Dragon Ball Z "Seasons" On Blu-ray: News & Discussion

[TheAldella]

I'm going to waste my life waiting for my definitive release

It won't be just you.

[BlazingFiddlesticks]

(hell I even voted for 16:9).

...Why?

Also, every HDTV I've seen in person has had a DNR setting. If you want it to fill your screen, click to zoom button. If you want it to be smoothed out, flip the DNR setting.

Wouldn't that not work with Blu-Ray versions, though? Given that its not a 4:3 image, it's 16:9 with pillars.

(hell I even voted for 16:9).

...Why?

Also, every HDTV I've seen in person has had a DNR setting. If you want it to fill your screen, click to zoom button. If you want it to be smoothed out, flip the DNR setting.

I tried with my Kai blu ray messed about with every setting on both ps3 and tv but it wouldn't zoom in.

Then you missed something, modern TV remotes (And thus TV menus) have an aspect ratio button, named "view", "aspect", "zoom", something of the kind, and most TVs have at least one super zoomed in ratio. As I questioned, though, I don't think it would be as effective with Blu-Rays given that they aren't anamorphic.

[qjz123]

I... don't think that's true. I could be wrong, but as far as I know, the Dragon Boxes didn't undergo any kind of substantial (if any) grain removal, and they were working from the source, so, lower resolution notwithstanding, they're a better indicator of the kind of grain structure the original film has.

The reason the Dragon boxes appear to have less grain than the level sets is because of their lower resolution. In Standard definition a lot of the grain is smooshed over when using an HD scan your looking further into the film which is the reason their is so much more grain.

I don't see much grain difference between the two halves of your picture

There is a huge difference
Raw
http://imageshack.us/a/img822/229/x8aw.png
Restored
http://imageshack.us/a/img849/8387/olkl.png

[Black_Anime_Fan]

Well, to play devil's advocate, the Level sets were too grainy, the consequence of FUNimation having a multi-generational film print with multiple generations of grain superimposed on top of each other, so... no, strictly speaking, it's not supposed to look QUITE like that, but it's a hell of a lot closer than this monstrosity, and I'd much prefer some extra dupe grain to FUNimation systematically wiping out all texture and detail.

Again, it's the difference between doing the best with your available resources (the Level sets) and just purposely trying to screw everything up (both season sets).

Well, seeing as how Blu-Ray has 7 times the detail and clarity of standard definition DVD, of course you're going to notice all that extra grain that you didn't see before, which is a GOOD thing. They didn't use any so-called filters to add any grain, quite the opposite actually, they actually used a little bit of DNR (if you look at qjz123's comprarison shots of the raw film and the Levels you can see that they toned the grain down a little, but without erasing a single shot of detail, so any more grain removal would've resulted in detail-loss which was not what FUNi was aiming for at the time, oh how times have changed).

[bkev]

^Dupe grain does not refer to grain added in post but instead a natural part of the copying process for release prints. It's basically like how the further away from its source a copied tape gets, the lower the quality gets (ie 1st gen vs 3rd gen tapes.) Has FUNimation ever said what generation their prints are? Did TOEI tell them? It's obviously not from the negatives, and of course they never claimed they were, but I'm curious to know.

[TheAldella]

Well, I guess if you look at em from a distance they're fine. XD

[Black_Anime_Fan]

Well, I guess if you look at em from a distance they're fine. XD

They're fine from any distance

[Ashura]

I... don't think that's true. I could be wrong, but as far as I know, the Dragon Boxes didn't undergo any kind of substantial (if any) grain removal, and they were working from the source, so, lower resolution notwithstanding, they're a better indicator of the kind of grain structure the original film has.

Dragonball is 16mm, so it's going to be grainy no matter what. You can tell just by looking at the Dragonbox that it's been temporal smoothed and/or a few other things have been applied to the footage to stifle the amount of grain that's visible on the sets; it's just not been tampered with to the level of the Orange Bricks or these new sets. They smoothed it out a bit, but there's still some grain there, and they didn't really lose many details. Any real removal of detail is pretty much hidden in the low resolution of DVD.

If you want an idea about how grainy things can look, go look at the safety specials on the Dragonball Dragonbox. Those are pretty much just dumps of the film masters.

There was actually a grain pass on the Level sets as well, it's just that it wasn't substantial enough to wreck the footage. It was just enough that it helped, not hurt. These kinds of processes can be ok when you don't go overboard and instead apply them with a metered hand.

[Ringworm128]

Am I the only one who thinks a good chunk of the casual market who bought the OB's will see this on the shelf at a store and think "meh, I already have it on DVD"?

[Metalwario64]

Am I the only one who thinks a good chunk of the casual market who bought the OB's will see this on the shelf at a store and think "meh, I already have it on DVD"?

Not just you. I think it's a possibility as well. Here's my theory:

So many people here say these will be super successful because of people who want cheap DBZ and remember it on Toonami. Tons of those people already own the Orange Bricks, and if they only wanted it as a cheap cartoon from their childhood, I highly doubt most of them will "upgrade" to Blu-ray.

As for the others who still don't own the Orange Bricks, I imagine a large portion of them will get Orange Bricks instead because they're still plenty cheaper, and they're all immediately available, making them a good choice (obviously from a price perspective) for impulse purchases of the entire series in one go. There are also probably some who will look at the Orange Bricks, see they're cheaper, and "remastered in HD", and thus, making FUNimation's misleading Orange Brick marketing bite them in the ass.


If this is the case, then these new Blu-rays might be more successful than the Level sets, but still not Orange Brick level.

[Ajay]

I agree, I'm not 100% convinced these will sell as well as many are predicting.

The number of people I've encountered who hold the opinion of 'how does animation in HD make any difference at all' is astounding.

I'll be surprised if you see many upgrading their Orange Bricks in favour of this release.

[Gaffer Tape]

Dragonball is 16mm, so it's going to be grainy no matter what. You can tell just by looking at the Dragonbox that it's been temporal smoothed and/or a few other things have been applied to the footage to stifle the amount of grain that's visible on the sets; it's just not been tampered with to the level of the Orange Bricks or these new sets. They smoothed it out a bit, but there's still some grain there, and they didn't really lose many details. Any real removal of detail is pretty much hidden in the low resolution of DVD.

If you want an idea about how grainy things can look, go look at the safety specials on the Dragonball Dragonbox. Those are pretty much just dumps of the film masters.

There was actually a grain pass on the Level sets as well, it's just that it wasn't substantial enough to wreck the footage. It was just enough that it helped, not hurt. These kinds of processes can be ok when you don't go overboard and instead apply them with a metered hand.

Yeesh, it's getting so a guy can't say anything without it being misconstrued and blown out of proportion!

Anyone who's been around the boards with me for any length of time should know I'm not complaining about grain or the Level sets (although if I did want to complain about them, it would be for the lack of NEPs, title cards, and openings and endings). I'm just saying the Level sets have a heavier grain structure because of their considerable distance from the original source. You may agree or disagree with that. As for the safety specials, I have not seen them, but I wouldn't be sure they had an original source on something so obscure. They probably had to dig up whatever they could find, and it probably was a multi-generational print with layers of dupe grain as well. That's just my guess.

Again, my point was that I was applauding FUNimation in that case for doing well by their limited resources, as opposed to this where they're going out of their way to screw up their limited resources.

[ErikB]

The number of people I've encountered who hold the opinion of 'how does animation in HD make any difference at all' is astounding.

It's funny because I, even as an animator, actually used to think that way. Then I saw a 720p TV rip of The Lion King and was kind of like, "...Oh." (Seriously, if you haven't seen any of Disney's traditional animation in high definition, you need to put that on your to-do list.)
Plus, when I was buying Kai, I had a difficult time finding parts 4 and 7 on blu-ray so I ended up getting the DVD sets of those. They look noticeably worse (though I wouldn't say they look bad).

Honestly, at this point, I'd be happy if FUNimation just does what they're doing except for the cropping. While the saturated colours may still offend my eyes I can deal with them, but chopping off parts of the picture is just plain insulting; especially when every widescreen TV ever has a Zoom function.

(hell I even voted for 16:9).

...Why?

Also, every HDTV I've seen in person has had a DNR setting. If you want it to fill your screen, click to zoom button. If you want it to be smoothed out, flip the DNR setting.

Wouldn't that not work with Blu-Ray versions, though? Given that its not a 4:3 image, it's 16:9 with pillars.

Why would the pillars make a difference? They'd fall outside the boundaries of the TV just like the top and bottom of the footage would if you used Zoom.
EDIT: Also, blu-ray discs can have 4:3 videos on them.

[bkev]

It's funny because I, even as an animator, actually used to think that way. Then I saw a 720p TV rip of The Lion King and was kind of like, "...Oh." (Seriously, if you haven't seen any of Disney's traditional animation in high definition, you need to put that on your to-do list.)

Gonna stop you right there. Lion King was only the second or third film where they'd gone completely digital with the CAPS system. So - in that respect - that clean, grainless look is ultimately the way it was meant to be. As for their traditionally animated catalog, they're known for tinkering. It makes for a great modern presentation, but film preservationists consider them more revisions than preservations.

There's no question that there's an upgrade when they're presented in HD, though.

[dprez]

Am I the only one who thinks a good chunk of the casual market who bought the OB's will see this on the shelf at a store and think "meh, I already have it on DVD"?

Blu-ray fans, casual fans who didn't get OB's, casual fans who want both. This will sell decently enough I think. It might end up look better than the season sets, and that would be enough to convince fans who still want to watch the FUNi dub on HD blu-ray. They will think this is the next best think and get it. I think this is what FUNi is thinking.

[Roland_ELoG]

Anyone who's been around the boards with me for any length of time should know I'm not complaining about grain or the Level sets (although if I did want to complain about them, it would be for the lack of NEPs, title cards, and openings and endings). I'm just saying the Level sets have a heavier grain structure because of their considerable distance from the original source. You may agree or disagree with that. As for the safety specials, I have not seen them, but I wouldn't be sure they had an original source on something so obscure. They probably had to dig up whatever they could find, and it probably was a multi-generational print with layers of dupe grain as well. That's just my guess.

RepreSENT. I so badly want the Level sets to be perfect but then again it's missing the credits sequences and such. So. BLAH.

[ErikB]

It's funny because I, even as an animator, actually used to think that way. Then I saw a 720p TV rip of The Lion King and was kind of like, "...Oh." (Seriously, if you haven't seen any of Disney's traditional animation in high definition, you need to put that on your to-do list.)

Gonna stop you right there. Lion King was only the second or third film where they'd gone completely digital with the CAPS system. So - in that respect - that clean, grainless look is ultimately the way it was meant to be. As for their traditionally animated catalog, they're known for tinkering. It makes for a great modern presentation, but film preservationists consider them more revisions than preservations.

There's no question that there's an upgrade when they're presented in HD, though.

Now that you mention it, you might have a point here. I think all of the HD Disney films I've seen are post-CAPS-introduction. What really sold me on it though wasn't the presence or lack of film grain, but just the sharpness. This was during college when I was in the middle of learning about line quality, weighting and such. So when I saw that version of Lion King, I noticed how clearly I could make out nearly every stroke made by the clean-up artists and really appreciated the thick and thin of them. EDIT: And I was saying 'traditional' just to mean hand-drawn frame-by-frame, which CAPS still is. It doesn't help that 'traditional' as a term isn't very consistently defined across the industry. Some will prefer it to mean hand-drawn with nothing digital, while I, and many of my peers, use it simply to refer to 2D frame-by-frame animation digital or not.
That having been said, 2010's diamond edition, which I own and love, has a very serious error in it. One of the shots near the end of the Mufasa ghost sequence is missing the cloud; that layer of the animation was, for some reason or another, plain forgotten (at least I really hope that was a mistake and not intentional). I'm at work at the moment so I can't grab a screenshot.

[dprez]

I don't believe we will get any more Dragon Boxes from FUNimation even if these sell, so I say fuck this shity "HD blu-ray" release that's obviously pointed towards people who don't really care about the show.

I hope these at least replaces the season sets for fans who want them... I also find it funny how they are already showing the first three seasons cover art, almost assuring us that they wont be canceled early.

[snaku]

I also find it funny how they are already showing the first three seasons cover art, almost assuring us that they wont be canceled early.

They only showed the first three covers?! It's boned.

[KingofWisdom]

This garbage remastering costs a lot less to produce, so the sales will probably be okay enough to carry it through to the end. It's not worth overthinking, especially at this point.