Vandread DVD release - not actual widescreen!?

[Onions]

This has probably been talked about before (seeing as the DVDs have been out a while) but after deciding to watch Vandread finally on my fairly new setup (32" widescreen LCD HDTV with playback through my Xbox 360 using VGA) I notice that this title was released in a "fake" kind of widescreen.

I don't know the official term for it, but it doesn't go to full widescreen like all my other DVDs. And I did buy a TV that had a zoom option, but it still cuts off too much of the top and bottom when I have it selected.

So, did Geneon/Pioneer do this a lot for older shows? I watched Chobits on a 4:3 set, but I hope it doesn't do the same as Vandread now that I have an actual 16:9 TV.

Anyway... does anyone know of a fix, or a good way to get around this? Are there any good DVD players that let you heavily tweak the zoom, so that I could perfectly match the video to my TV's size?

As of now I'm thinking I'll skip watching this show until it gets a rerelease (preferably and most likely for HD). But who knows how long that could take...

[chloes_fork]

You're talking here about a hard-letterboxed presentation versus anamorphic 16x9 -- and yes, it sucks. I've had it suggested, however, that Vandread was early enough in the widescreen revolution that no proper anamorphic version probably exists, so I guess we'll cut them some slack.

This isn't the only release where you'll encounter this, BTW. For example, Mangle's R1 releases of Perfect Blue and The End of Evangelion are both letterboxed with no anamorphic enhancement. You should be okay with Chobits, though; I checked around a bit, and it is anamorphic.

[Pelianth]

You're talking here about a hard-letterboxed presentation versus anamorphic 16x9 -- and yes, it sucks. I've had it suggested, however, that Vandread was early enough in the widescreen revolution that no proper anamorphic version probably exists, so I guess we'll cut them some slack.
Ding! Ding! Ding! This would be correct. Due to the technology they were using at the time, no anamorphic prints of any early Gonzo series exist. Last Exile was the first Gonzo series to be released in anamorphic format.

[Pyocola]

Just to be clear on the terminology (and I've seen Chris erroneously use this as well) no print exists for Vandread period, because a print is physical piece of film and there would be little point in doing one for a digitally created TV animation. The correct words should be "anamorphic master" and is something completely different from "anamorphic print".

[ADC]

Pioneer were aware of this problem when they created the Vandread DVDs, though: They placed the subtitles within the frame of the program itself (instead of halfway into the letterbox bars, as Bandai did on Betterman, for example), so that you can zoom in on your TV and pretend it was made that way. (There is a loss of quality in so doing, the severity of which probably depends on your TV and DVD player. The program itself didn't look bad when I tried it on my PowerBook, but the subtitles scaled badly.)

I'd probablly double-dip if Gonzo were to create anamorphic masters for Vandread. I very much enjoyed that show.

[Lego]

So if I can break this down into lamens terms(because I need it heh), this means that instead of it being anamorphic where you hit the 16:9 button on your remote or watch it on a widescreen TV, it's letter boxed no matter what(as in it has the black bars at the top and bottom all the time regardless of your TV)?

The video in Vandread looked nice to me, and I had no problems with it. Does this take away from the video or show, or is it something that is just something that you have to live with due to the technology at the time?

[chloes_fork]

So if I can break this down into lamens terms(because I need it heh), this means that instead of it being anamorphic where you hit the 16:9 button on your remote or watch it on a widescreen TV, it's letter boxed no matter what(as in it has the black bars at the top and bottom all the time regardless of your TV)?
Basically, yeah. If you want more details, though, this article (http://www.thedigitalbits.com/articles/anamorphic/index.html) does a pretty good job of breaking the subject down in understandable terms.

Does this take away from the video or show, or is it something that is just something that you have to live with due to the technology at the time?
Yes and yes. It does affect the quality of the image, since not only does an anamorphic image fit a widescreen monitor without the necessity of zooming and such, it also has significantly higher resolution than a non-anamorphic image; the link above will explain why better than I could. But it's also true that if it ain't anamorphic, you basically have to live with it unless and until an improved version is created/released (which I'm not even sure is possible in the case of Vandread).

[Buster Darkwings]

But it's also true that if it ain't anamorphic, you basically have to live with it unless and until an improved version is created/released (which I'm not even sure is possible in the case of Vandread).

Even if the masters weren't created in a higher resolution, a professional upscale with uncompressed and/or remixed audio like the Air BD release would probably still be possible. That would produce a better picture than having one's own DVD player or TV do the upscaling, at any rate.

[Skywise]

Upscale to what? Anamorphic? The gains would be minimal and not really worth it. It's also not that simple to upscale without avoiding issues like aliasing and the like. Remember WoH.

[Buster Darkwings]

Upscale to what? Anamorphic? The gains would be minimal and not really worth it.

Not necessarily just anamporphic. And like I already said, it would produce far better results than using one's own equipment to upscale it in real time, and as already established, certain set-ups can't even zoom in on non-anamorphic material without additional cropping.


It's also not that simple to upscale without avoiding issues like aliasing and the like. Remember WoH.

Remember fucking AIR. This is not the year 2000 and Gonzo is not some incompetent little company like Mangle that could never do a proper upscaling job. Air isn't perfect either, but after a few years of both upscaled and made for HD releases, I'm sure Japanese BD authoring will look fine.