Ashura wrote:Yes, and that's exactly why you wouldn't want to upscale the Dragonbox masters... because they're only in SD.
Just to clarify, because I think there are mixed messages and opinions being tossed around (and I'm mainly talking about the movies, here)...
The main reason we "wouldn't want" Dragon Box masters from FUNimation upscaled is because, as has been noted, the masters FUNimation likely received from Toei are digital at 480p -- but that's not the issue. The issue is that Toei has film prints of the series (they created "Dragon Box: The Movies" from pretty fantastic 35mm prints).
Therefore, why upscale something when there's a film master to go back to for the full resolution?
(And of course, we
already have a product like that -- FUNimation's "Double Features" were released on DVD
and Blu-ray, and were created from real film prints... of course, the biggest issue there is that Toei's masters are worlds nicer, especially in the audio department, than what FUNimation has.)
For things that ONLY exist as SD productions (mainly digitally-produced things from the early 2000s, like "FLCL"), yes, professionally-handled, in-house upscales are going to be better than what your consumer-grade receiver and TV are going to be capable of producing, and you get the added benefit of lossless audio.