Kai Blu-Ray Release

[SSJToreto]

Here's a high res picture: http://img413.imageshack.us/img413/3746/49761991.png

This cover looks as it'd fit on a boxset, not the first volume of the series...

Yeah just as much as SSJ4 Goku fit's on the first disc of the GT R2 singles...

[Chuquita]

The DVD cover at Kanzentai; it's so beautiful and screaming "This is what the saiyajin arc would look like completely reanimated!" at me that I feel a weird mix of delight (at new artwork) and disappointment (that there's no animation to accompany it). @_@


Why can't we get new animated specials every couple years like Lupin III does? TT_TT


I hope we get full-sized scans of the new dvd art in the future.

Here's a high res picture: http://img413.imageshack.us/img413/3746/49761991.png


BTW already placed a pre-order on amazon

WOW that's nice!
Thank you!

I'm looking forward to the many future pieces of cover art.

[Kendamu]

When comparing some of the redrawn shots, I'm sure that a lot of you noticed that many, if not all, of the redrawn scenes in Dragonball Kai are actually wider than their Dragonball Z counterparts. So, that leads me to wonder about something: Will these scenes be just as wide in 4:3? Will it basically be like "take this shot and add the top and bottom back to it" to turn it into 4:3 or will it be "trim the sides and add the top and bottom back on"?

I'm guessing that the scenes that weren't redrawn will have a similar framing to previous airings and releases of Dragonball Z. But the new stuff is something that might be fun to speculate about.

While we're speculating, do you guys think Toei is giving us 4:3 Kai because that was the plan all along or do you think fan outcry over cropping was something Toei actually listened to and said, "How about fix this for the home release because we care about our fans (and their money)." I'm thinking that maybe a little bit of both was involved.

Finally, on the issue of censorship, Japan's been known to release uncensored versions of things that were originally censored, right? How likely do you think we'll get giant doughnut holes in Raditz and Goku?

[SSj_Rambo]

I wonder if Jump will revive their Dragonball DVD blog to follow these Kai Blu-ray and DVD releases, or create an entirely new one (unless if this is it).

[sangofe]

When comparing some of the redrawn shots, I'm sure that a lot of you noticed that many, if not all, of the redrawn scenes in Dragonball Kai are actually wider than their Dragonball Z counterparts. So, that leads me to wonder about something: Will these scenes be just as wide in 4:3? Will it basically be like "take this shot and add the top and bottom back to it" to turn it into 4:3 or will it be "trim the sides and add the top and bottom back on"?

I'm guessing that the scenes that weren't redrawn will have a similar framing to previous airings and releases of Dragonball Z. But the new stuff is something that might be fun to speculate about.

While we're speculating, do you guys think Toei is giving us 4:3 Kai because that was the plan all along or do you think fan outcry over cropping was something Toei actually listened to and said, "How about fix this for the home release because we care about our fans (and their money)." I'm thinking that maybe a little bit of both was involved.

Finally, on the issue of censorship, Japan's been known to release uncensored versions of things that were originally censored, right? How likely do you think we'll get giant doughnut holes in Raditz and Goku?

I hope they actually won't be using any redrawn scenes, because most of them just look bad, only a few look okay and have been corrected for mistakes.
And for your other questions, I basicly asked these things before. Maybe we should make a topic called "Dragon Ball Kai Blu Ray speculation: discussion"?

[Cold Skin]

Maybe 4:3 was indeed a plan all along. As far as I know, Japanese releases about Dragon Ball never cared to crop anything, it doesn't seem like they want to lose image. As some other members pointed, it might be because on TV, an HD broadcast has to be widescreen to be allowed.

I'm kind of hoping, even if it is not mentioned in the box, that the footage will also be widescreen. It surely will be 4:3, but if they actually put in each episode twice (one version 4:3 and one version 16:9), that would be a nice surprise, and that would justify a bit the only-3-episodes stuff, since each of them would be there twice. But let's not dream too much...

There are fans of both 4:3 and widescreen, and that's understandable: one has the advantage of keeping the whole image, not losing anything. The other has the advantage of filling a whole panoramic screen with a picture that's been worked on to lose only unnecessary details, because let's face it, for some people (like me), it's annoying to have black areas on the sides of the screen with a smaller-than-should-be-given-your-big-TV image! So sure, you can zoom to make it full screen... but it's nothing but a dead-on-center zoom instead of an intelligent one, who would do that kind of cropping, and it makes you lose some definition!

So, they should have put both, and everybody would be content!
Why not an "as aired" version with widescreen and (if they really want to put it cause I don't think there are much fans of it) censorship and "DVD exclusive" version with uncropped/uncut stuff? With that, there wouldn't be much fans unhappy with the release!

[Kendamu]

There are fans of both 4:3 and widescreen, and that's understandable: one has the advantage of keeping the whole image, not losing anything. The other has the advantage of filling a whole panoramic screen with a picture that's been worked on to lose only unnecessary details, because let's face it, for some people (like me), it's annoying to have black areas on the sides of the screen with a smaller-than-should-be-given-your-big-TV image! So sure, you can zoom to make it full screen... but it's nothing but a dead-on-center zoom instead of an intelligent one, who would do that kind of cropping, and it makes you lose some definition!

If they don't have a 16:9 version on there, people like myself who have an HDTV can just mess with the display options to make it 16:9 if we so choose.

[Rod]

There are fans of both 4:3 and widescreen, and that's understandable: one has the advantage of keeping the whole image, not losing anything. The other has the advantage of filling a whole panoramic screen with a picture that's been worked on to lose only unnecessary details, because let's face it, for some people (like me), it's annoying to have black areas on the sides of the screen with a smaller-than-should-be-given-your-big-TV image! So sure, you can zoom to make it full screen... but it's nothing but a dead-on-center zoom instead of an intelligent one, who would do that kind of cropping, and it makes you lose some definition!

If they don't have a 16:9 version on there, people like myself who have an HDTV can just mess with the display options to make it 16:9 if we so choose.

That can be done?
But wouldn't that ruin the whole point of Toei manually cropping the series?

[Kendamu]

There are fans of both 4:3 and widescreen, and that's understandable: one has the advantage of keeping the whole image, not losing anything. The other has the advantage of filling a whole panoramic screen with a picture that's been worked on to lose only unnecessary details, because let's face it, for some people (like me), it's annoying to have black areas on the sides of the screen with a smaller-than-should-be-given-your-big-TV image! So sure, you can zoom to make it full screen... but it's nothing but a dead-on-center zoom instead of an intelligent one, who would do that kind of cropping, and it makes you lose some definition!

If they don't have a 16:9 version on there, people like myself who have an HDTV can just mess with the display options to make it 16:9 if we so choose.

That can be done?
But wouldn't that ruin the whole point of Toei manually cropping the series?

Well, if Toei were to put the 16:9 version on the home release then there'd be no need to mess with my TV settings to make it fill the screen. It would do it on it's own with the default settings. However, with anything 4:3 that I might feel like I want to see in 16:9, I can either upscale it to fill the whole screen on my PS3 or I can hit the "Zoom" button on my TV remote a few times to show it stretched and/or cropped in various ways to fit the screen. Whichever way I like the best, I just go with that.

If I just want to watch whatever I'm watching in it's intended resolution, I just leave the settings alone and it'll show THE WAY IT WAS MEANT TO BE SEEN!

[B]

There are fans of both 4:3 and widescreen, and that's understandable: one has the advantage of keeping the whole image, not losing anything. The other has the advantage of filling a whole panoramic screen with a picture that's been worked on to lose only unnecessary details, because let's face it, for some people (like me), it's annoying to have black areas on the sides of the screen with a smaller-than-should-be-given-your-big-TV image! So sure, you can zoom to make it full screen... but it's nothing but a dead-on-center zoom instead of an intelligent one, who would do that kind of cropping, and it makes you lose some definition!

If they don't have a 16:9 version on there, people like myself who have an HDTV can just mess with the display options to make it 16:9 if we so choose.

That can be done?
But wouldn't that ruin the whole point of Toei manually cropping the series?

My HDTV has the options of "Zoom 1," "Zoom 2," "16:9," and "4:3."

[Tanooki Kuribo]

I just received an e-mail from CDJapan with new and upcoming items. Apparently this DBK release will come with a booklet...? That's cool.... *shrugs*

Dragon Ball Kai Box 1 (Blu-ray)
*******************************
Price: Yen- 15200, US$(156.7) Release Date: 23-Oct-2009
First DVD box set release from anime series Dragon Ball Kai, a new version of Dragon Ball Z. Includes 12 episodes total. Also includes original booklet.

[Kendamu]

I wonder if this'll be anything like the Orange Brick booklets.

[Kai_fan]

It would be stupid not to include the 16:9 version (they did the work, they might as well), but that would be too good to be true. Putting the thing back to 4:3 (ie, UNdoing the pan-and-scanning and reanimating they've done) just seems like yet more work. I don't understand why they're doing this.

As for setting your TV to the correct aspect ratio, that's not really an acceptable alternative, because everything gets warped when you set a 4:3 image to fill a 16:9 screen.

[Kendamu]

It would be stupid not to include the 16:9 version (they did the work, they might as well), but that would be too good to be true. Putting the thing back to 4:3 (ie, UNdoing the pan-and-scanning and reanimating they've done) just seems like yet more work. I don't understand why they're doing this.

I'm guessing it's because the mainstream doesn't care and the nerds threw a fit over the cropping, so Toei's putting the home release in 4:3 to make more people happy.

As for setting your TV to the correct aspect ratio, that's not really an acceptable alternative, because everything gets warped when you set a 4:3 image to fill a 16:9 screen.

I dunno about your TV, but mine doesn't really warp everything. A friend of mine has an older HDTV that has the "stretch" option and it looks horrible and warped. Mine, on the otherhand, doesn't seem to do that. Then again, my TV's a few months old. Also, both of our TVs can crop 4:3 images to 16:9 if we wanna use that option.

[B]

I don't think they'll be "putting it back" in 4:3. It makes more sense to me to redraw any and all scenes, then go crop it for 16:9. So technically, they would, or should, have 4:3 Kai lying around.

[Kendamu]

I don't think they'll be "putting it back" in 4:3. It makes more sense to me to redraw any and all scenes, then go crop it for 16:9. So technically, they would, or should, have 4:3 Kai lying around.

The way it looks on the Amazon listing for the Blu-Ray box, it was originally remastered in 4:3 and then cropped to 16:9 for television.

[bkev]

I don't think they'll be "putting it back" in 4:3. It makes more sense to me to redraw any and all scenes, then go crop it for 16:9. So technically, they would, or should, have 4:3 Kai lying around.

The way it looks on the Amazon listing for the Blu-Ray box, it was originally remastered in 4:3 and then cropped to 16:9 for television.

I think the full frame was re-animated, then cropped. The 16:9 picture shows information not in the original 4:3 aspect ratio - they did a little more than crop the picture, much like the Orange Bricks.

[Hujio]

I just received an e-mail from CDJapan with new and upcoming items. Apparently this DBK release will come with a booklet...? That's cool.... *shrugs*

Actually, all three Blu-ray box sets are listed to come with "special booklets".

All three box sets will come with a "special booklet" and the first box set is listed to include non-credits versions of "Dragon Soul" and "Yeah! Break! Care! Break!" and a promotional video for the new PS3/360 video game "Raging Blast".

[Cold Skin]

To answer to Kendamu, that's right, HDTV usually have options to turn 4:3 into full widescreen. There are two ways the TV can do that: stretch the image, which... well, I guess it's a way some people will love, but it deforms the picture, so I never use that one.

The other is zooming as you mention, but then the zoom will be focused on the center, which might eliminate important detail for some shots to be good, unlike Kai's aired widescreen where it was shown on Daizex that the parts cropped are carefully chosen so that the image remains natural. So for example, by zooming, if a character is shown in a close-up, you might end up with his mouth and nose on the screen but his eyes being half cropped, which may look weird. The clumsiest shots are when a character's head on the original picture is on top of the screen, then when you zoom you see their body but not their head, which looks like a failed camera position by the director! Zooming also makes you lose some resolution, just like when you zoom more and more on a picture of your computer.

That's why it is best to have an original widescreen. But I'm still a fan of that fonction of zooming, which I use all the time on my TV for programs who are not widescreen. I only zoom to 14:9 for full screen 4:3 programs, cause you never lose any important information (framing is still good and all writings are always visible), but it obviously leaves little black areas on the side, but it's a cool compromise between 4:3 and 16:9 I think. For the "fake" 4:3 which can also be called "fake" widescreen, which is widescreen aired as 4:3, which leaves black areas all around, full zoom is a good option as it restores the original widescreen despite costing some resolution.

All of this to say there is always a way we'll have Kai in widescreen anyway if we want to, cause we can create it ourselves, but it would be better quality if it was from their direct master. So, we'll see when they release those stuff, maybe they're thoughtful enough to include both 4:3 and widescreen and make everybody happy (it's so good to be optimistic, but anyone calling me "dreamer" might be right as well on that one)!

[SSj_Rambo]

Here's a high res picture: http://img413.imageshack.us/img413/3746/49761991.png

Did you manually capture and align each segment of that image, or did you manage to find out where Amazon hosts the full-size image?