This would make a lot of sense, since Funi initially stated an intention to produce 26 episodes of Dragon Ball. It would furthermore make sense that, if they were preparing to do the first 26, they would get all 28 of the first two arcs.

[AlexSketchy04]

The status of the film is written in next to each airdate, so I think they were still running the film reels in real time.

Frankly this is blowing my mind. I assumed the guy at the station just popped in a videotape with the programs and commercials all ready to go and hit play. They must have had it down to a science in order not to run into technical difficulties all the time, switching the feed between film telecine and commercials tape at precisely the right time

The switching is programmed beforehand, i'm sure about it

[Metalwario64]

I mean DBZ ep 1 on the old 4:3 DVDs looks very different from the rest.

By a lot of the fandom ep 1 is criticised for how it looks on these old DVDs and there was this notion that ep 1 of every release must be inferior quality.

But it actually looks better than the rest. It has way more grain than the rest of the series so that could be why people assumed it’s worse. But when it comes to so many other artefacts like chroma shifts and blurs as well as excessive ringing, ep 1 is the only one that doesn’t have this. So yeah, maybe funi did have film and ep 1 of Z on the old releases is the example? Not sure.

For DB it appears to be first 28 eps that look filmic then they get that very composite master look with the chroma issues, ringing and less grain.

The old masters of Z movie 1 were also of similar quality to their masters for Z episode 1. The colors are also very similar.

[Planetnamek]

The status of the film is written in next to each airdate, so I think they were still running the film reels in real time.

Frankly this is blowing my mind. I assumed the guy at the station just popped in a videotape with the programs and commercials all ready to go and hit play. They must have had it down to a science in order not to run into technical difficulties all the time, switching the feed between film telecine and commercials tape at precisely the right time

The switching is programmed beforehand, i'm sure about it

I heard that before 9/11 many independent TV stations had essentially been automated so that the only person that would usually be there was the janitor if that. But after 9/11 local stations had a policy change to have at least one person working there live in case a tragedy like that happened again.

[AlexSketchy04]

Frankly this is blowing my mind. I assumed the guy at the station just popped in a videotape with the programs and commercials all ready to go and hit play. They must have had it down to a science in order not to run into technical difficulties all the time, switching the feed between film telecine and commercials tape at precisely the right time

The switching is programmed beforehand, i'm sure about it

I heard that before 9/11 many independent TV stations had essentially been automated so that the only person that would usually be there was the janitor if that. But after 9/11 local stations had a policy change to have at least one person working there live in case a tragedy like that happened again.

Not sure where you heard that, but most of the time, stations had two guys working on master control, mostly in case something went wrong, and to put the tapes

[ArmenianPepsi]

There is so much info to dig through here, but it's so technical and nerdy I love it. Good report Robo

So you have some of the actual film that the rebroadcast tapes were transferred from? Does your film happen to have the same kind of tinting that the rebroadcast footage has? I was thinking that the rebroadcast footage looked very tinted because of the film fading, so I'm curious to see if your film looks similar to that.

They're yellow-tinted and really, really dark. Every film print from Toei that I've seen is remarkably darker than those from other companies like Shin'ei Douga. I understood why Funi's own film transfers always have the crushed blacks. The film footage itself is already dark as hell.

That is so awesome. How in the world did you even get ahold of this? That must've costed an arm and a leg

I'm assuming so, there is no mention of any restorations in their booklets (like the Orange bricks). I think since Dragon Ball doesnt sell as well as Z they haven't taken the time to rescan the film. I just want a better release of Dragon ball.

TBH, the way for a "Better release of Dragon Ball" would be for Funi to just rerelease raw DVD represses of the DigiBeta masters they have; it would look better than the singles by virtue of better encoding, and better than the Blue Bricks by virtue of not being DNR'd to hell and back.

I'm not sure it's the same approach but that idea makes me think of that SD Blu Ray of Fist of The North Star Discotek put out in 2017. It's SD, but it's still a nice step up from the original 2010/2011 DVD release since it benefits from higher bitrates and such.

[eledoremassis02]

Spoiler:

There is so much info to dig through here, but it's so technical and nerdy I love it. Good report Robo

So you have some of the actual film that the rebroadcast tapes were transferred from? Does your film happen to have the same kind of tinting that the rebroadcast footage has? I was thinking that the rebroadcast footage looked very tinted because of the film fading, so I'm curious to see if your film looks similar to that.

They're yellow-tinted and really, really dark. Every film print from Toei that I've seen is remarkably darker than those from other companies like Shin'ei Douga. I understood why Funi's own film transfers always have the crushed blacks. The film footage itself is already dark as hell.

That is so awesome. How in the world did you even get ahold of this? That must've costed an arm and a leg

I'm assuming so, there is no mention of any restorations in their booklets (like the Orange bricks). I think since Dragon Ball doesnt sell as well as Z they haven't taken the time to rescan the film. I just want a better release of Dragon ball.

TBH, the way for a "Better release of Dragon Ball" would be for Funi to just rerelease raw DVD represses of the DigiBeta masters they have; it would look better than the singles by virtue of better encoding, and better than the Blue Bricks by virtue of not being DNR'd to hell and back.

I'm not sure it's the same approach but that idea makes me think of that SD Blu Ray of Fist of The North Star Discotek put out in 2017. It's SD, but it's still a nice step up from the original 2010/2011 DVD release since it benefits from higher bitrates and such.

I am 100% in support of SD-Blu rays! Infact FUNi used Dragon Box footage on one of the season bluray special features (18's VA interveiw). Id buy it in a heart beat. If anyone wants to compare with the US /JP DB 9 (these were taken with VLC so the colors off but it's to show the higher bitrate. I'm trying to get used to how virtual dub works)

[Psajdak]

I just realized that 18's forehead is fucking huge.

[ArmenianPepsi]

Spoiler:

There is so much info to dig through here, but it's so technical and nerdy I love it. Good report Robo

They're yellow-tinted and really, really dark. Every film print from Toei that I've seen is remarkably darker than those from other companies like Shin'ei Douga. I understood why Funi's own film transfers always have the crushed blacks. The film footage itself is already dark as hell.

That is so awesome. How in the world did you even get ahold of this? That must've costed an arm and a leg

TBH, the way for a "Better release of Dragon Ball" would be for Funi to just rerelease raw DVD represses of the DigiBeta masters they have; it would look better than the singles by virtue of better encoding, and better than the Blue Bricks by virtue of not being DNR'd to hell and back.

- -> https://imgur.com/a/GXEdHfh
I'm not sure it's the same approach but that idea makes me think of that SD Blu Ray of Fist of The North Star Discotek put out in 2017. It's SD, but it's still a nice step up from the original 2010/2011 DVD release since it benefits from higher bitrates and such.

I am 100% in support of SD-Blu rays! Infact FUNi used Dragon Box footage on one of the season bluray special features (18's VA interveiw). Id but it in a heart beat. If anyone wants to compare with the US /JP DB 9 (these were taken with VLC so the colors off but it's to show the higher bitrate. I'm trying to get used to how virtual dub works)

Whoops forgot something, here's a quick comparrison I whipped up for HnK if you care to look

- - > https://imgur.com/a/GXEdHfh

[eledoremassis02]

Spoiler:

Spoiler:

There is so much info to dig through here, but it's so technical and nerdy I love it. Good report Robo


That is so awesome. How in the world did you even get ahold of this? That must've costed an arm and a leg





- -> https://imgur.com/a/GXEdHfh
I'm not sure it's the same approach but that idea makes me think of that SD Blu Ray of Fist of The North Star Discotek put out in 2017. It's SD, but it's still a nice step up from the original 2010/2011 DVD release since it benefits from higher bitrates and such.

I am 100% in support of SD-Blu rays! Infact FUNi used Dragon Box footage on one of the season bluray special features (18's VA interveiw). Id but it in a heart beat. If anyone wants to compare with the US /JP DB 9 (these were taken with VLC so the colors off but it's to show the higher bitrate. I'm trying to get used to how virtual dub works)

Whoops forgot something, here's a quick comparrison I whipped up for HnK if you care to look

- - > https://imgur.com/a/GXEdHfh

thats night and day! lol I wish SD blurays were more common, some shows (like all in the family) can only go so high, but Blurays can make them looks so much better than their DVD versions.

[HakkaiBills93]

Whoops forgot something, here's a quick comparrison I whipped up for HnK if you care to look

- - > https://imgur.com/a/GXEdHfh

Hokuto no ken have been HD remastered around 2008 for the 25 th anniversary box, i think that dragon ball kai was done cause 291 ep+ was too much for Toei, i wonder why Bluray never came at that time, i only know that actual SD bluray released in japan use the premium box (the dragon box version of Hokuto no ken) i wonder why they never used the HD footage they actually had

[Metalwario64]

Whoops forgot something, here's a quick comparrison I whipped up for HnK if you care to look

- - > https://imgur.com/a/GXEdHfh

That first shot definitely doesn't look like an actual screenshot from the DVDs. It looks like one of the heavily compressed streaming versions of the show. There's compression and smearing all over the place, and the Discotek DVDs are of pretty good quality. I don't have a screenshot from that specific scene, but this is one I do have on hand:



I don't remember the episode number, but I'm pretty sure it's the episode where he first fought Raoh.

[ArmenianPepsi]

Whoops forgot something, here's a quick comparrison I whipped up for HnK if you care to look

- - > https://imgur.com/a/GXEdHfh

That first shot definitely doesn't look like an actual screenshot from the DVDs. It looks like one of the heavily compressed streaming versions of the show. There's compression and smearing all over the place, and the Discotek DVDs are of pretty good quality. I don't have a screenshot from that specific scene, but this is one I do have on hand:



I don't remember the episode number, but I'm pretty sure it's the episode where he first fought Raoh.

Oh I see now, thanks for correcting me. I'll correct my mistake here. Turns out what I used for comparison was the version of the show ripped from CrunchyRolll. My bad, sorry if I ended up misguiding anyone

[TVfan721]

This is the common understanding of Funimation's video masters:

In the '90s, Toei supplied Funimation with Digital Betacam transfers of film prints of the first ~20 episodes of DB, as well as the three original movies, for use in their 1995 dub with BLT. They were later given similar copies of DBZ for the first two seasons (and the related movies). Funimation then switched to getting materials from Latin America when they moved in-house, because it was cheaper.

I never knew this. So it's not my imagination that the picture quality for Funimation's DBZ dub went down the shitter from "Ginyu Assault" onwards? The picture looks so vibrant and colorful in the Saban dub and then as soon as Funimation went in-house, the quality of the picture looks so much older.

[Robo4900]

I never knew this. So it's not my imagination that the picture quality for Funimation's DBZ dub went down the shitter from "Ginyu Assault" onwards? The picture looks so vibrant and colorful in the Saban dub and then as soon as Funimation went in-house, the quality of the picture looks so much older.

As I note later in the post, the understanding I explained there wasn't completely right -- the material they got from Toei was film that Funi transferred themselves. I'm not sure what form the Latin American footage was in, but I think it may very well have been tape; transfers that were done years ago in Latin America.

But yes, most likely the reason the post-Saban footage doesn't look as good as the Saban footage is because they switched to cheaper methods of getting footage.

[Lightningexpose]

So, I actually have evidence right now that FUNimation did indeed receive 16mm film for all 153 episodes of Dragon Ball. However, they had disposed of it all.

The part of the evidence I can show to you right now is insufficient so you'll have to wait a bit. Once I can show the full evidence I'll post here.

[SuperSaiyaManZ94]

So, I actually have evidence right now that FUNimation did indeed receive 16mm film for all 153 episodes of Dragon Ball. However, they had disposed of it all.

The part of the evidence I can show to you right now is insufficient so you'll have to wait a bit. Once I can show the full evidence I'll post here.

Really? I thought they had only standard def digibeta tape masters of DB, this is is interesting to hear.

[eledoremassis02]

So, I actually have evidence right now that FUNimation did indeed receive 16mm film for all 153 episodes of Dragon Ball. However, they had disposed of it all.

The part of the evidence I can show to you right now is insufficient so you'll have to wait a bit. Once I can show the full evidence I'll post here.

That's interesting. Do you know if they're getting new masters to work with, or not every episode being destroyed?

Spoiler:

[PizzaShrapnel]

For the Blue Bricks it looks like they used actual film for the first 28 episodes but from 29 onward they just applied DNR to the digibeta tapes they already had and called it a day.

Was there ever an explanation given as to why the first 13 episodes or so are so zoomed in?