Filmation He-Man and the Masters of the Universe coming to Blu-Ray in Germany!

[Dynamo of Eternia]

Just found this out from a Blu-Ray forum that I frequent.

He-Man and the Masters of the Universe, the original Filmation cartoon is coming to Blu-Ray in Germany.

They are listed on the German Amazon site (Amazon "dot" de.... I can't post the actual link here). There's a listing for Season 1 and a separate listing for Season 2. Apparently there is an English audio track, but I'm trying to find out if it is region free or not.

I doubt that the quality is going to be much better than what we have on the existing DVDs since the original masters were discarded and Hallmark transferred everything to standard def digital years ago. But it does appear that each season is 1 disc, so that's 65 episodes on a single disc (which will line up with the quality not being much improved, if at all). If these are region free, I will be tempted to get them.

EDIT: From some info posted on that blu-ray site it appears that it is region B locked, which won't work on North American Blu-Ray players. Doh!


EDIT again (UPDATE - 7/31/2012):

Another site (Bluray-disc "dot" de) has some more info, some of which conflicts with the Amazon info. The main conflict is that they list the sets as being 6-disc sets as opposed to 1-disc. I'm not sure which is the true number.

These are the specs, as listed on that site, for Season 1 (translated into English... I don't speak German, but it's obvious what these meant):

Region: B
Disc Capacity:BD-50 GB
Resolution: 1920x1080p (1.33:1)
Video-Codec: MPEG-4/AVC
Running Time:1266 Minutes

The Season 2 specs are the same except for the running time, which is 1430 minutes.


They also have tentative covers posted on the site. They don't appear to be final since they both have the word "Precover" watermarked over the image, and for some reason both of them say "Season One" on the cover, even though the image with He-Man on Battle Cat is the one that was shown on the Season 2 listing:







The issue of how many discs are in the set raises the most questions. From what we know/have been told, the original masters of the series no longer exist. Hallmark supposedly destroyed them years ago after converting the show (along with many other Filmation shows) to digital, but permanently locked in Standard Definition.

While one disc seemed kind of low since even in SD putting 65 episodes on a single Blu-Ray disc would seem to be pushing it, 6 discs (if that is the accurate number... I have no way of knowing which is right and which is wrong, or if either of them is accurate) almost seems overkill if these aren't even truly in hi-def. I would think they easily could have fit 20 episodes on a single disc in SD. Maybe they are just upscaled to the best they can be, with no compression that isn't already present in the source material.

Either way, I am interested, but still annoyed that I can't play these in US Blu-Ray players. I REALLY hope that a US release comes out. It would also be cool if the She-Ra series and "The Secret of the Sword" were to get the same treatment.

And of course it would be awesome if the 200X series were to get released in Hi-Def, since that could actually be in true Hi-Def. I just hope if that ever happens, Mill Creek puts the proper "Masters of the Universe VS. The Snakemen" opening in front of the Snakemen episodes. That intro was present on the BCI DVDs, but the Mill Creek release replaced it with the standard "He-Man and the Masters of the Universe" intro that all of the rest of the episodes had.

[Grimbot]

You can watch any region disc on your computer with the use of VLC player.
As for the quality, at least we'll finally have a clean episodes without ant pixelization occurring.

Edit:
**Links to online retailers such as Amazon should only be posted in the Marketplace forums. Thanks.**

Only 1 disc? Geez. Looks like they'll simply put the DVD versions on the bluray. LAME.

[Firefly]

Interesting...it appears that Bravestarr, M.A.S.K., Defenders of the Earth, and Galaxy Rangers are coming out on Blu-Ray in Germany as well...

[Dr_SLUMP]

Oh my, oh my... I'll be so excited if they managed to get true surround!

[Dynamo of Eternia]

Hopefully we get US releases as well. I'm not sure if or how the rights differ between there and here.

[Grimbot]

Guys. 65 episodes on 1 blueray disc... the quality will be lower than any of the previous DVD releases.

[Firefly]

Guys. 65 episodes on 1 blueray disc... the quality will be lower than any of the previous DVD releases.

I'd wait closer to the release date and see what the description says then. Sometimes, item descriptions can be fairly off when first put up for pre-order.

[Trebor]

Folks,

Unless there was some *major* money, time, and other resources invested (I'm talking Lucas/Spielberg production level), taking the original Masters of the Universe series and moving it to Blu-Ray will look no different than 480p (DVD) upscaled to 1080p. The source material just is not there for a "true" 1080p quality video without the aforementioned investment. The same can be said for practically any 1980's (Or earlier) animated series.

The MYP series to Blu-Ray is where you would see a difference.

[darkmoon766]

Blu-Ray compression is way different than dvd. 65 Episodes on one blu-ray could look better than the dvd. It depends on the source transfer and how they master it.

[DJ Force]

You can watch any region disc on your computer with the use of VLC player.

Umm... Tell me how. I always thought the hardware has to support the region code, not the software.

[Grimbot]

Folks,

Unless there was some *major* money, time, and other resources invested (I'm talking Lucas/Spielberg production level), taking the original Masters of the Universe series and moving it to Blu-Ray will look no different than 480p (DVD) upscaled to 1080p. The source material just is not there for a "true" 1080p quality video without the aforementioned investment.

The source material is at least clean - no pixelization whatsoever, thus it would benefit from a proper(ish) Blueray release.

The same can be said for practically any 1980's (Or earlier) animated series.

Not really. Unlike MOTU, film prints for most have been preserved.

65 Episodes on one blu-ray could look better than the dvd.

Wanna bet that it won't?

Umm... Tell me how. I always thought the hardware has to support the region code, not the software.

Because it's a software issue, not a hardware issue.
Just download and install VLC player. Then insert any region disc into your computer and it'll play it perfectly fine.

[Stoopid Head]

You can watch any region disc on your computer with the use of VLC player.

Granted, currently without menu support, but viewing the main program is possible.

[csc0709]

Folks,

Unless there was some *major* money, time, and other resources invested (I'm talking Lucas/Spielberg production level), taking the original Masters of the Universe series and moving it to Blu-Ray will look no different than 480p (DVD) upscaled to 1080p. The source material just is not there for a "true" 1080p quality video without the aforementioned investment. The same can be said for practically any 1980's (Or earlier) animated series.

The MYP series to Blu-Ray is where you would see a difference.

I'm a professional video editor and make BluRays and DVDs all the time...Thought I'd make a couple of comments

Not necessarily true, it all depends on whether the cartoon was done on film and if the film positives still exist. Film is higher resolution than 1080p.

As for the Filmation He-man going to Blu-Ray, yes these will just be 480i transfers to Blu-Ray. Not even 480p folks as the He-Man masters are all interlaced. So these would be nothing more than ported over to Blu-Ray. They could possibly be taking advantage of the mp4 codec for BluRay which produces a higher quality picture at a higher compression rates than standard MPEG-2 video used on DVDs. This could offer a slightly better viewing experience, albeit not by much cause for 65 episodes on one disc, the disc would have to be dual-layered (50GB) and your still looking at a 4000 kbps compression ratio. Which is about the same on the DVDs, but as I said if they use MP4 compression may look a bit better. A lot of people equate Blu-Ray to HD, well Blu-Ray can also contain SD digital video with much improved picture quality over DVD because you can increase the bit rate significantly on compressions. BluRay can also maintain the same quality encode as DVD, but hold vast more hours of SD material. I always thought TV shows would be excellent material for BluRay (regardless of HD or SD) to get smaller sets out if in just SD. Takes up less shelves in stores and makes it easier for distribution. However, the industry is a little slow in catching on. This is the first sign of possible things to come.

[Dynamo of Eternia]

Yeah, I would be interested in getting these if they were region free or if a US version was being released. I have no desire to do a work-around on my computer to watch them. I don't have much desire to watch these from my computer, but I have 2 PS3s and a regular Blu-Ray player that I could watch them on if they were region free or region A compatible.

Just having the episodes on fewer discs would be nice. It would be even better if there was less compression. Some compression artifacts do stand out at times on the existing DVDs... especially when Cringer transforms into Battle Cat. If that could be reduced or eliminated, I would be pretty happy with that.

[EtherianChronicles]

Has anyone actually located an announcement from any company about them? They may very well just be those "wishful thinking, sign up to find out when this is available" things at Amazon.

That said, yes, if this is actually a real product - then it would simply be the DVD versions (whatever masters were made for them) on Blu-ray. I'm not sure why people think it would be tough to put all those episodes on one Blu-ray - Blu-ray uses a much more sophisticated compression method, and if they use a dual-layer Blu-ray there are 50GB to play with.

For those worried about poor upconversion, if it's all on one Blu-ray they won't likely be upconverted - which actually I'd prefer to let the player handle it. If that is the case, it wouldn't matter if it was region locked or not - digital video has no "standards" issue like NTSC/PAL in SD, *but* if these are PAL while you TV would have no problem displaying it most American Blu-ray players are not capable (usually by software restriction) of playing PAL content. For example, I have the UK PAL versions of the later seasons of Buffy (because they are in Widescreen), and while my Blu-ray player won't touch them, I have a hacked DVD player which plays them great on my HDTV. (Note - most DVD players can be "hacked" by entering in a few codes on the remote, it's not rocket science - usually takes five minutes to google the code and do it.)

If this is all the case, it will be interesting - while obviously when available we want the HD versions, like the Complete Series of Friends coming out on Blu-ray later this year (I already pre-ordered it!), but in the case of He-man, as we all know that's impossible- the film was long ago destroyed, and all that survives are the PAL Digial Video Masters. I wonder if somehow they will be able to deal with the speed-up issue with the newer technology available today.

[huntsman360]

65 chapters on one disc, ok, it is a 480p/i, i suppose interlaced in a blu-ray disc.
This is not he-man in 1080p blu-ray, is the regular 480i episodes of dvd, burned in a blu-ray.

The only difference, may be the codec, but nothing more.

[Dynamo of Eternia]

Has anyone actually located an announcement from any company about them? They may very well just be those "wishful thinking, sign up to find out when this is available" things at Amazon.

They have a specific release date of November 19, 2012 and they can be preordered. The kind of listings that you are referring to don't allow you to place a preorder and don't have a release date... they just offer you the option to sign up to be notifies via email when/if the title becomes available.

[Dr_SLUMP]

The video is definitely going to be 480/576i/p. However, the modern encoding (if not transfered directly from DVD releases) will provide less, virtually invisible artifacts. So we are probably talking about the best possible image for He-Man & TMOTU.

What I'm mostly excited is the audio; I hope that at least the German track will offer 2.1 channels or more.

[csc0709]

The video is definitely going to be 480/576i/p. However, the modern encoding (if not transfered directly from DVD releases) will provide less, virtually invisible artifacts. So we are probably talking about the best possible image for He-Man & TMOTU.

What I'm mostly excited is the audio; I hope that at least the German track will offer 2.1 channels or more.

First off the encoding will be 576i not p (480 is reserved for NTSC based content which doesn't apply in Germany as they use PAL). P means progressive and the masters are not progressive they are interlaced. You could make them p, the picture quality would suffer at the expense because you are basically throwing away every other line or blending them with an overall lower resolution as a result to get the progressive output. Furthermore, progressive is not likely because the Blu-Ray specs do not support any type of progressive encoding on disc at 480 or 576. Currently, the BluRay specs only support material at 50p or 60p at a resolution of 1280x720. For 1080p it has to be 24 frames per second, meaning neither 50p or 60p or 25p or 30p is supported at the resolution of 1920x1080. Secondly, there is no way, with 65 episodes per disc, there not going to be compression artifacts. You still would have a compression of about 4000 kbps which is a little less actually than what some of the DVDs used. Therefore, there will still be compression artifacts. The best thing for them to do is put it on two dual-layered BD-Rs, that way you can do about half the number of episodes per disc with a compression average bit rate of greater than 8000 kbps, which is the higher than most DVD encodes and close to the max that DVD would support. Sorry folks, anything but a Dolby Digital 2.0 encode at 192kbps would detract from the bit rate used for the video.

[Dynamo of Eternia]

I updated the original post with additional information from another website which also included tentative cover art pics.

[csc0709]

I updated the original post with additional information from another website which also included tentative cover art pics.

There is already a problem with the screen resolution posted on that site. It states it at 1920x1080p (1.33:1). Well that's a 16:9 aspect ratio with a 4:3 aspect ratio in parenthesis. So, these must be pillar boxed inside a 16:9 frame? Also, again the picture is going to suffer if they make these transfers progressive from an interlaced source material. Also, for it to be 1080p (which it isn't, no way it could be unless they had an artist redraw every frame of animation) they would have to pull it from 25 fps (which the masters are in) to 24 frames per second to get actual true progressive at 1080 on BluRay. Also, could effect picture quality. Wonder what is really up with these? Makse one wonder if the original film source material hasn't been destroyed as earlier thought? Hmmm!!!!

[Grimbot]

I updated the original post with additional information from another website which also included tentative cover art pics.

Now THAT sounds more reasonable.

Makse one wonder if the original film source material hasn't been destroyed as earlier thought? Hmmm!!!!

Indeed.

Perhaps someone fluent in German could e-mail the publisher to get more details about this?

[Dynamo of Eternia]

There is already a problem with the screen resolution posted on that site. It states it at 1920x1080p (1.33:1). Well that's a 16:9 aspect ratio with a 4:3 aspect ratio in parenthesis. So, these must be pillar boxed inside a 16:9 frame?

Yes, that will most likely be the case. I have a few Blu-Rays in my collection with 4:3 aspect ratio content (the first two Family Guy Star Wars parodies are examples of this.... the 3rd one was done after the show went to 16:9), and that is how they are done. It's actually a 16:9 picture, with the black pillar-box bars being part of the picture. I don't personally care for it when they do things this way.... I'd rather have to adjust the aspect ratio on my TV, but I understand that they do this for the benefit of those who don't want to adjust their TV or who would think something is wrong if they end up with a picture stretched out to fill the screen if they don't adjust it.

If I hook my PS3 up to an older, standard def television set and put it something like one of those Family Guy Star Wars discs, you end up with a very small 4:3 image surrounded by black on all 4 sides since the image is actually 16:9 with black bars being part of the picture, and then there are black bars on the top and bottom as there would normally be when watching a 16:9 movie on an older SD TV.

- - - Updated - - -

Makse one wonder if the original film source material hasn't been destroyed as earlier thought? Hmmm!!!!

I wonder the same.... or if there were other masters out there. Are the rights to these shows different internationally? Did other countries have other masters? This does raise many questions. Hopefully we'll find out more once these are released!

[Grimbot]

I wonder the same.... or if there were other masters out there. Are the rights to these shows different internationally? Did other countries have other masters? This does raise many questions. Hopefully we'll find out more once these are released!

Well UK had its own film masters as you can tell by the film look of the episodes:
http://bustatoons.blogspot.com/2007/...988-rerun.html

Although they heavily edited the episodes as demonstrated in that clip so if those still exist, they'd be useless.

Judging by the screen caps posted on Amazon, looks like it'll be sourced from film reels.
Hopefully they won't remain unremastered:
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51RcXheNxIL.jpg
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51qQme2QD4L.jpg
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51ejvfQ4h5L.jpg
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51jLCM0zdYL.jpg
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51uzsDyReyL.jpg
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51rEw22kh3L.jpg
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51E7HMM8iEL.jpg
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51ThSQ-mVGL.jpg
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51k18CI-f3L.jpg
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51SKfDcoLNL.jpg

[norse_sage]

Sorry to necrobump this thread, but seeing as the german Blu-ray releases of the Filmation series are less than two weeks away at the time of this writing, I thought it was relevant.

Does anyone have any solid intel on how many discs there will be in each season set, and if the original English language dub will be included as opposed to just the German language dub? I have been googling in, but as far as I have been able to figure out, both matters appear to be disputed.

Still, release being mere weeks away, there must be a definitive answer by now.
Anyone know what it is?