Hyper Shinchan wrote:saturation

EM should have been more specific. "Market saturation", nothing to do with image quality.

Baz wrote:EM should have been more specific. "Market saturation", nothing to do with image quality.

THIS.

The Eva Monkey wrote:Don't expect a Blu-Ray release of Evangelion anytime soon. At least not until DVD is phased out.

The main reason is that Evangelion was shot on 16mm film. The difference between that and 35mm, which translates well to 1080p, is that you're only getting one quarter the resolution. 16mm is better suited to 480p. So while they could upscale it, you won't be seeing a significant increase in quality like we did from VHS to DVD, or from the Perfect to Platinum releases. There's no real reason to put it on Blu-Ray now. Blu-Ray is expensive, and doesn't have the proper saturation, and the masters can't make proper use of it.

i had read this in another thread as a post by u... if my memory serves me correct, my memory is bad, u said EoE was done in 35mm... I mean i personally dont mind not having the series in blu-ray as i own 2 box sets of the original dvd release... however i have no copies of EoE, if it was done on 35mm wouldnt that be a possible blu-ray release?

Baz wrote:EM should have been more specific. "Market saturation", nothing to do with image quality.

Thank you.

Animejunkie wrote:i had read this in another thread as a post by u... if my memory serves me correct, my memory is bad, u said EoE was done in 35mm... I mean i personally dont mind not having the series in blu-ray as i own 2 box sets of the original dvd release... however i have no copies of EoE, if it was done on 35mm wouldnt that be a possible blu-ray release?

I'm afraid that in Japan they don't care about the fact that in the U.S.A. there's a semi-decent remastered version of the TV series while the movies aren't licensed any more (and the old Manga version was one the worst DVDs that you could purchase).
Also they probably don't care about the fact that the quality of the transfer is more or less good, they've done several BDs so far (Mahoromatic, FLCL, Abenobashi, Gunbuster&Diebuster movies) because they were thinking that it was useful to do them (i.e.: they'd sell, the market saturation EM was referring before) and they've not been bothered at all that they were going to do upscale for most of them since they were originally in digital SD.

Whether or not Evangelion can be released on DVD depends on whether or not it was composited on film, and if the negatives still exist. If the only master of the show that still exists is a standard definition one, then you can forget about seeing the show on Blu-Ray unless it's a looooong time from now, and they simply compile all the episodes onto one disc. If the show was on film though, and the negatives still exist, we may be in a bit of luck.

Honestly, I don't know what to expect if they were to put the original Eva on Blu-Ray. The look of the show, while still crisp and colorful on the DVD Platinum Collection does look dated. While there's no shame in looking like a product of the 90s, the fact that the show was meant for the low resolution of broadcast TV could yield some visual quirks that the artists didn't want us to see in the original broadcast when we see it at 1080p. I guess the question they'd be asking themselves would be "does this look better, or worse than when we aired the show?"... right after they ask themselves "will it make lots of MONE¥¥¥?"

Timstuff wrote:some visual quirks that the artists didn't want us to see in the original

http://wiki.evageeks.org/Radioactive_Waste#The_Tree_of_Life_at_Second_Impact

Mr. Tines wrote:http://wiki.evageeks.org/Radioactive_Waste#The_Tree_of_Life_at_Second_Impact

Little things like that are actually easy to fix now with digital restoration techniques. You should check out the restoration documentary on the Looney Tunes Golden Collection, it's quite fascinating. The "mistakes" I'm talking about are more about the artists not being happy with how their artwork looks when shown 10 years later in 1080p. I don't know if that's the case or not, but I bet some animator who worked on the show is going to start seeing lines that aren't as sharp or straight as they looked when it was in 480p, and he's going to get annoyed by it. That's just my guess anyway, because we artists can be very anal about our own work.

I'm sure some of you are familiar with the "flopping" process which was once quite popular in Manga localization. The reason why manga artists hated it was not really because it was less authentic to the original version, but rather because it made the mistakes and imperfections more visible. I wonder if something similar could happen if an old TV series is brought to an HD format, but was originally made for low definition TVs? The original Star Trek got around that issue through digital enhancements, but I don't think Evangelion would have the budget for that.

I remember seeing a youtube vid from a convention with one of the ADV bods saying that it would cost an absolute fortune to get the rights to EoE for any sort of re-release. Silly money.

Jayfive wrote:I remember seeing a youtube vid from a convention with one of the ADV bods saying that it would cost an absolute fortune to get the rights to EoE for any sort of re-release. Silly money.

What's the deal with this movie? Are the reels made out of solid gold?

^

Yes.

I bet if we get Eva Blu-rays, it will be QTEC nonsense like with FLCL release. Do this to EoE and I will be perpetually pissed off for the rest of my life.

Clover wrote:I bet if we get Eva Blu-rays, it will be QTEC nonsense like with FLCL release. Do this to EoE and I will be perpetually pissed off for the rest of my life.

The QTEC thing seems to be a process for upscaling and destroying early digital anime with SD masters, not for traditionally made animation like Eva TV and EoE.

Just like the western HD releases there's a spotty and inconsistent track record with re-releasing things. A good portion of the time you get nice straight film scans with just the minimum needed fixing up, but at times you do get plenty of DNR and other filtering. The degree of the application of the latter is quite varied. Most 35mm sources fare quite well: Nausicaa, Honneamise, Patlabor 1 & 2, Five Star Stories, Nadesico, Bebop and Escaflowne movies are pretty much perfect and should be a good indication of how EoE should turn out if they don't fuck with it. Char's Counterattack and F91 on the other hand have been filtered flat for no real reason.

The TV series is more worriesome. As the Renewal notes indicate most of it is 16mm master and some portions are even missing that so they had to go from internegatives, etc. By itself 16mm isn't that bad, just soft and grainy and some people would rather see it filtered to oblivion because they're used to flat old DVDs. Two clear examples of 16mm shows we have so far are Dancouga which is just a straight film scan with all the dirt, grime, grain and splicing marks completely untouched. The other is the Z and ZZ gundam BDs which have been filtered and cleaned up quite a bit but not to the point of utter destruction, so that's just plain soft looking video still with clear benefits over old SD media.

We'll just have to wait and see. I don't really have much hope for TV series being unmolested because of the missing stock and etc, but I really hope they leave EoE alone. That was as high quality late 90s traditional animation project as it got and those films don't really need anything other than a clean film scan.

Would Anno have any say in the remastering process? I've read that he is siphoning the rights for Eva off of Gainax.

arkiel wrote:Actually, I recall reading Anno getting fucking livid at Gainax for making a Gunbuster pachinko machine without his permission. Or putting his name on it, or something. And that the people at Gainax that managed licensing for the Evangelion property had up and left.

Regarding this and the post above me, please read this thread: http://forum.evageeks.org/viewtopic.php?t=9216

Clover wrote:Would Anno have any say in the remastering process? I've read that he is siphoning the rights for Eva off of Gainax.

I never understood this story, I don't know about animes but in the case of videogames there are famous directors that left their studios and of course they didn't take the rights of their famous works (for example Hironobu Sagakuchi and Shinji Mikami); the rights should belong to the company, not to individuals but I could be wrong.
Anyway as TMBounty_Hunter said QTec upscale are used generally only for digital animes (as I mentioned in the past Mahoromatic S1 wasn't done digitally yet they simply upscaled it); anyway it could really happen that they'll make an upscale if they don't want to remaster it again or if it has become impossible to remaster it again, but I hope that it won't be the case (since they made a lot of money by releasing the Renewal I hope that at least their negatives and internegatives have been kept in decent conditions in the last 8 years).

In discussion of the latest Manga Stage, the MinnaNoEvaFan blogger seems to be wondering if Eva will be offered on Blu-Ray next year: http://neweva.blog103.fc2.com/blog-entry-1381.html#more

While that would be interesting, I kind of doubt it. (I thought there would be up-scaling and other issues with Eva on Blu Ray?) But since Nadia and Gunbuster and other shows are being offered on Blu Ray, maybe it would work.

Sailor Star Dust wrote:In discussion of the latest Manga Stage, the MinnaNoEvaFan blogger seems to be wondering if Eva will be offered on Blu-Ray next year: http://neweva.blog103.fc2.com/blog-entry-1381.html#more

While that would be interesting, I kind of doubt it. (I thought there would be up-scaling and other issues with Eva on Blu Ray?) But since Nadia and Gunbuster and other shows are being offered on Blu Ray, maybe it would work.

Upscaling is only an inevitable problem for shows created digitally at sub-1080p resolution (such as FLCL or Lucky Star). Shows created as such were prevalant from the late '90s to late '00s. Of course Gainax could always upscale an existing SD transfer and release it that way, but I seriously doubt they would do that. They're doing a proper film-based remaster of the Gunbuster OVA, so I'm sure they'd do the same for Eva.

EvaTV was created on 16mm film, and Death/EoE were created on 35mm film, so that shouldn't be a problem. The problems with film-to-HD transfers are primarily preservation-oriented (dirt/scratches on the film surface, deterioration of the film stock itself, etc.) instead of resolution-oriented.

Obviously you'll get better results from 35mm film than 16mm (which is one of the reasons that EvaTV scenes in Death don't look as good as scenes created for EoE) due to 16mm film being physically 1/4 the frame size of 35mm, but both formats can be used to create a 1080p HD master without upscaling.

svenge wrote:but both formats can be used to create a 1080p HD master without upscaling.

Good to know. I wouldn't mind original Eva on Blu Ray, I just wish Japanese Blu Ray releases wouldn't cost so much. I get that what's $60 to sometimes $80 (USD) for a single DVD or Blu Ray volume is the norm in Japan, but $500 or more (Examples: Nadia Blu Ray, Haruhi Blu Ray, Kanon 2006 Blu Ray ) for a Blu Ray box set?! Ugh....

Sailor Star Dust wrote:Good to know. I wouldn't mind original Eva on Blu Ray, I just wish Japanese Blu Ray releases wouldn't cost so much. I get that what's $60 to sometimes $80 (USD) for a single DVD or Blu Ray volume is the norm in Japan, but $500 or more (Examples: Nadia Blu Ray, Haruhi Blu Ray, Kanon 2006 Blu Ray ) for a Blu Ray box set?! Ugh....

They're within historical market norms for Japan. Gainax sold the KIBA-91001 "Monolith" set for ¥41,790 successfully, thus I'm sure they could definately get away with a MSRP of at least ¥60,000 for a similar set on Blu-ray with a film-based 1080p remaster. Before you get too mad, the MSRP of the Laserdisc releases totaled ¥106,199 back in the day. It just seems worse now due to the currently terrible USD/JPY exchange rate...

svenge wrote:It just seems worse now due to the currently terrible USD/JPY exchange rate...

Right, I figured as much.

The thought of Eva on Blu Ray is pretty exciting, (though I assumed IF a Blu Ray release would happen it'd be when Khara's New Movie Edition is complete in an effort to bring in new and old fans towards both projects). But sooner isn't a bad thing, assuming something does come from this!