Madman DVDs

[omgitsgodzilla]

Ah. So that must have been a zoom or dolly shot or something.

[Rockzilla]

Why can't Toho take a cue from Kadokawa? Kadokawa's Gamera films look pretty good in HD. It just really sucks for us, because most companies put little effort into niche/cult titles as it is. 90% of the companies will use what ever materials they get from Asia and they always assume it is the best. Media Blasters promised a new transfer for Riki Oh, but they opted out like always and used Fortune Star's fake HD.

[Tamura]

^ That was really disappointing about RIKI-OH. I was looking forward to it, too. Good thing I never bought it and never will.

[The Killer Meteor]

I wonder...could it be that the LD is from a print, that presumbly would have been colour timed and printed on, say, Eastmancolor, whilst the dvd is just a straight transfer from a negative but with no attempt made to colour time it (and on of top of that, too much DVNR?)

[Tamura]

^ I have no idea, but what's interesting is that many of Toho's HD versions have the exact same or very similar color timing compared to the R2 DVDs. No idea why.

Also, I don't think Toho uses heavy DVNR on their DVDs/BDs. It instead looks like they simply applied a blur filter, which is an even lazier and more incompetent way to remove grain.

[The Killer Meteor]

So that would explain the blurriness on the Madman dvds, especially the smokey scenes on Gigan?

That said, I don't think the Classic Media releases look anywhere near as bad as the Madmans when it comes to blurriness.

[omgitsgodzilla]

Yeah, it might be DVNR, but Criterion used some of that on their release of Godzilla and that transfer is simply gorgeous, sharp and retains a fair amount of grain. Either they really piled it on there or they applied a slight blur effect.

[Tamura]

Good studios like Criterion do use DVNR in smaller, much more subtle and tasteful amounts. But it is a process that can just as easily be abused by companies who could care less about film grain, aka detail.

I'm sure Toho simply slapped a blur filter on most of their titles. If they used massive amounts of DVNR, we'd also see a ton of ghosting. I can only think of a few that have a good deal of ghosting (their DVD transfer of MONSTER ZERO comes to mind).

[omgitsgodzilla]

That is beyond lame. Shit, even Sony's discs keep a fair amount of grain, and it doesn't seem to me like they particularly care about Godzilla. You would think the creators of the series could at least be bothered to give a shit about the technical quality of the presentation.

[Tamura]

Speaking of Sony, I believe their GvsMG74 has some noticeable DVNR. Thankfully, the whole film isn't manipulated as such. A few scenes look a little smooth and waxy, but others have the film grain. It's not a deal breaker, though, since the image is correctly framed and the color reproduction is great.