Tuned in to Retro Anime / Manga!

>>3231
Meh.

>>3231
OP text taken from /meta/

>>3231
Definitely should be a push towards preservation, up to asking companies to release or re-scan their material. I'ts shocking that Square, Enix, Capcom, etc have entire series or shorts that they never bothered to release in HD. Rumiko's early OVAs are all LD only quality for some reason.

Relevant since Manga tankobons are going to last for decades, but 16mm film, VHS tapes, Laserdiscs, are quickly falling apart.

As for the slime video: charming, cute, harmless. I can see myself having this on VHS and show to some kids in the 90's. Nothing ground breaking of course, but it has charm and nice animation.

I enjoyed the first four episodes of Gakkou no Yuurei, a recent mid 90s project that mixes live action and animation to do a horror short anthology. It's a very marginal work, and due to this induces a lot of nostalgia for watching Halloween programing on tv in the early 2000s. I'm looking forward to seeing the next few episodes subbed.

>>3231
Wapchan doesn't have a critical mass of posters which is the main thing. Too much moldy nostalgia for series they've already seen rather than discovering new manga/anime is the secondary problem. Combined /cel/ and /lum/ isn't that interesting.

The period from 1983 to 1998 produced thousands amount of OVA, tv specials, and film, and often these obscure one-shots or promotional media. Some were just a short video to promote a manga series. Part of this is the japanese bubble economy and new cash to spend by both consumers and producers on more speculative or creative projects. We should talk more about these than wanking about the same shows we grew up on.

Truth be told though, the vast majority of the VHS/LD only OVA aren't that remarkable. I can't name a single one that I'd consider some must watch essential. Most live action is better than it.

That being said, I like the style of them. I'll give them points for trying something creative even if it didn't land. I like the pacing, artstyle, and of course coloring, which you can't get in modern series.

I think Kineko video are frens with their attention seeking behaviors, but they also have access to proper film scanners and collab with Lonely Chaser.

Orphan is the other subgroup that works on these kind of obscuro retro shit, sometimes DVDs, sometimes LD or VHS only. Possibly due to legal reasons they keep the nyaa links off the blog so you need to post both.

The only question is any of this life altering? And not really, so let's be realistic and most of the VHS/LD only material is because there's legal limbos no one cares enough to resolve, or the material just wasn't popular to begin with. But the Japanese are doing a terrible job of preserving any of this, so it's up to us. The internal copyright laws for Japan are quite harsh, and they fear breaking the law so its outsiders who do most of this.

https://nyaa.si/user/archivisth
https://collectr.blogspot.com/
https://www.lonelychaser-subs.net/search?q=kineko

>>3231
>>3234
>>3238
>>3239
It's definitely true that this board has felt stale with the lack of obscure discussion. I used to run streams and many of those were orphan fansubs - perhaps I can start doing that again especially now that there's a larger crowd here.
I also thought about adding a news section to the site concerning retro anime/manga developments but honestly that could be accomplished with a thread like this one.

>>3234 They haven't because it's an expensive process, and little perceived (or actual) demand. A few years back a Japanese film lab was charging 277K yen for restoring 10 minutes of 35mm negatives. TV shows, even on 16mm and at 2K, still cost millions of yen to scan. And that's not to mention tape-edited stuff that would be much more involved to restore, lost or misplaced masters, eventual legal issues, etc. etc. and it becomes a lot more apparent why so much is stuck on old formats.

>>3231
I'd also note that even stuff released on DVD (and streaming and BD) is regularly in need of LD caps, because the analog signal on the LD is often higher quality than MPEG2-compressed digital video, not to mention that LDs often used magnetic audio instead of optical, resulting in much higher audio quality as well (there are people syncing LD audio to BD releases because of this). Or take movies that were released in 4:3 on LD but cropped to widescreen in subsequent releases, like Beautiful Dreamer. Hell, there are web releases that are worse quality than a corresponding VHS, somehow. It's not just limited to stuff that only has analog releases.

>>3242
BD was meant to always be a widescreen film, like other tv-film productions they used the same tv animation process for 4:3 and then just cropped it as needed. It's just faster and simpler than hiring a new film animation studio. That is why proper releases such as the BD of Project A-Ko have 4:3 and widescreen versions of the film. A-Ko shows you how GORGEOUS these old anime would look if given a proper scan.

>>3240
The main thing is that wapchan doesn't have the critical mass to have proper discussions.

>>3241
>>3242
I wish some charities and organizations got in on this. I know Criterion did a very early Akira LD release but has mostly shied away from animation. There's probably some more obscure anime that might be high brow enough for them to embark on restoring. I know Criterion and their streaming service do a good job of restoring European TV films and other more obscure material.

I'd like to see some charities get in on this as well, and try to do it legit while partnering with streaming services for low cost distribution to recoup losses.

>>3242
Yeah, somehow Kineko and others are able to scan 16mm and 35mm reels scanned for low cost. I think the big investments is the material and the labor. They already use these machines for profit on other projects, and then on the side will scan other reels. Going through "professionals" means they need to charge full price for everything.

>>3243
I'm aware of the process. The point is that the full frame was produced, the animation is there and should be out there to be watched. In the case of Beautiful Dreamer your only options are LDs or the super crusty R1 DVDs (don't think a 16mm print of that has ever been spotted in the wild, and there's no way Toho's doing it). Crusher Joe and A-ko having both versions is great, and should be more common - I remember watching A-ko from an LD source years ago (long before Discotek rediscovered the reels) precisely because of this.
Honestly WMT shows are my biggest pet peeve here, because most of the HD remasters are streaming only and cropped to widescreen from a 4:3 source, the DVDs generally suck, and getting all the LD boxes capped is a massive workload with uncertain results (3000 Leagues is a frameblended mess on both DVD and LD volume 1 for example). Nippon releasing new 4:3 HD remasters on Youtube of all places just adds insult to injury.

>>3244
NHK is the closest you're getting to that, and that's just them cleaning up their own mess on e.g. Marco Polo. Japan doesn't seem to care much about preserving a lot of this unfortunately. Blocker Gundan IV Machine Blaster isn't high art at the end of the day.

Kineko is definitely a case of fans being able to squeeze down on labor costs, plus not being bound to deadlines etc. like a professional studio would be. Much easier to charge less than what you're worth if you're personally interested in it getting a new scan, and don't have to worry about it being your job.

>>3231

> new laserdisc scans

Elaborate on what you mean here, on a professional level like domesday or just people doing modern better quality rips?

>>3242

One of the reasons i prefer LD to these better formats is the audio.

Anyone ever watch old masters of shows even if the Blu Ray better just because they prefer the original look? I do that with a few shows I own on DVD.

>>3249
BDs are generally closer to the original than DVDs or LDs are, it takes about 1080p to not lose notable visual information from 16mm film when digitizing. Consumers just never had access to accurate versions in the past.

>>3250
That's true but sometimes I just prefer the look of an older master but also Lain is the worst anime remaster I've seen because looks like they digitally recolored it or redid the lighting or something vs just a direct HD transfer.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HPKTp8WEeCE
Original in high quality.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ti6JL491oyA
The Pioneer release is closer to what the animation cels looked like vs the remaster.

>>3246
I assume he means Domesday? And it's not like that's "professional level", the technology was developed by hobbyists and is pretty much standard in fansubbing at this point. Modifying an LD player to Domesday is an investment of course, but it's incomparable to film scanners and the like.

>>3249
Old DVDs, particularly R1s, are honestly garbage. They're done from shitty tape masters and have numerous additional visual defects stemming from 90s digital work. It's very rare that a DVD would be preferable over an LD or a BD for a cel-animated show (mostly when the BD is an upscale or otherwise mutilated).

Here's a classic example of R1s being utter trash - even twitter compression can't hide those defects.
https://x.com/w0wmd/status/1718613549541417015#m

Modern HD remasters are generally closer to the original image on the film reels (especially colors have gotten a lot better over time, even compared to early BDs), so if you want the "original look", that's where you should go. The only "original" part of the old DVDs is that is how you originally saw the shows.

>>3251
Lain's not a purely cel-animated show. A large portion is done in digipaint, and yet more is drenched in all kinds of digital effects work, presumably done at stunning 480p and below resolutions, as was typical of the 90s. There was no way to do a direct HD transfer of that, so they decided to redo it in HD. I agree that the results are jarring, but I don't think there was a perfect solution there, and I don't think it's relevant to the question, which I presume to be limited to traditional cel animation.

>>3267
That didn't answer the question, sometimes people like to watch older releases of shows even if there is a improved one for whatever reason also there's other anime with digital shots that are cel and they get normal HD transfer with the digital shots being left alone or upscaled which makes the release of Lain even more annoying.

>>3268
I like the look of Domesday LD rips and 35mm film scans even if they have better sources. They have a kind of retro look and feel to them.

>>3271
I really like releases with lots of grain, why I prefer my old Berserk and Mospeada DVDs to the Blu Ray.

>>3272
I know more grain doesn't = better but I just like the look of it.

>>3268
I'll always try to watch the best available master (which is generally the one that is closest to the original film), whatever that may be. I've got no nostalgia for DVDs and bad image quality.

All the other late 90s anime that leave digital scenes in upscaled look like ass in the upscaled scenes. And most of those only use digital effects or editing in isolated scenes, while in Lain it's pretty much all of it. Their final masters were Betacam, not film reels. So the BD could have been an upscale as-is (like Betterman, or all the digipaint shows), or recreating the effects like they did. Is what they did good? Meh. But that's what the DVD and LD are still around for. Classic case of the BD not necessarily being better. Lain was just going to be fucked no matter what.

>>3271
I mean, a modern 35mm scan is just about the best source you can get (what do you think they put on the BDs for cel-animated shows - digital masters made from film scans), and LDs routinely beat out corresponding DVDs.

>>3272
Mospeada's BD has ridiculous amounts of grain. Can't comment on Berserk, but Mospeada's a bit of an odd example. Xabungle might be a better one, the DVD has more grain but the BD has more detail and an overall nicer image despite the degrain.

>>3274
>I mean, a modern 35mm scan is just about the best source you can get (what do you think they put on the BDs for cel-animated shows - digital masters made from film scans), and LDs routinely beat out corresponding DVDs.

Fans have been making their own scans of 35mm film reels for films for a few years, partially for the novelty of it and partially to get something akin to the original release. But these are not pristine film masters kept in ideal conditions, but just 35mm film reels that someone decided to keep or sell to someone so they have obvious color fading and obvious damage. So rather than replicating what it looked upon release, they look like old beat up film reels, which has their own aestetic appeal.

For The Matrix, it's had a million releases, and none have replicated the original look. The 4K release toned down some of the absurd colorization of later releases, but isn't close. The scan however is quite faded but it gives some idea of the original colors.

Both The Matrix and Star Wars have never had home releases that are 1:1 to their original theater releases, so there's a reason fans will want to scan the reels. Others are just for fun and to get another way to enjoy the film.

Some of these reels are also Open Matte format, which was never meant to be shown, but many like that format. We'd kill to find Open Matte film reels for anime films but I don't know of any that have turned up. This is probably the only way to get Open Matte versions of the UY films.

>>3275
For UY, it's one of the best, if not best, home releases on BD that I've ever seen. They scanned all of the 195 16mm film reels and preserved all the film grain. Many companies will de-noise their releases since people hate film grain. I believe this was late 70s and early 80s 16mm film stock, and wasn't actually the best so it's extra grainy than normal.

This presents extra problems since fan rips based on these BD are absurdly huge (800GB) if you want to make it accurate. So normally they'll downscale them to 720p or de-noise them to reduce the amount of information and thus file sizes.

If only Toei fans had these kind of fears! DB has never had an HD home release, and Sailor Moon's best version are the Italian DVDs which still have significant color fading and tinting. Recently twitter discovered that no, the show isn't supposed to be pink. I don't know if the BD were denoised or if they were upscaled, but the backgrounds are incredibly blurry. Supposedly Toei doesn't believe it's worth it to scan hundreds of episodes. So in all likelihood, the original DB and SM film reels will just deteriorate into dust and we'll never get proper HD versions ever.

>>3274
I couldn't remember with Mospeada but I remember someone was saying the Blu Ray wasn't very good, maybe for other reasons looks fine to me though but I think I'm right about Berserk, I don't know but you got my point some people might want to watch older master for any number of reasons, color, soundtrack, picture, etc like I have the Boogiepop Phantom DVDs which is the boardcast version not the updated DVD version that's on the new Blu Ray/ old JP DVDs.

>>3277
US DVDs*

>>3276
>Sailor Moon
reminded me.

>>3275
I know open matte reels of Arcadia of My Youth showed up for auction a few years. Kineko didn't buy them because they went for over 600$, and the seller was a known dickhead (who'd apparently bet on his own auction to drive the price up). There has probably been more, but I don't know anything for certain and some may be insider stuff (since I know people who work with Kineko).
For the UY movies, the TLL-2001 LD has the open matte, even if the image quality isn't great (Toho's first LD and all that). For the rest we at least have the R2J DVD rips with 4:3 crop instead of widescreen that look pretty close to the BDs in terms of master. I'm not hopeful we'll ever see reels for these for auction though, and Toho definitely isn't going to give us full mattes or even 4:3 alternative versions.

>>3276
UY TV BD is great, movie BDs are meh. Monkey's Paw or something.
Oh, the BDMVs for the UY BD boxes are 1.4TB. Somewhat in line with other BDs, the Votoms BD-Box with all the OVAs was 830GB. And there's Escaflowne. 287GB BDMVs, 200GB encodes…

Toei mastered all of their catalogue on digibeta in the early-mid 2000s, which of course is 480p. When the age of HD rolled around, they somewhat stubbornly refused to do rescans in HD, at least for TV shows, and instead did upscales for e.g. 999 and Sailor Moon, or recently Harlock. It's a shame because Toei takes good care of their reels, unlike other companies, and their movie HD remasters and the few real TV remasters can speak to that (when the encoding isn't fucked like on Voltes V).

>>3276
>>3279
Yes, when DiC did their version, they were using very recent tape masters by Toei, so the colors were accurate to the original release. We know from promotional material, the HD film releases, etc what the show is supposed to look and a yellow or pink tint isn't it..

It's easy to bitch and moan, but western animation is even worse. There, the original film reels were literally thrown out when the shows were transferred to video tape masters so there's no hope at all for an HD release. The Simpsons for instance, when aired on FXX is cropped, and badly upsclaed into a blurry mess. I grew up on a lot of American produced shows and I have a lot of nostalgia for them, but they are always going to be some awful DVD quality since with only a few exceptions. DCAU for some reason was one of the few productions that kept their original film masters and they were able to produce HD BD but that's the exception than the rule.

These aren't problems unqiue to Japanese productions, and if anything the situation is a lot better there than elsewhere. At least with Japanese productions there's some chance of finding a film reel, or making a domesday of some LD but for Western productions there's nothing.

Here's a full thread on bad home releases:
https://archive.4plebs.org/tv/thread/197993131/#197993131

>>3271

Probaly because they arent stretched and cut like many bluray releases.

>>3267

All preservation seems to be hobby level, remastering is something entirely diffent.
The operation can be more than just "hobbiest" from what ive seen, alot of work goes into it.
Everything starts as a hobby.

>>3282
This is how one of the biggest shows of the 90's in America will look presumably for forever. Cropped, and badly upscaled. The hobby of making New scans and rips that exists for anime is literally not possible since there's nothing to work from. From a cultural relevancy angle, many of these 90's tv shows which might have been huge are losing relevancy probably because of this. New young people are rarely going to sit down and watch some ugly blurry show, and I know that The Simpsons are completely irrelevant for the under 30s.

That its the fate of a LOT of 80s and 90s American productions since they're stuck in shit home release hell and effectively no one's experienced them for like 25-35 years. SM picked up a fanbase over the years, despite its initial release doing so badly it was cancelled before finishing the second season.

https://wikimoon.org/index.php/Sailor_Moon_in_North_America#English_Dub

>>3282
The best SM Blu Rays are the movies because their from the film reels and not pink but problem with those is they are 16:9 which yes they were shown in theaters as that but home video was 4:3 but they should have option for both like Batman: Mask of the Phantasm.

>>3277
Lot of people don't know that Cowboy Bebop was slightly changed for the Remix DVDs and that version used on the Blu Ray.
''Here we are, verbatim from Symbi0tic's post/rip of his DVD set:

"This is the complete original North American English dub DVD release from 2001, including all 26 sessions that spanned across 6 volumes. This has not been edited in any way. There are no watermarks, the picture is not stretched or cropped and is displayed in the full screen resolution of 720x540. It is presented exactly as originally intended.

Included:

English & Japanese Audio

English Subtitles (Optional)

In 2008, Anime Legends released a "Remix" edition of the entire series in the same 6 volume DVD format, however, amongst their "remastering," there were a lot of completely ridiculous and unnecessary modifications. Unfortunately, this "Remix" release was also used to create the Blu-ray edition released in 2014. Differences between original release and the "Remix" set include but are not limited to:

– Removal of entire scenes, albeit mostly scenery. (Prime example: The beginning of Session 5 has 30 seconds of footage completely cut.)

– The entire series has went through a brightening filter, washing out colors.– Sound effects have been completely changed in various places, not enhanced. (Example: The gunshot at the end of Session 1 doesn't even sound like a gunshot anymore, and it seems like the sound effect gets cut off before it even finishes. Ambience has also been completely removed from space scenes.)

– Songs have been replaced in certain places. (Example: The next episode preview at the end of Episode 25 now has upbeat music that was used in Jupiter Jazz Part I's eyecatch on repeat rather than the depressing "Farewell Blues" that actually fits the dialogue and mood.)

– Some songs start/stop at different times, while complete portions of some songs have been removed from scenes (most notably "Blue" from the final episode, as the choir ends and the doves fly by).

These are only what I've observed from skimming Sessions 1, 5, 25, and 26. I can't imagine how many changes there truly are amongst the entire series.

However, what's more disappointing is that the original series seems to be very difficult to find on the internet in any respectable form. Thus, I've taken the initiative to rip my personal DVDs and provide the definitive Cowboy Bebop release for fans old and new alike.

I apologize for the large file sizes. It was the only way I could, personally, provide the series without degrading the quality. If someone is proficient enough in the art of video optimization and can cut down the file size without sacrificing the quality, feel free to compress and upload a smaller torrent. I'd appreciate some credit, though!

I hope you enjoy the series in its original form! Be sure to pass it along."''

>>3284

You people constantly talk about blurry like you wear beer goggles watching stuff.

>>3284
I rather they just used the high quality SD masters of lot of old shows I'm not that picky about quality than upscale them and shit, it's why early digital shows that weren't animated in HD tend to look better on DVD but shows like The Simpsons look fine from the old broadcast tapes, yeah not as good as HD remaster but it's better than the screencaps you posted.

>>3288
I personally never cared much for upscales at all, I mean a few look fine like I own FMA 2003 on BD and it looks mostly good but still and upscales on cel animation always looks off like one of the worst upscales is The Slayers Blu Ray for the show since I think they lost the masters, better off just watching the old DVDs, hopefully if US gets Slayers again it will be SD on BD not the awful upscale but I doubt it since Crunchyroll has the rights.

>>3288
>>3289
I mean duh. The 640x480 DVDs are perfectly watchable, and what the fans mostly prefer.

Part of the reason I want this media preserved as much as possible is because I know Japan and America are never going to produce shit like this ever again for a variety of reasons. Japan is just never going to make a cel animated show ever, and I know a lot of VHS and LD releases were so minor and irrelevant or stuck in some kind of legal limbo that they never bothered to even make a DVD release, let alone a BD release. And i know film reels and LD have a life span that is soon coming to an end.

Lensman is caught in some legal hellscape since the original creator's family hated it so they suppressed any future home releases.

Manga is printed on paper so less of a concern.

>>3289
Wouldn't shock me if they exist but were just mislabeled like the A-Ko film masters. The Japanese didn't care enough to try to preserve it.

>>3281
Oh in that case, Kineko could have maybe done a fundraiser to off-set the costs, since something like Open Matte 16mm film reels from Japan are so rare and so fragile.

>>3290
Oh and I generally don't like modern anime art styles, which seem way more uniform, less diverse, and somewhat off-putting. Take note of Megami Paradise (1995) as an example. It's very "anime" and isn't striving for a realistic or naturalistic art style, but it doesn't go overboard on the "anime" art style like a modern production does.

>still has a nose
>more angular face shape showing signs of adulthood
>more realistic body proportions for an adult woman
>big eyes and some neotenic effect but doesn't go overboard
>Very obviously an adult woman

>>3290
Kineko already has a patreon, and usually raises funds from their members and collaborators whenever cases like that appear, but asking publicly is always risky because it brings attention to the auction, meaning potentially more bidders and higher prices, with Kineko losing out altogether (not to mention that it's difficult to estimate how much it'll actually be, it's an online auction of a rare article after all). They evidently deemed it not worth their money compared to other stuff they were chasing, doubly so since the guy was trying to scam them with the price pushing.

>>3291
The designs in lots of 90s anime like Slayers, Rayearth and Saber Marionette J make modern anime designs seem pretty conservative in comparison to me.

Monthly screenings of the new anime might work.

>>3311
Yes, I was focusing on the best rather than the worst. 90's was definitely more diverse, but it has a LOT of frankly grotesque designs and art styles. Modern anime is more uniform and bland, but less brazenly offensive. Obari's women are the stuff of nightmares.

>>3362
I disagree, the wildly deformed designs are the best of anime in general. The dynamic expressive curves and awesome sense of volume, because everyone who designed this stuff were amazingly skilled animators, makes them a real treat.

>>3311
>>3364
Yeah, I also have a strange fondness for that super deformed pokey cheeks and little fangs 90s style.

Obari is a little too far for me, but Saber Marionette J is just right. (It's actually a pretty good show) Shamanic Princess is just so beautiful I don't even notice anything else.

Alot of the bluray versions ive skimmed of many older anime had way too much detail, which is the opposite of what you would want in something you are trying to watch.
You guys focus on film grain but here is noting intentional or acceptable about having visible dust and hair between layers and cel lines that arent on the outer edges.

>>3286

Ive never seen anybody mention the cowboy bebop laserdiscs in any conversation about versions, is there something unremarkable about them?

>>3381
>dust, hair, scratches

You need frame-by-frame restoration to fix that, and companies like Criterion do that because they're working with a 90-120 minute films and have the money. There's no group like this for anime, sadly but I'd love to see one. Criterion isn't just about releasing old films it's about restoration and preservation. i think we miiiiiight get them to do a handful of anime films if we bug them, but probably ones that are out of print and very high brow and artistic. Probably some artistic 70s films that need a rescan.

https://vimeo.com/84135659
https://movieweb.com/what-is-the-criterion-collection/

DVDs or BD for often obscure tv shows might run dozens of sidesteps and they lack the funds to really fix all that. So we should just be lucky that we have proper HD scans at all.

Truth be told, most anime fans are idiots with the worst taste, and companies are not making a mistake by not catering to high level of perservation and restoration that we want.

>>3382

The point is that its too restored when you can see those things, you couldnt see any of that in vhs/ld or even dvd. Bluray releases almost make it a point to have things scaled up to the level where you can see what you really werent supposed.
Its a bad thing imo, not a good one.

>>3383
>scaled up

It's not scaled up, it's scanning the original 16mm film in HD, only it has some minor flaws and imperfections that they don't have the budget to remove.


The old releases exist so you can just grab those. No one cares enough to go that kind of detail on long forgotten tv series that haven't been culturally relevant in 40 years. Those VHS, LD, and DVDs may very well have just been using tape masters rather than actual film master scans.

It's much easier to just run something through a denoising filter to blast away the grain, fine details, and small imperfections than frame by frame restoration and fixes. These old tv releases just don't have the budgets for that. Even Dirty Pair, which has SOME cultural legacy, got denoised.

People already bitch about film grain as it is, with many seeing it as a flaw to be removed, and customers complaining about weird dots on their tvs.

>>3384
And an anime example of bad grain removal attempts.

The 16mm film stock used is just kinda grainy, and remember, it's used as a cost saving measure to begin with. They're supposed to be using 35mm film stock.

>>3385
I think SM is an upscale rather than a new scan but it shows how bad these can get. I would muuuuch prefer to be whining about a few hairs than whatever this is.

>>3381
Bebop Laserdisc looks the same as the original released DVD just slightly less sharp so it's the usual but Bebop changes aren't really visual anyways even if Blu Ray is darker.
https://youtu.be/vK3G07zN6NA

>>3387
It is, the only HD direct scan SM has is the movies which are sadly only in 16:9 (played in theaters that way but it was animated and shown on Tav 4:3 so it's better) and fan upload of Sailor Stars op.
https://youtu.be/322WvZ3e2zs

You can literally see white specs fly up during the scene.