Does anyone have this LD https://www.lddb.com/laserdisc/02166/113...s-Vacation by any chance?

I've just placed an order to import the Japanese LD of A Brighter Summer Day (1991) from Japan to the US. It only cost $9 (without shipping). Hopefully it sounds better than the filtered BDs. There's also a VHS Hi-Fi, but the asking price is a whopping $66.

If anyone is interested in other JP LDs, let me know in the next few weeks. If it's available through Neokyo, we can combine shipping (probably $50 or so in total). They are a forwarding service for shops like Rakuten, Mercari, Surugaya, Amazon JP, Yahoo Auctions, etc.

I haven't yet found any volunteer to help with capture though. @Bilbofett has generously agreed to help capture this. Thank you!

(2023-06-26, 11:04 PM)axeyou Wrote: Do we still have anyone in or near Japan who can capture bit-perfect PCM plus a good-enough video for sync reference?

I'm interested in picking up the Japanese LD of Edward Yang's A Brighter Summer Day (1991). It's available at one of the used-goods sites in Japan. If no one is near Japan anymore, I can import this to the US. Hopefully we have more active members here.

One of the best films from Taiwan, it's sadly seen very few home releases. One day I'll post a more detailed analysis with charts, but here's a summary:

• The Criterion BD and FR Carlotta BD are exactly identical in audio but for a 4db difference. Their high frequencies appear to be filtered. (Video wise, FiM encoded the FR BD, so it will be my sync target.)
  
• Additionally considering that Criterion sponsored the 4K restoration, I would guess the Taiwan/Korea/Japan BDs are more or less identical.
  
• No DVD releases anywhere prior to the 4K restoration.
  
• There are various VCDs from Mainland China and HK. AFAIK these feature MP2 encoded audio, which probably sounds terrible.
  
• Then there is a Hong Kong LD. But no one is selling it anymore, not even on Mainland Chinese or HK sites. I was able to find a rip online. Unfortunately, the 2.0 mono was ripped into 96 kbps MP3, so the high frequencies were chopped off by MP3 compression.
  
• Finally, we have the Japanese LD and also a Hi-Fi VHS. I hope to compare at least this LD's audio to the BDs.
  

(2023-06-26, 11:04 PM)axeyou Wrote: Additionally considering that Criterion sponsored the 4K restoration, I would guess the Taiwan/Korea/Japan BDs are more or less identical.

I can get you the audio from the TWN disc and maybe the JPN disc. The Korean disc looks to have the exact same video bitrate as the Criterion so it's most likely exactly the same anyways. That FRA disc looks like a huge improvement over Criterion's garbage encode so definitely the right one to sync to.

And the HK release is available, you just have to be a bit mad to pay for it. Fingers crossed the JPN LD sounds great.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/175417897350

(2023-06-30, 11:27 PM)Yarp Wrote: I can get you the audio from the TWN disc and maybe the JPN disc. The Korean disc looks to have the exact same video bitrate as the Criterion so it's most likely exactly the same anyways. That FRA disc looks like a huge improvement over Criterion's garbage encode so definitely the right one to sync to.

Thanks, Yarp! Since my original post, I've managed to get my hands on a DTS-HD MA 2.0 track, likely from the Korean or Japanese release. Sadly its spectrogram and spectrum analyzer results look exactly the same as Criterion & Carlotta's, except for minor differences in level. So it seems likely that all BDs have exactly the same audio that Criterion provided.

(2023-06-30, 11:27 PM)Yarp Wrote: And the HK release is available, you just have to be a bit mad to pay for it. Fingers crossed the JPN LD sounds great.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/175417897350

lmao I wish I had $250 to burn on a single LD 

I can rip both US WS releases of El Mariachi and Pulp Fiction (2.0 pcm track) if still needed!

Does anyone have Mean Streets? I see Moshram reckons it’s the best version so I’d like to sync it with the 4K

I've seen there a sync on the utopian place. Wonder where "Cinephiles" gets his sources.

Ok, anybody somebody mind cluing me in on what “the utopian place” is? Definitely feeling like I’m missing out on a great resource

(2024-01-23, 06:48 PM)onlysleeping23 Wrote: Ok, anybody somebody mind cluing me in on what “the utopian place” is? Definitely feeling like I’m missing out on a great resource

It's a private tracker torrent site. The only way to get access to the site is by an invitation. If you don't know "utopian"place" means, you're most likely not a member.

I've been wanting to get onto there for years but can't seem to find an invite anywhere...