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

[Dougurasu]

Out of curiosity, I see people wanting to buy both the blu ray and the DVD set. What's on the DVD set that's not on the blu ray set? :o

[pwhodges]

The DVD set is the original broadcast versions with none of the cleaning and tidying up that started almost immediately; it also has the first two versions of Death, which have not been available before.

The BD set is a new remaster of the final versions of everything, much as we had in Renewal/Platinum but better again. There are single and two-part versions of EoE.

The two sets have different extras.

The differences between the first and the last version might be slight (except for the DC episodes), but there are more than you might think, such as different music in some places, for instance. Whether it is worth paying for the Archive set is a purely personal decision, though - no logic need be applied.

[Dougurasu]

Alright, so while the new set is audio-visually the best version, or at least the best presentation, the DVDs are the original version that was once on TV. Alright, I can see why they wouldn't need to put those on Bluray. There are so many versions of Death, though... I don't really need all of them. Same goes for the original broadcast versions, I'm already happy to have both the regular and the DC episodes :o So for me I think the Blu-rays are best :)

[pwhodges]

I imagine 80% of people would agree with you.

[svenge]

The DVD set is the original broadcast versions with none of the cleaning and tidying up that started almost immediately; it also has the first two versions of Death, which have not been available before.

Slight correction: The Archives of Evangelion DVD set only has the second version of Death which was given the name "Death(True)", and was previously only seen in the January 1998 WOWOW broadcast of D&R. The Blu-ray box has both the original 1997 theatrical version of Death as well as the third version named "Death(True)²", which was part of the 1998 "Revival of Evangelion" theatrical re-release.

For those wondering what version of Death the previous VHS/LD/DVDs had, all of them contained Death(True)² without exception.

[pwhodges]

Oops - sorry; a brief senior moment (and I haven't opened the boxes yet!).


^ "Shinji! Why are you always apologising?"

[cody727kirby]

Can someone tell me which episodes are on each disc for the Blu-ray set? Greatly appreciate it :)

[Dougurasu]

Can someone tell me which episodes are on each disc for the Blu-ray set? Greatly appreciate it :)

Disc 1:
Ep 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6

Disc 2:
Ep 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12

Disc 3:
Ep 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18

Disc 4:
Ep 19, 20, 21, 21 (dc), 22, 22 (dc)

Disc 5:
Ep 23, 23 (dc), 24, 24 (dc), 25, 26

Why tho? Can you only find downloads that don't tell you what's on the disc? :/

[cody727kirby]

Thank you for taking the time to do that. Very helpful info that some users I've seen have been asking for.

[Shinoyami65]

My god, the BD set is already out? Can't believe I didn't know about it

Is there any way to get the Platinum subs on it? Much as I'd like to see the whole series yet again in the new sexy BD format, it wouldn't be half as good without decent subtitles...

[Mr. Tines]

Is there any way to get the Platinum subs on it?

Yes, though you have to acquire the subtitles yourself, at the very least. There are some discussions of these earlier in the thread. What I've not yet seen is any corrected EoE subs.

[Sailor Star Dust]

EoE here (He's still working on them):

[url]http://3xrani.me/subs/EOE.English.zip[/url]

This is not finished, just retimed for the Blu-ray Disc of the movie. Enjoy.

And for NGE:

My project is this so far:
1) Create uncompressed copy of Blu-ray Discs with Platinum subtitles and English audio (space permitting) for personal and familial use on 50GB discs.
2) Create uncompressed copy of Broadcast DVDs with Platinum subtitles for personal and familial use on 8GB discs.
3) Create 1080p and 720p rip of Blu-ray Discs with Platinum subtitles and English audio for web use (you know where XP).
4) Create 480p rip of Broadcast DVDs with Platinum subtitles for web use.
5) Create iTunes compatible rips of Blu-ray Discs with Platinum subtitles and English audio for portable use.
6) ...
7) Watch Broadcast DVDs in honor of 20th Anniversary!

[xPearse]

Anything interesting on the extras side of things for the Blue-Rei's other than a yawning Anno?

[Gendo'sPapa]

There's a 16 minute "Making Of" on the cut live-action sequences from End of Evangelion that seems to have been mostly shot by Hideaki Anno himself personally. It's 16 minutes of 1997 era videotaped footage of Anno hanging out & directing the lead voice actresses & genuinely getting into live action filmmaking. It's pretty cool & the filmmaking - until they get to squeezing a bunch of people into the theater for that shot - they're doing is so small-scale you'd have no idea it was actually going to be used in a theatrical movie.

I wish I knew what they were saying but it's still pretty interesting to see the man & actresses in action.

Haven't explored too much else on the discs. Since I don't speak or read Japanese it's a lot of "click that selection & see where it takes me".

P.S. That live action shot in EOE of Asuka, Rei & Misato standing amongst a crowd with their backs turned to the camera isn't actually the three actresses in their character's costumes. It's just three store mannequins. I learned something new.

P.S.S. Sadly my absolute bit of Evangelion marketing ever is not given a flashy HD upgrade. I'm talking this - [url]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4HALL5-PZu4[/url]

[pwhodges]

I thought this was interesting. Someone has made a version of Death and Rebirth [the original] with English subs - he had to assemble them from other sources, of course, as this version has never been available on home media before. OK - so far, so unremarkable.

Now the interesting thing is what he has written in his notes to his version about the versions of EoE. He tells us that the separate and Revival versions of EoE are identical - as in the files have the same checksums; straight copy and paste onto an extra disk, it seems. So if anyone thought that the Revival version was tweaked, it would seem that it was not so (I think I knew that, actually). More interesting though is his comparison of Rebirth with the corresponding parts of EoE. Although the Rebirth cuts are incomplete, they are also a great deal sharper - a considerable amount of quality was lost in making the final EoE versions. Similarly, Death is better quality than Death (True^2).

Here is part of his notes:

Notes by Sephirotic -   SPOILER: Show

[...] It contains two parts: A 1h:12m summary film called Death, which wasn't even directed by Anno, and the "pre-release" Rebirth, which is the first 20 minutes of Evangelion AIR incomplete and unpolished

Though some effects and sound effects are missing and the shadows look crushed, this movie is actually MUCH SHARPER than the End of Evangelion. Many people were mistakenly believing that evangelion "Revival" was a remastered version of end of Evangelion. THIS IS NOT TRUE, as a matter of fact, both the Disc 7 and 8, which are EoE and Revival respectively have THE EXACTLY SAME CRC for the files. Is a blatant copy and paste. There is no hope of a sharper version of EoE, fellows, however, Rebirth IS sharper and you have 20 minutes of footage in extra quality for you to check out.

Here is some comparisons of the EoE m2ts with samples of my Release [of Rebirth] for you to get a taste what to expect and the amazing level of detail from Rebirth:
[url]http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/142548[/url]
[url]http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/142549[/url]
[url]http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/142550[/url]

There is also another version of the first part of the movie, the recap one: "Death" On the Revival disk. It's called Death True (2). [...] If you are in doubt of which version you want to watch, I recommend [the earlier] one because it has that extra scene and most importantly: IS MUCH SHARPER than Death True 2 from revival.

[Bagheera]

But why? That is just bizarre.

[TMBounty_Hunter]

While the Rebirth footage may be sharper it also has utterly fudged contrast. Any remotely dark colors are completely crushed into black oblivion completely killing all the details.

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/142787/

A bit of softness is a small price to pay when actually being able to see all the detail and proper colors/contrast.

[FreakyFilmFan4ever]

A lot of what we might consider "sharpness" is actually tricks done with the contrast of the image. My brother had a Samsung LN40C630K1F LCD TV, and after calibrating it with this guide (I don't have the proper gear to determine pixel intensity), I found that the "Sharpness" feature in the setting was really unnecessary, as at this point it was only acting as an edge-enhancer filter, meaning that I was getting all of these nasty looking highlights around the inked lines in animation. So I turned it complete to zero, and let the calibrated 95 Contrast/47 Brightness settings speak for itself.

This all being said, if you have your TV is calibrated properly, you shouldn't notice how "soft" EoE looks. The "Sharpness" of Rebirth is probably just a contrast filter over the image anyway, especially when judging the exaggerated graininess effect over Rebirth. Rebirth cels aren't actually photographed any better than EoE cels. So just let the un-crunched black levels convey the art to you, and know that EoE is the finished work.

[TMBounty_Hunter]

The user end is worth mentioning. When it comes to videophilia I usually hang out in places where it's the default assumption to turn off all the "features" that usually only ruin image quality, both on your TV/monitor and in your video card drivers. When talking about purely the source there are definitely sharper and softer transfers when it comes to 35mm anime, we have dozens of unmolested (ie not ruined with DNR or overly color-corrected) examples from the 70s to the 90s. EoE transfer falls somewhere in the middle of the range. Not obscenely beautiful but also not utterly incompetent. The two Death and one Rebirth transfers on the other hand clearly falls in the "rushed as fuck" category.

[Dougurasu]

For anyone who has the blu-rays and wants to play them with MacGo Blu Ray Player (it probably works the same with Windows Blu Ray Player) and add subtitles and has seen that if you play Blu Rays without Blu Ray menu (to avoid choosing a region and being able to play all regions) you will notice that all the episodes are bunched together in a 3 hour long clip. I'm making subtitles for those based on the platinum subs, retiming them so you have a subtitles file for every disc. However I'm having trouble finding the platinum subtitles for the On-Air versions of episode 21, 22, 23 and 24. Can anyone help me with this?

Once I'm finished with all the subtitles for at least the episodes I'll upload them here free of charge of course.