Are There Any Updates On The Harmony Gold Dub Of Dragon Ball?

[KBABZ]

Episode 6 probably would have been too much for them. Even the edited Funi dubs had to keep some of the content for it make sense.

SO! I think I figured out why Yamcha already knows about the Dragon Balls in Episode 5! I think it's because Harmony Gold were going to skip over Episode 6 entirely: the only things that happen in this episode are that Yamcha learns what the Dragon Balls are, and giving him previous knowledge in Episode 5 (rather smoothly, I might add) would be a way to solve that.

The only other thing that needs to be explained is how they got the red Fiat 500, and that can easily be explained by re-scripting Episode 6's opening scene, which we know that Harmony Gold were perfectly capable of doing given the first five episodes.

[Robo4900]

For the rare VHS i should mention it was someone else that did the actual ripping of the tapes, then they sent me the video files in the MP4 format, and I had to use Handbrake to shrink them down because the site i'm a part of does not allow films to be uploaded in the MP4 format, it has to be something like MKV.

Pro tip: You didn't need to use Handbrake for that. You could've used MKVToolNix, which would've done it quicker, and with no quality loss.

Which makes you wonder what the heck was the point of the blue brick “remaster.”

To sell people old stuff as "new".
The "Remastering" of DB and GT amounted to them zooming in the frame slightly to hide black borders, blurring the image to remove grain, removing the Japanese title cards (yes, really), and adding the Funi dub + JP audio option to GT.

Funi's "Remastering" has been shitty snake oil from day 1.

(I still think the tapes should "baked" before doing another transfer if it hasn't already been tried yet, this piece of history should be preserved as best as possible because we may never get a chance like this ever again).

Baking isn't necessarily an increase in quality, it's a solution to "Sticky-shed syndrome", which would mainly manifest in video in the form of dropouts, and it's somewhat risky too, particularly if done wrong, so I don't know if that's such a good idea.

SO! I think I figured out why Yamcha already knows about the Dragon Balls in Episode 5! I think it's because Harmony Gold were going to skip over Episode 6 entirely: the only things that happen in this episode are that Yamcha learns what the Dragon Balls are, and giving him previous knowledge in Episode 5 (rather smoothly, I might add) would be a way to solve that.

The only other thing that needs to be explained is how they got the red Fiat 500, and that can easily be explained by re-scripting Episode 6's opening scene, which we know that Harmony Gold were perfectly capable of doing given the first five episodes.

I agree with this thought, though that still leaves the question of what they would have done about the Playboy bunny suit Bulma would then suddenly start wearing out of no where.
... Maybe that's why they ended up canning the project.

[Danfun64]

removing the Japanese title cards (yes, really)

While the Japanese episode titles didn't show up on either the Blue Bricks or the Green Bricks, they were in the Japanese viewing option on streaming sites that used the same masters...

the Levels might've been the first master to have never been released with Japanese episode title cards. Could be wrong on that, but I suspect that the Season Blu-ray master definitely didn't. Otherwise, why does the Japanese viewing option on FuniNow still use the Orange Brick footage to this day (except for Season 9 which apparently uses DBox footage)?

[Robo4900]

Otherwise, why does the Japanese viewing option on FuniNow still use the Orange Brick footage to this day (except for Season 9 which apparently uses DBox footage)?

Pretty sure FuniNow DBZ is Season BD footage. Though you're right about the DBox in season 9 on the Japanese track.

[Danfun64]

I was under the impression that the Season Bluray footage was only used for the dub track.

On a different note, I'm surprised nobody mentioned virtualdub for the purpose of transferring vhs to digital. It's certainly meant for that purpose, unlike OBS which was meant more for stuff like video game streaming.

[MasenkoHA]

Episode 6 probably would have been too much for them. Even the edited Funi dubs had to keep some of the content for it make sense.

SO! I think I figured out why Yamcha already knows about the Dragon Balls in Episode 5! I think it's because Harmony Gold were going to skip over Episode 6 entirely: the only things that happen in this episode are that Yamcha learns what the Dragon Balls are, and giving him previous knowledge in Episode 5 (rather smoothly, I might add) would be a way to solve that.

The only other thing that needs to be explained is how they got the red Fiat 500, and that can easily be explained by re-scripting Episode 6's opening scene, which we know that Harmony Gold were perfectly capable of doing given the first five episodes.

That was my thinking. That they were going to skip episode 6-9 entirely to avoid Chi Chi’s armor bikini and Playboy Bunny Bulma and just explain that they found another dragon ball on the way.

But I feel like Oolong wishing for underwear was going to also present a problem. Funimation downplayed the perversion by making it comfortable underwear but something tells me that would have been too much for Harmony Gold

[Danfun64]

Wasn't there a rumor or something that parents viewing the test airing of the HG dub complained about the bathing scene in ep 2?

[eledoremassis02]

In episode 5 they mentioned Ox king as "The Giant" tho they don't name drop "Frypan mountain" as instead talking about crossing the Diablo desert. I could see them easily dropping Chi-chi. I wonder if they would have just ended up splicing episodes together (kind of like Ocean Z) at some point or doing long "specials" comprised of multiple episodes.

[10gigtriforce]

removing the Japanese title cards (yes, really)

While the Japanese episode titles didn't show up on either the Blue Bricks or the Green Bricks, they were in the Japanese viewing option on streaming sites that used the same masters...

the Levels might've been the first master to have never been released with Japanese episode title cards. Could be wrong on that, but I suspect that the Season Blu-ray master definitely didn't. Otherwise, why does the Japanese viewing option on FuniNow still use the Orange Brick footage to this day (except for Season 9 which apparently uses DBox footage)?

Didnt the gt singles have japanese title cards, at least as an option?


really the more i think about it the more i think HG did the first 5 episodes without knowing what was to come, and once they got done they looked ahead and saw they couldnt possible do this and keep their family friendly style.

[Planetnamek]

Wasn't there a rumor or something that parents viewing the test airing of the HG dub complained about the bathing scene in ep 2?

Wouldn't surprise me if they did, I remember there was one episode of Ren and Stimpy that originally had a scene of a family bathing together which got removed in reruns.

[kei17]

If you guys want digitization of old videotapes in professional quality, I can help you out, but sending rare tapes oveaseas is somewhat risky and I don't really recommend it, though. TanookiKuribo's copy of the Funi-Zero dub was accidentally lost when he sent it to someone else by FedEx.

[eledoremassis02]

If you guys want digitization of old videotapes in professional quality, I can help you out, but sending rare tapes oveaseas is somewhat risky and I don't really recommend it, though. TanookiKuribo's copy of the Funi-Zero dub was accidentally lost when he sent it to someone else by FedEx.

Dang, that really sucks. It seems he did digitize it himself to some-degree, maybe not archival. There is still Jamie Snowden's copy

[Planetnamek]

If you guys want digitization of old videotapes in professional quality, I can help you out, but sending rare tapes oveaseas is somewhat risky and I don't really recommend it, though. TanookiKuribo's copy of the Funi-Zero dub was accidentally lost when he sent it to someone else by FedEx.

Dang, that really sucks. It seems he did digitize it himself to some-degree, maybe not archival. There is still Jamie Snowden's copy

I used USPS instead of FedEx for that reason, I sent one tape to a guy in Canada and another to someone in another state and both times they got there just fine.

[10gigtriforce]

If you guys want digitization of old videotapes in professional quality, I can help you out, but sending rare tapes oveaseas is somewhat risky and I don't really recommend it, though. TanookiKuribo's copy of the Funi-Zero dub was accidentally lost when he sent it to someone else by FedEx.

Dang, that really sucks. It seems he did digitize it himself to some-degree, maybe not archival. There is still Jamie Snowden's copy

I used USPS instead of FedEx for that reason, I sent one tape to a guy in Canada and another to someone in another state and both times they got there just fine.

Yeah fedex is anus at the very best, ups or maybe usps are the ones id trust. Hopefully snowden does some digitization of it otherwise we may never see it surface again

[eledoremassis02]

Dang, that really sucks. It seems he did digitize it himself to some-degree, maybe not archival. There is still Jamie Snowden's copy

I used USPS instead of FedEx for that reason, I sent one tape to a guy in Canada and another to someone in another state and both times they got there just fine.

Yeah fedex is anus at the very best, ups or maybe usps are the ones id trust. Hopefully snowden does some digitization of it otherwise we may never see it surface again

His video shows clips https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q1ZbaoB6mL4&t=192s

[DrBriefsCat]

I don't know if this has been proposed yet, but I think the best solution to preserve these would be if the bearer of the VHS could just recapture the raw audio. With that out of the way, others would only have to resync it to higher quality footage. The titlecards and credits can easily be recreated.

[10gigtriforce]

I used USPS instead of FedEx for that reason, I sent one tape to a guy in Canada and another to someone in another state and both times they got there just fine.

Yeah fedex is anus at the very best, ups or maybe usps are the ones id trust. Hopefully snowden does some digitization of it otherwise we may never see it surface again

His video shows clips https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q1ZbaoB6mL4&t=192s

True i should have said hopefully he shares it not just digitizes it

[KBABZ]

I don't know if this has been proposed yet, but I think the best solution to preserve these would be if the bearer of the VHS could just recapture the raw audio. With that out of the way, others would only have to resync it to higher quality footage. The titlecards and credits can easily be recreated.

That's what I'm doing at this very moment! BUT, I think it'd be a mistake to just capture the audio. The video footage is very important (to the point that I honestly think that the ads should be kept too, like with the Star Wars Holiday Special), and better quality video means it's much easier to recreate that stuff in the first place.

[DrBriefsCat]

I don't know if this has been proposed yet, but I think the best solution to preserve these would be if the bearer of the VHS could just recapture the raw audio. With that out of the way, others would only have to resync it to higher quality footage. The titlecards and credits can easily be recreated.

That's what I'm doing at this very moment! BUT, I think it'd be a mistake to just capture the audio. The video footage is very important (to the point that I honestly think that the ads should be kept too, like with the Star Wars Holiday Special), and better quality video means it's much easier to recreate that stuff in the first place.

Okay. Whatever floats your boat.
Regarding the ads, they look like they were edited out on the VHS before it was digitized.

[Robo4900]

There is still Jamie Snowden's copy

Fairly sure Snowden's copy is just Tanooki Joe's digital transfer, sent to him to commentate on.