DBGT SIngle vs Green Bricks

[dragonfist]

Another quick question for you guys. Do the singles contain the complete opening/closing credits by episode? Just want to be completely nitpick about it since its something to, at least, complement my dragon boxes.

Is the tv special also looks good on the original single release? Again thanks for the help guys.

[BluezaBladeNZ]

Another quick question for you guys. Do the singles contain the complete opening/closing credits by episode? Just want to be completely nitpick about it since its something to, at least, complement my dragon boxes.

Is the tv special also looks good on the original single release? Again thanks for the help guys.

Yes, the singles do contain the complete opening/closing credits on every episode, so it's pretty much set out like the Dragon Box.

Not sure but when I compared it to the Dragon Box version, they looked around the same, it just doesn't have the opening credits, eyecatchs (which were added in the Green Brick release) and episode preview at the beginning.

[dragonfist]

Another quick question for you guys. Do the singles contain the complete opening/closing credits by episode? Just want to be completely nitpick about it since its something to, at least, complement my dragon boxes.

Is the tv special also looks good on the original single release? Again thanks for the help guys.

Yes, the singles do contain the complete opening/closing credits on every episode, so it's pretty much set out like the Dragon Box.

Not sure but when I compared it to the Dragon Box version, they looked around the same, it just doesn't have the opening credits, eyecatchs (which were added in the Green Brick release) and episode preview at the beginning.

The last part on what you're talking about? The tv special? For a moment you lost me there...

[Spoofer]

Just to reiterate, and since someone asked for pics of GT's macroblocking (which I can't provide). What I can provide are links to Blue Gender's macroblocking, released the same year as the GT singles. Keep in mind that all of Funi's releases during this period were constantly complained about because of just how awful this issue was.

http://i1092.photobucket.com/albums/i40 ... -12-26.png
http://i1092.photobucket.com/albums/i40 ... -12-47.png
http://i1092.photobucket.com/albums/i40 ... -14-05.png
http://i1092.photobucket.com/albums/i40 ... -14-10.png
http://i1092.photobucket.com/albums/i40 ... 4-10_2.png
http://i1092.photobucket.com/albums/i40 ... -14-34.png
http://i1092.photobucket.com/albums/i40 ... -14-59.png
http://i1092.photobucket.com/albums/i40 ... -15-42.png
http://i1092.photobucket.com/albums/i40 ... -15-47.png
http://i1092.photobucket.com/albums/i40 ... -17-14.png
http://i1092.photobucket.com/albums/i40 ... -17-33.png
http://i1092.photobucket.com/albums/i40 ... -17-38.png

http://www.fandompost.com/forums/showth ... ic-Line%29 - with timecodes that I was too lazy to re-copy.

Again, I understand a lot of you caring more about other issues than macroblocking, but for me personally, no amount of blur or missing features makes paying for something like THAT acceptable. Is GT better? God, I'd sure hope so. But given the time period it was released in, and all the flak Funi got 24-7 about their awful releases back then, there is no way I'd ever chance it. I don't really want to pay for the DB or GT bricks either as they're still a letdown compared to the Z DBoxes, but if I had to pick a poison I'd probably go with those. >_<

Effing Funi...

[Krycek7o2]

The TV Special looks like shit on every release. It wasn't remastered for the Dragon Box either. The only thing the Dragon Box is better at is that it includes the original teaser for the special.

[dragonfist]

Let me get this straight, TOEI only remastered in the TV specials for Z but left GT's untouched?

[Puto]

Pretty much, yes.

[Krycek7o2]

Let me get this straight, TOEI only remastered in the TV specials for Z but left GT's untouched?

Exactly. They also left the audio in stereo in the Dragon Box! I don't remember if the Green Bricks did that too. I know the original DVD Release was in mono. Or was it, I don't quite remember.

[Puto]

Exactly. They also left the audio in stereo in the Dragon Box! I don't remember if the Green Bricks did that too.

They did.

[Cipher]

Is GT better?

Not really. Maybe a little bit.

It happens time after time. Someone will post a picture of the Dragon Box next to a GT single, and everyone will jump on board with, "Woah, they're just as good as the Dragon Box!" because it has similar colors and grain.

But they're not good, guys. They don't look good. The Dragon Boxes are competently encoded and have minimal grain. The singles look like there's a thick layer of fuzz over them in motion, and it's only aggravated by regular macroblocking (anticipate it about half the time anything is flashing or moving quickly). One example I can remember off the top of my head is Oob doing some sort of electric flash technique to block Yi Xing Long as Goku is powering up with his family. Fairly indicative of a regular problem.

The screenshots don't really do these justice. Even I think the screenshots make the season sets look too blurred, and I've never had a problem with them in motion. In a similar way, you can't really tell how sub-par the singles are until you're watching them on a TV. Maybe neither one is ideal, but I'll side with the season sets in this case time and time again.

[jpdbzrulz4sure]

Let me get this straight, TOEI only remastered in the TV specials for Z but left GT's untouched?

Exactly. They also left the audio in stereo in the Dragon Box! I don't remember if the Green Bricks did that too. I know the original DVD Release was in mono. Or was it, I don't quite remember.

In the language menu, it says "Japanese Stereo".

[Jon Jon]

I agree with Spoofer on the macroblocking issue. You might as well watch a terrible bootleg copy.

I have some screen shots I had taken comparing stuff between the singles and season sets myself. One thing to note, is that the Japanese audio is much louder on the singles than on the season set. I don't know why that is though.

[Pokewhiz7]

I have the "Lost Episodes" singles box set, and I have to be honest with you, the grain and damage are really not that bad. The macroblocking, I have never noticed, although I'm sure I could if I looked for it. Really though, I think the green bricks look just too damn blurry. If someone could upload a clip of the green bricks, preferably a high-motion scene like Goku vs Oob in the 1st episode, we could do a better comparison, because I have to say, screenshots don't do the singles or the green bricks proper justice.
It's also worth pointing out that the GT singles have the original titles and the next episode previews. Personally, I don't mind English-only title cards, but I know some people do, and if they have the previews anyway (in both Japanese and English, no less) that it's kind of silly not to include them in a release.

[Cipher]

I have the "Lost Episodes" singles box set, and I have to be honest with you, the grain and damage are really not that bad.

Maybe it's just been too long since I watched them (I'll have to haul them out again), but I remember the grain on the "Lost Episodes" set being particularly distracting.

At any rate, it's much more present than on the Dragon Boxes, which doesn't carry through to the screen shots.

[atm5508]

I have both the Complete Series Box Set (as far as I know, the exact same release as Seasons 1 &2 but different packaging) and all of the singles, and I must say, I really do prefer the Season sets.

I'll have to agree with the point about the macroblocking on the singles. It isn't terrible, but it's definitely there. The footage seems to be grainier than the Dragon Box GT footage I've seen (to be fair, I don't own them so I could be wrong). These aren't a bad release, but they are going to be harder to track down, and potentially more expensive if you want the original art boxes.

On the other hand, the season sets look great to me. They aren't Dragon Box masters, but I think the video quality is very solid, especially considering the type of master that Funimation was most likely working from. The audio on this set sounds a bit cleaner to me as well, but I could just be hearing what I want to hear.

The two best reasons to pick up the season sets, in my opinion, are the newly added dub+original score and the fact that you get the hero's legacy movie included right in the set. Also, Funimation's dubbing of Dan Dan (Bit by Bit is what the English version seems to be called) with Vic Mignogna singing is amazing.

The best reason to pick up the singles is the art boxes. They really do look cool on a shelf.

Overall, I'd say go with the season sets. The quality between the two is debatable, and opinions are going to sway on both sides. However, the season sets just have a little more content with the Original Japanese track, the Dub track, and the new Dub+Japanese score track.

[Puto]

Not to mention that finding the singles in this day and age wouldn't be all that easy, and probably would come off as rather expensive when compared to the Season Sets.

[dragonfist]

Not really just a while ago I found out a guy on Ebay selling his entire collection of DBGT singles (series + tv special) for like thirty bucks plus shipping. I found that to be reasonably price considering it still clock at about the same price point the complete series box set from FUNimation costs right about now.

Pains me to say but I will have to wait it out a bit longer before deciding on any purchase fro GT in hopes that there might be a potential Dbox release of the series. Looks like both the singles and seasons have varying degrees of things that I want but not to the fullest capacity like my dragon box. A guy can certainly dream can he? Just look at Mike, way back on an early episode of the podcast, he wished there were a release of the dragon box footage in NA and voila it did making all our dreams come true. Get the joke?

Anyway just wanted to say thanks to you guys for the clarification between both releases.

[funrush]

You know, if Funi was using the DBox as the base for this set, they could have done better. Look at this:

This here is the GT Dragon Box Shot. I then decided to take this picture and put it in Paint.net and do my own remastering.

See? I did a small surface blur to rid it of the grain, but I still managed to keep most of the detail. The only thing in the picture that lost detail was the tree near Goku. Now compare this to the season set pic:

Here, they blurred it a lot. I know they didn't want grain, but this was overboard.

[Pokewhiz7]

Did you do the method of selecting all of a color and then brushing over it? A lot of people do that. Funimation won't, because they would have to do that frame by frame. Also,

if Funi was using the DBox as the base for this set

well, they weren't. But other than damage, their masters that they used on the singles are very similar.

[funrush]

Did you do the method of selecting all of a color and then brushing over it? A lot of people do that. Funimation won't, because they would have to do that frame by frame. Also,

if Funi was using the DBox as the base for this set

well, they weren't. But other than damage, their masters that they used on the singles are very similar.

No, I just blurred the whole thing. Wanted to do it quickly.