I haven't paid much attention to this one for a long time now, which honestly is mostly because on top of the translation being very difficult for someone with no formal Japanese language education, my own dog died and it was just getting me down looking at a very similar looking dog in this film for hours at a time. It's been a while since that happened now and there's been another significant development: I managed to find a copy of the LaserDisc, which I'm going to use to replace the flawed mono track from the Japanese Blu-ray Disc! It isn't in great condition externally, but the disc itself appears to be almost flawless. Fingers crossed it captures well and hopefully doesn't have that weird glitch I found in the Japanese Blu-ray audio.

The weird audio glitch you found on the JP and DE Blus as well as the DVDs, could very well be part of whatever film and/or audio elements Shochiku has. Shochiku created their 1080i (for DVD/HDTV) master from an IP, and their 4k SDR master from what looks like a mix of the OCN, an IP, and possibly an Interneg. They might have used a master recording mono mix for the DVD and Blu masters, which could have had damage at spots including the one you found. There's a chance the JPN VHS and LD you got are based on the same IP and master mix with the audio glitch, or is based on an entirely different master that uses a 35mm optical mag track as the audio source.

(2020-10-04, 12:47 AM)SpaceBlackKnight Wrote: The weird audio glitch you found on the JP and DE Blus as well as the DVDs, could very well be part of whatever film and/or audio elements Shochiku has. Shochiku created their 1080i (for DVD/HDTV) master from an IP, and their 4k SDR master from what looks like a mix of the OCN, an IP, and possibly an Interneg. They might have used a master recording mono mix for the DVD and Blu masters, which could have had damage at spots including the one you found. There's a chance the JPN VHS and LD you got are based on the same IP and master mix with the audio glitch, or is based on an entirely different master that uses a 35mm optical mag track as the audio source.

Oh, I'm well aware of all this, yes. But I wasn't going to pass up the chance to confirm.

And regardless of whether the weird buzzy noise is present on the LD, I wouldn't be surprised if the audio is superior in some other way compared to the Blu-ray, so it might be of value even if it does have the glitch!

EDIT: BTW I didn't find the glitch on the DE BD because the DE BD doesn't even have the Japanese audio, only a German dub. But I have a copy anyway because I feel like I probably should.

Update:

https://vimeo.com/464611896

(2020-10-04, 01:04 AM)pipefan413 Wrote: EDIT: BTW I didn't find the glitch on the DE BD because the DE BD doesn't even have the Japanese audio, only a German dub. But I have a copy anyway because I feel like I probably should.

Sounds like this was part of the dialog recording on the Japanese master mix. The German dub (which you say doesn't have this audio glitch) sounds like it was done on a M&E track created for export dubbing purposes and is in a different state of condition than the JP mono mix.

(2020-10-04, 01:50 AM)SpaceBlackKnight Wrote:

(2020-10-04, 01:04 AM)pipefan413 Wrote: EDIT: BTW I didn't find the glitch on the DE BD because the DE BD doesn't even have the Japanese audio, only a German dub. But I have a copy anyway because I feel like I probably should.

Sounds like this was part of the dialog recording on the Japanese master mix. The German dub (which you say doesn't have this audio glitch) sounds like it was done on a M&E track created for export dubbing purposes and is in a different state of condition than the JP mono mix.

Well I'm saying it doesn't have the glitch without actually checking the track because it by definition won't: it doesn't contain the Japanese dialogue and the glitch happens on a piece of dialogue (someone saying "anno" as far as I can tell). Have a nosey at the video I just linked!

From one pet owner to another I just wanted to say that I'm sorry to hear about your dog. I hope you're alright.

Well done tracking down the laserdisc! I'm guessing from your reaction that the glitch is still there, but I didn't notice anything when he said "anno". What is it that I should be listening for?

If the fault is even on the LD (which I think only contains an analogue soundtrack) then it must be part of the film itself; an error during production of the audio.

(2020-10-05, 03:17 PM)HippieDalek Wrote: From one pet owner to another I just wanted to say that I'm sorry to hear about your dog. I hope you're alright.

Well done tracking down the laserdisc! I'm guessing from your reaction that the glitch is still there, but I didn't notice anything when he said "anno". What is it that I should be listening for?

If the fault is even on the LD (which I think only contains an analogue soundtrack) then it must be part of the film itself; an error during production of the audio.

Thanks. Am fine, but it was kind of ruining the whole experience trying to sit and do something quite difficult (translating a language that I have only a very basic rudimentary self-taught understanding of) while also staring at loads of video of a dog that looks like the one I had. It was hard enough trying to motivate myself to do it with so many other easier things on my plate as well, never mind when it also became kind of upsetting on top of that...

I'm not sure how to describe it exactly, you can kinda see it on the waveform so I don't think I'm insane: it's as if you tried to record an electric shaver being pressed against something that muffles it. Just after he starts to make the "n" sound, it turns into a kind of electrical buzz instead of a noise a human voice should be able to make. You can hear the actual N sound a little bit on either side of it, but it's as if something got stuck when digitising it or whatever (like, software locking up when it runs out of memory, that type of thing).

The LD is indeed analogue only so yeah I'm guessing this must be baked into the master and therefore inherent in all possible versions of the film. It's a very small thing but it's enough to irritate me, hahah. It may or may not still be worth syncing the LD track anyway, I haven't yet compared it to the Japanese Blu-ray PCM.