Dragon Box Z 2's Hands On Discussion

[Gaffer Tape]

Meh. Annoyed at his seeming favoring of the terrible orange bricks and use of dub terms but quite pleased with his obvious awareness of the innaccuracy of the dub and the ridiculous dependence fans have on nostalgia. And he misspelled "complimentary"...

[Sebastian (SB)]

It seems Carl and Thoren just sort of represent the average anime fanbase that has no knowledge of the shoddy and rocky DVD releases for DBZ or even the history of the fanbase. And even if they did, they'd probably go with the majority consensus. When I saw penguintruth's review on Dragon Box 1, I was pleasantly surprised. It was good to see someone who understood these releases and why they came out in the first place.

[desirecampbell]

ANN's review for Dragon Box 2 is here. (It's not me this time... I don't even have DBox 2 yet!)

Eh, not much of a review for the DVD set really. A shallow, but even handed review of the show - but hardly anything about the boxset itself.

[penguintruth]

Well, I thought it was a fairly good review from somebody outside the DB fan community.

[Corporate_Nothing]

Has anyone hear used VLC Media Player to playback either Dragon Box? Given the limitations of the grainy source material and the 480p resolution, has anyone here tried to fool around with VLC's upscaling/postprocessing filters to achieve the best picture possible?

I used this guide, following the instructions and enabling OpenGL as well, but honestly, I don't have the eye to discern much of a difference without making a side-by-side comparison.

[Piccolo Daimaoh]

ANN's review for Dragon Box 2 is here. (It's not me this time... I don't even have DBox 2 yet!)

What? You do reviews on ANN?

[penguintruth]

ANN's review for Dragon Box 2 is here. (It's not me this time... I don't even have DBox 2 yet!)

What? You do reviews on ANN?

I've contributed a couple of times. I did the first Dragon Box review for them. Recently I reviewed the first episode of Gundam UC (Gundam Unicorn). I'm not a regular staff reviewer, but I hope to do more work for them in the future, though.

[Piccolo Daimaoh]

I've contributed a couple of times. I did the first Dragon Box review for them. Recently I reviewed the first episode of Gundam UC (Gundam Unicorn). I'm not a regular staff reviewer, but I hope to do more work for them in the future, though.

That's awesome and you were pretty unbiased with the Dragon Box review.

[penguintruth]

I've contributed a couple of times. I did the first Dragon Box review for them. Recently I reviewed the first episode of Gundam UC (Gundam Unicorn). I'm not a regular staff reviewer, but I hope to do more work for them in the future, though.

That's awesome and you were pretty unbiased with the Dragon Box review.

Oh, I was harsher in my first draft, but I went through a few more drafts after Zac suggested some redirection. I thank him for that.

[Piccolo Daimaoh]

Oh, I was harsher in my first draft, but I went through a few more drafts after Zac suggested some redirection. I thank him for that.

I would have also been harsh. I mean, it's the fourth time FUNi has released the series.

Did you actually meet Zac in person?

[penguintruth]

Oh, I was harsher in my first draft, but I went through a few more drafts after Zac suggested some redirection. I thank him for that.

I would have also been harsh. I mean, it's the fourth time FUNi has released the series.

Did you actually meet Zac in person?

No, no, it was all through e-mail, which is how I imagine much of the business at ANN is done, as far as reviews. We live on diferent coasts, anyway.

My view, by the way, was that it was only the second true release of the series, after the Season sets.

There was supposed to be an interview of some kind with a Funimation brand manager, where I asked all sorts of questions about the DBoxes and other DBZ-related things, but that fell through. Things happen, I guess. I got my question about Kai answered when everyone else did.

[VegettoEX]

There was supposed to be an interview of some kind with a Funimation brand manager, where I asked all sorts of questions about the DBoxes and other DBZ-related things, but that fell through. Things happen, I guess. I got my question about Kai answered when everyone else did.

Wow... that sounds... oddly familiar ^_~.

Anyway, my review of the set should be coming sometime this week... if anyone cares, that is. I write words sometimes. Lots of them.

[penguintruth]

I'll definitely read it!

[Gaffer Tape]

Awesome! I've been looking forward to the DaizenshuuEX official review! I wrote my script for my review video several days ago, but I've been too busy moving to feel like filming it/editing it.

[Piccolo Daimaoh]

ANN's review for Dragon Box 2 is here. (It's not me this time... I don't even have DBox 2 yet!)

Eh, not much of a review for the DVD set really. A shallow, but even handed review of the show - but hardly anything about the boxset itself.

I guess he doesn't really care that much about the video quality and boxset presentation and more about the actual show, which is fair enough.

[Corporate_Nothing]

Just finished episode 84. Now what? :[

Also,




Also also, any idea why VLC is outputting these in 720x540 instead of 640x480? Or is 720x540 the correct resolution for these DVDs?

[MajinVejitaXV]

Also also, any idea why VLC is outputting these in 720x540 instead of 640x480?

No idea. It's the correct aspect ratio, but it's the wrong resolution. Probably something in your settings. Instead of squashing the horizontal resolution to achieve the proper 4:3 ratio, it's stretching the vertical resolution. VLC kind of sucks for screen captures (and DVD playing) in general. It's a "Jack of all trades, master of none" application.

[Greenman]

Also also, any idea why VLC is outputting these in 720x540 instead of 640x480? Or is 720x540 the correct resolution for these DVDs?

Don't use VLC for screen shots. Here's a good little guide made by MarcFBR:

Quite glad to see all the good proper resolution caps.

The main issue with not doing it in VLC and then scaling down is because VLC scaling it up is going to create a few erroneous issues.

Here are my old directions in shorthand for those who don't need an explanation why they are doing certain things.
--------------------
Install CCCP
Open Media Player Classic Home Cinema (comes with CCCP), use the open disk option to load up your disk.
While watching, save caps as .PNGs.
These PNGs will be native to DVDs resolution, 720x480.
Using CS4, CS3, or the Gimp, load your screencaps, and change image size using the bicubic/cubic filter to 640x480 and save these, once again, as PNG.


also, for anything widescreen (the menus on the Dbox, modern animation/film/etc), do the same as above, but make the final resolution 853x480.

CCCP download.
Gimp download.

[BobZ]

Everyone's afraid to touch Ginyu's balls.

[The Time Traveller]

Also also, any idea why VLC is outputting these in 720x540 instead of 640x480?

Go to Preferences (under Tools), then click All under Show Settings, then go to Input/Codecs then to Access modules then go to Screen and if the Capture Fragment Size is 1 then change it to 0.

I had to figure that out all on my own a while ago, it's pretty straight forward, I hope.