Angel Cop is from Betamax masters. It's all that is left from source material apparently.

That Xabungle collection sat around for a long time. I got it when it hit $24.99 last year.

I got it for $9 in the blowout along with the Votoms stuff and Ideon. Basically no one wanted all that stuff, hence the clearance prices. The quality is really bad compared to what I usually see from Discotek (esp more recent releases) but it was all so cheap that it's hard to care too much.

I knew what I was getting. LDs on a BluRay. It looks fine.

It takes an entire shed to store 35mm masters of year long TV series. A garage for Kinnikuman or Dragonball. Anime is cheap, CHEAP. TV anime is even cheaper. They busted their asses to get that thing to a telecine guy before a deadline so they’d have a tape to duplicate for broadcasters. They weren’t that concerned with the original since it had no known use at the time. Ten years later...still no use, maybe it got lost.

It sucks about A-ko and Flashback 2012, but less so for Xabungle.

If everyframe is upgraded and therefore scanned or photographed once more digitally the color hue will be altered and put to mp4 so it is just another usual rip or worst.
Central key word is preservation and you will be an old dead man before your A-ko LD become unreadable

See I never knew they were doing this, found some other anime last night streaming, sort of feel cheated.
To me this is the same as film companies releasing MOD Manufactured On Demand, I don't like buying burned DVDs
from private individuals and don't like doing it from companies either, have I done both in the past, yes but I don't like it.

What you want DOESN'T EXIST and it’s IMPOSSIBLE TO MAKE. I’m sorry you feel ripped off by streaming. Go buy the box set for $800.

I see no relationship to major motion picture companies doing DVD-R, which I loathe. In that case the studio often does have a brand new scan (Manchu Eagle) but they put it on a burn which is just betrayal of the customer. Sometimes they do just drop tapes onto DVDs but the only one I have like that is the Rankin Bass Wind in the Willows which, like A-Ko, probably lost it’s negative decades ago. Since this is a major favorite of mine and it had never been released in any format anywhere in the world before, I got it. I don’t regret it.

In the case of A-Ko, as far as we know, we have no choice. There is no negative or theatrical print that anyone seems to be able to locate. Therefore until we find one the LD is all there is. Do you want A-Ko to go out of print forever? Is that what you’re saying should happen? Yes?

No? Well if no then it’s time for the next generation of fans to see this movie. How? They’re going to convert it to MP4 because that’s what people use now. There aren’t anything like enough working LD players in the world for people to see it that way so, sorry, that plan sucks donkey D. It’s going to have to be made as good as possible so people won’t feel ripped off after watching it. So let’s make the best BR we can out of an LD using quite cutting edge methods. That’s the plan, I probably won’t buy it, but that’s the plan because...WTF else can they do? Seriously. You’re so informed, explain it.

While I personally had the DVD and felt that a-ko was very weak and my opinion has nothing about this comment.

I feel that films copied from LDs, VHS, Beta even by legitimate companies should be reissued if that's the only way to get them so others can see and
enjoy them BUT they should not bother with the stupid bluray or 4K discs for nothing special other than a copy of the best available format.

I just go by what others have posted in the past about how some people will say such that the LD format looks like VHS or LD is such a horrible format.
Well then don't waste your time praising the amazing quality of some new Bluray when it was copied from LD or tape. just praise that you enjoy what is
left of said program.

I for one would NEVER knowingly want to buy any copy of any film that I knew was sourced from tape at all.
its not like this is London After Midnight..........

Next generation fans can enjoy the Youtube or Netflix from the DVD and they go bananas with that !
We, old school fans have the LD, the LD to a 4K for sale release need for sure a lot of Frankenstein processing

The problem with the LD is that you can't find them for sale. Or when you do, people ask $40.

@reino: That's a problem with a lot of anime though. Almost nothing old is from the original materials. Usually involves tapes, especially for old series.

Yes agree but I've only heard about this recently and its usually with more obscure anime other than ako.

Most of the anime I think I own are straight from masters, but now that I think about it this explains why some anime
doesn't look great on the DVDs I have, straight from home media?
These obviously aren't criterion release LOL
Even their Repo Man I was upset about, they used some beta master for the TV cut, was really bad and I could never figure out why they
just didn't take the audio from the beta master they had.

They care so much but just slap it together at the last minute sometimes and don't even tell you they are cheaping out.

I would rather to know and decide for myself than buy it and be disappointed as I can see what they used for a master once I play it.
Not really a reason to upgrade stuff in my eyes unless you don't actually want to ever own an LD or whatever format they are taking from.
Which I understand that also.

I cannot speak for the perfect disc since i never had it, but other than that this film has never looked good on home video.

I have the original DVD and original Laserdisc from the US release just not the letterbox DVD.

Did they lose the original master tape what is the point of capturing a Laserdisc? There should be a composite video master the original laserdisc was made from.

That is what they usually do if the negative was destroyed and is missing or they don't want the expense of tracking down and scanning a theatrical print.

Could be it's the victim of that same fire that befell many other OVAs from that same time period. I know Armored Trooper VOTOMS: Shining Heresy was one of those victims, and I think Armored Hunter Mellowlink and possibly the Starship Troopers OVA were also among them, I'm not entirely sure.

Something tells me they already thought of that.

As a film archivist and datacine operator, I can assure you that no distributor or film restorer in the entire world would ever opt to use a Laserdisc as their source elements unless it's absolutely necessary. In most cases Laserdiscs are used, it's to maintain a specific audio track or special features.

Apart from Project A-Ko, the only exception I can come to think of would be the Director's Cut of Manhunter, where the additional scenes on both DVD and Blu-Ray seem to be sourced from a Laserdisc due to the noise pattern (it's clearly not your typical 1" Tape or D1 master).

A lot of master copies for various Japanese programs (not exclusively just anime) were lost or destroyed as a result of the tsunami that hit part of Japan back in March of 2011.

Im happy its getting a reissue so others can enjoy it. I still have my old DVD box. It looks fine on a small CRT.

More AKo news!

https://nitter.13ad.de/discotekmedia/st ... 21661698#m

Link above is a privacy friendly Twitter link.

Interesting, those side by side still shots are not from the same master.

They’re not even from the same shot! Am I missing something?