AB Video to release original Dragon Ball on Blu-Ray

[jjgp1112]

Clearly this release was a DiscoTek like situation where they got a fan that was knee-deep in all of this shit helming the project. Only explanaion

[eledoremassis02]

Clearly this release was a DiscoTek like situation where they got a fan that was knee-deep in all of this shit helming the project. Only explanaion

Speaking of Disco Tek, I kind of feel like they should of just done a SD Bluray using uncompressed Dragon Box footage and the main seller being the Broadcast audio and color correction. While the upscale is impressive it still has the pitfalls of the Dragon Box (the ghosting is this there tho a little less obvious because some of those details didnt get thru the AI, and some details ended up getting slotched out duing the AI conversion.
AB (mux of the opening *only thing available* since I dont have the bluray but I wanted to 100% upfront and was interested to see how it looked in motion):

DB:


However, if it wasnt labled as "HD" it might not pick up traction as I feel like thats more important the c.c or B.A to less hardcore fans so its a catch 20/20. Still a solid release and much better the Selecta's blurays. For me tho, I think the color correction and fixing (and I mean fixing!) the botched episodes are my biggest selling point. Those episodes look really good!

It'll be interesting to see how/if this changes future released.

[Cold Skin]

I don't want to be pessimistic, but I'm just taking past French releases into account (especially the most recent ones for the last few years) to try to possibly keep some expectations in check, though hope is always welcome.

While we can be sure that we'll have all of the OG Dragon Ball available like this with this specific remastering process, it seems unlikely to me that it will be used for Dragon Ball Z too.

The reason is that - and you can correct me if I'm wrong and forgot something, of course - I think French DB releases usually use another master that's already done and ready to go, the latest one from the original country.
We've learned that they were ready to use existing masters for OG Dragon Ball, except I think no proper HD version justifying a Blu-ray release currently exists in Japan, am I right? So they planned on turning to another country and use the Selecta Vision that's ready for use, but ultimately couldn't bring themselves to feel it was good enough quality-wise and were "forced" to create their own remaster by the situation, as a last resort.

Now the thing is, I think I saw that there are Blu-rays of DBZ in Japan, I remember I saw news on the main Kanzenshuu website about the censorship of middle fingers, etc... If I'm not wrong and didn't make this up, and an acceptable remaster already exists, they'll likely go for it (and remasters like the DBZ movies are deemed acceptable, since as far as I know they were precisely used for the movies Blu-ray pack that was released here earlier this year, with the same censored middle fingers and all).

So while I think Dragon Ball Z may very well be coming after Dragon Ball for a French Blu-ray release (it would make sense and that could explain why our anime streaming service ADN is setting the DBZ episodes for "later in 2023" comared to all other DB shows coming in December and January), my bet is that they'll simply use the Japanese Blu-ray masters like they usually do.

Now, for a more hopeful side, we can hope that other countries will take notes on how this remaster was done and decide to apply a similar process, if not directly asking the French staff what they did, so that they can apply it to a new DBZ release themselves.

As for a GT release, there's some good and some bad to consider. The bad thing is that GT doesn't get a lot of releases around here, so who knows if they'll be willing to invest in a release if they think it won't be really popular.
The good thing is that I think it's similar to OG Dragon Ball in that there's currently no "acceptable" Blu-ray master as far as I know, meaning if they decide to release it, they'll probably do exactly what they're doing with OG Dragon Ball.

But I'm not saying that to bum you out, just what I think if I analyse the situation, but this set already proves that big surprises are possible when it comes to releases! Who knows, maybe after this set, they'll be like "actually, let's keep doing our own remasters exactly like this for Z too instead of using existing masters". I hope it happens if it can satisfy fans all around the world!

[Scsigs]

Pretty sure the remaster was just the of the 4 DB movies, 13 Z movies, & 2 Z TV specials, Cold Skin. They got put out back in 2018 or 2019. 2 versions of some of the Z movies exist with censored middle fingers for the disc releases while the streaming versions on Amazon Japan aren't censored for the ones that had them.

[Vegard Aune]

Pretty sure the remaster was just the of the 4 DB movies, 13 Z movies, & 2 Z TV specials, Cold Skin. They got put out back in 2018 or 2019. 2 versions of some of the Z movies exist with censored middle fingers for the disc releases while the streaming versions on Amazon Japan aren't censored for the ones that had them.

Indeed. And I feel like, if they rejected Selecta Vision's upscales for DB, they would also be likely to reject CR's upscales for Z.
Is it a surefire thing that AB will go on to remaster Z later? Obviously not. Do I feel reasonably optimistic that they might? Yes.

[eledoremassis02]

Also just a theory (no evidence) but if they got pre-timed broadcast audio from the internet, could they have gotten pre color corrected footage (espeshally since this was all last minute)? I'm not sure whats available, but may explain some of the odd/(what seems to be) rare artifactng

Spoiler:

Unless AB was only given legit DVDs to work woth and not uncompressed SD masters.

[MistaL]

Also just a theory (no evidence) but if they got pre-timed broadcast audio from the internet, could they have gotten pre color corrected footage (espeshally since this was all last minute)? I'm not sure whats available, but may explain some of the odd/(what seems to be) rare artifactng

Spoiler:

Unless AB was only given legit DVDs to work woth and not uncompressed SD masters.

I don't think a colour correction project for the whole series exists to the same extent as on this release

[SuperSaiyanPan]

Also just a theory (no evidence) but if they got pre-timed broadcast audio from the internet, could they have gotten pre color corrected footage (espeshally since this was all last minute)? I'm not sure whats available, but may explain some of the odd/(what seems to be) rare artifactng

Spoiler:

Unless AB was only given legit DVDs to work woth and not uncompressed SD masters.

I don't think a colour correction project for the whole series exists to the same extent as on this release

Are...are you sure about that?

[eledoremassis02]

For fun I did a comparison between AB AI HD of a first gen scan and Kenekos Native HD (youtube) of a multi-gen scan

[MistaL]

Also just a theory (no evidence) but if they got pre-timed broadcast audio from the internet, could they have gotten pre color corrected footage (espeshally since this was all last minute)? I'm not sure whats available, but may explain some of the odd/(what seems to be) rare artifactng

Spoiler:

Unless AB was only given legit DVDs to work woth and not uncompressed SD masters.

I don't think a colour correction project for the whole series exists to the same extent as on this release

Are...are you sure about that?

I'm aware of colour correction efforts by fans, but I don't know of any that go to the same lengths as this release seems to, though I could be wrong, hence the word "think"

[Dragon Ball Ireland]

Now the thing is, I think I saw that there are Blu-rays of DBZ in Japan, I remember I saw news on the main Kanzenshuu website about the censorship of middle fingers, etc... If I'm not wrong and didn't make this up, and an acceptable remaster already exists, they'll likely go for it (and remasters like the DBZ movies are deemed acceptable, since as far as I know they were precisely used for the movies Blu-ray pack that was released here earlier this year, with the same censored middle fingers and all).

The series hasn't been released on Blu-Ray in Japan, only the movies. There's been rumours for years about TOEI doing a HD remaster, and some still have hope, buy seemingly the reason they created Kai was because it was "good enough", they've shown no signs of wanting to do all 291 episodes, never mind the original series or GT.

And yes, I think TOEI's remasters of the movies was released in France, but don't quote me on that. It was definitely released in Europe, but given Dragon Ball's popularity there France sounds about right.

[sangofe]

Now the thing is, I think I saw that there are Blu-rays of DBZ in Japan, I remember I saw news on the main Kanzenshuu website about the censorship of middle fingers, etc... If I'm not wrong and didn't make this up, and an acceptable remaster already exists, they'll likely go for it (and remasters like the DBZ movies are deemed acceptable, since as far as I know they were precisely used for the movies Blu-ray pack that was released here earlier this year, with the same censored middle fingers and all).

The series hasn't been released on Blu-Ray in Japan, only the movies. There's been rumours for years about TOEI doing a HD remaster, and some still have hope, buy seemingly the reason they created Kai was because it was "good enough", they've shown no signs of wanting to do all 291 episodes, never mind the original series or GT.

And yes, TOEI's remasters of the movies and specials was released in France. It has only been released in France outside Japan.

Fixed info in your quote.

[Banduck]

Now the thing is, I think I saw that there are Blu-rays of DBZ in
And yes, TOEI's remasters of the movies and specials was released in France. It has only been released in France outside Japan.

Fixed info in your quote.

The movies and specials were also released in Germany. Just like this new DB remaster, which will be released in Germany in January.

[Javaki]

Fixed info in your quote.

TOEI's remasters of the movies (with middle finger censorship) and specials were also released in Germany.

[Scsigs]

I wonder if Crunchyroll would ever release the Toei remasters of the DB movies & specials here in America. I'm surprised FUNi didn't release them already. Are they really that proud of their remasters of the movies from a decade ago?

[Javaki]

The movies and specials were also released in Germany. Just like this new DB remaster, which will be released in Germany in January.

It wasn't confirmed we'll be getting the exact same remaster (+broadcast audio) though? Could still be the Selecta Visión one or something else AFAIK

[sangofe]

The movies and specials were also released in Germany. Just like this new DB remaster, which will be released in Germany in January.

It wasn't confirmed we'll be getting the exact same remaster (+broadcast audio) though? Could still be the Selecta Visión one or something else AFAIK

No, it's not confirmed. At all.

[Cold Skin]

Oh, the fact that I got it totally wrong about a Japanese HD master existing means pretty good odds for a Dragon Ball Z release that would be similar, I guess!

If this OG Dragon Ball set has enough success, they might want to release Dragon Ball Z in continuation, except if they think like Toei and go "they already have the Blu-rays for Dragon Ball Kai, no need to invest in the original DBZ", which is always a possibility.

But I'm thinking maybe Toei would be naturally less inclined to do it in Japan to begin with, because a remastering process is already something they're not willing to do with OG Dragon Ball, but there's more than that: if they did a remaster of the original Dragon Ball Z, it might be like officially saying "the remastered / recut version we created for years named Kai and hyped you up with as the "ultimate version of Z" is not up to the original in the end, we totally failed." Which is not really what they'd like to convey, I guess.

As external publishers or handlers or whatever it's called, I guess other countries are possibly more inclined to easily say without a flinch "there's already Kai, but you like the original more or you want a deep dive into nostalgia? We give you the original Z newly remastered now!"
Providing they're willing to invest in it all, it's still business after all!

All of this is pure speculation, but all I'm saying is that a similar Dragon Ball Z remaster coming up next and handled by the same staff is not unlikely at all, it wouldn't be surprising if it was coming right after OG Dragon Ball!

[superrayman3]

Pretty sure the remaster was just the of the 4 DB movies, 13 Z movies, & 2 Z TV specials, Cold Skin. They got put out back in 2018 or 2019. 2 versions of some of the Z movies exist with censored middle fingers for the disc releases while the streaming versions on Amazon Japan aren't censored for the ones that had them.

Indeed. And I feel like, if they rejected Selecta Vision's upscales for DB, they would also be likely to reject CR's upscales for Z.
Is it a surefire thing that AB will go on to remaster Z later? Obviously not. Do I feel reasonably optimistic that they might? Yes.

I'm feeling optimistic myself, I feel if fans support and encourage AB to continue releasing the entire series (the rest of DB, Z, and GT) using the process they currently are enough, AB will be more inclined to do so and if they do they'll have a true winner on their hands, AB threw a MASSIVE curveball nobody was expecting by deciding not to use Selecta-Visions "remaster" so close to release and I hope it pays off for them in spades because they've earned it.

[eledoremassis02]

Pretty sure the remaster was just the of the 4 DB movies, 13 Z movies, & 2 Z TV specials, Cold Skin. They got put out back in 2018 or 2019. 2 versions of some of the Z movies exist with censored middle fingers for the disc releases while the streaming versions on Amazon Japan aren't censored for the ones that had them.

Indeed. And I feel like, if they rejected Selecta Vision's upscales for DB, they would also be likely to reject CR's upscales for Z.
Is it a surefire thing that AB will go on to remaster Z later? Obviously not. Do I feel reasonably optimistic that they might? Yes.

I'm feeling optimistic myself, I feel if fans support and encourage AB to continue releasing the entire series (the rest of DB, Z, and GT) using the process they currently are enough, AB will be more inclined to do so and if they do they'll have a true winner on their hands, AB threw a MASSIVE curveball nobody was expecting by deciding not to use Selecta-Visions "remaster" so close to release and I hope it pays off for them in spades because they've earned it.

The other good thing too is that they'll have more time (and perhaps money) who knows how much better the upscale could be!