Bluray release (TV + original movies) - August 26th 2015

[TMBounty_Hunter]

That's what good 35mm film gets you :P

Watch Cowboy Bebop, the entire show (except with lots of occasional digital effects shot) looks that clean and crisp and with extremely subtle grain. It's delicious.

[The Eva Monkey]

So would everyone agree that the jump in quality between the original release and Renewal/Platinum is greater than the jump in quality between Renewal/Platinum and Blu-ray?

The series doesn't look vastly better to me, but EoE looks gorgeous. I seriously want that in my life.

[Ray]

That's what good 35mm film gets you :P

Watch Cowboy Bebop, the entire show (except with lots of occasional digital effects shot) looks that clean and crisp and with extremely subtle grain. It's delicious.

I can concur to this.

[TMBounty_Hunter]

So would everyone agree that the jump in quality between the original release and Renewal/Platinum is greater than the jump in quality between Renewal/Platinum and Blu-ray?

Doesn't mean it's not completely worth it.

original = analog video = absolute and irredeemable garbage. Comparisons between it and later formats are completely useless because of how bad it is.
renewal = 2003 was still the early days of proper DVD mastering and DVD is still a pretty shit standard due to MPEG-2 and loads of other issues
BD box = the first time we're ever getting even remotely close to the original film masters

[svenge]

I'm of the opinion that the jump from the original DVDs to Renewal was a bigger deal for the movies than the Renewal to BD transition, if only for how terrible the original Theatrical Edition DVDs from 1999 were.

Composite "dot crawl" was everywhere, and 4:3 letterbox is no way to see a 1.85:1 motion picture on a modern TV...

[TheDrmcvey]

So would everyone agree that the jump in quality between the original release and Renewal/Platinum is greater than the jump in quality between Renewal/Platinum and Blu-ray?

The series doesn't look vastly better to me, but EoE looks gorgeous. I seriously want that in my life.

I agree. I already knew they couldn't do much with the quality of the TV series after Platinum, but in terms of EoE, it looks A LOT better!

[Rei IV]

Speaking about the movies, both Death and Rebirth and EOE are going about $125 and $180 respectively at Amazon. With that money, one might as well buy the Japanese Blu Ray set. Who'd spend that amount cash on DVDs based on VHS/LD masters and that isn't anamorphically enhanced? They're barely worth $20.

[cody727kirby]

Cannot wait to watch this, the quality looks GREAT. Fiancee hasn't watched Eva yet, should be fun to get her reactions too. Two birds with one stone :)

So would everyone agree that the jump in quality between the original release and Renewal/Platinum is greater than the jump in quality between Renewal/Platinum and Blu-ray?

I think this should be a big jump from Renewal. Not only is the screenshot quality great, but didn't the original Renewal process have some other problems along with it? Ones that the Blu-ray probably addresses?

2D4U Rips Encoder: "The 2003 Renewal project is a joke compared to any modern restoration, with aliasing likely due to poor HDCAM mastering, abusive edge enhancement, and often times muddy details (Occasional DNR smearing)"

*Edited for formatting issues

[The Eva Monkey]

Speaking about the movies, both Death and Rebirth and EOE are going about $125 and $180 respectively at Amazon. With that money, one might as well buy the Japanese Blu Ray set. Who'd spend that amount cash on DVDs based on VHS/LD masters and that isn't anamorphically enhanced? They're barely worth $20.

They aren't really selling for that much, those are just list prices. Actual auctions go for 30ish.

[Rei IV]

They aren't really selling for that much, those are just list prices. Actual auctions go for 30ish.

Oh.



Still, they're not even worth $30.

[Blue Three]

I agree with TMBounty_Hunter. With the DVDs we had a nice product, but it was clear that the footage had to be relatively compressed and all. With this new release though, I'd say we can be pretty sure that we have in our hands the best that Evangelion will look at this point. The raw material that the guys at Khara / Sony worked with won't look considerably better / less compressed, so it's about as good as it's going to get really.

As someone who's gone through so many releases, starting with faulty bootleg VCDs off eBay 16 years ago, a product as complete as this is almost too satisfactory. I guess the only thing I'll be missing are the scripts that they had on the previous DVDs. Then again they're also available in book form and that's better anyway.

[ath]

I guess the only thing I'll be missing are the scripts that they had on the previous DVDs. Then again they're also available in book form and that's better anyway.

Damn. I was looking forward to some nice clean 1080p scripts to replace the ones from the DVDs. I know I have the storyboard books, but they're barely readable and generally a pain to scan and work with.

[shinhito]

I agree with TMBounty_Hunter. With the DVDs we had a nice product, but it was clear that the footage had to be relatively compressed and all. With this new release though, I'd say we can be pretty sure that we have in our hands the best that Evangelion will look at this point. The raw material that the guys at Khara / Sony worked with won't look considerably better / less compressed, so it's about as good as it's going to get really.

As someone who's gone through so many releases, starting with faulty bootleg VCDs off eBay 16 years ago, a product as complete as this is almost too satisfactory. I guess the only thing I'll be missing are the scripts that they had on the previous DVDs. Then again they're also available in book form and that's better anyway.

Yes, at least in terms of the show proper which was shot on 16mm this is the best Evangelion is ever going to look.

It's interesting to see some of the reactions here. I am curious as to what people were hoping for? Or what do you feel these sets are lacking?

The Sony PCL team did an amazing telecine for the show (minus Episode 16, but that seems to be because they have now lost both the original film and the 35mm internegative used for Renewal) and all of the films. They didn't abuse the footage with post-processing nonsense; I'm looking at you Dragon Ball Z Blu-rays where they sharpened the grain so much it should have been called Dragon Ball Grain. They did a good job of subtlety retouching out dust and scratches and even correct the notoriously bad Gainax film editing 'wobble'. They gave us all the versions and extras we could have wanted between the Blu-Ray and Archives DVD.

So I am going to say that all tallied up these sets are a huge leap from the Renewal sets. Yes that was also a great jump in quality from the LDs and original DVD releases but Renewal had only about a quarter of the special features and only included Revival of Evangelion.

Anyway, I am loving these sets so far and now I can't wait to pick up Archives when I collect the funds to do so!

[Dima]

Well the ones svenge posted would look pretty identical. Episode 16 has been notoriously mired in quality issues by having the original film roll lost. For the 2003 Renewal DVDs they used a 35mm internegative and so that's why the quality of that episode was subpar for the Renewal set and the Platinum set.

For the Blu-Rays it looks like even that 35mm Internegative was lost of Episode 16 and so the episode as it appears on the Blu-Ray set is an upscale.

The rest of the screenshots that are slowly becoming available look great! They did a great job on the telecine for a show produced on 16mm film in the mid-90s!

The grain isn't overtly apparent due to over sharpening, but yet you can see very fine detail in such things as the newspaper articles that show up frequently in the TV series. You can also clearly see the details of the animation cels right down to the lines of paint separating out different colors. The color reproduction looks fantastic so far and not oversaturated.

Yeah i noticed that the pictures from the other episodes look better. Overall it seems that there are more vivid colors and some sharpening but most of the grain is still there. Maybe this is the best they could do with an old release?

When they announced the Blu-Ray box i had high expectations seeing the work of Sunrise with the Gundam releases but it seems they are the exception.

[pwhodges]

For those who might be wondering: it appears that the Reiquarium shots are not on the Blu-ray (at least not as part of Ep 23). Too bad.

All this wealth of material, and it's still not complete! So I shall be keeping my Resurrection DVD, it seems.

For the Blu-Rays it looks like even that 35mm Internegative was lost of Episode 16 and so the episode as it appears on the Blu-Ray set is an upscale.

Do you have any reason to say this other than the pictures? To my eyes, looking at the pictures above, the BD and Renewal look very similar indeed, with the barest of advantage to the BD.

[TMBounty_Hunter]

The description of the BD Box has for months specifically stated that episode 16 will be an upscale of the 2003 master. The Newtype interview restates this.

[shinhito]

Do you have any reason to say this other than the pictures? To my eyes, looking at the pictures above, the BD and Renewal look very similar indeed, with the barest of advantage to the BD.

I am using deductive reasoning. In the description on the official website they said that Episode 16 was an upscale from an SD source.

The the Renewal booklet it is explained that the original film for Episode 16 was lost, but a 35mm internegative duplicate was found and that is the source for the telecine in the Renewal set.

So since the episode in the Blu-ray set is an upscale (using a technique called 'Real Scaling for HD' as described in the Sony PCL interview) one can assume that for whatever reason they decided not to use the 35mm internegative for a new telecine. I am guessing this is because they no longer have the 35mm internegative either because it was lost or somehow damaged in the 2003 telecine process, I don't know.

But they had the internegative for the 2003 set and yet for whatever unknown reason it wasn't utilized for the Blu-ray.

EDIT: Here is the applicable note taken from the official Japanese Evangelion website about the Blu-ray Box.

第拾六話はフィルム原版が現存しないため、SDマスターからのアップコンバートとなります。あらかじめご了承ください）

It basically says "Please note that since the original film for Chapter 16 is nonexistent it will be an upscale from an SD master."

[pwhodges]

Thanks both - I recall the info, but hadn't put two and two together correctly.

[backseatjesus]

It's a shame I'm broke and can't spare the money for this right now. Hope I can get it for my birthday next month.

[Sailor Star Dust]

Here's another Japanese review with pictures. This time by EvaFan instead of RageMax:

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