From what I understand for every laserdisc title there is (was) a master video tape. That would be over 50000 of them. Discovision used a 2" analog at least for their movies, and I'm guessing 1" analog was the norm until the 1" digital tape appeared. So where are they? I have read that some of them were used for Dvds. Anybody know? Anybody care?

I care. But I don't know. Watching this thread...

movie recorded on master tape which was transfered to LD.
how did laserdisc manufacturer manage to pause the final scene on side A then transfer the rest of the movie to B side in manufacturing recording process?

was that possible to lose a few seconds or a few picture frames from the final scene on side A when the disc was full before flippin' to side B continuing the rest of the recording process?

I have seen a master tape that is from the late 90s. Seen, as in played it. A Digital Betacam tape. Probably the best picture quality I've seen on a SD format. He had a small stack of master tapes used for both laserdisc and DVD.

I've seen laserdisc master tapes come up for sale as well. I recall a chap from Elite Entertainment sold the master tapes for Evil Dead, The: Special Collector's Edition (1981) [EE7264]. They were on D-2 tapes.

Where are all the master tapes? They were never intended for the public, so I assume they're just as rare as prototype carts for video game systems. Many were probably destroyed (thrown in the bin) or are still in storage.

If you search you will find lots of great info.

"Copies of Dracula, one of DiscoVision's premiere titles, sold out quickly making this one more than a little difficult to locate. The video transfer is stunning. DiscoVision struck this edition from an original nitrate release print, which explains the incredible sharp detail in the image. There are some horrible repairs on the film, and other damage is evident throughout, but on the hole, the transfer is excellent. It looses some minor points for being too closely cropped. For example, during the opening credits, the bottom name cannot be seen at all. The transfer also suffers in some places from being washed out completely."

You can check out Blam's site, http://www.blamld.com/DiscoVision/Library.htm lots of great info, also google helps with lots of info on LD.

Publius gave a pretty detailed answer in this thread . . .

Laserdisc Master Source Materials

Thanks everyone for your replies!

For what it's worth Vini Bancalari is selling a bunch of the Elite Entertainment D2 master tapes in the Facebook group.

While I to a degree get the notion of just collecting for the sake of it, how many working & obtainable D2 machines are there still around? Or are we really just talking for the John Fowles collectors out there????

Well there are a few here: http://www.broadcaststore.com/store/prod_search_results.cfm?brand_search=0&category_search=592&model_search=0&parent_category_search=592&price_search=0&price_search_high=0&price_search_low=0&bitIsNew=0&bitIsUsed=0&closeout_items=0&PageNum=1 but I largely get the feeling these tapes would just be trophy items for a cabinet somewhere.....

Being a completely unique item, I don't think playability matters. It's not like it's an LD and they stamped tens of thousands of the suckers. It doesn't have to work to be cool, same for ancient ceramics or 18th century watches.

I have a Turbo Grafx game called Chew Man Fu (despite the name, it's a good game) that seems completely normal. It doesn't even have the case. To me though it's very special. This copy came from the binder of play copies that NEC/TTI used for their "help line". Before the Internet, when you got stuck in a video game you could call places to get help. Sometimes it was pay, sometimes free. In Japan it was usually free, here it was usually pay. 1-800-USA-SEGA was free. Anyway, in order to help you through a game they needed to be able to play it themselves so every game would have been in this binder. My copy of Chew Man Fu came from this binder, making it about 1000x more special to me.

I have no paperwork proof of this, I don't need it unless I want to sell it as a special item and I never will so it's just a really cool artifact from the 16-bit days.

A master tape would be the same sort of thing.

I guess you're right for a whole bunch of people about the playabilty not mattering, though if I had one of them I'd really want to be able to watch it!

You can enjoy the form and design of collectable ceramics or a watch even if they're not functional, but something like this might as well be any old blank D2 tape with a label unless you are able to enjoy what it contains, well at least that's my feeling.

I agree with Audioboyz on this

I think most of them were destroyed, because they couldnt sell them for copyright reasons.
Some years ago, I found several UMATIC and BETACAM tapes leaning before a trash bin, these were full of episodes with LORIOT.
I called the tv sender, if they had more, but they replied, that they arent allowed to sell them, because they only have the rights to broadcast them or sell them on VHS or DVD. I should erase the tapes. But I couldnt, because I have neither a UMATIC nor a BETACAM VCR.

Someone on Ebay was selling a bunch of analog master tapes for adult laserdiscs recently. There was a separate reel for each side, some of the pictures show notes on where to put the chapter stops also.