kaze_andrew said:
Who says I plan to do an NTSC-PAL conversion...
?
Dabbling with the idea of starting NTSC colour DVDs for now unless I can find a magic way to remove that very problem as many people are doing it and returns are proving negligible.
Thoughts?
AP
PS Holdbacks on BD due to requirement not so much choice.
Third Window Films have been releasing their DVDs as NTSC for the last 12 months or so and they've been great, but the key is getting proper progressive transfers that decode to 24fps on compatible equipment. Interlaced NTSC discs just don't look good on UK TVs, and I'm forever fiddling with my Blu-ray player's settings trying to reduce flicker and combing artefacts on US R1 anime discs. But recently Terracotta released Gyo as a progressive NTSC disc and it looked excellent. TRSI's Nadesico boxset also has the movie as progressive, but the series discs are interlaced. Of course Blu-ray at 1080p is the perfect option, but if a BD has to be interlaced it should be 60Hz, not 50Hz, as that gets 4% speedup as well (chipmunked textless credits on Persona 4 BD).
As for a wishlist of titles, I hope that you can get some of the more niche shows that companies like TRSI and NISA are releasing, stuff like Bunny Drop and Ristorante Paradiso, the shows that aren't represented by the mainstream releases in the UK. Of course they'll probably sell fewer copies, so maybe go for LE's with mega packaging and physical extras to offset LE prices that will work at a few hundred sales instead of a couple thousand. Of course there are some mainstream titles that have slipped through the gaps, and Gosick definitely needs a release here. Some classics could use BDs, and as they are getting HD treatments in Japan, materials for shows like Bubblegum Crisis and Paranoia Agent ought to exist. Blu-rays for Satoshi Kon's film catalogue would be nice, although I haven't heard good things about the Japanese release of Tokyo Godfathers or Perfect Blue.